Intel Edison USB voltage on breakout board

July 5, 2017

The red arrow points to the side of the “74” diode that comes right off the micro USB connector. With 5.00 volt input, downstream of the diode measured 4.72 V with the Edison idling. This voltage drop is expected due to the forward bias diode voltage drop.

Under 100% of one core CPU load measured 4.98 V on the USB side, and 4.66 V on the Edison side of this diode while powering from the USB port on the Verbatim 97928. The minuscule apparent 20mV voltage drop on the battery/USB side of the diode is likely to come from ohmic losses in the USB connector and cable.

Intel Edison alkaline battery life estimate is based on:

• Intel Edison measured power consumption
• assuming 2000 mAh for an AA battery

We estimate 10-12 hours of battery life on four AA alkaline batteries assuming continuous 100% CPU of one of the two CPU cores (other core idle). Normally the Edison will be mostly resting, drawing perhaps 100 mW.

Thus with mixed use, I might expect up to 4-5 days of continuous mixed use operation on 4xAA batteries for the Intel Edison.