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Author: Subject: Running a Laptop off a car battery?
FASTdan

posted on 30/8/12 at 07:17 PM Reply With Quote
Running a Laptop off a car battery?

How long approximately will a car battery run a laptop using a basic inverter for? Say a small-ish battery from my XR2?





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RAYLEE29

posted on 30/8/12 at 07:35 PM Reply With Quote
Hi, I don't know the answer but it has always seemed rather wasteful using an inverter to provide 240v to power a transformer to take it back down to the laptop power of around 16v.
Ray





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crutch

posted on 30/8/12 at 07:41 PM Reply With Quote
Typical laptop battery is 7ah. So 40ah car battery so 5 x the standard laptop run time. Maybe less with the invertor.

I would guess 6-9hrs depending what you are running on the laptop.

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bi22le

posted on 30/8/12 at 07:55 PM Reply With Quote
Tiz' a little wastful.

Try looking for Laptop in car chargers. they will have less wasted heat, be smaller \ more compact. They obviously wont allow you to power other 3-pin plug stuff though.





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owelly

posted on 30/8/12 at 08:17 PM Reply With Quote
I used to use a 12v to 24v step-up inverter (bought from a truck-stop) and then a multi-voltage adapter that had various settings from 6v up to 19v, which worked a treat. Now I use a £3 inverter, bought from Asda, that plugs into the ciggy lighter, and that charges my phones and lappy. I've used the same cheap inverter to run the lappy off a car battery whilst using OBD software and it was still charging after 8hrs use!





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mark chandler

posted on 30/8/12 at 08:21 PM Reply With Quote
My IBM thinkpad runs directly off the battery, try with nothing inbetween in the first instance.
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whitestu

posted on 30/8/12 at 09:30 PM Reply With Quote
Maplins have some car laptop chargers on offer at the moment - I've had one for ages and they work really well.
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Proby

posted on 31/8/12 at 06:40 AM Reply With Quote
I run mine in the car using a dc/dc convertor from RS. Steps up from 12v to 19v (can't remember what's juice it rated at) and works a treat. Pretty much the same size as a standard laptop charger.





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mcerd1

posted on 31/8/12 at 09:30 AM Reply With Quote
quote:
Originally posted by whitestu
Maplins have some car laptop chargers on offer at the moment - I've had one for ages and they work really well.


I'm just looking at those myself at the moment (trying to find a decent cheap one that does both 16v and 18.5v)





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