Using capacitor to gracefully shutdown PC

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We all know pulling the plug on a running PC is bad, bc the operating system could be in a critical process and interrupting it would corrupt the system.

But using a capacitor that holds electric charge couldnt we give the PC a couple of „grace seconds“ where the pc finishes its job and then starts the shutdown process?

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9 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

A capacitor has a few downsides. “A few seconds” of grace time may not be enough if a system is in the middle of an update that takes minutes. If you want to increase the amount of time, you’ll need a bigger capacitor which can be dangerous given the size and amount of power stored.

Instead of a capacitor, you should use a battery. Much like how a laptop can run on battery when the power cord is pulled, there are devices called uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) that have a large battery for backup power if there is an outage. This gives you a few minutes to save your work and gracefully shut down your system rather than everything shutting off instantly.

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