Monday, Apr 03, 2023 at 14:45
This article is the definitive version of how to construct a 12V power source for SL. There's also a YT video of him doing it.
But looking at the article just now, he is now linking to a commercial product that avoids the DIY aspects. There are a number of such commercial DIY alternatives becoming available, and had I not already done the DIY project, I would probably get one, depending on price.
In short, the SL dish is powered by 48V. It is connected to the SL white box by a shielded CAT6 cable that runs PoE, but not standard PoE. The dish handles all the connection activity, and outputs an internet feed over the ethernet cable. The white box is essentially just a wi-fi hot spot taking an ethernet feed from the dish. The only other thing the white box does is to inject 48v power into the ethernet cable, so it must also have a 240V to 48V device as
well.
So the DIY kit involves a 12V to 48V step-up device, and and PoE injector. But if you go this route, you'll need to use your own 12V wi-fi router, so that's two 12V devices you have to power, whereas with the SL kit there's just one 240V outlet needed. It's a moot point whether the 12V power savings from not running an inverter are worth the trouble. If you have plenty of battery and solar capacity and don't intend to make heavy use of SL, then perhaps not. But clearly plenty of people think otherwise. I haven't crunched the numbers for my own usage to date.
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