#Arduino mega 2560 timer pins mods#
#Arduino mega 2560 timer pins code#

The reset and ground pins are the two pins on the USB ICSP header located closest to the USB connector. The ninth test was to jumper the reset and ground pins of the USB ICSP header together to put the 16U2 USB chip into reset mode which consumes less power than programming mode as suggested here. This reduced power consumption to 55mA while awake and 28mA while asleep. You need to use a multimeter to make sure the pin is disconnected from the board. The regulator is next to the barrel jack and the ground pin is the one closest to the barrel jack. The eigth test was to disconnect the on board regulator by cutting the ground pin with a pair of side cutters. This doesn't seem like much of a saving in terms of milliamps, but if you consider the voltage and amperage and look at consumption in watts (V * A = W), then in sleep mode it is consuming 0.16W at 5V compared with 0.23W at 7V. This reduced power consumption while awake to 58mA and while asleep to 31mA. I did this by feeding 5V directly into the 5V pin of the Arduino and connecting the negative from the power supply to the Arduino ground pin. The seventh test was to bypass the on board regulator and power the Arduino from an external regulated 5V supply. Dummy watchdog timer handler to prevent reset * set new watchdog timeout prescaler value */ This reduced power consumption while sleeping to 32mA.

The sixth test was to put the Arduino to sleep using the power down sleep mode for the longest interval possible of 8 seconds.The fourth test was to set all of the digital pins as output and write them low.

#Arduino mega 2560 timer pins code#

Previous steps code omitted for brevity

The third test was to set all analog pins as digital and write them low.

This turns off the on board LED located near pin 13.

The second test was to set pin 13 as an output pin and write it low.

My first test was a baseline, with a stock standard Mega copy connected to 7.2V through the barrel jack basically doing nothing.

I am measuring current with a multimeter connected in line between the power supply and the Mega.

#Arduino mega 2560 timer pins mods#

it includes all code and hardware mods from previous tests.

Most of these techniques exist in various posts around the web, but I thought it would be handy to capture them all in one place and specific to the Mega. I didn't want to build a bare bones board at this point in time, so I was trying to do the most possible with a stock standard unit. I thought that I would capture my power measurements here in case they benefit someone else. I have a project that is required to run on batteries and also needs an Arduino Mega 2560 to drive HTTP communications over a 3G shield.