I have a Kurzweil SP6 and a Yamaha MODX7 and a Lenovo laptop. Could I run them all from a powerbank and do away with mains leads? Anyone out there done this? There are a (very few) threads on Reddit but nothing recent or very helpful
How many batteries you got?
It’s a matter of how much stored energy you have, how much power you’re burning, and how long.
Get a bank of 20–30 deep cycle batteries you can play quite a while
I’ve done this often, but it requires some forethought. First i’ll describe my rig:
- Schumacher XP2260 power pack. Cost around $100 (i think that was on sale) in the automotive section of the local big box hardware store. Rated 22Amp-hour @12V.
- Pure sine wave inverter which i needed because the 120V output from the Schumacher is crap (“modified” sine wave is really more like a square wave, not good for electronics).
- 2x EV ZxA1 powered speakers
- Small A&H Notepad mixer
- Casio PX3 keyboard (later replaced with Roland FA08)
- Lenovo laptop computer running off its internal battery
I measured the power consumption of each piece in the rig (at a low-to-moderate volume level), with the goal of keeping the total power requirement no more than 60 Watts total. This gives me enough power to last for 3 hours: 60 Watts = 5A x 12V, so 3 hours would in theory take 5 x 3 = 15 Amp-hour, but in reality you’d need more than that due to inefficiencies of the system (and manufacturers’ optimistic ratings).
I suspect your Kurzweil SP6 and Yamaha MODX7 would each take a bit more power than my estimates; i measured the current draw of my Yamaha XF6 to be 2.5x the FA08. Certainly if you want to use both keyboards that’s going to add up.
What are you using for amplification ? I was pleased to measure a relatively low current draw for my ZxA1’s, around 200mA @120V each (mfr spec says 600mA). But it’s still the major piece of the total current draw.
You could always get a larger power bank – there’s one that was discussed on another forum that ran around $500 if i recall correctly.
Anyway, that’s my experience, so i hope you get something useful from all that.
– Jimbo
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Almost all my gigs nowadays are battery powered. I use Vox mini5 amp which has guitar, mic and aux inputs. My guitar Variax 700(with external battery) connects using a MOTU microbook(power from USB) into aux. My computer is a Surface Pro 6 tweaked for max performance. Cantabile handles the Midi from the Fishman Tripleplay pickup and guitar into Helix Native as well as drum machine and media player for backing tracks. I’ve given away all my trade secrets. It’s better to use Cantabile for a mixer instead of an external mixer board.