Battery discharging

[Anonymouse]

I work abroad for 6 months of the year. Normally 3 months at a time.

I installed a battery holder + ML2032 3v battery in my Dreamcast years ago. But the last few times I have come back the battery needs recharging. It is then fine throughout my time at home but will discharge again when I come back. Is this normal? It’s quite annoying.

I have a Mega CD and the battery stays charged when away from home. Just to note. Everything gets switched off at the sockets when I am away.

I am thinking of installing a diode into the circuit so I can safely put a non-rechargeable battery in it.

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SOLVED. The charging circuit is only 2mAh so will take about 30 hours to charge from being discharged. I have not been playing my Dreamcast enough. I will leave it on longer.

[poopidoop]

i have the ml2032 also, mine will do the same if its been a while since ive played. the battery just looses charge after so long and needs to be juiced up again. i dont know if a stock dreamcast cmos battery would keep charge for 3 months like you say or not.

[NightBreeze]

I think it’s normal. Although IIRC the stock battery is a ML2430, which is 100 mAh, compared to ML2032 which is 65 mAh. So stock battery (when new) holds the charge significantly longer.

Are you using stock power supply by the way? I’ve seen claims, at least for Saturn, that if it’s plugged into the wall, the battery never runs out. That would indicate stock power supply was able to provide power to the clock circuit but I’ve never found evidence to support this. Would love to know if it’s true or not (using picoPSU myself).