I am planning on running the Jetson AGX Xavier developer kit (in nvp model 0) from a lithium ion battery through the barrel connector. Depending on how charged the battery is, the voltage varies between ~16V and ~12.8V. Which is within the specified range that I can find in the documentation. There are a bunch of low power usb devices connected. There is nothing else connected to the battery.
I have a few questions. Should I put a regulator in between the battery and Jetson? Should I put a fuse between the battery/regulator and Jetson? (if so what amp rating?) Is there a better more secure way to provide power than the barrel connector?
Sorry, I am a bit new to a lot of the electrical side of things and I am finding it challenging finding and reading some of the documentation.
I can’t answer the fuse or other questions, but yes, you should provide a regulator between battery and Jetson (especially if the battery powers anything else…and if the battery powers something inductive, like motors, you could actually damage the Jetson under some conditions if there is no regulation or spike protection). If regulation is poor, then you might find the system randomly shuts down for no other apparent reason.
can you explain why a fuse is unnecessary for the dev kit?
A short-circuit somewhere in the dev kit will never draw a high current from the 12V-in?
Is that it?
The module can monitor current, yes, but only the current provided to the SOM. If the problem is on the carrier, how do you protect the whole electronics? No way.
The fuse should be right after the battery, before the regulator.
That being said, if the battery can godown to 12.8V, and the devkit needs >> 9V, that doesn’ leave you much room for regulation, especially if you run the whole devkit at max power.