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ditchcrawler

By ditchcrawler
in Boat Equipment

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Nickhlx Veteran

Nickhlx

Posted
Posted

Good luck, its a lot cheaper option than I posted which was a lot cheaper than Dell.

 

Its amazing what they knock them out for - not sure of quality but I wouldn't mind betting some are merely re-badged cheap Chinese items, yet probably not far off the OEM items for quality

 

e.g. http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=90W%2012V%20%20laptop%20power%20supply&_sop=15

 

 

Nick

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alan_fincher Veteran II

alan_fincher

Posted
Posted

If it powers it surely it must charge it!

 

Dell chargers have a chip inside. If the Dell laptop can't see the chip it will not charge, just run.

 

Paul

Third party chargers are available from companiesoother than Dell that provide the necessary "I'm pretending to be a Dell supply" signal. Only with that will some modern Dells both run and charge simultaneously.

 

Using a generic 19.5 volt supply that doesn't provide that "magic" actually causes the laptop to throw up a message that it will run, but not charge.

 

However, last time I tried, even the third party route is potentially not without its flaws.

 

The largest third party charger I could find was 90 watts output (4.62 amps at 19.5 volts). That was within spec for my previous Dell laptop, (a Studio). But my current one (an Inspiron with a large screen and Core I7 processor), claims to need a staggering 120 watt power supply, (so theoretically could need to draw as much as 6.15 amps at 19.5 volts). I couldn't find one that did, at the time - perhaps now they are available?

 

Currently I run a 120 watt laptop off a 90 watt supply, so theoretically could be overloading it by 33%. In practice it runs cool, and the laptop both runs and charges. But I could hardly complain if it goes bang!

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Alanji Proficient

Alanji

Posted
Posted

The largest third party charger I could find was 90 watts output (4.62 amps at 19.5 volts). That was within spec for my previous Dell laptop, (a Studio). But my current one (an Inspiron with a large screen and Core I7 processor), claims to need a staggering 120 watt power supply, (so theoretically could need to draw as much as 6.15 amps at 19.5 volts). I couldn't find one that did, at the time - perhaps now they are available?

 

Currently I run a 120 watt laptop off a 90 watt supply, so theoretically could be overloading it by 33%. In practice it runs cool, and the laptop both runs and charges. But I could hardly complain if it goes bang!

Are you sure, Alan. I have a 17" Dell Inspiron with I7 processor which is rated 4.62A and, as I already said, is charging of the adapter I bought (also rated 4.62W).

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alan_fincher Veteran II

alan_fincher

Posted
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Are you sure, Alan. I have a 17" Dell Inspiron with I7 processor which is rated 4.62A and, as I already said, is charging of the adapter I bought (also rated 4.62W).

Both my Dell Laptop itself, and it's own 230 Volt power brick say "19.5 volts 6.7 amps".

 

Surprising, as hat is 130 watts, (sorry wrongly said 120 watts before). It seems to run on a lot less, but I'm not doing power intensive things with it on board.

 

If it were really 130 watts, clearly that represents 10 amps or more at nominal "12 volt" battery voltage, so probably not the best laptop to have chosen to use on a boat that has only one single battery for everything, and not a lot of charging capability, (Sickle, that is...).

 

Some time I'll try and measure the actual drain.....

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alan_fincher Veteran II

alan_fincher

Posted
Posted (edited)

What the brick says is probably more than the laptop will ever need, a margin so it operates within its capacity I would think?

Yes, but a sticker on the PC itself also has the 6.7 amps figure, (as I said!...)

Edited by alan_fincher
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Bobbybass Experienced

Bobbybass

Posted
Posted (edited)

Not a criticism, but from my own experience.

 

I bought a PSU marked as 'Sony' for a video camera on Ebay. It wasn't, it was a Chinese knock-off, and a few weeks later I was £1500 poorer as it wrote off the camera, and put me into a legal dispute that would have cost me too much to win.

When it was opened up, it was nothing more than a cheap and dangerous transformer and a basic diode/resistor setup.

 

A friend recently bought a 'foot pedal' for his guitar (maybe Boss M125 ?? or something like...cost about £140)

Bought a PSU from Ebay...that turned up but didn't look the same as the Ebay picture..

Blew his pedal out....as it didn't stabilise properly...

 

So..just a word of caution..that a supply you may buy cheap, may not have much safety or stabilisation inside it and may cost you more.

Edited by Bobbybass
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Ian Mac Proficient

Ian Mac

Posted
Posted

my dell power supply is a dc091-006 from Powery of China 90W max at 18-20v. Drives my old Dell Precision M60 well, but only when the alternator is going on some boats, if I'm too far away from the battery - vole drop down the cable! Some boats don't have big hawsers like we do :)

I got it off amazon, the MEXXTRONICS shop for £30

--

Cheers Ian Mac

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alan_fincher Veteran II

alan_fincher

Posted
Posted

Which Inspiron do you have, Alan?

It says it is a 7720 - although I would not have known that without turning it over.

 

A bit of a "Google" last night turned up inconsistency of information, as it seems sometimes the 230V brick supplied is 130 watts, (as mine was), whereas other times it is 90 watts, (though of course this may depend on exact spec of the supplied machine).

 

As I said, mine runs OK on a third party 12V supply that was bought for my previous laptop (90 watts), but I'm not sure it would if I turned all the power/performance options and started gaming on it with the fan and the graphics card working hard.

 

People are still actually buying Dell???

Yep,

 

Have always had good support on Dell, which I have failed to get when buying other brands.

 

You can usually get a comprehensive warranty deal at about half the price of most other brands, and if you wrap that in with whatever "free" upgrade offer Dell have on at the time, then usually they come in as a pretty good deal.

 

The power supply think is a bugger, but easily solved for not much money. If i couldn't run on a 12v supply without hassle, I'd just use the 230 volt brick through a low power inverter but on one of the boats, we try and avoid anything other than 12 volt items, (and not too many of those).

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Trix Collaborator

Trix

Posted
Posted

I have a large dell laptop and I use the maplin 150 watt charger all works fine , also use it on my other lap top and my work PDA amongst other things , you can adjust voltage so well worth the £39 paid I think

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alan_fincher Veteran II

alan_fincher

Posted
Posted

I have a large dell laptop and I use the maplin 150 watt charger all works fine

Well I can only repeat, as a warning to others, that in my experience modern Dell laptops will run off it, but it will not run the laptop and charge batteries at the same time.

 

That doesn't just apply to latest models, I have a "Studio" perhaps 5 years old where this was also true.

 

It is a known and well documented situation, so anybody who wants full functionality on a relatively recently produced Dell Laptop will not get it from any generic Maplin 12 volt laptop converter.

 

I don't wish to disappoint you on the £39 price, but for a while recently they were knocking them out at £2.99! I bought a couple, because they are useful to have for other things, but because of the reduced functionality, they are not a god choice for a Dell. A better "Maplin based" solution would be to but a small 240V inverter, and use it to run the laptop's normal mains "brick".

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Trix Collaborator

Trix

Posted
Posted (edited)

Those cheap ones are different I believe Alan this charges and runs it , unless I am just lucky

 

But this is a small inverter really goes from 5 - 24 volts

Edited by Trix
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