CN201134687Y - Charging module for prolonging service life of battery - Google Patents

Abstract

The utility model discloses a charging module for extending the battery life, which is suitable for being arranged in a computer system. The charging module includes a charging circuit and a control circuit. The charging circuit is used to charge the battery of the computer system, and the control circuit determines whether to start the battery protection function according to a control signal. When the battery protection function is started, the control circuit determines whether the battery power reaches a preset power, and when the battery power reaches the preset power, the charging circuit is controlled to stop charging the battery.

Description

Charging module for extended battery life

technical field

The utility model relates to a charging module, in particular to a charging module for prolonging battery life.

Background technique

Laptop suppliers generally advise users that if they want to use the laptop at home for a long time, they should remove the battery of the laptop and only use the power supply (adapter) to supply power to the laptop, which will help prolong the life of the battery .

The reason why these suppliers suggest this is because the power of the battery will gradually decrease through discharge. The charging circuit (charger) will charge the battery. In this way, the battery will be continuously charged and discharged, which will greatly affect the service life of the battery.

In addition, notebook computer suppliers also believe that whether the battery is overcharged (such as fully charging the battery to 100% power) or over-discharged (such as making the battery show 0% power) for long-term storage, it will also shorten the battery life. battery life. Therefore, these suppliers usually recommend that when the battery needs to be stored for a long time, it is only necessary to charge the battery to 30%~50%. However, laptops to date do not have this feature.

Contents of the invention

The purpose of this utility model is to provide a charging module that prolongs the life of the battery to solve the problem that when the notebook computer uses the power supply and the battery to supply power at the same time, the battery will be constantly in the state of charging and discharging, which will greatly affect its service life. problem of impact.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a charging module for prolonging the battery life, which can decide whether to charge the battery of the notebook computer to a predetermined amount according to the actual needs of the user.

The utility model provides a charging module for prolonging battery life, which is suitable for being arranged in a computer system. The charging module includes a charging circuit and a control circuit. The charging circuit is used to charge the battery of the computer system, and the control circuit determines whether to activate the battery protection function according to the control signal. When the battery protection function is activated, the control circuit will determine whether the power of the battery reaches the preset power, and when the power of the battery reaches the preset power, the charging circuit will be controlled to stop charging the battery.

According to the charging module for prolonging battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention, before judging whether the power of the battery reaches the preset power, the control circuit first judges whether the value of the charging state is the preset value, so as to determine whether the battery is powered on at startup. After the battery protection function, has the battery power reached the preset power level? When it is judged that the value of the state of charge is not the preset value, the control circuit determines that the power of the battery has not reached the preset power, and continues to judge whether the power of the battery has reached the preset power, and when it is judged that the value of the state of charge is the preset value, The control circuit judges that the electric quantity of the battery has reached the preset electric quantity, and controls the charging circuit to stop charging the battery. In addition, when it is judged that the power of the battery reaches the preset power, the control circuit further sets the value of the charging state as a preset value, and before controlling the charging circuit to fully charge the battery, the control circuit first clears the value of the charging state.

The charging module for extending battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention further includes an impedance and a switch. One end of the impedance is coupled to the power supply voltage. One end of the switch is coupled to the other end of the impedance to generate the above-mentioned control signal, and the other end is coupled to the common potential.

According to the charging module for extending battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention, the above-mentioned switch is arranged on the casing of the computer system.

According to the charging module for extending battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention, the computer system is a notebook computer, and the battery is a battery of the notebook computer.

The utility model utilizes the control circuit to control the operation of the charging circuit, and the control circuit determines whether to activate the battery protection function according to the control signal. When the battery protection function starts, the control circuit will judge whether the power of the battery reaches the preset power, and when the power of the battery reaches the preset power, it will control the charging circuit to stop charging the battery, so the utility model can be used according to the control signal. Decide whether to charge the battery only to a preset level, preventing the battery from losing its useful life due to overcharging or overdischarging. In addition, since the control circuit can also determine whether the value of the charging state is a preset value, it can further determine whether the battery power has reached the preset power after the battery protection function is activated, so that as long as it is determined that the battery power has reached the preset power At this time, the control circuit will jump out of the related control program of charging, so the utility model will not allow the battery to be repeatedly charged and discharged, and the service life of the battery will be avoided.

Description of drawings

Fig. 1 is a charging module for extending battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 illustrates an operation mode of the control circuit 102 in FIG. 1 .

FIG. 3 illustrates another operation mode of the control circuit 102 in FIG. 1 .

Detailed ways

Below in conjunction with accompanying drawing, specifically illustrate the utility model. In addition, for the convenience of comparison with the background technology, the following computer systems are all taken as an example of a notebook computer, and the battery is the battery of the notebook computer, but this example is not intended to limit the present invention.

Please refer to FIG. 1 , which is a charging module for extending battery life according to an embodiment of the present invention, which is suitable for being installed in a computer system.

The symbol 100 in FIG. 1 is the computer system, and the charging module for extending battery life mainly includes a control circuit 110 and a charging circuit 120 . The charging circuit 120 is used to charge the battery 132 of the computer system, and the control circuit 110 will determine whether to activate the battery protection function (described later) according to the control signal CS. The operation of the control circuit 110 will be described below with reference to FIG. 2 and FIG. 3 .

Please refer to FIG. 2 , which is an operation mode of the control circuit 110 in FIG. 1 .

Please refer to FIG. 1 and FIG. 2 at the same time. After the control circuit 110 starts to operate (eg, step 202 in FIG. 2 ), the control circuit 110 will determine whether the battery protection function is activated (eg, step 204 in FIG. 2 ). When the battery protection function is not activated, the control circuit 110 will control the charging circuit 120 to fully charge the battery 132 (as shown in step 206 in Figure 2); Reaching the preset power level, for example, whether the power level reaches 40% (as shown in step 208 of FIG. 2 ). If the control circuit 110 judges that the power of the battery 132 has not reached the preset power, it controls the charging circuit 120 to charge the battery 132 (step 210 in FIG. 2 ), and then returns to step 208 to continuously judge the power of the battery 132 On the contrary, if the control circuit 110 determines that the battery 132 has reached the preset power level, it controls the charging circuit 120 to stop charging the battery 132 (step 212 in FIG. 2 ). In this way, the user can determine whether to charge the battery 132 to a preset level through the control signal CS, thereby preventing the battery 132 from being depleted in service life due to overcharging or overdischarging.

Please refer to FIG. 3 , which shows another operation mode of the control circuit 110 in FIG. 1 .

Please refer to FIG. 2 and FIG. 3 at the same time. After comparison, it can be found that the operation method shown in FIG. 3 has more steps 302, 304 and 306. The battery 132 is repeatedly charged and discharged. In the example shown in FIG. 3 , when the value of the state of charge is 1, it means that the power of the battery 132 has reached the preset power level after the battery protection function is activated; After the protection function, the power of the battery 132 has not reached the preset power. Please refer to FIG. 1 and FIG. 3 at the same time for further explanation. Before judging whether the electric quantity of the battery 132 reaches the preset electric quantity (that is, step 208 in FIG. Step 302 of 3) to determine whether the power of the battery 132 has reached the preset power after the battery protection function is activated. When judging that the value of the state of charge is not 1, the control circuit 110 determines that the electric quantity of the battery 132 has not reached the preset electric quantity, and continues to judge whether the electric quantity of the battery 132 reaches the predetermined electric quantity (i.e. execute step 208 of FIG. 3 ); otherwise, when When the value of the charging state is determined to be 1, the control circuit 110 determines that the power of the battery 132 has reached the preset power, and controls the charging circuit 120 to stop charging the battery 132 (ie step 212 in FIG. 3 ). In addition, when it is judged that the electric quantity of the battery 132 reaches the preset electric quantity, the control circuit 110 also sets the value of the state of charge as 1 (as in step 304 of FIG. 3 ), and before controlling the charging circuit 120 to fully charge the battery 132, the control circuit 110 first clears the value of the state of charge (as shown in step 306 of FIG. 3 ), making the value of the state of charge 0. In this way, as long as it is determined that the power of the battery 132 has reached the preset power, the control circuit 110 will jump out of the related control program of charging, and will not allow the battery 132 to be charged and discharged repeatedly, so as to avoid the service life of the battery 132 being consumed.

Please refer to FIG. 1 again. In this example, the charging module for extending battery life further includes an impedance 140 and a switch 150, wherein the impedance 140 is realized by a resistor. One end of the impedance 140 is coupled to the power voltage VDD. One end of the switch 150 is coupled to the other end of the impedance 140 to generate the control signal CS, and the other end is coupled to the common potential GND. When the switch 150 is turned off, the control signal CS is high, and the control circuit 110 does not activate the battery protection function, so it will control the charging circuit 120 to fully charge the battery 132; otherwise, when the switch 150 is closed, the control signal CS is low (low), the control circuit 110 starts the battery protection function. The switch 150 can be arranged on the casing of the computer system, so that the user can make a selection conveniently. If the user wants to go out, the switch 150 can be disconnected to fully charge the battery 132; to activate the battery protection function.

In addition, in this example, the battery 132 is disposed in the battery module 130, and the control circuit 110 is implemented by an embedded controller (EC) 112, and is used to execute the operations shown in FIG. 2 or FIG. 3 . The embedded controller 112 has communication interfaces SMBUS1 and SMBUS2, both of which are system management bus (SMBUS for short), so each communication interface has two communication lines. Among them, the communication interface SMBUS1 is used to connect the battery module 130, so that the embedded controller 112 can obtain the relevant information of the battery 132, and the communication interface SMBUS2 is used to connect the charging circuit 120, so that the embedded controller 112 can control the charging circuit 120. Perform charging-related settings, such as setting at least one of charging current and charging voltage.

Besides, the embedded controller 112 also determines whether to cause the charging circuit 120 to charge the battery 132 according to the charging enable signal CHGEN. In addition, in this example, the embedded controller 112 also has a general purpose input/output pin (general purpose input/output pin), which is marked with GPIO in the figure, and the embedded controller 112 uses the general purpose input/output pin GPI0 to receive the control signal CS.

Although the embedded controller 112 uses the system management bus as a communication interface and receives the control signal CS through a general-purpose input/output pin, those skilled in the art should know that even if the embedded controller 112 adopts other types The communication interface, and using other types of input pins or input/output pins to receive the control signal CS can also be implemented. Of course, the control signal CS is not limited to be generated by the circuit formed by the impedance 140 and the switch 150 . In addition, the charging module for prolonging the battery life proposed by the present invention is not limited to be used in notebook computers, and in extension, it can be applied to any computer system.

The utility model utilizes the control circuit to control the operation of the charging circuit, and the control circuit determines whether to activate the battery protection function according to the control signal. When the battery protection function starts, the control circuit will judge whether the power of the battery reaches the preset power, and when the power of the battery reaches the preset power, it will control the charging circuit to stop charging the battery, so the utility model can be used according to the control signal. Decide whether to charge the battery only to a preset level, preventing the battery from losing its useful life due to overcharging or overdischarging. In addition, because the control circuit can also determine whether the battery power has reached the preset power level after the battery protection function is activated by judging whether the value of the charging state is a preset value, so that as long as it is determined that the battery power has reached the preset power level , the control circuit jumps out of the relevant control program for charging, so the utility model does not allow the battery to be charged repeatedly, and avoids the service life of the battery being consumed.

The above disclosures are only a few specific embodiments of the utility model, but the utility model is not limited thereto, and any changes conceivable by those skilled in the art should fall within the protection scope of the utility model.

Claims (16)

1. A charging module for extending battery life, suitable for being set in a computer system, characterized in that it comprises: a charging circuit for charging a battery of the computer system; and A control circuit determines whether to start a battery protection function according to a control signal. When the battery protection function is started, the control circuit judges whether the power of the battery reaches a preset power, and when the power of the battery reaches the preset power , the charging circuit is controlled to stop charging the battery. 2. The charging module for extending battery life according to claim 1, wherein when the battery protection function is not activated, the control circuit controls the charging circuit to fully charge the battery. 3. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 2, wherein the control circuit controls the charging circuit to charge the battery when the power of the battery does not reach the preset power. 4. The charging module for prolonging battery life according to claim 3, wherein before judging whether the power of the battery reaches the preset power, the control circuit first judges whether a value of a charging state is a preset value to determine whether the battery’s power has reached the preset value after the battery protection function is activated. preset power, and continue to judge whether the battery’s power has reached the preset power, and when it is judged that the value of the charging state is the preset value, the control circuit determines that the battery’s power has reached the preset power, and controls The charging circuit stops charging the battery. 5. The charging module for prolonging battery life as claimed in claim 4, wherein when it is judged that the power of the battery reaches the preset power, the control circuit further sets the value of the charging state as the preset value. 6. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 5, wherein before controlling the charging circuit to fully charge the battery, the control circuit first clears the value of the charging state. 7. The charging module for extending battery life according to claim 1, further comprising: an impedance, one end of which is coupled to a supply voltage; and One end of a switch is coupled to the other end of the impedance to generate the control signal, and the other end is coupled to a common potential. 8. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 7, wherein the switch is arranged on the casing of the computer system. 9. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 1, wherein the control circuit is implemented by an embedded controller. 10. The charging module for extending battery life according to claim 9, wherein the embedded controller as the control circuit has a general input/output pin, and receives the control via the general input/output pin Signal. 11. The charging module for prolonging battery life according to claim 9, wherein the battery is set in a battery module, and the embedded controller as the control circuit has a first communication interface, and uses the second A communication interface is connected to the battery module to obtain relevant information of the battery. 12. The charging module for extending battery life according to claim 11, characterized in that, the embedded controller as the control circuit has a second communication interface, and the charging circuit is connected to the charging circuit through the second communication interface to The charging circuit performs charging-related settings. 13. The charging module for prolonging battery life according to claim 12, wherein the charging-related settings include at least one of a charging current setting and a charging voltage setting. 14. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 12, wherein both the first communication interface and the second communication interface are system management buses. 15. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 9, wherein the embedded controller as the control circuit determines whether to cause the charging circuit to charge the battery with a charging enable signal. 16. The charging module for extending battery life as claimed in claim 1, wherein the computer system is a notebook computer, and the battery is a battery of the notebook computer.

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