EU Committee Votes To Make All Smartphone Vendors Utilize a Standard Charger

Deathspawner writes "The EU has been known to make a lot of odd decisions when it comes to tech, but one committee's latest vote is one that most people will likely agree with: Standardized smartphone chargers. If passed, this decision would cut down on never having the right charger handy, but as far as the EU is concerned, this is all about a reduction of waste. The initial vote went down on Thursday, and given its market saturation, it seems likely that micro USB would be the target standard. Now, it's a matter of waiting on the EU Parliament to make its vote."

Comments

Sure, it's good today

[ThatAblaze]

This bill had better have an expiration date, or else it might well interfere with new technologies like (perhaps) wireless power transmission.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[allsorts46]

Don't think there's anything to stop manufacturers including both micro USB *and* wireless charging. But yes, eventually we should probably move on...

Re:Sure, it's good today

[pspahn]

Eventually? The sooner the better, if you ask me.

I currently have several devices that are nothing more than paper weights now as they are no longer chargeable due to broken micro USB ports.

It's not a terrible design for something like an external hard disk or other device that generally just sits there. On a device that is designed to be handled constantly, however, it falls flat on its face. The connection is simply too fragile.

If the EU really wants to reduce waste, they would mandate a connector that didn't break so easily, thus bricking the device. This is less of a problem nowadays with laptops, but they too have suffered this problem long enough that at this point the only reason you would keep releasing devices with fragile power connectors is that you are engineering obsolescence.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[nomadic]

Uhh, no, they updated their charger interface more than once. Try using an iphone 1 charger with an iphone 4 and get back to me.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[msauve]

Huh? There was Firewire/30 pin, then there was USB/30 pin, then there's the shuffle "charge using the headphone jack," then the Lightning charging cable.

Beyond charging, Apple's changed the other interfaces, too. Try to find a recent audio device with iPod control support which works with any iPod prior to 5G ones (and even those are iffy). "Made for iPod" means nothing, because Apple does frequently change their interfaces.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[Pokey.Clyde]

This gets +5 Insightful? Really? You're a damn clutz who manages to break things that I've never broken in my life.

Maybe you should learn how to take care of you things better.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[pspahn]

I must have been holding it wrong, right?!?!

Let's look at the most recent device, a Samsung Galaxy Player 5. That one stopped working properly one day when I had unplugged it from the charging cord (like I would do each morning) only to find that the little wafer of plastic that sits in the middle of the female port came out of the device.

Other USB connectors (of various sizes) I have seen do the exact same thing over the years across all sorts of devices. What did those devices have in common? They were handled constantly. On devices that do little but sit there, the connector works well.

Kudos. You've managed to never break one in your life. This doesn't change the fact that other people will use these devices in a manner much less "sterile" than yours. Being a clutz has nothing to do with it, because, well, I'm not a clutz. I will admit, though, that occupational hazards probably contributed the majority of wear and tear on my devices.

In the end, a micro USB connector (and other USB connectors to an extent) is terribly fragile and no matter if it breaks because you gave your phone to a baby while it was plugged in or if it breaks because of normal wear and tear, the end result is the same, electronic waste. If the goal of the EU is to reduce this waste, choosing micro USB is directly in conflict with that goal.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[Anonymous Coward]

I must have been holding it wrong, right?!?!

Or something, yes. I work in IT and support includes the phones (smart and dumb). I have never, ever seen someone break a microUSB connector. These are people that drop phones in coffee and in the toilet, who leave them on top of vehicles and who run them over with their cars. They are one of the more durable connectors I have ever seen, especially for their size. The fact that you manage to break multiples of them speaks way more about your own ineptitude than it does the plug design.

Re:Sure, it's good today

[rsilvergun]

I actually probably came near 4x that, so about 11k insertion/removals. Micro USB is designed for 10k, so it very likely outlasted its design lifetime.

There's a "Your Mom" joke in there somewhere...

Re:Don't worry

[CastrTroy]

I agree. All the waste is really in the charger itself, not in the cable. As much as I would like Apple to switch to a standard USB connection, I have no problem with their choice. Laptop charges on the other hand are a completely different story. They should also look into standardized replaceable batteries if they are really focused on cutting waste.

waste? LOL !!!

[gadget junkie]

"[...]but as far as the EU is concerned, this is all about a reduction of waste"

I wonder how many times they shuffled between Strasbourg and Bruxelles while they decided that I do not need three 15 EUR chargers.

Re:Don't worry

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd rather see all the other manufacturers switching to the solid, less breakable than USB, invertible, plug that Apple are using to be honest.

Re:Don't worry

[Anonymous Coward]

And what happens when micro-USB is deprecated? Do we go back to some EU overseer commission for approval again?

This is one of the least significant problems facing most societies today. No wonder EU birthrates are dropping - there must be something in the water.

Re:it will kill innovation

[plover]

Much as I don't like to like Apple's "lock-you-in" marketing strategies, I have to agree that the Lightning connector is the best engineered small-form-factor connector of its type that I've used on any portable device. It's secure, it's invertible, and it is designed to not wear out through forceful insertions. The old "universal" connector was awful by comparison.

I find micro-USB to be annoyingly fragile, although that could be due to cheap, under-engineered connectors with weak physical board mounting hardware.

Oh, well. I live in America, so I expect Apple will continue to provide the US market with Lightning connectors, just to cheese off the EU. And they will no doubt continue to keep the Lightning connector on EU based iPads, just to remind people that they voted in a bunch of intrusive politicians.

Re:Don't worry

[Hognoxious]

Designing the phone to break before the connector has no advantages.

It does if you sell phones.

Can we have standard laptop chargers next please ?

[bheading]

A fine idea.

What about laptop chargers too ? Every laptop I've owned has had a different charger plug. In some cases machines made by the same manufacturer have different plugs. Have a set of standard charger ratings and a standard way for the laptop to detect it.

Re:Vote with your wallet

[icebike]

No need to legislate this.

Wrong.

You need only look at power outlets across europe to see what happens when you don't legislate standards.

When an otherwise popular device foists yet another cable requirement on the market, that, in most cases will over-ride users
resistance to having a new cable. All you have to do is LOOK at all the Apple fanbois tossing out their 30pin connector,
(which we were assured by Apple was the best thing ever) and substituting the new Lightning cable, which is also now the best thing ever).

In the mean time, the rational for doing ANYTHING thru the cable besides charging is virtually non-existent.

A world standard almost exists for phone charging. There is really only ONE holdout.
Wired charging will eventually be supplanted by wireless charging, and you will need standards there as well.

Standardization is ALWAYS something that needs legislation. Always.

Re:Except we'll end up with none.

[jonbryce]

That is actually the idea. You will be able to use your existing charger with your new phone, so less landfill waste will be produced.

I have a charger with 4 USB ports, so my phone, iPod, iPad and Kindle can be charged at the same time using just one wall socket.

Re:Don't worry

[CauseBy]

++

That cable is what turned me away from Apple. Around 2007/8 I replaced my iPod and the video cables I had for my previous pod wouldn't work with the new pod because of some kind of verification chip. The old cables sold on Amazon for (literally) six cents (on sale, obvs but still) and Apple's cable cost $49.99. That's ridiculous! That iPod was my last Apple purchase which is a shame because Apple makes some great products.