Inside the Hopi power meter. (It contains a smart meter chip!) 

Only half way thru "what the f*#/ is the button for" had me rolling.

I reckon the numbers 1-24 you can select in the annual power consumption part are the number of hours per day the device is in use?

"What the f*** is the button for?" Great t-shirt texts. I thought it was the hopi logo. So unassuming. lol

if you want to relive that button moment 5:15

"There's a button." "WTF is the button for?" "I have no clue what that's for." "I'm obviously gonna have to press it" "Right, that has to be investigated as well. One moment please." "That took a while because there were a couple of interesting things...." This is why we subscribe. Thank you Clive, for being Clive and for sharing your videos with us.

HAHAHAHA! I've never heard you swear like that over a button!

That button comment has to go into the Big Clive highlights video when someone makes it.

"there is a button" "wtf is the button for" that cracked me up.This is why clive's videos are amazing, you are just a genuine and funny person that shows in your content.

Love the battery cover that exposes live terminals !

"There's a button ... WTF is the button for? ... I have no clue what that's for .. I'm obviously gonna have to press it" I was so hoping for the display to change to "Please do not press this button again"

2:44 “..end up with a gap if I did try to turn it around”. But what the hell, it already has a deathdapter style mains socket, mains voltage clip in speaker terminals, and a user accessible live battery compartment round the back! What’s one more design defect amongst friends!

To test it properly I want you to plug the Hopi meter into a Hopi meter.

uH-- = Complex (or apparent?) power (datasheet says it's active electric energy) AEC = Annual electricity costs APC = Annual power consumption CO2 = Annual CO2 consumption L-UP = Upper limit of power When the display shows 'uH--', the display below it shows the apparent power. In the video, calculated apparent power is 5.645VA (slightly offset, it is 6.86VA), and when the displays changed to show another value, it is defined as load time, which is the combined value of those two displays, 0001 17.42 = 117.42h of load time (datasheets says h, I don't know what it is for). USB section is just used for USB-to-serial port converter, but the IC is omitted on the board. Additional note: The range it goes between 1 and 24 is both to set up an alarm for upper power limit and to set hours for APC.

1-24 may be how many hours the appliance will be used per day.

Am I the only one who was half expecting one of the displays to say "RTFM" eventually? :P

Unbelievable!! After all this time, you find a button on the Hopi!

Unexpected mystery buttons inside devices are like free candy unexpectedly

Just here to tell that HOPI is being unboxed right now ❤ The T button is now described in the manual: "Key: adjust hours, display model, clear energy data. Remark: w hen display active power power will a lternate display the hours of load." There is also long and short press operation with graph provided! It can show even "annul CO2 consumption". Remember that "it will automatically stores the current operation as long as you not to press the key for more than 3s"!

@bigclivedotcom, I've been looking at the datasheet and the communication to the processor is SPI, which means the speed of communication can be anything, so I guess you could put a faster crystal on the processor side without any apparent issues. I'm guessing the CS5463 Xtal speed is 4.096Mhz (which was shown in the datasheet examples). It IS a pretty amazing chip.

I just took delivery of a HOPI today based on Clive having one. Good enough for Clive to use in his videos, good enough for me. Greetings from Australia.

You mentioned the lower current range HOPI meter which had me interested, based on a quick search the only place that came up for HOPI meters appears to be aliexpress. The HOPI HP-9800 model does have a "HP-8173" listed in the description below rated up to 2.5A and "active power test range" 0.01W~550W instead of 0.5W~4400W of the HP-9800. The only minor issue appears to be that no HP-8173 is anywhere to be found, not on aliexpress nor on other places at the internet. There is also some documentation on that description about the button btw (any weird spelling below is directly from their image) "AEC: Annul electricity costs APC: Annul Power Consumption uH__: Active electric energy CO2: Annul CO2 Consumption L-UP: Upper limit of Power" Yet another interesting bit here, they have button press instructions consisting of long (>2s) and short (

Couldn’t you put an R+C over each of the pins on the back (approx 3:35 in the vid), to keep the segments lit for 20ms (one 50hz cycle)? V=Ve^trc so to get a half-life of 20ms and a resistance of 1k so it doesn’t pull the voltage down to ground too fast, 20ms/1kOhm gives you 20uF so grab some 1k resistors and 10V 22uF ceramic caps and stick them across to fix the flickering for the camera? Guess that’d cost £20 and a lot of headache soldering almost two hundred parts

In my world, Hopi (long o, named after the Hopi Tribe of Arizona) is a Labrador who enjoys chewing on Flukes.

1...24 hours of daily use - then it also makes sense with the kWh/year

Regarding mystery optocoupler: it could be for creating a nice square wave for mains frequency counting ( if that specialized power-monitor IC wants it that way )

If any of your phones have a high speed camera function, it could be vaguely interesting to see a slowmo shot of the leds so we can better understand how they are driven.

Ohh... That button reminds me of a secret button inside my old CRT TV remote, it has the rubber pad with the carbon contact but it's very shallow and the label has buried the hole it's sitting in, use a needle and press it reveals a service menu that let you change a lot of things like overscan, rotate the screen...

Let's change the batteries *bzzzzzzzzt*

2:35 A little bit of filing and some how glue n she'll be right 👍🏻 If it was me then I'd definitely stick a double pole switch in for those speaker terminals AND a fast blow fuse because they're only rated for 3A at 50V so that's almost 6x the voltage rating! 🤯

You could theoretically put a faster osc in the board without affecting the serial communication, where it's SPI or I2C, they both have a clock pulse line Although look at the datasheet for the microcontroller for max clock speed, i would say it's max would be 20Mhz, but don't quote me on that

Hi! The variability of mains AC frequency is a lot greater than we often assume. While the grid is regulated closely, and the frequency is maintained at 50hz almost perfectly over longer time frames (think days), it can swing around considerably in the short term. Excursions of up to a few hundred millihertz are not uncommon, and smaller deviations are constant. The stability of the quartz crystal inside your Hopi will contribute some, but over the short term and with a constant ambient temperature I think what you're seeing on the display is pretty accurate.

3:45 “Without taking the circuit board out...” Two seconds later- the board is coming out...! Thanks for that.

This reminds me of a sequence from Titan A. E. ... Gune: "Does this look familiar? Do you know what it is? Neither do I. I made it last night in my sleep. Apparently I used Gindrogac. Highly unstable. I put a button on it. Yes. I wish to press it, but I'm not sure what will happen if I do."

Great video, Amazing that after so many uses already, you revealed that magic hidden button.

The pulse output on the metering chip is often exposed on terminals which can be wired to an external recording system, most usually a building management system (BMS), or a dedicated pulse counting logger. Advantage: simplicity, disadvantage: any failure of the monitoring system and pulses are missed (with a BMS, notouriously pulses might be missed if the microcontroller is too busy doing other things, or comms to the central unti fail). The alternative is a serial communications protocol between the meter and BMS, most commonly MODBUS, a variant of RS485.

possible functions for the "WTF button" -triggers the earth shattering kaboom -switches between metric and SAE units -launches North Korean nukes -its the missing AZ-5 button from Chernobyl

I google the operation instruction for you~ APC: Annul Power Consumption REC: Annul electricity costs uH--: Active electric energy CO2: Annul CO2 Consumption L-UP: Upper limit of Power Annual Power consumption can be set by press the key for short to set the limit (Range : 1~24) When set to display 'uH--' mode, displaying the load time the number in "Hz" and "kWh" are combined to give out the total hour? long press twice the miracle button to clear all data

Can you imagine Clive in an Ulduar raid, getting to Mimiron and seeing the BIG RED BUTTON on the wall that says DO NOT PUSH THIS BUTTON.

At 7:16 did anyone else think their broadband had died? 😄

Very nice. I've seen the Hopi in a lot of your videos and it's nice to see how it's made. The dedicated power meter chip is really surprising! The mystery button though..... have you tried to contact the manufacturer about it? They might be happy to explain it to you.

AEC might be REC can you record current consumed over time maybe?

Thumbs up if you think Big Clive should design and sell his own Hopi meter without the flickering!!!

I tend to always open mains powered stuff I ordered from china, you just wanna see if there's a chance of it burning down the house

Could uH be micro Hertz and AEC actually be REC as in record? Not sure that record would mean but was the first thing I saw

uH - current power consumption APC - annual power consumption numbers - number of hours a day the thing is on - want 24 for constant use measurements RTFM, i think

I bought one of these devices from Aliexpress after I saw you using it in one of your videos. Great little device and great videos.

Sounds like we need a high speed camera to check the display

For anyone curious like I was, I purchased one and have the manual. HAND-HELD POWER MONITOR, Operating Instructions MODEL: HP-9800/20A, HP-8713/2A Shenzen HOPI electrnoic technology co. LTD. 1. Description of menu and key REC - Annual electricity costs APC - Annual Power Consumption CO2 - Annual CO2 consumption uH - Active electric energy L - UP - upper limit of power Short press: Press key less than 1 s Long press: Press key more than 2 s 2. Set the allarm upper limit of power and the hours for annual pwoer consumption Short press Set the amount of hours per day to calculate annual power consumption 3. Set the display content Reset device by unplugging and plugging in Long press "FREQUENCE" segment display shows: A. Active electrical energy, "uH--" short press B. Annual electricity cost "REC" short press C. Annual CO2 consumption "CO2" short press D. Annual Power Consumption "APC" Note: When set to display "uH--" model, display the load time: 1880.5h (No idea what the hell this means) 4. Clear the electrical power data and load time Reset device by unplugging and plugging in A. Long press until 'FREQUENCY' segment display shows 'uH--' B. Long press once more until 'FREQUENCY' segment display shows 'REC' 5. Storage operation It will automatically store the current operation as long as you do not press the key for more than 3s Note: After some experimenting you are able to set the kWh price when using the AEC mode a. Switch to Annual energy cost mode b. Short press and set the price per kWh The range is $0 to $20 per kWh.

I wanna know what happens if you plug a hopi into another hopi

If you set the number to 2 you get the monthly power consumption, which I personally find more useful. Unfortunately my hopi doesn't remember the cost per kWhr, so you have to set it every time if you want to have a direct display of cost. Also the male plug gets hot at only 8A for a few seconds, so I will probably change it. And in my unit the soldering of the thick wires was pretty bad, so I resolder it before use. I forgot to mention, if you hold the button for a couple of seconds more you reset the energy and time of the "uH" screen.

What would happen if you plugged the Hopi into another Hopi?

Just wanna say i have a Hopi meter too, also UK, and i just checked the fuse inside the plug and its a 13A fuse that they've bridged with some solder and copper wire... Might be worth checking yours, and maybe even the new meter you have (even tho the new one isn't rated at 4500W)

Huh that meter is only $50, I might have to get one :D

Definitely getting strong RTFM vibes from this device. 😂

Nothing special with the frequency going up and down. It depends on the loads of net. Someone starts an engine, or heat pump, or whatever? The frequency drops. Then the compensation kicks in to raise it, ad then someone stops some (often heavy) consumers, and the frequency goes up, then compensation kicks in and lowers it. It's a constant battle! And, at least here in Sweden, they try to even it out to be averaged to 50,00 Hz in a 24 hour period (calendar day). You can see that it's often lower during morning and evening and higher during day and night (higher consumption during morning and evening when people start and end their day, and thus the frequency drops).

I'd like to say "I was waiting for this for YEEEARS." ..., but I don't think I even follow for that long... ^^

I often wondered what the 'T' was there for. Mystery solved.

whats that 4 pin pad alignment for could this be for serial port or isp connection. mmmh maybe it is even more hackable than you deemed possible. edit looked the rest of the video. im a bit dissapointed that you didnt whack out the datasheet for that uC. looks like an st one to me from the picture so datasheet should be available. then you could use the meter in continiuity mode and just find out whether or not our supections are corrector not

Would you be able to build one with what you want and without the flicker? A plug, a standard Edison screw fitting and wire terminals for the common things you test without needing to use adapters. Right up there with building a USB test rig to handle the normal testing and look for the normal bugs you run into with the cheaper builds. Why daisy chain 2-3 devices together to test a power bank/load and see it on a screen/be able to save the data.

Hi Clive, you should try recording these videos in a higher frame rate to stop this HOPI from flashing at us. say 60fps?

It would take 168 capacitors but I wonder if you could put a capacitor across each led in the display so the flicker on the camera would be a brightness flicker rather than a hard on/off

Ran out of things to tear down?? few days ago I bought a toy from Walmart that was on clearance and called "Boxer Robot", seemed very interesting until I took it apart to see what chips are there and found 3 black "blobs". I was disappointed, so I put it together and returned it. now I got the thought that I should've sent it to you.

Annual Power Consumption hidden setting, my money is on Hours (on) per Day for the purposes of calculation... .

we should send Clive boxes with a secret button, see if he dares press them, perfectly normal little LED devices or summat, see if he can find the button, then engineer something harmless that happens when said button is pressed. well I might. In fact I have a plan...He'll see straight through it but its a plan nonetheless.

Running out of gadgets to tear down? What next? Those industrial strength mobility scooters you have there in the UK for non-drivers?

www.dhgate.com/product/hopi-hp-9800-handheld-power-meter-power-analyzer/435688031.html Shows uses of the button if you scroll down past the advert

is it just me... or am I the only one to find it weird that people STILL have to wonder and ask about the flickery display? I learned that back watching OLD black and white TVs.

The way to fix the rolling screens is to adjust the shutter speed and frame rates of your camera.

If you work out the annual power consumption for the load to be connected 24/7 it reads way out. By pressing the button to around 23 it reads nearer what you would expect the consumption to be over a year of use.

ibb.co/kXkqwSt Here is operation instruction for that "mysterious" button, and everything that button can do. It has interesting functions.

From a listing on AliExpress: Short press sets the hours per day it's on for calculating Annul Power Consumption (Range: 1~24) Long press sets you in "Set the display content mode", using the short press to cycle between modes AEC: Annul electricity costs APC: Annul Power Consumption uH: Active electric energy (I think it's the total amount of energy used, as it cycles in this mode between "active electric energy" and hours of load, displayed over both the frequency and annual power consumption field) CO2: Annul CO2 Consumption I hope this helps decipher the "what the fuck" button, although the manual remains quite cryptic.

I like the flickery display, it adds to the charme of this channel. Not everything has to be professional, a little bit of flicker fits with what is written in the channels about page: "So just like a normal workshop really." Also unexpected button was unexpected.

Could you put a phosphor type sheet in front of the led segments to lag them a bit to stop the flicker on the ipad camera?

At one point I had a thought that that "T" would be a good place for a button. Well turns out it is.

Clive, go to www.dynamicdemand.co.uk/grid.htm ... see if it matches with what you're seeing (assuming the manx grid is synced to the national grid? I think the undersea interconnect is AC, no?)

multiplier may be the number of hours a day you use the device your testing. AEC or REC

You could always remove the opto-isolator and see if any readings look suspicious or wrong. That may give a clue as to it's purpose.

Clive, here in the US, power stablizers/cleaners are a way of life in the world if high end light and sound. At a planetarium I used to frequent in my youth used Xenon arc lamps. They are expensive and kept blowing. Power company said all was fine, until a bunch of high school kids and teacher got out their meters and found just how dirty the wall power was. Will remember that meter going back and forth well past my 50's (since I am 60, done). After the "Power Cleanser" was installed, life of the lamps literally tripled. Sad but true. The 60HZ frequency appears to be a guideline. Can vary from 58 to 63 Hz. Your meter is probably very accurate in that regard, power is probably that dirty! Keep the very interesting and occasionally weird videos coming! And Americans do not have hotdogs in a can...just saying...we call those sausages...

LMFAO love that battery compartment... Secret buttons? Must be CIA surveillance... I don't think the serial data from the meter chip would be affected by a different clock speed on the LED driver chip; that'll likely buffer serial data and o/p it on its own timescale (scuse any lapses in jargon, snakebite has a hold right now). There'd be no way of keeping them synced with 2 independent xtals anyway. One major criticism of this video; no explosions!

to fix the flicker, change your video camera's shutter speed (aka shutter angle) to 100%

That will teach you to read the manual for a new toy, won't it. No? Actually, no I didn't think it would. ;-)

Press it, Clive!! Press that button!!! PPRREESSS IT!!! ................attaboy

I was lookin on ebay and if you look up "hopi meter" they show that meter but it does have the USB interface....

Hippity Hoppity Clive's Got A Flickery Hopi T

That's easily the best reaction anyone has ever had to a button.

That looks a bit like a serial port to me, where the USB to serial converter has been left out.

But how about removing the speaker terminal for more clearance? Someone (or I) can easily 3D Print you a nice (pink) bigclive plate to cover that remaining hole :)

Looks like you could swap the speaker terminal for shrouded banana sockets quite easily.

According to the manual, the 1-24 is number of hours in a day that the device is used. uH is "Active Electric Energy," AEC is "Annual Electricity Costs," APC is "Annual Power Consumption," and CO2 is "Annual CO2 Consumption."

You do a lot of videos that involve LED or LCD's that flicker on modern CCD cameras because of rolling shutter. Have you ever though of picking up a later model CMOS or 3CMOS camera? In the last generation of CMOS cameras there were some good HD ones before everyone switched to CCD. Also, cameras like the DVX100B had a feature called "syncro scan" that let you modify the frame rate frequency to really dial down the flicker effect from LED's and LCD's.

Someone did not read the instructions that came with the meter, a hidden button and extra functions.

I quite like the flickering effect. It's something you don't see on most modern electronics in videos anymore, since everything is usually so high speed you just get bars along the screen, if anything at all.

The not meassuring low loads could be to avoid a ADC-offset from building up a bill. Smart-meters (and mechanical ones) have a thing about not metering at very low power to avoid ghost-load. Basically inperfections that "make the disc spin" at absolutely NO LOAD.

I guess the counting up from 1-24 is the hours a day the device is on for calculating the annual power consumption.

It can be surprising how unstable the powerline frequency actually is. In the United States I've been watching and logging it for several years as a hobby. There are times I've noticed drops of over 0.040 Hz and later been able to read the Nuclear Regulatory Commission website and verify a nuclear reactor in another part of the country had to go offline at that time. U.S. power grid is divided into at least 3 parts so dips in another part are not noticeable in this part.

The mysterious button had me gasping for breath, havent laughed like that in several months!

Ya know, I've often noticed that odd yellow T on that meter and thought it seemed very out of place on that front panel. And now I know.

I use a KillaWatt Meter, but I won't be dismantling or looking for any fucking buttons.

The Hopi is coming apart? I'm making dinner and watching this! Wow, rock on!

Wanna bet all that extra stuff is available by the USB port?