ESP8266 Community Forum

- Mon Jul 27, 2020 1:13 pm #88087 Power consumption: https://bbs.espressif.com/viewtopic.php?t=133
Useful hints re battery power: https://www.instructables.com/id/ESP8266-Pro-Tips/
Including an estimation of battery life on 2xAA:

I wouldn't call 10 hours "reasonable"

Even assuming typical consumption of, say, 70mA we would get 3x this value or 30 hours which is still pretty impractical. The ESP8266 was never designed to be a used in portable devices: the pyhsics just doesn't work.

- Mon Jul 27, 2020 3:26 pm #88089

Define: "reasonably well"

Several hours as I recall.

- Tue Jul 28, 2020 7:41 am #88095

I wouldn't call 10 hours "reasonable"

Even assuming typical consumption of, say, 70mA we would get 3x this value or 30 hours which is still pretty impractical...

What is it that you are expecting it to do?
I'm not proposing for something to last the duration of the pandemic on a single charge, but something that takes note of who you've been close to while you're out.

OK, the idea is not as practical as I first imagined, but neither is it so far removed from it as you suggest.
That said, there are presumably far more efficient chips available that would do it better.

Useful link in any case, thank you.

- Tue Jul 28, 2020 8:49 am #88096 Though I have to agree with pangolin on a couple of things, it's always good to brainstorm on the issues at hand and possible solutions to it.

There are already a few/a lot of (commercial, of course) initiatives at the moment: in some countries it's compulsory to install some app on your phone, in others it's optional or at least still in a development/testing stage.
Since "Everybody" in the modern world nowadays has and uses a mobile phone with installable apps, writing an app would be more fruitful than trying to create dedicated hardware that is, in all it's fairness, pretty limited (in flexibility, scalability, updatability and above all privacy-ability ); people are always connected to a network (either through WiFi or GSM) and will keep their batteries topped-up, so the information you receive is fairly up-to-date and one could take appropriate action ASAP if needed (eg. go in quarantine).

Here in the Netherlands we've got an app that works with BlueTooth, which is somewhat better suited since it needs less power and the range is only limited to 3 - 10 meters or so (whereas WiFi could travel hundreds of meters, possibly even more) and you only want to know whether someone with the virus was in close proximity.

Though I always encourage people to work out their ideas, you might want to have a look at the ESP32, the bigger brother of the ESP8266: it also supports BlueTooth as well as WiFi and has better power management.

Assumption is the mother of all f*ckups. At least: that's what I'm assuming.