MagSafe Charger Teardown Reveals Simple Design With Magnets and Charging Coil Encircling a Small Circuit Board

[rubaxter]

I loved MagSafe, but doesn't this kind of defeat a big purpose of wireless charging? Since it's held with magnets I'm going to have to grab the charger and pull it off in order to disconnect it. Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?

I want MagSafe on my laptop to keep it from being jerked around if somehow the pretty-much requisite power cord is tripped over. I don't need it as a glitzty, intrusive, $$$$-driven pseudo-feature on a phone where a larger battery and other USEFUL features are the victims.

I am also quite able to successfully use a normal wireless charging station cuz not dead or inept.

NOW, if MagSafe is an effective connection point for other standardized packs, battery or otherwise, I'd see the real point. But now, it's just a big ????

 

[rubaxter]

Some people want that freedom to use the phone while it is charging.
If you don't, just latch down the charging puck. There are many ways to do this, from 3M Command to nanosuction tape.
We live a glorious golden age of non-destructive "artificial friction".

Some people want a phone that doesn't have to be on the charger continually cuz instrusive charging in case. They don't want to have to be tied to a cord while they talk because, ahem, MOBILE PHONE.

You are just excusing a feature that is really just a ???? to most people, or feature for Apple's convenience, with no obvious consultation with users.

If Apple told us why the MagSafe will make things better in the future, that's what the customers should be told up frong.

 

[Jimmy James]

People are clamouring for fast charging. This is slower than the 0.5 amp socket in my car. Is it really that convenient? I don’t think so.

 

[Elwe]

I think the magnet's purpose is to make sure that the device is aligned with the charger for proper charging. In my case, I find it sometimes that my iphone is not charged when I wake up in the morning.

Correct. But to further address the parent point--what was described this way--"Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?"--this is not currently technically possibly at the desired charging rates, and is one reason why Apple has not released a workable AirPower/charging mat product. The best technical solution I have personally seen involves mechanically moving some elements to align them for efficient and adequate charging . . . but think about that. Think about the added manufacturing cost at scale as well as expected failure rates.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

I didn't buy last time because of bigger battery, better reception, and speedier modem elsewhere, regardless of the longer upgrade/relevance of iPhones models. That will still rule next time.

I think your points above will ALWAYS be true, Android solutions will likely continue to maintain leads in the areas above as each particular line has less of a “legacy” to be in-line with. Fortunately, with Android, you have choices of many vendors with dozens of feature sets to suit your particular need! Choice is awesome!

 

[Vanilla35]

I loved MagSafe, but doesn't this kind of defeat a big purpose of wireless charging? Since it's held with magnets I'm going to have to grab the charger and pull it off in order to disconnect it. Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?

This is exactly why it's stupid. Also, I don't know who all these people are with their phone's not charging on their Qi chargers. Over the last few years I've only bought one's with rubber rims on the edge and have not had any phone fall off once. This magsafe is not solving an issue. I love picking my phone up and putting it down freely on my charging puck. Having to wrestle a strong magnet off the back 20x a day is not cool at all.

 

[name99]

Probably not much more than 2-4 dollars total cost make each one.
Add 1 dollar for packaging and boom! 39 dollars in the store.
30-34 dollars in profit on each unit, tens of millions will be sold.

You can say that. And yet it remains a fact that
- lining up the phone on a qi charger has been a known hit-or-miss hassle for 5 years or so BUT
- not one of the many other phone companies ever bothered to try to fix the problem.
Huawei, HTC, LG, Google -- nothing stopped them from solving this years ago...

And of course having the landing magnets means
- cases attach better
- you can easily attach the phone to a car mount (that also charges)
- you can easily attach the phone to things like magnetic tripod mounts.

That's how you get to a trillion dollar company -- by fixing small irritations one at a time, rather than simply accepting them.

And if you don't want want to pay for that convenience, you can still get a $5 Qi charger at Ikea, or a cheap USB-C brick.

 

[name99]

This is exactly why it's stupid. Also, I don't know who all these people are with their phone's not charging on their Qi chargers. Over the last few years I've only bought one's with rubber rims on the edge and have not had any phone fall off once. This magsafe is not solving an issue. I love picking my phone up and putting it down freely on my charging puck. Having to wrestle a strong magnet off the back 20x a day is not cool at all.

Then isn't it nice that you can stick with your current charger?

I do not understand this mentality that insists "If I don't want a function, then no-one else should have it either!"
I've been wanting a built-in strong magnet on my phone for years, based in part on how well this same functionality works for iPad Pro.

 

[name99]

Some people want a phone that doesn't have to be on the charger continually cuz instrusive charging in case. They don't want to have to be tied to a cord while they talk because, ahem, MOBILE PHONE.

You are just excusing a feature that is really just a ???? to most people, or feature for Apple's convenience, with no obvious consultation with users.

If Apple told us why the MagSafe will make things better in the future, that's what the customers should be told up frong.

What is getting you so upset?
(a) I can tell you for a fact that there are people on Twitter who love the Magsafe connector for precisely the reason I gave that you can use your phone while it is charging. You're welcome to say that you don't care about this. You don't get to tell other people that they should not care about this.

(b) If you don't want to use magsafe, then don't. The world is full of non-magnetic wireless chargers.

(c) It sounds like you really really want a larger battery. Buy a battery case!

All these problems CAN BE SOLVED. Do you want to solve them, or do you want to whine?

 

[manu chao]

Also, I don't know who all these people are with their phone's not charging on their Qi chargers.

And I don't know why you apparently would want to imply that those people are either incompetent or don't exist? Are you somebody who doesn't believe that touching an electric fence hurts until you have experienced yourself?

 

[manu chao]

To lure me to iPhone, Apple needs to make recharging less frequent, not easier or gliztier once you buy the aftermarket 'certified but deliberately not included' $$$$ charging equipment.

Except for the 'certified' part, you could have said exactly the same when they added Qi charging to their phones.

 

[freedomlinux]

A good gag gift would be to custom fit a reverse polarity magnet in this charger so when people tried to put their iPhone on, it would push it off.

BRB, working on a magnetic levitating iPhone

 

[Wizec]

We need another Pro “X” model SKU without wireless charging where all that wasted space is allocated to extra battery capacity. SMH

 

[Websnapx2]

I loved MagSafe, but doesn't this kind of defeat a big purpose of wireless charging? Since it's held with magnets I'm going to have to grab the charger and pull it off in order to disconnect it. Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?

It's a by-product but not a purpose of wireless (induction) charging — not clicking a wire into a port is the actual purpose.

 

[Websnapx2]

To lure me to iPhone, Apple needs to make recharging less frequent, not easier or gliztier once you buy the aftermarket 'certified but deliberately not included' $$$$ charging equipment. I can easily use normal QI charging, so pseuco-MagSafe is nice but not a feature I want at the expense of other, useful features. On a laptop REAL MagSafe made sense; here it's just for people who can't be bothered to pay attention or get an effective QI solution.

I didn't buy last time because of bigger battery, better reception, and speedier modem elsewhere, regardless of the longer upgrade/relevance of iPhones models. That will still rule next time.

You are missing the forest for the trees. While I agree, the focus should always be to need to charge a device less, followed by when you DO need to charge it does so as fast as possible, this is not meant to be "glitzy", it's the beginning of an ecosystem. If it was just about charging it wouldn't need to be built around an NFC chip. That means things that will connect though this will communicate with the device and — I'm certain — eventually allow a host of accessories to activate actions once connected. For instance, I can see a gimble with MagSafe that — once connected — launches a specific app, or a drone controller. Like when the U1 chip was initially included seeming limited initially as a means for precise AirDrop, but now more tech targeting it is becoming realized (UWB tracking tags) as developers see the potential of building that out. For that stuff to happen, the capabilities need to be in people's hands well before that ecosystem matures so that it can be actually realized.

 

[Shawzborne]

I loved MagSafe, but doesn't this kind of defeat a big purpose of wireless charging? Since it's held with magnets I'm going to have to grab the charger and pull it off in order to disconnect it. Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?

No, with “well made and weighted” MFI third party MagSafe stands and chargers you won’t have to hold on to the stand or pad to pull it off. I don’t recommend buying the $$$ apple charging puck it is silly and a waste of money compared to the MagSafe products coming soon. “This is just my opinion”

 

[acblue94]

I think the benefit of this is that it *snaps* to your phone, so you don't have to worry about alignment issues when quickly setting it down, which is common. Functionally it's the same as the Apple Watch. Personally, I think it's a good idea, but I think they messed up calling it MagSAFE and associating it with the old MacBook MagSafe because unlike the MacBooks, it doesn't provide the same SAFEty feature as shown in previous MR videos. Basically it's just an easier way to connect a charging cable to your phone. They should've just called it MagConnect or something similar (that they could trademark ).

It doesn’t just snap. You have to place it exactly in the center. If you don’t you have alignment issues just like wireless charging. This is even more inconvenient then wireless charging. You have to pick up the whole MagSafe to remove the phone. It’s just terrible of an idea.

 

[sharbeen]

I loved MagSafe, but doesn't this kind of defeat a big purpose of wireless charging? Since it's held with magnets I'm going to have to grab the charger and pull it off in order to disconnect it. Isn't it more convenient to just set it down and pick it up?

I use my iPhone a lot at work. Twice I didn place it properly on the wireless charger and woke up to less than 10%. This was disaster. Since then I switched back to lightning cable. Mag safe solves this

 

[ZachNathan]

I just installed a couple of these MagSafe chargers on my kitchen counter. I plugged them into my undermount cabinet electrical sockets, used clear tape to secure the wire to the backsplash and counter, and 3M double sided tissue tape to hold the charger to the countertop. Works like a charm!

Oooh I see someone might have merchandising experience... those coils look on-brand!