The SolarCamPi project involves a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W booting into Linux, capturing and uploading photos while conserving power. Balancing power consumption and run time is crucial, with tools like Nordic Power Profiler Kit II and USB-SD-Mux aiding hardware optimization. By tweaking settings to reduce operating current, boot time can be shorter by disabling HDMI, activity LED, turbo modes, and more. Detailed boot process analysis reveals inefficient kernel loading that can be improved with a custom-built Buildroot distro. Unique methods like disabling HDMI probing and overclocking GPU to enhance boot performance are explored, underlining the significance of efficient power usage in solar-powered devices.
https://kittenlabs.de/blog/2024/09/01/extreme-pi-boot-optimization/