Slashdot Mirror
What To Do With All of My Gadget Chargers?
legoman666 writes "On my desk I have chargers for the following gadgets: Nokia N810, LG Chocolate, Sony Ericcson Z310a, Canon Powershot SD1000, Cowan iAudio X5L, Lenovo Thinkpad, Logitech MX1000 and my Nintendo DS. Not a single pair of them share a similar connector. I have two power strips whose singular purpose is to energize these chargers. My question to Slashdot is: How do you organize all of your different chargers? Please, share your secrets."
Yes the charge rate is slower, but you need far fewer plugs - I've managed to get usb chargers for all my gadgets ( ds included ) and net result is I only need to manage one plug for the server. ( the number of usb cables is a different question, but they are much easier to manage ).
"Success is based on knowing how far to go in going too far"
I've noticed that the power warts get quite hot. I'm not comfortable keeping them plugged in all the time. On off switches on the strip is in this case useless since you need to keep it on almost always (since something is charging). Ahh, luxury problems. Aren't they sweet?
I neglected to ask this in my previous post: why the f-ck have you got three mobile phones?
ilovegeorgebush
China has already mandated USB charging for all new mobile phones
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
And will make your USB power fall over and die and blow something up, very creative and "performance art".
Better:
500W PSU
a pair of side cutters
soldering iron
a terminal block
tons of heat-shrink
Select and solder some heatsinked resistors over the 12v and 5v rails so that you are sinking an amp in each (switchmode PSUs need a constant load).
Next tap wires for different chargers, 12v and 5v are easy (as almost all are now) 3.3 and 12v will give you around 9v, 5v and 12v will give you 7.
Then all you need is a nice little cabinet with some ventilation and one power lead and you can dump all your junk in there to charge and GO THE FUCK OUTSIDE AND LEAVE THEM BEHIND!
A phone, an mp3 player and a camera should do anyone, heck some phones can be your mp3 and camera too now.
And if you can't follow even a bit of what I said, don't try it :)
...
If you can get hold of a Blackberry Travel Charger, it serves as a very handy charging plug for all your USB powered devices. Except Sony Ericssons, which, for some reason, will ONLY charge from USB if the USB cable is connected to an actual computer.
"The dew has clearly fallen with a particularly sickening thud this morning"
Yes, AT THE MOMENT.
There's no reason why gadgets can't be designed around a particular voltage - look at all the stuff you can buy which plugs into car cigarette lighters.
Being forced to use 12V doesn't seem to slow anybody down.
No sig today...
Actually, in the recent years most of the 'bricks' turned into SMPSes. It's no more expensive to produce and less so to ship in cargo containers from China - smaller, lighter = more units in a container = lower shipping fee per unit. That makes a difference when sending out several tons of this junk a day.
This is Slashdot. Common sense is futile. You will be modded down.
A quick trip to Home Depot solved my problem, though slightly ugly. Two 4" square electrical boxes and quad-outlet cover plates, four duplex outlets, a 9' 14 AWG power cord, a few feet of 14/2 NM, an NM clamp, a 1/2" rigid conduit nipple, and some nuts, washers, and bolts. A bit of electrical know-how and drilling, and I wind up with 8 outlets mounted to the side of my desk. It's better than a power strip because it won't flop around/fall behind the desk. And its better than a mounted power strip because it's not a cheap piece of plastic. It is, however, plugged into a power strip/surge protector under the desk... And it's on the side of my desk facing away from the office door, so the Wife Acceptance Factor is quite high.
I'm not suggesting by any means that it's necessary to carry ALL thos devices around ALL the time ... in fact as three of them are cellphones anyway, I can't think of a situation when I'd NEED all three of them at the same time.
However, the point of my post (comprehension not being your strong point either obviously), is that the iPhone is a piss-poor replacement for ANY of them, and by compromising on quality you end up with shitty results.
I usually know IN ADVANCE when I'm going somewhere special and might feel the need to take a nice photograph, ergo the camera would only be necessary on those days. Whereas you, with your trusty iPhone, can take a shot anytime granted, but it'll be grainy quality crap and you'll regret afterwards having not taken the nice camera instead.
If i want to put an MP3 on my phone, I'll do it ... I don't have to go to the web-store first, or get Steve Jobs permission to listen to my own bloody music. And the iPhone has GPS does it ? Newsflash, so do a lot of other phones too. The iPhone has been playing catch-up since it left the drawing board - and up till now it hasn't caught up.
And you've had to wait for almost a year just to get 3G ... well you got it now, but only at the expense of calls dropping left right and center, and a patch that seeming didn't work after all. Can't you see the whole world is laughing at you, or are you too dazzled by the sun reflecting off the "shiny" to see past your own nose ?
Any time I read a post from an Apple fanboi, invariably I find the words "in most cases to the extent necessary", or similar apologetic terms, rather than just standing up and admitting you wasted $300 on something shiny that performs worst than just about anything else on the market (and usually costs a lot cheaper too).
And now I'd better put on my asbestos underwear, I can imagine the fanbois tooling up with flaming torches and pitchforks as I write.
Meh, I modified a drawer in my "back of the couch table" to have a power strip in it, I then tied up all the plugs with tyewraps and made a charging drawer. Open drawer, plug in and charge item/items. Attached to the power strip is a $3.95 light timer that turns the strip on and off. On an hour before I get home and off when I leave for work. This works great and reduces the parasitic load on my electric bill. Plus everything is out of sight.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Another reason I regret buying one :(. My Creative Zen Vision M is the same, which is a PITA. Damn gadget designers, get a clue!
I know a lobbyist who works for a company that makes connectors. He actively lobbies in Brussels against any standard. That's his daywork, he get's paid to do so. His company has thousands of different connectors in production, and standards would make there business les profitable.
For those who haven't read Douglas Adams's "The Salmon of Doubt" and the excellent essay on power supplies (a.k.a. little dongly things) here's a link: http://www.douglasadams.com/dna/980707-03-a.html
I have owned 3 different Motorola phones and all 3 have used mini USB for charging. All 3 have included or provided a wall-wart charger with a mini USB plug on the end that can charge the phone with no computer needed
What ex0a means is that vendors can sell replacements once you lose the original charger. They could not do that if you could simply replace the lost charger by one for another gizmo. However: Has anyone ever thought about the transformer that is connected with the charger? Not all devices need the same voltage (or whatever is transformed). I think that is the main reason for the multitude of chargers. However, ex0a's (well hidden) argument still applies to many similar areas.
That seems like a silly thing to say.
Just use the USB charger for everything. I know my camera, my phone, my mp3 player, and my Nintendo DS all charge off my USB.
It's been a long time.
I have more gadgets than Mr. Kibblet. Two laptops, my cell phone (and the kids have one each, so that's three), my PDA, and two laptops. Oh, a camera, a carpet sweeper and my hand vac. He just has a cell phone. I believe Martha Stewart made a cute little container to deal with this problem. Put the powerstrip inside a box you decorated, and drill holes for the wires to come out of. I've seen stuff like this for sale, too. They are called CHARGING STATIONS. They've been around for ages. (Some fancypants stores call them "Charging Valets".) Next someone will be asking where we can buy stuff to cover our feet when we leave the house or something.
How about something like this gadget station? http://thewoodwhisperer.com/episode-57-gadget-station-pt-1/
"Many of my toys are 12vDC, of the round pin variety. Polarity is totally random, as is size of the center pin, but many are compatible. If they're going to standardize, this is probably where to go."
I keep a well-used voltage tester handy for exactly this reason. This, coupled with an ultra-fine point sharpie marker (those marked "fine" are ballpoints, not markers) means I can mark the volt, amps and polarity somewhere on the device and mark the charger with the device is belongs to - it's amazing how few chargers are marked that way by the manufacturer.
Rounding out the equipment pack is a hard-to-find 12 VDC car lighter multi voltage converter that has a polarity switch. If a compatible plug isn't already on the converter it isn't hard to figure out which wires to splice. I put on a USB plug, but for items with entirely proprietary connectors you have to sacrifice a wall wart.
I have mod points. The reign of terror begins now.
One would assume that the manufacturer's motivations remain where they "should" be, to insure profit. If you lose or break a charger, or if it just plain fails, you can either order another one from the manufacturer for some unreasonable amount, or you can buy a whole new unit. I've had to buy a whole new unit on several occasions.
When a charger I own breaks or get lost I stroll to the nearest hotel and asks if they got one of the model I need. The hotels are very happy to get rid of them since they usually have bins full of chargers that people have left in their rooms and never claimed.
--- Reality doesn't care about your opinions, it happens anyway and if you are in the way you'll get squished.
There's probably a warranty-security issue here too. Manufactures of higher end devices spec out a third party plug, or have one designed specifically for their product to reduce any problems further down the line. They know exactly what voltage range, quality of full wave rectification, and total amperage their gizmo needs. Since you just paid $400 for your new toy, it sure would suck for both you and the company if your El Cheapomatic Universal Dongleizer provided one of those resources just outside of spec and fried your brand new Thingiee. It's a warranty headache for you and for the company.
I think companies would be thrilled to stop shipping wall-warts. The cost that is passed on to the consumer could be pocketed and they could also save on packaging, shipping and materials overall. I think it's just too much of a wild-card, in their eyes, to hope that every Universal Wall-Wart is made within spec.
This one's tricky. You have to use imaginary numbers, like eleventeen... --Hobbes
But this could be a problem if not done properly. Unless you use something like a buck boost converter to step from 12V to 5V or even 3.3V (all common small electronics voltages) you could end up with problems. Suppose the current to this device draws 500 mA and needs the 5V supply and uses a simple LDO regulator to step the voltage down. The power dissipated by the device would then be (12V-5V)*0.5A = 3.5W just in the voltage regulator in addition to the 5V*0.5A = 2.5W load of the device. This LDO is dissipating more power than the actual electronics you want powered!
Now using a buck-boost regulator (sometimes known as a DC-DC converter) has its own issues. These supplies have some sort of AC source (usually a PWM square wave) to charge reactive components as well as large inductors inductors to store the energy. Both of these have their own issues which are a problem. Square waves are 'noisy' and generate plenty of harmonics. Any consumer electronics device must pass FCC rules for radiated emissions. PWM waves don't help you here. Inductors are frowned on since the can be quite large. They may even have some sort of iron (or similar ferrous material) which will add to the weight so they can increase the inductance. These reasons right here is why most electronics have external regulators; they can do all the hard stuff outside the device they really want to build.
All of this is just a long winded answer to say that 12V may not be a one size fits all solution. Twelve volts will blow up most integrated circuits requiring the voltage to be stepped down in some fashion.
I have a bunch of sheets of blank white label (sticker) stock. Each time I get a new charger thingy or other non-standard wire, I just cut out a little piece of sticker, stick it on the charger and write what device it's for. That's also good for going through your drawer of chargers and seeing- oh! I haven't had that XYZ for years! So this charger can get tossed.
Many devices with standard plug sizes can share power supply. Switched mode power supplys produce the same voltage even if the load (amperage) varies.
There are even plug converters availiable, they often come with a variable voltage switched mode powersupply. Just make sure your device does not overload the amperage rating of the powersupply and it'll work like a charm.
For example the PSP comes with a 5V 1000ma switched mode powersupply and a fairly standard plug. My mediaextender that I found in the trash uses the same voltage and plug and draws less amperage so I use the PSP powersupply to power it when I'm not charging it.
A switched mode powersupply can be identified by specific symbols on it, or by it's weight. A linear powersupply is generaly much heavier bulkier and produces more heat and thus generally has ventilation holes.
/ Jonas Rosenqvist from Sweden (sorry if my english sucks btw)
It applies to all new models approved after June 2007 (to legally sell phones in China, each new model has to have something called a Network Access Certificate issued by the government). So most of the new ones support USB charging, but there are still quite a lot of older designs still for sale that don't. And the rules don't apply to "grey market" phones imported from abroad.
My Verizon phone (a RAZR), has a USB charging port on it, but will NOT accept any other USB charger. If I try to use my Blackberry charger the phone says something like "Unauthorized charger detected" and refuses to charge.
I'm tempted to call their support line and ask how I can 'authorize' a different charger for my phone.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
The nice thing about USB is that it is first and foremost a communication protocol. It would be very nice if when you plugged your device in, it got it's standard 500mA, and then requested from the charger the amount of power it actually needed to charge the quickest. The chargers could actually become smart, and do things like shut off power to ports when not in use, or turn the power way down when the device is charged.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
USB is good but it's not perfect.
I just bought a Seagate 250 GB external USB HDD. It came with a Y-shaped USB connector which you're supposed to plug into TWO USB ports and the drive. I figured that was for low-power (USB 1.0?) computers* so I took a chance and just used a regular mini-USB cable I had from a camera and it's been working fine with just one USB (2.0) port. Except on my MacBook Pro--I can plug it into the USB port on the right and it works but if I use the port on the left the drive just makes a funny noise and won't mount.
* or crazy things like the way you can plug a device into a Mac and it's fine but if you plug it into the USB port on the keyboard you get a "not enough power" warning. WTF?!?
In other news, I was pleasantly surprised with my GPS--a Garmin Nuvi 200. It doesn't come with an AC adapter (only a car charger) but the charging jack is actually a mini-USB port. I can use a USB->mini-USB cable to charge it from my computer. But wait! There's more! I went to Garmin's site to see if they sold an AC adapter. They do--it's a thing that plugs into your wall and then gives you a cigarette-lighter thingie that you then plug your car charger into. How stupid is that?!? A) That's bulky, kludgy, clumpy, ugly, and B) it means I can't just LEAVE MY CAR CHARGER IN MY CAR!!! Luckily I made another happy discovery--I can use the tiny AC->USB adapter that came with (you guessed it) my iPhone along with the mini-USB cable and charge it that way. SUCCESS!
Of course, FireWire was designed from the beginning to have enough power to drive USEFUL devices, and it was much, much, much faster than USB for years, and I've never had any trouble with my FireWire devices. Oh well.
A couple more random bits: I've got a 60 GB iPod and an iPhone. Both use the same connector so one stays at home (plugged into the AC brick) and the other travels with me in my ever-present backpack. (If I only had one job I'd just leave it at work.) For my cameras, I use a card reader--I've always thought it was the dumbest thing in the world to have a camera with a removable card and get pictures from it by turning on the camera (draining the batteries) and connecting it directly to a computer. (Plus, my first digital camera had a SERIAL port and took FOREVER to transfer pictures.) Other than the aforementioned hard drive (which travels with its USB cable wrapped around it) those are the only devices I have. So an overabundance of chargers is not a problem for me.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Awww... I use 7805's to power lots of interesting tidbits in my car ;-)
(Then again, I use a hig-power 12V power supply for my subwoofer amp in my living room )
"I was in love with a beautiful blonde once, dear. She drove me to drink. It's the one thing I am indebted to her for."