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Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

chargerlab.com

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Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#21

Post by torgoguys »

okasaki wrote: post #8

There doesn't really seem to be anything interesting about this. Also while the US plug makes some pretty compact power adapters, the effect is largely ruined in the EU and UK with their wider more cumbersome plugs.

> There doesn't really seem to be anything interesting about this.

Agreed. Seriously, am I missing something or are the compact chargers from various other companies at least as compelling as this? I've got a nice one from Lenovo with high output and a smaller form factor than this. (Several other manufacturers have a similar size and output so nothing special about Lenovo here). The Apple one, while maybe smaller then their usual, is still bigger and appears to be short and "fat" which can limit where you can plug it sometimes.

Or is just another "but this time it is from Apple" kind of thing. (All the vapor chamber talk from a few days ago had me scratching my head too.)

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#22

Post by tialaramex »

BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #19
rr808 wrote: post #16

Is there a way to slow down these high power chargers? Sometimes I want a fast charge but mostly I want slow to getting hot. I realize overnight charging phones are smart enough to do this but otherwise seems to be impossible without having two different chargers.

It's up to the device. If I have an alarm for the morning my pixel 7 slow charges over the night so that it's full when the alarm goes off. Modern charging standards give all the control to the client device.

Is that with a dock, or without? My Pixel showed me a menu of choices for how to behave when first shown its wireless charging dock (charge to full ASAP, assume we'll need to be charged by alarm time, and some others) but I agree that a device can choose to do this from any power source, I don't feel like it gave the same choice when plugged in to a wall, maybe I'm wrong or it's in a menu somewhere.

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#23

Post by jandrese »

mikepurvis wrote: post #17
brandall10 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a generic slim GAN charger that does a similar stepdown, 65W -> 45W. Different form factor, but same 80g weight. Peak power tends to last about 10 minutes or so.

I bet their telemetry shows that a lot of people grab a quick charge while in the shower or the like, and that 10mins is a good amount of time for that. Or put another way, past ten mins it’s just as likely the phone will be plugged in for hours or overnight and the charge speed is irrelevant.

Also, it may be to avoid overheating the phone. Otherwise you might expect to see a GAN charger where the body is a heat sink.

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#24

Post by dwood_dev »

Reason077 wrote: post #13

Hopefully Apple releases a UK version of this adapter soon. The design looks very similar to my beloved Apple UK 20W charger [1]. I’d buy a 40-60W version in a heartbeat! [1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-20W-USB-C-Power-Adapter/dp/B0...

Similar design is a Ugreen Nexode 45 watt charger[0]. Folding prongs, May be ever so slightly larger. I just purchased one for an upcoming trip.

0: https://www.amazon.co.uk/UGREEN-Foldable-Charger-Support-Com...

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#27

Post by Moto7451 »

rr808 wrote: post #16

Is there a way to slow down these high power chargers? Sometimes I want a fast charge but mostly I want slow to getting hot. I realize overnight charging phones are smart enough to do this but otherwise seems to be impossible without having two different chargers.

On newer MacBooks you can turn on a similar battery protection mechanism to the phones. I believe vs the phones the smaller chargers won’t stress these cells since they’re a lot larger. 20-40W into a 15Wh battery is more stress than the same through a 52Wh (MBA) battery. A 1C charging rate is healthy.

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#28

Post by 0_____0 »

analog31 wrote: post #18
rr808 wrote: post #16

Is there a way to slow down these high power chargers? Sometimes I want a fast charge but mostly I want slow to getting hot. I realize overnight charging phones are smart enough to do this but otherwise seems to be impossible without having two different chargers.

The device being charged controls the charging current. Typically for smaller gadgets, a single resistor connected to the charge controller IC sets the current. Bigger things like laptops may be more sophisticated.

Re: more sophisticated

USB-PD now has a standard for having sink devices request a particular current from the charger, meaning that you could actually remove a converter from the sink device side, because with a programmable source, the current limiting happens on the power supply side. Cool stuff especially for small electronics like wearables.

Generally though if you want to charge with USB-PD and accept all kinds of chargers, the sink device will have to have its own charge control PMIC.

All this negotiation happens over a side band via the "CC" pins on the USB-C connector.

Re: Teardown of Apple 40W dynamic power adapter with 60W max

#29

Post by Filligree »

Moto7451 wrote: post #27
rr808 wrote: post #16

Is there a way to slow down these high power chargers? Sometimes I want a fast charge but mostly I want slow to getting hot. I realize overnight charging phones are smart enough to do this but otherwise seems to be impossible without having two different chargers.

On newer MacBooks you can turn on a similar battery protection mechanism to the phones. I believe vs the phones the smaller chargers won’t stress these cells since they’re a lot larger. 20-40W into a 15Wh battery is more stress than the same through a 52Wh (MBA) battery. A 1C charging rate is healthy.

I've always wondered if lower rates are a problem. Off-topic, but the best my solar panels can do is 0.1C into the battery bank.
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