Apple iPhone charger teardown: quality in a tiny expensive package (2012)

Audiophiles swear by Apple chargers as a power source. It's a needlessly clean power source. I was having extreme issues with noise from my DAC, to the degree of clearly audible at normal listening levels. Apple sorted that right out.

The charger is the only product I will buy from Apple. It's complete and utter overkill, you'll never have problems for a very minor premium (absolutely speaking, not relatively).

It would be interesting to get a real expert's explanation of how the ways the Nintendo Switch violates the USB specifications leads to third party docks sometimes frying consoles, or maybe an explanation of how phone manufacturers can charge batteries at absurd C rates without killing them.

Thanks for the previous work. I was most interested in your prose about the old, recalled Apple charger, where design suggested to you someone at Apple was told ~“be sure these never can come out again.”

Most of the action in chargers right now is in 30 watt USB-C. Everyone wants the fasted charge possible.

New iPhones can apparently consume 22 watts plus (via usb-c to lightning and macs and iPads (I believe) can pull the full 30 over an appropriate usb-c.

As a result, when shopping for USB-C chargers, or power strips containing USB-C, I study the supply carefully to make sure they provide this or if not I’ll be happy enough consuming a standard wall plug with a 30W adapter.

These adapters seem to have shrunk in the past two years due to GaN, or Galium Nitride instead of silicon. (I have not read what this means exactly but it is in the marketing copy)

One of the bigger electronics accessory names was the first, but now you see no-name brands offering GaN as well.

To my knowledge, Apple has not introduced GaN-based power adapters but I could be wrong.

Regardless, it would be very interesting to read a study of yours of 30W chargers in this class.

For example, this no name brand is selling two for $20, a very low price point: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B098J6LN4Q/

Versus Anker and the other big names which have similar, higher priced versions.

I’m presuming the cheap one linked above is likely to set my home on fire. But maybe not? You would be the one to speculate.

I’d be happy to fund a portion of the purchases needed for such an article. My email is in my profile.

Would love to see this type of post for framework's power adapter: https://frame.work/blog/power-adapter

I don't know if it's unique to them, but Sony slow-charges up to 80-90% until about an hour before you set your alarm, then brings you up to 100% before you wake up. Seems to work well and the battery degradation I've seen, after 4 years, has been very minimal.

At least with Samsung you can turn fast charging off. That's what I do most of the time. I only fast charge if I need it fast.

Is there any truth to this? I have noticed battery life vary from 100% depending on if I use a different charger. But it only really happens when I travel, so I chalked it up to different usage patterns or climates.

Many cheap wireless "Qi" chargers are limited to 5 watts.

This is what sketches me out so much about electronics like chargers by random brands on Amazon (the trend lately seems to be random characters in all caps) that surely have no oversight or conformance to standards.

Its been a while but my first macbook charger came close to setting a fire I think. I smelled something as I passed my bedroom, and found that the computer charger was smoking. I unplugged it from the computer/wall and put it in my sink and things were fine, but it definitely freaked me out. I haven't had similar issues since, but every single one of my dozen or more since have frayed _very_ quickly relative to other cords/chargers I use.

I have seen the result of two mobile chargers blow up in the office - the fire was only prevented by fuses and even so there were black scorch marks on the power outlets. My dads battery charger blew up similarly.

In all cases it was because they were brought cheap on Aliexpres. I haven't seen any chargers sold elsewhere have any issues. The closest thing I got was when I charged my laptop on my bed and had put the blanket over the charger - it didn't fail but it got really, really, really hot.

So based on anecdata: don't buy things things to stick in walls on aliexpress. Also fuses are really nice.

Apple Macbook charger was the only one charger in my life which released magic smoke. I must admit that it was after I soldered new cable and assembled it with duct tape (because it was glued and I broke the plastic casing trying to pry it off), but that does not inspire much confidence in me anyway. I don't know why everyone prays Apple hardware which was so terrible in my life in so many occasions and the only reason I tolerate it is their good software.

I think it is pretty much the datasheet reference circuit so the people that designed the chip were already paid for that and that cost is in the bill o

exactly, estimating the price solely by the sum of its components is like paying programmer by the number of characters they typed

That's infinitely more powerful than the charger which comes with the iPhone 12!

I mean, that’s the healthiest charger for the phone. I know you’re trying to say “give me a stronger charger”, but for others this is actually a selling point - I don’t want strong chargers, I want a well built weak one that preserves my battery.