Bootstrap wrote: ↑Thu Jun 20, 2024 8:06 pm
RZehr wrote: ↑Thu Jun 20, 2024 7:48 pm
Bootstrap wrote: ↑Thu Jun 20, 2024 7:43 pm
By the way, I'd like to put in a plug for USB charging stations. They let us charge a handful of USB-A and USB-C devices at the same time.
I have only ever used a wireless charging station once, at an airport. It seemed to work, slowly. Didn't seem ideal to me.
Public USB chargers? They rarely work at airports. Sometimes they randomly don’t work in cars either. I’m stuck in a delayed plane at the moment, and at the gate the usb charger was unsurprisingly broken. Almost always end up needing to use a plug. I haven’t figured out why these public USB chargers are always broken. Even on airplanes themselves you end up needing a plug adapter for the ones down between the seats. The ones on the seat back have a higher working rate.
Yeah, maybe someone who knows electronics can enlighten us. Even on my wife's car, the USB chargers are much weaker than the cigarette lighter, so I have a good USB-C adapter for the cigarette lighter. And like you, I use plugs to charge my USB-C device on the plane.
Do the wireless chargers work better at home?
Electricity is measured in volts, watts, and amps.
volts is a measure of electrical potential or the pressure that is pushing the electrical current through the wire. To use the analogy of a water pipe, the volts would be equivalent to the PSI. With no volts (or pressure) in the pipe, no electricity or water will flow no matter how big the wire or pipe is.
amps are a measure of the rate of flow of electricity. Or how much current is flowing through a wire. Using the analogy of a water pipe, it would be equivalent to how many gallons per minute are flowing through a pipe.
watts is a measure of energy consumption. Or how much energy is being used. Watts equals amps x volts. So for example, if you have a 100 watt light bulb on a 120 volt household current it would be using 100 watts / 120 volts = 0.8 amps of current. In a water pipe analogy it would be how much work is being done by the water such as pushing a water wheel or turbine. To move a really big turbine such as in a dam you need both a lot of water volume and a lot of water pressure.
New phones typically charge off 12 volts of electricity. Either 12 volt DC power directly from a USB-C port, or 12 volt DC converted by a power brick from 120 volt AC household current. Although older chargers only produce about 5 volts. So those first generation chargers you still have around are going to be slow. And all chargers all have a maximum amount of current they can absorb or power that they can use. Cell phone chargers come with different wattage ratings. The little white Apple chargers that came with the older iPhones were 5 watt chargers. The new bigger ones are 20 watt chargers so can take 4x more throughput of electricity. Hence they charge a lot faster. You can get aftermarket 100w and 240w chargers from companies like Anker that will charge multiple phones simultaneously or bigger things like laptops. Your phone circuitry has a maximum amount of watts that it can absorb so going beyond about 20 watts for a cell phone doesn't get you anything. But a higher watt charger is useful for bigger gear like iPads and laptops that can use higher wattages. Or for charging multiple devices at once.
The cheap little cigarette lighter chargers are often very low wattage so they put out very little power. And who knows how many watts the the USB ports in your car put out. Probably not much. They are probably cheaply made and can't handle much current. And some older USB ports only put out about 5 volts so not nearly as much power as you'll get from a charging brick. The newer USB C ports should be at least 12 volts.
If you want to charge your phone fast, upgrade to a high watt charger like one of these which will cost you more money but give you a lot more output and will also charge smaller laptops:
https://www.anker.com/products/a2343-10 ... 1851911318
And for your car, upgrade to a high watt cigarette lighter charger
https://www.anker.com/products/b2731?re ... 3546354838
You probably can't go too much higher for a cigarette lighter charger because you will eventually blow the fuse on that circuit if you draw too many amps. Those wires are pretty thin so they have low amp fuses. Usually about 10 amps. So the max wattage they can produce is about 120 watts before blowing the fuse. But you'll probably blow the fuse long before you hit 120 watts of output due to all the resistance in the circuit. The more current you run through a wire the hotter it gets which is what fuses prevent. For higher current circuits you need bigger wires.
As for the wireless charging? Same principle applies. The older and cheaper ones are lower wattage and will go slower. The newer ones are more watts and will go faster. But they cost more. I think the new ones are 15 watts and the older ones are 5 watts. So read the labels.
For travel and public charging your best bet is to bring your own high wattage power brick and find a 120 volt household plug which are usually all over the perimeters of airport walls. And also just carry a backup battery. You also don't know if plugging into a public USB port is secure or if it will be a decoy that hacks into your phone. With your own power brick you are completely safe.
