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Qualcomm Announces Quick Charge 4+ Standard That's 15 Percent Faster Than Quick Charge 4 (theverge.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the blink-of-an-eye dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Just a mere six months after announcing Quick Charge 4, which boosted charging times and safety considerably over its predecessors, Qualcomm is introducing the new Quick Charge 4+ standard. Unlike previous standards, which required a new chipset, 4+ is something device and accessory manufacturers can implement by adding three enhancements to Quick Charge 4-compliant devices: "Dual Charge," which is already an option in earlier version of Quick Charge, but is "now more powerful"; "Intelligent Thermal Balancing," which steers current through whichever of the dual charging pathways is coolest to keep temperatures down; "Advanced Safety Features" to monitor both the phone temperature and the connector temperature to protect against overheating and short-circuit damage. Qualcomm claims devices that implement this standard can get charging times up to 15 percent faster than Quick Charge 4, and will charge up to 30 percent more efficiently -- an especially nice perk if you're charging from a battery pack. Charging will also be up to 3 degrees Celsius (about 5 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler.

6 of 30 comments (clear)

  1. Planned obsolescence by oic0 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Use this on your non removable battery phone and ruin it even quicker. Most people will buy a new phone when it goes rather than having it replaced. Qualcomm wins.

  2. I was hoping for... by dwillmore · · Score: 2

    USB-PD compatability? Nope? Nevermind, then.

    1. Re:I was hoping for... by Game+Genie · · Score: 3, Interesting

      USB-PD compatability? Nope? Nevermind, then.

      I came hear to bash Qualcomm too, but amazingly enough they seem to have done something right for once according to TFA:

      USB Type-C and USB Power Delivery (USB PD) compliant. By incorporating these technologies, Qualcomm Technologies standardizes the capabilities of Quick Charge 4 adapters, to help ensure that a single accessory supports multiple charging implementations and mobile devices, and that there is consistent performance when faced with the myriad of available charging solutions.

  3. Re:Surprise! A new spec! by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

    This is SOP. Put features into specs late in the day to make it impossible for other vendors, who may have been working in a standards body for an industry wide solution, to have compatible silicon available in a timely fashion.

    Well, the competition is going for USB-PD (Power Delivery), which IS an industry standard of supplying up to 100W. It's used by laptops so far, and a few phones support it as well. So you could plug your laptop charger into your phone and have it charge at max rate.

    Even worse for Qualcomm, Google has announced that all devices must support USB-PD for fast charging - proprietary solutions would not be acceptable.

  4. Re:How is it compared to Dash charging? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Quick Charge varies the voltage from 3-20V when charging while keeping the amperage the same. Dash charging varies the amperage while keeping the voltage the same at 5V.

    There are some pros and cons to both approaches but at the end of the day, they're going to deliver similar amounts of power.

    Watts = Volts * Amperes

    I'm guessing that QC is probably more tolerant of thin crappy USB cables, which is probably the main upside with it.

  5. Next up. by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 3, Funny

    Quick Charge 4++ - It will be like Quick Charge 4+, but object oriented.

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .