PiSugar 3; now this tastes a lot sweeter

This is just a short follow-up post to me complaining about how the PiSugar 2 really does not do what it claims it can; IE: power up the Pi after power is restored.

After scripting, configuring, testing, etc. on the PiSugar 2 and getting the automated scripts doing exactly what I wanted it to do (except for powering back on), the PiSugar 3 was a drop-in replacement for the PiSugar 2. I did not have to change a thing since I was using the PiSugar Power Manager software which handles the abstractions of talking to the various PiSugar devices. I still have to use the old version of the Power Manager software since I am using an original Pi Zero W, but it seems to work just fine.

I've been using it for about a week in the car, and it's doing exactly what I want, and it has improved the GPS tracking functionality as well as made it more robust and less likely to corrupt itself. When I get back home, previously if I took my time driving into the garage before shutting the car off, it would upload the latest data, but often it would not, or would upload part of it before being rudely powered off. With the PiSugar 3, the Pi stays on for roughly 5 minutes after the car shuts off before it powers itself off. I've considered making this 10, or even 15 minutes, and I may in the future. I'm trying to decide the right amount of time that it'll stay up while I make a stop somewhere in the car, while not collecting useless stationary GPS data for too long. As for runtime, I really don't know how long my Pi Zero W + USB GPS would run, but I don't ever plan on leaving it running on battery power for long periods. So far from logging information it drops about 1-2% in the 5-minute period, so runtime or depth of discharge will never be a problem in my usage.

One thing I do need to test is what happens if the PiSugar 3 initiates a poweroff on the Pi and power is restored before the Pi powers itself off. I have a feeling this might not power the Pi back on, and I might lose GPS data from that trip. I should have tested this before reinstalling it back into the car, and might remove it from the car to test what happens in this case. Either way, I would not consider this a PiSugar issue.

Other improvements

The PiSugar 3 has a few other improvements over the PiSugar 2; the primary one for me is that it actually limits charging to 80% when you set it to do so. The PiSugar 2 claimed it could do that, but I don't know if it was buggy or just simply didn't do it, but in my testing of about a week of fiddling with it, it maintained the battery at 100% state of charge which is not good for long-term Lithium-ion battery health, and even doubly so when the thing lives in my car which can get quite hot in the summer.

It also supports firmware updates, so bugs could be fixed or features added in the future. I did not touch the firmware on mine, and I have no idea if mine is even at the latest, nor do I see any kind of firmware changelog, but I do see some references to features that require some minimum version of firmware in their GitHub, so features have at least been added/fixed in the past.

Summary

So, if you need a UPS for your Pi that will boot the Pi when power is restored, you absolutely need the PiSugar 3. It seems to do and its other advertised features reliably so far in my limited use of it. I hope I have no long-term reliability issues, however I do not expect that will be a problem. I do have some concerns about the battery health since the hot/cold conditions the battery will live in are not ideal, but limiting charge to 80% I think it'll be just fine.