Geekworm for Raspberry Pi UPS, X728 (Max 5.1V 6A) UPS & Power Management Board with AC Power Loss Detection|Auto Power On|Safe Shutdown|Battery Capacity Reading|Low Battery Auto Shutdown|Buzzer

Product works very well, and and provides much more power than other similar systems. I'm able to power a Raspberry Pi 4 as well as a 5V USB powered router from the 5V pins on top of the board.They likely don't link to it because Amazon blocks them, but they also have extremely good documentation on their wiki which is easily found by google searching "X728 Geekworm." Their documentation provides both hardware specifications, as well as links to code repos to see how you can read current voltage and battery life status in for either display, auto timeout features, etc.

** Updated 11/2/21They sent me the chip I need to repair my damaged board because I couldn't get it myself. I see there is yet another revision that I would have liked to have but I'm stuck with what I have.One issue with these units is compatibility between versions. I now have 2 different discontinued versions that have different compatibility issues. I hope the ones I have don't break....**original:Ok, so to be fair, I have several of these and in general they work well and I like them so I ordered another one.I have multiple of version 1.3 and the new one I just got is ver 2.0. It looks like a complete re-design (look at 1.3/2.0 pics and you'll see the differences).THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE THAT CAUSED ME A PROBLEM is that the BATTERIES are oriented differently than the previous versions and of course I just popped the batteries out of the old one and put them in the new one and massive smoke. Yeah, I didn't pay attention so this is a warning that you should. On the other hand, CHEAP, SIMPLE DIODES could have prevented my problem.So now I have a cool looking paper weight.I hope nobody else has the issue I had and I hope they add some diodes.

The Raspberry Pi is a great piece of hardware, but it does not have a way to power on and off using hardware. Turning off power without proper shutdown runs the risk of corrupting the SD card. I needed reliable power management for several Raspberry Pi's running OctoPrint, a media control server and security server. I could not find a working system. In frustration, I had resigned myself to building my own system using an Arduino. That involved writing a bunch of C++ code, as well as designing and ordering my own printed circuit boards. Doable, but not a lot of fun. That's where the X728 system comes in. It does power management well but also includes a battery backup using 18650 lithium batteries. It's a hat, so it plugs in on top of the Raspberry Pi. Standoffs and screws are included so you can securely mount the hat on your Raspberry Pi. It has connectors for a lighted power switch and additional lithium batteries.Instructions are available on the GeekWorm web site. There is a script that needs to be downloaded and then run. It installs several scripts on the Raspberry Pi. You run a few commands to register startup and shutdown scripts. About 15 minutes work and it's done. Easy peasy.My first X728 V2.1 had a problem. It would not shut down. I purchased several X728 V2.1 boards, so it was easy to swap boards. Yep, the first board was defective. GeekWorm tech support was awesome so I'm only knocking one star off.This is the best Raspberry Pi power management solution I have found. Being able to safely control power is essential. The addition of battery backup for critical servers is HUGE!I wish GeekWorm had better quality control, but support is quite responsive. Support is based in China so there is a 24-hour delay to get a response. They start with very basic questions, so it takes a few iterations to find a solution.Update: I have purchased several more X-728 boards and almost each one has problems. Connectors not soldered on, boards that do not work, the list goes on. I want to love this board. I really do. But if you purchase one, resign yourself to dealing with Geekworm's quality control issues. Too bad, because there is a lot to like about this board.

I purchased one of these for my OctoPi/OctoPrint setup and I was having issues with the X728. The unit would turn on the RPi just fine, I could read the battery level just fine, and I could run the power test (too see if the RPi was being powered off batteries or the 5V input. But, I could not get the soft shutdown and power off to work at all.I actually returned the first one thinking it was defective and right after that, Geekworm contacted me, via the Amazon portal, to see if they could do anything to help me get this working. After several email exchanges of trying different things, I found, in my case, that one of the 3rd-party plug-in for OctoPrint was interfering with the communications for the soft shutdown.While they didn't come up with the exact solution, they hung in there with me with suggestions while we got it diagnosed and working.

Using the included 2.5 x 20 mm standoffs created an initially annoying problem. The 40 pin header extenders I have were about 6 mm too long, making the UPS float way above the Pi and preventing the stackup from fitting in the Geekworm metal case. I first trimmed down the pins on the header extender. That didn't get the UPS board low enough to fit in the metal case. I finally trimmed down the plastic on the header extender, that dropped the UPS by another 2 mm and solved the problem. Nowhere do they mention that a non-standard-height 40-pin header is required to get the stackup to work in the case. That was kind of annoying.Second annoyance is the "ac power" input. Where/what is this? The UPS board doesn't take ac power. So I'm guessing that it's the 5521 jack?As well, why would that jack be rated for only 5 Vdc? This should be designed to take a wide voltage range (10-30 Vdc would be great) that that I could power it in the truck without having to custom build yet another 12 to 5.1 stepdown converter.Other than these significant annoyances the UPS seems to work fine. I haven't yet installed the software to enable the autoshutdown feature. Since this is for the truck, I appreciate a UPS to prevent glitches getting to the RPi.