4 ms·

European Union Wants All Smartphones to Have the Same Charging Port

4 points by cyrksoft 7y ago

aphextim 7y ago
From the article >Nearly 1 billion consumers currently use the Apple lightning port. Bearing that in mind, replacing a billion chargers in a short space of time would overload the electronic waste sector, defeating the motive of the directive in the first place. So what we do is take the plunge anyway. Switch to a universal charger or USB type system. Take all the wasted chargers and then force the companies who created this problem in the first place to split the cost of going to the new system based on % of waste came from their brand. Apple had 1 billion lightning cords thrown away vs say a proprietary charger for Motorola is 100 million. In that scenario Motorola would only be on the hook for slightly less than 10%. Do this with all companies and chargers. The biggest offenders of people who created waste end up paying the most to fix the problem this way. On another tangent, I remember when almost every iteration of a phone had a new type of charger it seemed. You had the wide ones for Motorola, Nokia and whatever else you had, and they ALL were proprietary or you could buy those kits with 10 different adapters/voltage adjustments. I feel we have come a long way with most devices using USB and there are some companies holding onto old practices (apple). I was surprised when the new Nintendo Switch actually charged off of USB and Nintendo didn't force you to have some proprietary charger. I would completely love for there to be a universal standard when it comes to charging and stop more waste and everything could use USB.
tropo 7y ago
The right charging port is IEC C7 C8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60320 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60320 Cables are really common. They are typical on home audio equipment. It won't be abused to hack the phone. It offers fast charging. USB can do at most 5 A at 20 v, which is just 100 W. With IEC C7 C8 you get 2.5 A at up to 250 v, which is 625 W. You get 6.25 times as much power.

4 points by cyrksoft 7y ago

From the article >Nearly 1 billion consumers currently use the Apple lightning port. Bearing that in mind, replacing a billion chargers in a short space of time would overload the electronic waste sector, defeating the motive of the directive in the first place. So what we do is take the plunge anyway. Switch to a universal charger or USB type system. Take all the wasted chargers and then force the companies who created this problem in the first place to split the cost of going to the new system based on % of waste came from their brand. Apple had 1 billion lightning cords thrown away vs say a proprietary charger for Motorola is 100 million. In that scenario Motorola would only be on the hook for slightly less than 10%. Do this with all companies and chargers. The biggest offenders of people who created waste end up paying the most to fix the problem this way. On another tangent, I remember when almost every iteration of a phone had a new type of charger it seemed. You had the wide ones for Motorola, Nokia and whatever else you had, and they ALL were proprietary or you could buy those kits with 10 different adapters/voltage adjustments. I feel we have come a long way with most devices using USB and there are some companies holding onto old practices (apple). I was surprised when the new Nintendo Switch actually charged off of USB and Nintendo didn't force you to have some proprietary charger. I would completely love for there to be a universal standard when it comes to charging and stop more waste and everything could use USB.

tropo 7y ago

The right charging port is IEC C7 C8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60320 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60320 Cables are really common. They are typical on home audio equipment. It won't be abused to hack the phone. It offers fast charging. USB can do at most 5 A at 20 v, which is just 100 W. With IEC C7 C8 you get 2.5 A at up to 250 v, which is 625 W. You get 6.25 times as much power.