Topic: A Pleasent Surprise With My Acurite

[benay ra'am]

I had a power outage about 10:30pm last night. Both my Weather Stations, Modem and Wireless Router are plugged into a UPS. Well, a hour into the outage, one of my UPS shuts down and the other two I have is warning me they are about to shut down. So I killed power off to the UPS and my Acurite goes down and off line. The reason the Acurite goes down is because the HD Display does not have a Battery Back Up like my Davis has. I was bummed about losing the Data from the Two HD Displays.
About 1:00am, I have power again. I power up the UPS(s) and I was surprised that I kept the current day precipitation but had no historical data, time and date had reset too, also the smartHub started to up load in about a minute or two and under a minute that both HD Displays are receiving Data from the 5-in-1.

I said the heck with it and deal with the date and time when I get up.
Well, before I went to work, I reset the Date and time and All my data came back! AFAIK, the HD Displays do not have a Super Cap or Internal Battery Back up. CS over at Acurite Forums also stated that if you lose power to the HD Displays, you will lose all Data. My Displays were off about a hour. So I wonder what gives?

[Glenn]

Now that's interesting. I was under the assumption that just unplugging and moving the display would cause a data loss. Any chance the display communicates with the hub?

[benay ra'am]

Now that's interesting. I was under the assumption that just unplugging and moving the display would cause a data loss. Any chance the display communicates with the hub?

I assumed the same thing from what I read about over at the Acurite Forum. No mention of a non-volatile memory.

Nope, the Display just receives the Data from the 5-in-1 and AFAIK, the smartHub does not xmit from the Antenna, just uploads the Data via Hard Line Ethernet. The Displays were purchased from two different vendors at different times, one in a Kit Weather Station (1019m) from Amazon and one from Weather Shack.
 

[Glenn]

Very interesting.  I'll be keeping an eye on mine.  Power outages occurs often at the VT location.  I'll report back when that happens. 

[benay ra'am]

Very interesting.  I'll be keeping an eye on mine.  Power outages occurs often at the VT location.  I'll report back when that happens.

Standby, I'm going to unplug one of my HD Display for 2 hours and I'll report back.

[benay ra'am]

All rightie, I just plugged the HD Display back in. It took less than 5 seconds to acquire Station Signal and Data( yes I timed it at 3.7 seconds ). Display did reset to 01/01/2016 and lost Historical Data . I reset the Time and Date and I re-acquired All Historical Data, the only niggle is the 14-30 day learning period of the Barometer ( Not a big deal for me ). Let me stress that I did not bring the Station in and set it up next to the Display or vice-a-versa.

I do remember someone took the back cover off the display and noted there was a outlined empty spot on the circuit board for a Button Battery Holder for either a cr2025 or 2032 battery. I will not take my Displays apart while under warranty but I'm pretty sure there is a battery there, I'll look after the warranty expires or the Display dies.

Edit to Add: Display did not go into Auto Config mode when I plugged it back in, I had to manually configure the Date and Time.

[Glenn]

Interesting. We had a power blip in VT at some point during the week. My display appeared to be fine. Not sure how long the outage lasted for; we had  a few blinking clocks when we arrived.

[benay ra'am]

I finally have response from Tori CS Acurite:
 "Hello John N,
This model was not meant to retain memory. It is possible that the memory may have held. But this is not something we can guarantee as this was not what it was designed to do. Thank you."

Well something is in the HD Display that is retaining memory. Since I have two of them, I'll remove power for 3, 4, 8 hours, a Day and on and find out how long it takes until the Display will lose Memory. I'll stop at 30 Days, it'll be fun!

[DoctorKnow]

Have you tried hooking up to the port on the side yet, like with a USB cable to PC? I am curious if the port is live or what it is for? Maybe firmware updating?

[benay ra'am]

Have you tried hooking up to the port on the side yet, like with a USB cable to PC? I am curious if the port is live or what it is for? Maybe firmware updating?

No not yet, I'll wait when the warranty expires and then Dr. AvE will come out to play. So far both HD Displays are chooching pretty good and the 5-in1 and the smartHub too.

So far with the Davis, you do get what you pay for in spades, but with my Acurite, it's like the "little engine that could" ( Knock on a whole bunch of timber ).

[Glenn]

Have you tried hooking up to the port on the side yet, like with a USB cable to PC? I am curious if the port is live or what it is for? Maybe firmware updating?

I found the info on Acurite's forum; the port is for firmware updates.

Interesting that it's not designed to hold info, but in some cases, it does. Curious to see how the testing pans out.

[Glenn]

Keeping this going.

Our power dropped Friday in VT per text message from the power company. It was off for about an hour. When we arrived, the date and time were not correct. However, it appeared historical data was still there. Once I reset the date and time, things were back to normal. So wondering what's keeping the data after the power goes out.

[benay ra'am]

Keeping this going.

Our power dropped Friday in VT per text message from the power company. It was off for about an hour. When we arrived, the date and time were not correct. However, it appeared historical data was still there. Once I reset the date and time, things were back to normal. So wondering what's keeping the data after the power goes out.

Magic Pixies

[Glenn]

LOL! I'm starting to wonder!

[benay ra'am]

Lost power last night and my UPS Failed. The HD Display was off for 8 hours. Lost the Date and time, once reset, All of the Historical Data came back . Seems some Engineer made a change and Failed to update the Manual and notify Tech services/ customer support

[Glenn]

I wonder why it saves data...but not the date and time?

[worachj]

Just reporting and confirming.

Moved my HD Display to a different location. It took 10+ minutes before I was able to plug it back in. I lost nothing! The display retained everything, time/date, historical records, and my additional lightning detector sensor. The only thing I'm not sure about is retaining the data for the self-calibrating forecasting.

[Rhino]

If unit is without power for more than 10 minutes, the time and date will be reset.

As soon as you set the time and date again, the records will have the correct timeline reference again and show up correctly.

The USB port is simply for manufacturing QC.