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Apple Officially cancels AirPower

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I was kind of looking forward to possibly getting one, but not now!

Apple Officially Cancels AirPower - MacRumors

I am very surprised Apple could not get it working given others have created wireless charging pads. I realize the AirPower was going to offer charging for AirPods, a watch, and an iPhone which I believe herein lied the problem. Too many items at the same time generating too much heat. Maybe they should have not set the bar so high?

Oh well, I will save my pennies!

Lisa
 
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I can understand their frustration. I've tried so many wireless charges and pads. Unless you're going for a known brand charger, they pretty much all suck, and even the best ones heat up. They get hot, especially with more than one device, and give you erratic charging issues. After having some weird heat problems with a charger once, I probably will never trust them to wirelessly charge my device without being around them.
 

chscag

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Frankly, I don't see why wireless chargers are popular at all. I looked at several on Amazon and was not impressed with their price. And after reading how some of them heat up and how long it takes to do a full charge, I'll continue to use my lightning cable and charging cubes.
 
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Thanks for sharing your experiences. I have never tried wireless charging - other than my apple watch. Most reviews I have read about charging pads where so so. I have not been sold on any brand I have seen or read about. I was kind of hoping Apple would pull through because I would be more prone to trust their device. But I can do without just fine.

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I have five wireless chargers. One is the Apple default puck that came with the  Watch. Another is the Apple Magnetic Charging Dock for the  Watch that I keep bedside as a charging stand, the other three are all for my iPhone XS. One is a slanted stand version, also beside the bed, to use the iPhone as an alarm clock. Another is a pad, from Anker, on my desktop so all I have to do is drop my iPhone on it and it stays topped off. Finally, I have a suction-cup mounted iPhone holder in my car, for when I want to use GPS/Streaming music as I drive. All five work well, none overheat. I do sense heat in the  watch if I put it on either of the chargers with a low battery, but that heat is the battery itself as it is charging. Not hot, just warm. The iPhone doesn't get warm except in the car, and I suspect that is because it is in the sun more than the charging artifact. I wasn't interested in the AirPower because I have a metallic band on my  Watch that doesn't allow it to lie flat, so it wouldn't charge the Watch on the AirPower.

I do have to say they are actually pretty handy, particularly the one in the car. I just snap my iPhone into the holder and as soon as I turn the key, it starts charging. No cables to fumble with. Sweet.

Here is the car unit: iOttie | Best Selling Car Mounts, Wireless Charging Case, Accessories & Selfie Stick

I got it on sale, didn't pay that price.
 

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I've had good experiences with wireless chargers as well though I don't use them a lot. I have two at home. One of them handles two phones at the sime tme though I haven't used that feature too much. Can't try it with anything other than the iPhones though. My iPad isn't new enough to support wireless charging.

Wish more vehicles supported wireless charging.
 

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Wish more vehicles supported wireless charging.

Not a factor for me when we buy our next car. I do want "Car Play" though. Next week we are going to be doing some car shopping starting with the 2019 Honda CRV. I just "love" dealing with car sales people! :puke
 
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I was kind of hoping Apple would pull through because I would be more prone to trust their device. But I can do without just fine.

Why can't they just make a charger like the one I just drop my electric toothbrush onto???

It has worked well for years and nothing to actually plugin or connect, just a tiny induction probe I guess it uses. and just drop the toothbrush onto it in it's holder.

Nice K.I.S.S method and proven technology.



- Patrick
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That IS how it works, Patrick. You plug in the charging pad just like you do the base for your toothbrush, then just drop the wireless device on the pad and it charges. K.I.S.S. and proven.
 

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@Charlie

We almost bought one of the Hondas (CRV or HRV don't remember which) but ended up with the 2019 Outback instead. For us the differences boiled down to minor differences. For example, I found the cup holders in the Honda in a bit of an awkward place. Just a tad too far back for me. On the up side both vehicle's had cup holders that handle the 30 or so oz. Yeti cups. Our previous car didn't.

Outback doesn't do wireless CarPlay but I don't think the Honda's do either.

Remind me to tell you my car salesman horror story.

What are you driving now?
 

chscag

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What are you driving now?

The new car will be for my wife. Right now she's driving a 2005 Camry with 170K on it.

We're also seriously considering a 2019 Toyota RAV-4. Price for the Honda and RAV-4 are fairly close but the Honda has 1.9% financing for 60 months. Not sure what kind of financing Toyota is currently offering.
 
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That IS how it works, Patrick. You plug in the charging pad just like you do the base for your toothbrush, then just drop the wireless device on the pad and it charges. K.I.S.S. and proven.


OK, so what's Apple's problem then that they seem unable to accomplish that properly??

Did all their good designers and engineers abandon ship or has ol' Jony Ive finally admitted defeat???


- Patrick
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chscag

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Did all their good designers and engineers abandon ship or has ol' Jony Ive finally admitted defeat???

Maybe this?

Apple today canceled AirPower, the charging mat that it first announced in 2017, because of an inability to meet its high standards for hardware, reports TechCrunch.

But more likely their AirPower product was going to be way too expensive when compared with all other competitors. :goofy
 
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It's physics. The coils in the base and the devices are magnetically connected (same in your toothbrush, BTW) and as current passes through those coils, it produces heat along with the current to charge the battery. What I have read is that because the device AND the base both warm, one is not bad, but trying for three was a technical challenge that couldn't be overcome in a way satisfactory to Apple. Now add in that, unlike your toothbrush, the devices and the chargers have to communicate and the plethora of close by signals plus the heat from three at once just was not possible to do. Your toothbrush has either NiCad or NiMH batteries in it, which are basically pretty dumb batteries, but work well in that application. The problem is that they have very low power density (not a lot of storage in a big physical package), but for brushing your teeth for a couple of minutes, no big deal. And the chemistry of Nickel batteries is pretty tame. They won't overcharge and even if you push them, they won't do anything strange.

I don't want to repeat the whole article, but here is a good place to read about the "adventures" of Lithium batteries:

Lithium-based Batteries Information – Battery University
and
Safety Concerns with Li-ion Batteries – Battery University

Every lithium battery has an intelligent circuit in it that monitors the charge, temperature and the charging/discharging rate, and controls how the battery performs to try to avoid runaway thermal activity. When charging, that includes telling the charger to reduce the charging current to stay within safety limits. Therefore, each of the wireless devices has to communicate with the charging pad to say, "I'm getting full or warm, slow down." One device on one pad, no problem, the signals are all pretty weak but the battery and charger pad are close together so it works well. But three, in close proximity? I suspect some cross talk happens that was, again, just too hard to figure out in a reasonable time. I don't think this is a Jony Ive issue, but one where Apple expected the engineers could figure out the tech problems, got close enough to make an announcement, betting they could solve them all, but in the end, physics killed them for now. Will someone else solve the issues Apple didn't? Well, I suspect that AirPower-like devices will come out, even if they haven't solved the problems to the level Apple wanted/needed. And those devices will eventually kill batteries, maybe with fires, which we can only hope don't hurt any people.
 
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Not a factor for me when we buy our next car. I do want "Car Play" though. Next week we are going to be doing some car shopping starting with the 2019 Honda CRV. I just "love" dealing with car sales people! :puke

Stay away from the CRV for now unless you are looking at the base model with the naturally aspirated engine. They still haven't fixed the engine oil/gas dilution issue on their 1.5L Turbocharged engines. This problem spans throughout all Honda vehicles with their turbo 1.5L engine.

I've been looking at vehicles too, and the CRV is at the top of my list for many reasons, but there's no way I'm buying it while this problem gets swept under a rug.
 

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i forgot to mention that. I saw some of those reports when I was researching vehicle information. The deal breaker for me was that either the CRV or HRV (don't remember which) was too high for me to get into easily. In the long run it was minor differences that brought us to the Outback.
 
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i forgot to mention that. I saw some of those reports when I was researching vehicle information. The deal breaker for me was that either the CRV or HRV (don't remember which) was too high for me to get into easily. In the long run it was minor differences that brought us to the Outback.

I hate to drive the thread off subject, but I've been looking at new cars too. I like the outback because of the awd and smoothness while driving. It seemed a little loud while driving though. My E350 is quiet, but my new job requires me to drive even more than before, and I was averaging 24k miles a year!I'll probably be pushing 30-40k miles this year. As much as I love my car, and I mean LOVEEEEE it, I just can't handle paying premium fuel while averaging about 20mpg. It's such a waste of money! I know we had started a car thread some time ago...I'm going to go resurrect it :D
 

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I know we had started a car thread some time ago...I'm going to go resurrect it

Great idea IGGI, start the thread in the lounge. I'm sure I'll have some input after the wife and I go car shopping this week.
 

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