Laptops in cold weather - what do you do?

[Grunthos]

Last night I spent a pleasant hour or so observing the moon in near perfect seeing conditions.

After that I decided to break out my new SPC900 webcam and try to capture a few minutes of AVI.

Fired up my trusty Dell Latitude D620 and plugged in the webcam.

Problems started when I opened up Sharpcam software. It took an age to load and then another age to recognise the webcam. Once the software was "operational" it was, shall we say, extemely laggy. e.g. every time I tried to adjust a slide control the hourglass appeared and remained on screen for a good couple of minutes.

Eventually I just gave up and reverted to Mk 1 eyeball.

The laptop operates fine during the day btw...

The minimal research I've done suggests all of this is a function of the cold temperatres I was operating in (approx minus 9 Centigrade inside a garden shed).

I was wondering - What do you do and what can I reasonably do to have an operating laptop? (electric blanket?, cardboard box?)

Forget OTT options like building a warm room

[ianaiken]

I have it in a storage case with some holes drilled with 20MM grommets in for cables and shut the lid with it on when its cold. It seems to hang around 17 C when its ambient temp outside is around 0-2 C.

[kev]

That should work, also I would strongly suggest you turn it on 10 mins before you go out - connected to the mains. That way instead of warming up the circuitery from outside its operational range, it wil start up in its range and all it has to do is keep itself warm.

Me, I used a carboard box! hardly high tech but it works!

Kev

(in IT for the last 34 years)

[Bizibilder]

I have a padded fabric laptop case that mine lives in. It is used inside that and a "posh" MDF box when in use in the observatory. I always take mine outside from room temperature and plug it in (to a 12>18v adapter on the 12v battery). That way it keeps itself warm.

[ollypenrice]

If you Google Petnap you'll find that they make heated pads for puppies and cats. No they really DO, I'm not joking!! The laptops that stay in the observatory live on these in winter. Current draw is miniscule.

I could get no clear concensus on whether it was bad to let computers get too cold but one or two friends in electronics seemed to think it was. Batteries certainy don't like it.

Olly

[Carbon Brush]

Good suggestions from all the above posts.

Keeping the circuits above freezing, and above dewpoint is a very good idea.

My ancient abused laptop runs from the mains and is left at 'shed' temperature.

The only issue I have encountered is with the display.

If it is left for a long time, like a cloudy & damp fortnight, one pixel width in a vertical column shows a solid line. The driver is permanently on for some reason. After running for a few hours, maybe over two nights, the fault clears.

I'm assuming this is a bit of moisture ingress somewhere around the display drive circuit and using the computer dries it out.

Moisture in other places could of course cause all sorts of problems so I am running a bit of a risk with my unheated situation.

[samtheeagle]

In the past I did what others have suggested, fire up the laptop before going outside, so it's warming itself. And I always put it on a 10mm sheet of plastic packing foam, to help insulate it from the cold surface it was on. More recently I have upgraded to a netbook in a flight case approach

Please excuse the poor quality pic, but you get the idea. As I am still without an obsy I figured a way of keeping my computer related gear together would be a real help. And it is. Saves loads of fiddling, I can just take the case out, open it up and plug in the cables to the appropriate places. Sorted.

Also it keeps everything warm and protected. I can angle the netbook lid down so that the case lid can keep the dew off of things...

[Merlin66]

I use a 12V "Doggie" heating blanket (from Maplins)

It sits over the scope to keep it above dew point, and when observing becomes the "warm" mat for the laptop and desk...dual function...and no dogs were injured during the typing of this message...

[James]

I keep mine in a flight case which I'll leave ajar if I'm not doing anything on the computer, the laptop itself will keep it slightly warmer inside the case. When it's particularly cold and running off mains the battery won't charge but since it's on mains I don't worry too much. Keeping it in the case keeps the dew away. Like others I start it up before hand. Last year when a couple of nights were down at around -15 I ran a dewstrip into the case just in case.

Any Mac users out there who are using mains powered laptops can just run Stellarium in the background, pretty soon the laptop will be nice and warm DO NOT do this if running off the battery as it'll drain it pretty quick...

James

[MartinB]

I've never had a problem with a laptop out doors, running off the mains and covered with a plastic sheet to keep off the dew when I'm not actively using it. The real laptop killer is taking it back inside, especially replugging it into the mains. Best to loosely wrap it in something to keep the condensation off and leave it switched off for a couple of hours to warm up.

[ianaiken]

@samtheeagle how do you vent the laptops exhaust?

Looks cool that I'm gonna get some foam take mine one step further.

I also shut my lid when its outside when I'm not needing to look or touch it plus when I bring it in I leave it on until acclimatised.