I use my Framework 16 laptop pretty regularly on the train to and from work in the UK. I’ve noticed that often (but not all the time), if I have the laptop plugged into the 240V mains socket while on the train, at some point during the journey I’ll notice it’s no longer charging. This does not appear to be an issue with the charger or the socket, which both seem to supply power - the laptop just refuses to charge, and the LED on the side next to the port where I’m supplying the power does not turn on. After I turn the machine off and back on, it starts charging again.
I’m wondering whether this could be to do with power fluctuations from the train itself? During the journey there is a switch from the train taking the power from the tracks to taking it from overhead power lines, and also often a point where the train joins with another set of carriages and the power flickers. It’s odd to me that it’s the laptop itself that gets confused, though - I would have thought it would be the charger, if anything, that was perturbed by unstable power.
If it makes any difference, I’m running Tiny11 on the machine. I never really have any issues whatsoever when charging it anywhere else. Is there any way of diagnosing what might be going wrong?
next time you are on the train, power laptop off and connect the charger and see if light goes off while in power off state. If it does once lights in train flickers like they go off and on due to train temporarily losing power and light on laptop turns off aswell then that might be why, when train returns it’s power the charger brick might prevent laptop from getting high punch of voltage entering back into laptop which might be why it goes off to avoid more than allowed volts entering the laptop.
If the train uses DC to power, it needs an inverter to convert said DC to AC, if the AC output is square wave or modified sine wave instead of “pure” sine wave, it may confuse or overload the power factor correction (PFC) on your power adapter, causing it to shut down
@Charlie_6 is right on. The change or surge in power is being partially passed through the power supply and the EC is shutting down the charging circuitry to prevent potential damage.
By partially passing thru it is implied that the charging voltage that was negotiated by the USBC charger and the laptop skips out of bounds enough to trigger the fault (either over or under voltage).
A power conditioner might help in this case like ISOBar or a sensitive UPS with good circuitry however this now makes the portability aspect laughable as hardly anyone is going to carry an extra 15-40lbs of gear just so the laptop stays charging.
A word of caution though, as there may be transient spikes coming through and potentially causing minor but long term damage to the mainboard.
Consider getting a portable battery bank with USBPD, and using this to top up the laptop on the trip. Then when getting to work or home the battery bank can be topped up again. This will be much cheaper to replace than potentially an expensive mainboard! Suggest getting an LiFeO4 one as they can take tons of charging cycles much more readily than Li-Ion based ones.
Thanks, this is all useful to know! I could look into a USBPD battery, though I have the GPU add-on so the laptop might draw quite a lot of power from it. Alternatively, I can try to get into the habit of charging the machine regularly while I’m at home or in the office, to minimise when I need to use power from the train.
You may be able to just unplug the laptop and/ or charger after the switch. I’m not sure if you’ve tried that or not. As for a battery bank I use this Anker battery pack for my FW16 with the 7700s. It works pretty well and extends my gaming while I’m traveling.
If you’ve not completed your research yet, here’s the powerbank that I used with my FW16: Amazon.co.uk which may be worth adding to your list of candidates.
It can only deliver 140W, so if you’re going full pelt with your machine then you will have some drain from the battery, but hopefully if you’ve topped up the charge before leaving work and are on the train for less than ~1 hour it should get you there. (I’m picking ~1 hour as that’s about how quickly I can drain it at a full 140W draw) I tried doing some digging to find powerbanks that could offer more than 140W a couple of months ago, but couldn’t find anything at the time and this does the job well enough for me when I’m sitting at the dining table and can’t be bothered fetching a proper charger for a bit from the office.