Thread: Will CF auto-switch to hibernate from extended standby on Infill G4?

Originally Posted by johnk

One of the promoted features of the G4 with StreetDeck is that it after being in standby for a certain amount of time (depending on your car battery; for me it's about 16 hours), the G4 should automatically go to hibernate.

Hmm, that would require the G4 to be hardwired to the battery - bypassing the ignition. Then, given that application code doesn't run in Standby, this would have to be an OS thing - XP or Vista. So, SD or CF themselves don't have any bearing here.

So maybe I can find some expensive car battery that will last for the weekend.

So... you're talking about wanting to run your system for 48 hours without the car ever having been started? That kinda' leads me to ask "why"? Camping?

If you really wanna do this, then you should look at rigging a pair of batteries in parallel and dedicate them to the G4 (and the amps since you'll need those as well). I'd recommend the Optima Yellow or Blue tops - NOT the Red Top. The Red Top can be damaged if it drains to 0.

Originally Posted by johnk

I often don't drive my car on either Saturday or Sunday. Since the standby period is only around 16 hours, it is virtually guaranteed that at least once a week (Sunday or Monday, or even Saturday if I don't go out until late in the afternoon), the system will be booting from scratch. I could fix that by making it always hibernate, but I didn't spend thousands of dollars to have to wait a minute or longer to get audio every time I start my car.John

Ahh, ok... So the issue is basically with the G4, in that it's shutting down to hibernate at some pre-determined non-user-modifiable time. I think most folks that did the CarPC thing on their own end up just hibernating, or have hacked that time threshold.

Like I kinda' implied above, that's not a RR/SD/CF/frontend thing, that's Windows core. You might wanna approach David (Mr. CF) to add in an option to redefine that threshold, it's gotta be in the registry somewhere.

Originally Posted by johnk

Well, I wish it would go to hibernate after a certain amount of time. The problem is that it shuts down completely (big difference). I guess you just need the new Sleep feature in Vista for that (option to save hibernation data when it goes to standby, so that if the power is cut it can resume from the hibernation file).

The MP3Car guys tell me that the G4 shuts down when the battery reaches a certain voltage minimum, so I don't think a registry change will help.

I guess on the weekends I just need to try to remember to hit Suspend from the menu instead of just shutting off the car. Just very frustrating that a much cheaper head unit doesn't have this limitation... I would have gone with something else if they supported FLAC.

Man, I'm sorry.. I keep forgetting that we're talking about the G4 so I forget the solutions that the CarPC people use/take for granted.

We use one of these:
http://store.mp3car.com/category_s/22.htm

Those are power supplies that have a hook into the car battery full-time, and another into the ignition. The board is setup such that IT controls the power to the motherboard, the ignition line is just a monitor tap. When the ignition goes off, it pulses the power button on the motherboard, which we generally configure to be "hibernate". It then waits a programmable amount of time before it actually cuts the power. You set this timeout to be long enough to allow the CarPC to make it all the way to hibernate. The board can also be configured to be smart and actually watch for the MB to power down.

fwiw, I'm using the the M1-ATX 90. Works like a champ. I dunno what the external inputs look like on the G4, or how much you can get to the motherboard. To use this controller, I think you'd only have to hack into the "power" switch on the G4, or whichever electrical point you can to set it into hibernate.

The "Micro Shutdown Controller" works the same way, and may be a better option since you don't really need a full power supply:
http://store.mp3car.com/category_s/80.htm

Originally Posted by johnk

Well, I wish it would go to hibernate after a certain amount of time. The problem is that it shuts down completely (big difference). I guess you just need the new Sleep feature in Vista for that (option to save hibernation data when it goes to standby, so that if the power is cut it can resume from the hibernation file).

The MP3Car guys tell me that the G4 shuts down when the battery reaches a certain voltage minimum, so I don't think a registry change will help.

I've asked this before but I can't find it now. Anyways, my G4 was working great when I first got it, but after some update (either SD or XP) this feature stopped functioning a while ago.

My G4 will suspend fine, but after some amount of time (I suspect it's around 12-24 hours) it shuts down. So When I get into my car, it boots from scratch. This did NOT used to be this way. it used to come back from hibernate.

I've since gone into some XP window last week and set it to hibernate after 6 hours (that's the max the select box allowed), to help avoid this annoyance, but I really want to know what registry settings I'm supposed to have to get it to work properly again? As now it's annoying that I leave work after an 8+ hour day, and it's hibernated. Grrrr.

I used to be able to listen to music in the AM, go to work, unsuspend after work, go home, unsuspend the next AM and really only see the hibernate on weekends (as someone else mentioned) when I didn't use the car for a day or so...

Anyone? mp3car.com? (I did buy this from you guys). What XP settings or registry keys need to be set (and to what value) to get this functioning again properly?