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The Economist has a free article titled Coiled and ready to Strike which provides a summary of the state of wireless charging technologies.
From simple, but inefficient induction, to resonant induction, to lasers, many different avenues are being developed for charging different devices. There are efficiency problems with all of these.
Phones are the obvious target, with companies like McDonald's and Starbucks planning wireless charging stations in their restaurant tables. But other targets include electric cars, and buses, roadways, not to mention drones.
The story makes a good read to bring you up to speed without digging too deeply into the technical aspects of each method. Standardization seems the big problem, and even in the electronic device market there are competing non-inter-operable standards, being pushed. Oddly, the automotive industry may be closer to a standard than many.
Original Submission
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Friday June 26 2015, @06:20PM
Qi is a pretty wide-spread example of a technology for small devices. A large number of Android phones use it, many Android Wear devices, and even the Apple watch, which is quite surprising. It may not be the best, but it's certainly good enough. See Richard Gabriel's "Worse is Better".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 26 2015, @06:41PM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better [wikipedia.org]
http://dreamsongs.com/WorseIsBetter.html [dreamsongs.com]
http://www.jwz.org/doc/worse-is-better.html [jwz.org]
http://dreamsongs.com/Files/IsWorseReallyBetter.pdf [dreamsongs.com]
(Score: 2) by Gravis on Friday June 26 2015, @06:58PM
Qi [wikipedia.org]
Qi (pronounced chee; IPA: /tʃiː/, coming from the Chinese word meaning "natural energy") is an interface standard developed by the Wireless Power Consortium for inductive electrical power transfer over distances of up to 4 cm (1.6 inches).[1] The Qi system comprises a power transmission pad and a compatible receiver in a portable device. To use the system, the mobile device is placed on top of the power transmission pad, which charges it via resonant inductive coupling.[2]
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Friday June 26 2015, @07:27PM
Looking for a cheap, build-your-own-Qi-charger kit to charge my cell phone, I found this site [aliexpress.com]. Seems like buying it with the plastic case makes it cheaper.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2, Interesting) by TheGratefulNet on Friday June 26 2015, @09:44PM
how timely; I just jumped onboard the Qi bandwagon, myself; I'm doing a DIY arduino remote control that uses lipoly batteries and Qi charging coil (care of adafruit): https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3876/18405227243_586fc71fc3_o.jpg [staticflickr.com]
the charging pad I'm using is the cheapest I could find; $7 or less shipped from amazon. the coil from adafruit was $15 and here's what it looks like in my hand: https://farm1.staticflickr.com/397/18963769782_cbf2f48aec_z.jpg [staticflickr.com] (photo processed a bit to bring out the coil).
I've just added the Qi stuff last week, in fact. its brand new to me so I wanted to see what its like and what its like to develop with it. so far, so good; it gives a simple clean 5v out and you can connect that 5v coil to any usb input to charge its internal battery. I have a single coil charging pad (shown) as well as a more expensive 3 coil unit (also from amazon). both work fine.
now, that said, I live in silicon valley and when I drove around looking for Qi items, I found almost nothing! what the HELL? silicon valley and yet frys electronics and the other stores had next to nothing to show. overpriced samsung charging pad and that's it. pretty sad, esp. for a tech center like the bay area.
I went into an office store (staples or similar) and the guy there know what qi was but laughed when I asked if they had anything. 'thats too high tech for us and our customers'.
so, I wonder if qi is really going to make it. very little public awareness and very little name-brand product. it also generates a lot of heat, and if you mix that with cheap china electronics, its a formula for failure. a lot of qi pads got bad reviews on amazon probably due to not having air vents or using proper parts. and, I'm told the chipset matters, too; the ti ones are ok but all else are not very good (this is from the eevblog, where there is a post asking about it).
I'm happy with it and happy that its easy to DIY with it. maybe I have the first DIY remote to use a Qi coil ;) but for my use-case, it sure is nice to not have to worry about batteries, even on a very inefficient system (I have not even started to optimize it for battery life; and maybe I won't even bother since a charging pad is always near the tv or nightstand).
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday June 26 2015, @09:57PM
The problem, as I see it, is that until it arrives out of the box with your new device, the hassle of plugging in said device is NEVER going to approach the level needed to get people to add after-market solutions.
Plugging in is just not that big of a problem.
I also don't know enough about the specifics involved to know how much power is wasted when no device is present to be charged.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by TheGratefulNet on Friday June 26 2015, @10:02PM
while microusb is more robust than miniusb, it still wears out and the connector does come undone from the pc board due to the cost involved (or, rather, the slim margins that devices have these days). some phone users had to throw their phones out when their usb ports broke.
so, its one less wear item. and if you pick up and put down the device (like a remote or a phone) it makes sense to avoid having to cable it up just to keep it charged.
if you are in a hurry, wired power is still unbeatable but if you are ok trickle charging or letting it charge overnight, wireless power is very useful.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 2) by forkazoo on Friday June 26 2015, @11:19PM
At this point, a lot of phones actually do already support it out of the box. They just don't ship with a Qi charging pad by default so nobody uses it, and most of them have no idea it's an option. IMO, Google should start selling the next Nexus devices with Qi chargers so there is a user baser of people who have the things, and you'll start to see more support for it. It'd be better if Apple did it in terms of mindshare, but I can't see them going openly open-standards. The watch for example is Qi compatible, but Apple doesn't acknowledge it publicly.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 27 2015, @12:44AM
Is there a list of phones supporting QI?
For all I know I may have it and not know it. 8-0
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2015, @04:56PM
Many phones have two recessed gold plated contacts inside the battery compartment to make contact with a receiver. There is no list of compatible phones, but just look for "qi receiver 'your phone model'" on Ebay. If you don't find anything, it can't be retrofitted easily. Most phones with replaceable batteries have enough room under the back cover to fit a receiver, but if there aren't contacts where the receiver can deliver the current to the phone, then your only options are wiring the receiver to the external micro USB port or disassembling the phone and finding a way to connect the receiver to the USB power traces.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 26 2015, @10:34PM
If you aren't in a hurry, you can get chargers [ebay.com] and receivers [ebay.com] for less than $3 each from China, including shipping.
(Score: 2) by forkazoo on Friday June 26 2015, @11:28PM
Good to know folks are starting to play with it. I've been sketching out some designs for undercabinet lights that I want to build when I move into a bigger place. Basically, Qi transmitter in the bottom of the cabinet, and a light "puck" with RGB LED's, a battery, a little wifi microcontroller, and a Qi receiver that attaches to the cabinet magnetically. Just grab it off the cabinet and stick it anything metal with the magnet any time I need a task light somewhere, then toss it back under the cabinet. The lights speak wifi to an HTPC server that keeps track of things like timer notifications and alerts, and my kitchen lights can blink red when my frozen pizza is done cooking. Battery in the puck also means I have about an hour of light when the power goes out, plus probably a UPS on the Qi transmitters.
I'd really love to do freespace magnetic levitation for the light pucks. But AFAICT, that'll push the BOM to well over $100 per light and it'll be a lot more fiddly, more gear, more heat, more work to build, more power. Still, it'd look awesome to just have my magic wireless light pucks just hovering a few inches under my cabinets. (Possibly with magnetic fields strong enough to make having metal knives in the kitchen incredibly dangerous.) You could even have the "smart" notification functionality do things like bob the maglev lights up and down on a notification.
(Score: 2) by TheGratefulNet on Saturday June 27 2015, @12:22AM
...or, autodial the ambulance to come pick up an injured inventor who was attacked by his own kitchen.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2015, @02:29AM
My cheap kyocera phone came with a coil built in. Really fantastic. Slap a couple chargers in a table next to my bed, throw down my phone where it always has gone and Tada! rarely below 80% ever again without ever needing to think about it.
If only we could get a car version of this in a mat that you park on in the garage.