HOW-TO spare energy as much as possible
With this setup you will lose hardly any functionality, and also no energy.
- leave the Asus on all day.
- let the hard disk stop after 5 minutes of no activity
- make the WLAN (Wifi, radio) switchable
If you don't run processes that makes the disk spinning al the time, this will consume about 4.6 Watt most of the time, and after spinning up the disk it will consume 11.6 Watt, but only as long as needed.
All these 'techniques' have been described earlier by different people, but I give you them here in a combined version.
1) leave the Asus on all day.
There is nothing to it. Just plug it in.
2) let the hard disk stop after 5 minutes of no activity
If you, as I, use K.C.Furge's modified firmware 1.0.7.8 (second edition), see the comment from me here: http://wl700g.homelinux.net/drupal/?q=node/191
As I have found out that with WLAN on (wifi on) the hard disk spins up now and then, letting it spin down after 5 minutes will only prove useful with WLAN switched off (and no other process in your Asus attaching the disk constantly)
3) make the WLAN (Wifi, radio) switchable
This is a revised script after the one Milky has published here: http://wl500g.info/showpost.php?p=65373&postcount=7
Code:
#!/opt/bin/bash
#Initialize, get state
if wl radio | grep 1 &> /dev/null
then
#radio=off, Powerled on
echo "direction=out" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1_config
echo "0" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1
else
#radio=on, Powerled blinks
echo "direction=out" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1_config
echo "2" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1
fi
#loop forever
while true
do
#Check if copy button is pressed
if grep 1 /proc/miscio/gpio_6 &> /dev/null
then
if wl radio | grep 1 &> /dev/null
then
wl radio on
#Touch HDD to let it spin up (OPTIONAL)
touch /opt/bin/radio
#Blink powerled fast
echo "direction=out" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1_config
echo "2" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1
else
wl radio off
#Put powerled on
echo "direction=out" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1_config
echo "0" > /proc/miscio/gpio_1
fi
fi
#Stay here while copy button is still pressed
while grep 1 /proc/miscio/gpio_6 &> /dev/null
do
echo "Just waiting" > /dev/null
done
sleep 1
done
You can copy & past this script with a decent editor (nano, joe), and save it as 'radio' as I did, in /opt/bin. Make it executable with chmod +x /opt/bin/radio.
To test, start it manually. This script never ends, but you can stop it with Ctrl-C. When it runs, the power led will blink when radio is on, and you can switch radio on and off with the copy button.
To make it run forever, add a line in /opt/etc/rc.local:
Code:
# Start radio-switch
screen -d -m /opt/bin/radio
By the way, this assumes you have screen installed:
Code:
ipkg install screen
That's about it. Obviously, you must have telnet or ssh-access to the Asus, have root rights, have a writable /opt and so forth.
With all the wifi-clients I have, the disk spins up automatically. Spinolo has reported this is not the case with a PlayStation. (http://wl500g.info/showthread.php?p=97654#post97654).
BTW: You won't loose the ability to copy the contents of an USB stick as the Asus intended purpose of the copy button! :D
Good luck and save!
Marc
Turning the "Air" LED off
I'd like to be able to turn off the "Air" LED when the radio is off...any idea how to do that?
Better script now available
I have changed the script from Milky.
Most notably, if you pressed the copy button too long, the original script switched WLAN too often. Now the script will wait until you release the button.
Secondly, blinking the power led proved to be much easier. It now blinks faster.
With the new script you can press the copy button, wait until you see the power led burn contstantly or start blinking, and release.
See the first message in this thread:
http://wl500g.info/showthread.php?t=14517
Marc
