I want to establish how or if mains power feed to mains powered equipment can be designed to optimise equipment lifetimes. In my case I have a specific item of equipment that I am concerned about but my question is a general one about what design rules or lessons may be applied to even such a simple system to ensure optimum lifetime.
Of interest is how to supply power to or remove power from equipment – whether it is best to leave power supplied and rely on internal switching or to use intermediate switching points, and whether aspects such as mains power surges and spikes or power outages make a significant difference to what is done.
As a specific example – in my case I have a notebook PC (Dell Inspiron 15R) that I use as a desktop PC. I use it in a fixed location and do not have a battery installed (the battery is disconnected and stored away). So this laptop is similar to a desktop PC as regards power supply. This would also presumable apply to batteryless routers, switches, printers etc. There seem to be two options regarding how to supply power.
1) Keep the equipment plugged into a power strip with on/off button and switch on at the power strip when I have to use it and off when use is finished. In this way, however, the power supply of the equipment gets a voltage spike when I switch on the power strip, and absorbs energy to ground (absorbing the remaining currents) when I switch it off.
2) Always keep the equipment plugged into the power socket at the wall, leaving it connected even when not in use. In this way, instead, the equipment (in my example the power supply and motherboard) is always under voltage and never completely "at rest".
So, from an electronic point of view, in which of the two ways is equipment likely to get less damage and live longer?
Best Answer
Both will work ok and will not damage anything. I have several notebooks and some are always plugged in, some are regularly disconnected, everything just works fine for many years already. Modern devices are designed to work under both conditions.