[SOLVED] Wake-on-LAN from S5 using Toshiba Sleep and Charge, and USB NIC ?

[riny]

Yes this is another WOL question, but with a twist. I have an old Toshiba C55Dt laptop running centos, being used in an embedded application where it needs to be always on. The BIOS doesn't support automatic power-on, but wake-on-LAN would be fine for me. It works nicely after a shutdown as long as the AC is still connected, but in the event of a power outage, the onboard NIC no longer responds to WOL, even after AC power is restored. I'm guessing that after a shutdown on battery, power to the NIC is completely cut and it doesn't get restored until the next boot.

I thought of a loophole though. This laptop supports Toshiba Sleep and Charge, which can provide power to USB devices even when the laptop is off. It's meant for charging peripherals, as you can tell from the name. But I'm wondering if I get a USB NIC, if it could draw power this way and trigger a startup on WOL... or if it's just a lost cause.

The laptop in question is in a remote location and I'm only there about once a month, so while I'll probably have to try it to be sure, I'm interested in your thoughts before I next have the opportunity (and before buying a USB NIC that doesn't do me any good, even though they're cheap enough).

I'm also open to any other suggestions on getting this thing to turn on after a power failure!

 

[bill001g]

I have never seen a USB based wake on lan. Key is the bios itself needs some way to accept a signal from the USB device. What the wake on lan feature does is in effect push the power button to boot the rest of the machine. I guess it could be technically possible but I have never seen a bios setting like that.

Since you have the wol working...they tend to be very flaky...your best solution to the power problem is a small UPS. A laptop will take almost no power when it is in wol mode so you should be able to get by with a fairly inexpensive model.