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2twisty · 7th Mar, 2013, 11:47 PM

@rikardo1979,

If it's a device that has open files, then yes, I agree with you. However, a TV at most has some flash memory that remembers things like your channel scan, current volume level, etc. I would be very very surprised if those preferences were contained in an active (and therefore corruptable) file. Over the years, I've unplugged items like TVs and Tunner/Receiver/Amplifiers with no ill effects.

I do plan to also put my external USB drives on a relay switch, as well. However, as part of the "sleep" procedure, I'll issue the needed commands for "safely remove." I'll probably just use a script to unmount the filesystems, since that will sync any data, then issue the power-down command.

Do any of you have experience with items like the CoCo products that CurlyMo mentions, but are deesigned for use in the US and switch 110V? I'm also not looking for something very complex -- something with a couple screw terminals for the relay trigger and a switched 110V outlet is good enough for me.

However, I can't decide if I want to have the TV on a NO relay or a NC relay. I think I'm going to go for NO, so that if the Pi powers off, so does the TV. I don't see that have any ill effects since I won't be using the TV for anything other than a display for the Pi.

The external USBs, however, are another story. I can't really decide, but I am also leaning toward NO. In the rare case that the Pi is not shut down properly (and therefore safely unmounting the USB devices), it won't be any different than when you have a power outage. Also, since the data on these drives is mostly only being read, powering them down suddenly isn't as catastrophic, since its unlikely that there will be any open files. I'm still debating that one...

What are your thoughts?

I'm also thinking of cramming all this stuff into a box. Right now, with all the USB hardware and power cables, the area under my TV is an absolute rats nest! What do you guys do to control the wires?