Thread: Time for the universal cell phone charger

Cell phone makers Tuesday pledged to end one of modern life's chief frustrations --- and introduce a universal charger for handsets by 2012.
The GSMA (Groupe Speciale Mobile Association), which represents more than 750 of the world's cell phone operators, made the announcement at its annual Mobile World Congress in Barcelona Tuesday.

Under the scheme, phone makers have pledged that a majority of new handset models will include the universal charger by January 1 2012. The planned device will use a micro USB plug. Aside from bringing relief to drawers stuffed full of redundant chargers, the GSMA stressed that the new device would reduce raw materials.

Source: Economic Times, 18th Feb 2009 and
Universal cellphone charger will ring the changes, say makers - CNN.com

Read in Digg that Apple is reluctant to follow the norms.

Originally Posted by cool_techie_tvm

Read in Digg that Apple is reluctant to follow the norms.

All the biggies(m$, apple and so on..) are always reluctant to follow norms. M$ learnt their lesson with firefox, Apple will learn their lesson.

Originally Posted by vikramjb

All the biggies(m$, apple and so on..) are always reluctant to follow norms. M$ learnt their lesson with firefox, Apple will learn their lesson.

I really hope so...

once universal charger becomes the industry norm, even Apple owuld have to follow as otherwise it would be shown the door by the consumers.

Originally Posted by panchabhut

once universal charger becomes the industry norm, even Apple owuld have to follow as otherwise it would be shown the door by the consumers.

True but it will take some time and class action lawsuit for apple to bend and also depends on the amount of users who are ready to migrate to a different handset citing this reason.

very good initiative indeed. now we wont at least have to worry if a charger goes defective. spare chargers would easily be available ...

I guess meanwhile those 5in1 chargers should do fine...

Wont the charger ratings differ in between the chargers? I think only the mode of connection will be kept standard. Like a common interface will be adopted by many.

Originally Posted by cool_techie_tvm

Wont the charger ratings differ in between the chargers? I think only the mode of connection will be kept standard. Like a common interface will be adopted by many.

they seemed to mention Mini USB as interface so naturally they'll redesign their ratings according to the standard.

No i meant the battery ratings will be different. There are plenty of phone batteries with varying capacities, from 700 mAH to 2000 mAH. So the output parameters should also vary accordingly, right?

Originally Posted by cool_techie_tvm

No i meant the battery ratings will be different. There are plenty of phone batteries with varying capacities, from 700 mAH to 2000 mAH. So the output parameters should also vary accordingly, right?

Yea, I meant they will have to revampp everthing accordingly...

let see what actually gets implemented ... it would be tough to universalize the chargers for all varieties of chargers.

In the good old days, I have seen what was called in layman's language, the "universal eliminator/converter", a variable output device (1.5 V - 12 V DC) with multiple jacks to power all types of battery operated equipments, with a switch to select the output power.
May me something of similar nature could be possible.