Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Surf Naked! Here's the lowdown on the new wireless power trend
3:27 PM
One day you WILL be telling your grand kids silly story's about spending countless hours untangling cords and searching high and low for that one ac adapter for your 'now obsolete' CD player. The reason..wireless power and connectivity. There are 3 types of technology used to accomplish this: inductive, radio and resonance charging.
In inductive charging, an adapter equipped with contact points is attached to the device's back plate. When the device requires a charge, it is placed on a conductive charging pad, which is plugged into a socket. This method is what the folks at Powermat and some other newcomers on the scene have been raving about. The disadvantage is that you must buy all the added components to achieve the "wireless" convenience, and you must do this for EVERY device! Unless popular company's start to build their devices with these components, this type of method may be trumped quickly.
Radio charging is used for charging items with small batteries and low power requirements, such as watches, hearing aids, medical implants, cell phones, MP3 players and wireless keyboard and mice. Radio waves are already in use to transmit and receive cellular telephone, television, radio and wifi signals. Wireless radio charging works similarly. A transmitter, plugged into a socket, generates radio waves. When the receiver attached to the device is set to the same frequency as the transmitter, it will charge the device's battery. The folks at Rca Airnergy Article by Ohgizmo have been successful at using Wifi to do some cellphone charging and more!
Finally, Resonance charging is used for items that require large amounts of power, such as an electric car, robot, vacuum cleaner or laptop computer. In resonance charging, a copper coil attached to a power source is the sending unit. Another coil, attached to the device to be charged, is the receiver. Both coils are tuned to the same electromagnetic frequency, which makes it possible for energy to be transferred from one to the other. The method works over short distances (3-5 meters). One new example of this technology in use is by Dell. Here is the article describing the new wireless charger for their Z laptop. Dell Latitude Z
Verdict: Wifi (radio) charging technology seems most useful for our everyday gadgets.
If this truly works as efficiently as they say, look for all of us to have 'hot spots' in our homes where our everyday gadgets come to lay in the 'wifi sun'.
In inductive charging, an adapter equipped with contact points is attached to the device's back plate. When the device requires a charge, it is placed on a conductive charging pad, which is plugged into a socket. This method is what the folks at Powermat and some other newcomers on the scene have been raving about. The disadvantage is that you must buy all the added components to achieve the "wireless" convenience, and you must do this for EVERY device! Unless popular company's start to build their devices with these components, this type of method may be trumped quickly.
Radio charging is used for charging items with small batteries and low power requirements, such as watches, hearing aids, medical implants, cell phones, MP3 players and wireless keyboard and mice. Radio waves are already in use to transmit and receive cellular telephone, television, radio and wifi signals. Wireless radio charging works similarly. A transmitter, plugged into a socket, generates radio waves. When the receiver attached to the device is set to the same frequency as the transmitter, it will charge the device's battery. The folks at Rca Airnergy Article by Ohgizmo have been successful at using Wifi to do some cellphone charging and more!
Finally, Resonance charging is used for items that require large amounts of power, such as an electric car, robot, vacuum cleaner or laptop computer. In resonance charging, a copper coil attached to a power source is the sending unit. Another coil, attached to the device to be charged, is the receiver. Both coils are tuned to the same electromagnetic frequency, which makes it possible for energy to be transferred from one to the other. The method works over short distances (3-5 meters). One new example of this technology in use is by Dell. Here is the article describing the new wireless charger for their Z laptop. Dell Latitude Z
Verdict: Wifi (radio) charging technology seems most useful for our everyday gadgets.
If this truly works as efficiently as they say, look for all of us to have 'hot spots' in our homes where our everyday gadgets come to lay in the 'wifi sun'.
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