Newbie Questions

[mettamatt]

Hello! I'm very excited to join the community and completed my first CM3/BoxyPixel build. Though I have a few questions:

• What happens if I leave my device on? Will it automatically turn off or suspend after a certain period of time?
  
• Is there a sleep mode, or is a full shutdown and startup the way to use it?
  
• Should I bother using the 'sleep' mode built into some of the GBA games, or does that no longer apply?
  
• How do I know how much charge the battery has? I noticed that the retroarch.cfg has a menu_battery_level_enable config setting, but I didn't where to look for the output. 
  
• Do I need to worry about disabling bluetooth and wifi for the CM3 since it doesn't have those features? I saw the settings in the Retropie menu and was curious if I should run that everyime I start the system? 
  
• What should I expect for battery life? 4 hours?
  
• Any other optimizations or best practices to be mindful to preserve battery life? 
  

Thanks in advance for your advice!

[Porcinus]

From what I know :

- What happens if I leave my device on? Will it automatically turn off or suspend after a certain period of time?
It will power off safely when low battery circuitry will kick in.

- Is there a sleep mode, or is a full shutdown and startup the way to use it?
No sleep mode but the CM3 is pretty fast to start.

- How do I know how much charge the battery has? I noticed that the retroarch.cfg has a menu_battery_level_enable config setting, but I didn't where to look for the output.
To this point, CM3 Motherboard doesn't have battery monitoring.

- Do I need to worry about disabling bluetooth and wifi for the CM3 since it doesn't have those features? I saw the settings in the Retropie menu and was curious if I should run that everyime I start the system?
No need to do this, this feature is used in Zero.

- What should I expect for battery life? 4 hours?
It really depend on the game you play.
I have been able to play over 1 hour and a half of Dreamcast games (without fully drain the battery).
2 hours and a half for PSX game (without fully drain the battery).

- Any other optimizations or best practices to be mindful to preserve battery life?
Reduce the screen backlight is a good idea, right now I am at 15% (sensitive eyes), don't leave WiFi dongle plug if you don't use it.

[mettamatt]

Thank you for the feedback. This is exactly what I was looking for.

[Flavor]

Thanks for all the answers, Porcinus!

- How do I know how much charge the battery has? I noticed that the retroarch.cfg has a menu_battery_level_enable config setting, but I didn't where to look for the output.
To this point, CM3 Motherboard doesn't have battery monitoring.

I would add that the Freeplay CM3 does issue 2 different warnings about the battery being low.
1) The main front LED is typically green, but it will also add a red LED when the battery is low. The mix will appear more orange. This indication is directly from the battery management hardware.
2) The battery management hardware will also send a signal to the Raspberry Pi when the battery is critically low. Depending on several factors (like which LCD driver is in use) you may get a flashing battery icon on the screen. Even if you do not see the icon, the system will notice this signal and issue a shutdown if this low battery situation remains for too long.