FYI, most home solar setups are grid tied. This lets you sell power to the grid, as well as supplement it with grid power, when required. The downside is that it goes down with the grid, so not to back feed and electrocute linesmen.
To go independent you need a more expensive system with a fail over mode. It drops out with the mains, but then fires a switch that disconnects you from the grid. It can then fire up again in off-grid mode. The reverse process is needed to reconnect to the grid.
You can get a small solar power station (the kind that has an output plug and can generate AC power) and some solar panels to charge it, for less than £200.
It’s going to be limited in how much power it can put out (the one I have has a 500W limit) as well as how long it will last (mine would last about 2h if drained at a constant 500W) but it’s still reasonably cheap and it’s enough to, for example, power my TV and the little Mini-PC I use as a media box, and let me watch my offline library of films.
About £1000 - £1500 will get will get you something that can push out more power and with several times more power storage along with more/bigger portable solar panels so that you can actually charge the bigger storage.
The point being that this isn’t sized to be capable of providing 3000W peak and supply all your power needs during the night and then get charged from solar panels during the day all while the panels are still providing all your power needs during the day, this is something to just support a few lower power devices (so, not your washing machine or your heater) for a few hours - it’s basically a portable solution for use when, for example camping, that also works as an emergency preparedness solution to power a few things.
Mind you, if all you need is to just run a tablet to watch some films in, listen to some music or read some books, about £50 will get you a solar charged power bank. This was actually the solution I had in place recently when there was some freak storm were I lived and we were out for power for 4 days.
I’ve actually got one myself. I would have to get creative to get it recharged from my solar panels. The inverter is grid tied, and would need to be bypassed.
The original comment was talking about having a server up. That, and the networking kit to make it useful, would draw quite a bit. A lot more than you would get with a portable solar panel in the UK. To keep that up would require significant panels and storage capability, which implies fixed solar. Hence my comment warning them.
I know a few people who thought they would be fine in a power cut, due to having solar. I set them straight on that, before it caught them flat footed at least.
Oh yeah, I’m in Portugal so theoretically a bit better on the solar illumination but I’m in an apartment building on the side facing the wrong orientation to get much direct sunlight, so any panel I use here will even in a clear bright day produce less than half its rated power, so I have twice the panels I need.
Still, the point of my suggestion is not something that will let you do nothing but watch films 12h/day, it’s something to let you watch them for a few hours at night and still be able to recharge what you spent doing it during the day.
Now your point about the servers consuming lots of power is assuming some kind of home setup made up with some old desktop PC which by itself draws a lot even idle, but a NAS and a media player don’t really need anywhere close to that - my own setup has a Mini-PC that doubles down as NAS and media player that only draws at peak 25W but will likely draw far less in average since even when I’m playing films it tends to stay below 10% CPU usage. Add to that a flat screen TV that is mid-sized and a home router and I would be surprised if the whole thing even draws 100W at peak. All that stuff is wired with Ethernet, which should consume less power than wireless.
I mean my 2x 60W panels won’t be able into keep up with it because of my apartment not getting much direct sunlight and hence the panels not operating at the rated power, but during the day when charging they will top the power station enough to let me use that for many hours.
I expect most people’s setups will involve some kind of dedicated NAS (which again will be something that consumes a lot less power than a desktop PC) instead of a Mini-PC and some media player stick, android TV box or even the “smarts” on the TV to play the films, so it might even use less power than what I have.
That said, a tablet and small power bank are a more efficient way to watch films when the power is off - of course you have to already have the files of the films on the tablet or somehow power the necessary hardware to copy the files from the NAS to the tablet, which is how I ended up buying a power station capable of powering AC fed devices and some bigger panels to recharge it at least a bit during the day - in my own experience with a brownout that lasted 4 days (freaky storm that brought down the local power transmission for an entire city) which happened before I got that power station, the frustration was not being able to copy the files from the NAS to my tablet.
FYI, most home solar setups are grid tied. This lets you sell power to the grid, as well as supplement it with grid power, when required. The downside is that it goes down with the grid, so not to back feed and electrocute linesmen.
To go independent you need a more expensive system with a fail over mode. It drops out with the mains, but then fires a switch that disconnects you from the grid. It can then fire up again in off-grid mode. The reverse process is needed to reconnect to the grid.
You can get a small solar power station (the kind that has an output plug and can generate AC power) and some solar panels to charge it, for less than £200.
It’s going to be limited in how much power it can put out (the one I have has a 500W limit) as well as how long it will last (mine would last about 2h if drained at a constant 500W) but it’s still reasonably cheap and it’s enough to, for example, power my TV and the little Mini-PC I use as a media box, and let me watch my offline library of films.
About £1000 - £1500 will get will get you something that can push out more power and with several times more power storage along with more/bigger portable solar panels so that you can actually charge the bigger storage.
The point being that this isn’t sized to be capable of providing 3000W peak and supply all your power needs during the night and then get charged from solar panels during the day all while the panels are still providing all your power needs during the day, this is something to just support a few lower power devices (so, not your washing machine or your heater) for a few hours - it’s basically a portable solution for use when, for example camping, that also works as an emergency preparedness solution to power a few things.
Mind you, if all you need is to just run a tablet to watch some films in, listen to some music or read some books, about £50 will get you a solar charged power bank. This was actually the solution I had in place recently when there was some freak storm were I lived and we were out for power for 4 days.
I’ve actually got one myself. I would have to get creative to get it recharged from my solar panels. The inverter is grid tied, and would need to be bypassed.
The original comment was talking about having a server up. That, and the networking kit to make it useful, would draw quite a bit. A lot more than you would get with a portable solar panel in the UK. To keep that up would require significant panels and storage capability, which implies fixed solar. Hence my comment warning them.
I know a few people who thought they would be fine in a power cut, due to having solar. I set them straight on that, before it caught them flat footed at least.
Oh yeah, I’m in Portugal so theoretically a bit better on the solar illumination but I’m in an apartment building on the side facing the wrong orientation to get much direct sunlight, so any panel I use here will even in a clear bright day produce less than half its rated power, so I have twice the panels I need.
Still, the point of my suggestion is not something that will let you do nothing but watch films 12h/day, it’s something to let you watch them for a few hours at night and still be able to recharge what you spent doing it during the day.
Now your point about the servers consuming lots of power is assuming some kind of home setup made up with some old desktop PC which by itself draws a lot even idle, but a NAS and a media player don’t really need anywhere close to that - my own setup has a Mini-PC that doubles down as NAS and media player that only draws at peak 25W but will likely draw far less in average since even when I’m playing films it tends to stay below 10% CPU usage. Add to that a flat screen TV that is mid-sized and a home router and I would be surprised if the whole thing even draws 100W at peak. All that stuff is wired with Ethernet, which should consume less power than wireless.
I mean my 2x 60W panels won’t be able into keep up with it because of my apartment not getting much direct sunlight and hence the panels not operating at the rated power, but during the day when charging they will top the power station enough to let me use that for many hours.
I expect most people’s setups will involve some kind of dedicated NAS (which again will be something that consumes a lot less power than a desktop PC) instead of a Mini-PC and some media player stick, android TV box or even the “smarts” on the TV to play the films, so it might even use less power than what I have.
That said, a tablet and small power bank are a more efficient way to watch films when the power is off - of course you have to already have the files of the films on the tablet or somehow power the necessary hardware to copy the files from the NAS to the tablet, which is how I ended up buying a power station capable of powering AC fed devices and some bigger panels to recharge it at least a bit during the day - in my own experience with a brownout that lasted 4 days (freaky storm that brought down the local power transmission for an entire city) which happened before I got that power station, the frustration was not being able to copy the files from the NAS to my tablet.
EPS