Understood. Bloody nuisance compulsary power savings "feature"
What frustrates me the most is there is an option in setup to disable the feature; but it doesn't work... and dish sees no reason to a) believe me, or b) fix it. That is even more frustrating. Reminds me the days of cable tv...
My Samsung TV also does that e.g. when I'm watching a long movie.
"Press a button within 1 minute, otherwise I will enter standby" Grrrr.
That is annoying as heck... I got really frustrated to watch some show I wanted , only to see the screen saver message "Your receive has turned off to save power, press 'ok' to turn back on" -- Why it can't turn back on when it sees a channel change is beyond me. Luckily periodically sending the "on" Ir sequence doesn't alter what is on tv (no messages) and is not a toggle...
Can't you use e.g. a Nano and a 5volt phone charger with micro-USB lead.
Yes, I can; in fact I even picked up a 5v charger from the thrift store (I love that place for finding reusable electronics) but I decided to use this opportunity as a learning exercise (stretching the power). That and my uncle doesn't want another cord.. (neat freak of sorts; but he has always pushed me to try harder, so this may be one of his pushes to get me to learn more...)
A phone charger runs on fumes. Batteries are expensive
Initial version is a promin running off 3 AA batteries, this should last a good long time. Next version will be a rechargeable battery (like an 18650)
Sleep the Nano if you want to, or use it also for something else e.g. temp display or fancy TV background lighting.
It is awake for such a short period of time; most of the processing time is taken up staying asleep.
Every few cycles, it checks the battery voltage, if it dips down too much; it will start flashing the onboard led occasionally.
Otherwise it's a waiting game for 90 minutes to pass, send signal, wait for 90 minutes to pass... If I can cut down on the power it's using in sleep mode by flipping the power off; that would save more power...
re the 555 -- I only have 1 cmos555 here; and all I could find, schematic wise, involved using two 555's or two 556's with a 3rd chip to achieve 90-120 minute delays. The 4541 seems to be low power & more capable of long delays. (I did order up a couple of 555's as well to try to put together both circuits & try to see which is A) easier, B) smaller, C) better in power usage...
If you would suggest a good way to use a 555 for 90+ minute delays; please point me to it -- but so far, all I've read either says the 555 is not capable of those delays or I have to combine two...
Thanks for the ideas!
(I also squeezed in a ucurrent PCB & will build a couple over the next few months as time/money permits; also as a learning experience; but I may end up with an extra....)