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Dec 6, 2009
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I haven’t exactly measured it, but I swear there is a difference in the quality of charge between different chargers. When using Apple fast charger with Apple USB-C to Lightning, the battery seems to drain much more slowly than when I used an equivalent RavPower setup. Also it seems like sometimes it would not even charge or it would charge slower than the Apple setup. I thought RavPower was decent and it says MFi certified but who knows.

I guess I could test it scientifically but I just wanted to see if anyone knows why this would be or if I’m just dreaming.
 
The way you charge the battery doesn't affect the way it drains on a day-to-day basis. Fully charged is fully charged. Power is expended by the work that's done.

This takes me back to Elementary Electronics - the water analogy. Say you have a 10-gallon/40 liter water tank. You can fill it with a fire hose in about one second, or you can fill it with a one-cup/250 ML measuring scoop in 10 minutes. But once it's filled, it's filled.

Now, say there's a spigot on the side of the tank. You can open the spigot just a little and it dribbles out slowly - tank is empty in an hour, or you can open it all the way and it gushes out and the tank empties in one minute. Either way, you have 10 gallons of water on the floor.

In other words, the speed of filling the tank has no relation at all to the speed of emptying the tank.

What may matter with the charger is the long-term life of the battery - faster charging (higher wattage charger) may wear out the battery sooner than a slower charger. But no matter what, eventually that battery will wear out. In the case of a decently-designed piece of electronics all the important charging circuitry is built-in (iPhone in this case). The iPhone regulates the power being fed to the battery so that the battery is not exposed to a too-high voltage or charging current.

The thing to worry about with a charging brick is overall build quality - that it actually does put out the specified voltage and current, and that the DC signal is reasonably clean. It's not exactly rocket science and they're not exactly expensive things to build well, but we can't assume everyone is going to bother to build them well.
 
I haven’t exactly measured it, but I swear there is a difference in the quality of charge between different chargers. When using Apple fast charger with Apple USB-C to Lightning, the battery seems to drain much more slowly than when I used an equivalent RavPower setup. Also it seems like sometimes it would not even charge or it would charge slower than the Apple setup. I thought RavPower was decent and it says MFi certified but who knows.

I guess I could test it scientifically but I just wanted to see if anyone knows why this would be or if I’m just dreaming.
Use an Apple certified charger, not one of those poorly made Chinese knockoffs. If you do that, you'll be fine.
 
And no, a full charge is a full charge. There are tons of good chargers out there, and they do the same thing.

Yeah, I have several Anker & RAVPower chargers that work great for my iPads and other devices. I'm not even sure where my original Apple chargers are at this point.
 
Just curious; why have you both eschewed Apple chargers? Do your third party ones have multiple outputs, or is it something else?

I have chargers with multiple outlets, higher wattages, and slimmer form factors than Apple's - and at lower prices. Apple "overcharges". e.g., I use and like this thin, 45W charger for my 12.9 Pro -

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07H9WMW6N

It's $26. The Apple 30W USB-C charger is $49. Much like their cables, it's a ripoff.
 
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I have chargers with multiple outlets, higher wattages, and slimmer form factors than Apple's - and at lower prices. Apple "overcharges". e.g., I use and like this thin, 45W charger for my 12.9 Pro -

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07H9WMW6N

It's $26. The Apple 30W USB-C charger is $49. Much like their cables, it's a ripoff.
Apple certainly does "overcharge" in that manner.
 
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Are you suggesting that the electric current produced by off-brand charger is inferior to the electrons found in Apple‘s charger? I think this speaks to the power of branding and human psychology. It doesn’t matter how you charge it. The device itself regulates the voltage as it‘s charging itself. One charged, it’s charge.
 
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And they sure are convenient for traveling (whenever that may happen again).
Our old Anker 5-port chargers that we replaced with the 6- and 10-port are permanently in a go-bag with a bunch of Lightning and Micro-USB cables. 🙂 Ugh, the transition to USB-C will be pretty annoying as that'll just mean I need 3 types of charging tips instead of 2. 🙄
 
Our old Anker 5-port chargers that we replaced with the 6- and 10-port are permanently in a go-bag with a bunch of Lightning and Micro-USB cables. 🙂 Ugh, the transition to USB-C will be pretty annoying as that'll just mean I need 3 types of charging tips instead of 2. 🙄

lol - exactly what I did, in a bag ready to grab and go. And yes, I have Lightning, USB-C, micro USB, and even still some mini USB that I need for a couple of devices. And HDMI, mini HDMI, DisplayPort, USB-A 2 & 3, and then the combinations of each, and the dongles and hubs, ad nausea.
 
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