RFD900 powered okay from droid??

Posted by Richard Kennedy on December 4, 2013 at 7:11pm

 I am wondering if the RFD900 hooked up via usb / OTG cable does anybody have concerns that in full power setting it will be under powered from the droid? I'm by no means an electronic wiz so could be I'm worrying about nothing but as I recall on max setting it's 1000 Mah? There must be a limit on the power over the usb? is it 1000 Mah or more on most devices?

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Replies

  • Raph December 6, 2013 at 8:49am

    I use the RFD900 with a Nexus 7. I definitely am getting reduced range.. probably about 2km before very low rssi, which seems terribly short.

    Is it OK to power the RFD900 separately? that may be the only way for me to get full range using the tablet..

  • Developer
    Jani Hirvinen December 5, 2013 at 7:24pm

    I have been using RFD900 on my Samsung 8" Note and Note 2 phones without any problems. Powerlevels were defaults eg. 20 so not full power but let's say around 65% so enough.

    • ultrojo > Jani Hirvinen May 16, 2014 at 3:52am

      Jani,

      thanks, i receive rfd900 from jdrones.

      sorry newbies question

      i got range about 1km only before lost datalink,

      how to increase range via Mission planner? is it i have to key in more than 20db both air and ground?

      thanks

  • Richard Kennedy December 5, 2013 at 3:53am

    Thanks for the replies. Well I guess the proof is in the pudding so to speak it appears to work just fine. Wether or not the radio's range is affected by a potential marginal [?] power supply I don't know yet so I guess I will just need to go flying and confirm that it works without a shorter range issue. 

  • Developer
    Jani Hirvinen December 4, 2013 at 9:43pm

    and if you start to brown out you can always lower down transmit power on your RFD900 modems.

  • Developer
    Kevin Hester December 4, 2013 at 9:04pm

    I think you'd have to check each device.  I don't think most android devices have smart current limiting - if you go over the USB spec the device will probably just brown out.  So RFD900 might work on some devices but not others (or you can peel off the power and provided 5V some other way).

    900mA is the max per spec.

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