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PSA: Non-iPhone 12 Models Charge Super Slowly With MagSafe Charger
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I thought the same way, before I got my iPhone 8. What you’re missing is a paradigm shift - the act of charging changes character. Before, I would have to do some nominal planning to charge my phone: “I’m going to charge it now”, or “I’m going to charge it later this evening” or some such. But now, with Qi charging, I don’t have to plan to charge - I just set my phone on the stand (which I would do anyway) and it’s charging. You make a big point about “at least you can use the phone while it’s charging”, missing the way it actually works - yes, when I pick up my phone for two minutes to do something, the phone isn’t charging. But as soon as I set it back down, it resumes charging again. At any given time throughout the day, my phone like has more charge on it than yours does. Wireless charging removes much of the worry about charging, because you’re so rarely running on a low battery.
My biggest issue with wireless charging at this point is, I’m annoyed that my iPad doesn’t have it, and I still have to think aboutl and plan for, plugging it in.
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MagSafe V1 is a hard pass for me but excited to see future improvements.
In theory vs in practice can make a big difference; inductive charging consumes about 47% more energy compared to conventional cable charging, for other devices this number can be even higher due to bad alignment with the charging coil.
Additionally, "keeping a sense of scale", the adoption rate of new iphones is very high, so although the amount of power will be negligible when it comes to you as a single person, multiply it by millions/billions of people and suddenly it's a much bigger problem. And for what? Because one cannot be bothered to pickup and plug in a cable????
And then we haven't even talked about the heat degrading battery life, adding to the pile of e-waste
Source: https://debugger.medium.com/wireless-charging-is-a-disaster-waiting-to-happen-48afdde70ed9
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I've used AirPods every single day since owning them in 2017. Not once did my AirPods case ever run out of juice. My AirPods 1 battery case is coming to be 4 years old now and I've yet to experience completely depleted batteries from all of my AirPods and case, despite the battery capacity being severely diminished. I've even solo-traveled with them last year where it got heavy 16-hour day usage (had to charge one in the case while using the other in the ear), still never encountered complete 0% battery in the case.
Of course I'm only speaking for myself, but I believe people are not encountering that situation all that much.
HOWEVER, I do think there is one use case where it may be useful: charging both the iPhone and the AirPods with one cable/one charger while traveling so you don't need a multi-usb charger or bring extra cables. But if it means Apple has to implement extra hardware to do so, I don't think it's worth it. Apple has never really designed iPhone for "just in case scenarios" that involve extra hardware. Hardware has always been "what you absolutely need" and the rest is done in software.
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Easier said than done with apple’s current policies, my Genius Bar appointment is at the end of the month October 30th For My magsafe, i ruled out my iphone 12 pro, because i used two iphone 12 pros and same issue happened. Both never went about 2.94W. Can’t do walkin appointments, BUT the senior tech rep i managed to talked to did instruct me to make a sales appointment(which i have for tuesday), bring in the magsafe charger and 20w for an exchange If possible.
THey mentioned the DIY option but it would be same turnaround time if i would had waited for the magsafe charger via the Genius Bar appointment.
I don’t think a firmware issue could fix this, since outputing the same 1-3 watts consistently, so be apple or android device, it might be a hardware defect all Together or the coils not giving the right watt output at this rate...
We're talking about single digits of wattage not going directly to the phone. So yes, that lowers efficiency and does end up as a very small amount of heat. About the same as a typical modern LED bulb. But compared to using a toaster, electric dryer or over, it's pretty much nothing. You will never see the effect of an "inefficient" wireless charger on your electric bill...
Inflating your tires properly would make up much more than the amount of energy loss from wireless charging your phone for the whole year.
Energy loss from wireless is negligible.
I am more disappointed that I will have to pay for this magnet wireless technology when i buy the phone, then pay extra $40 for the charging pad to use...but in reality all I wanted is a bigger longer lasting battery that charges quickly and reliably via USB-C
but Magsafe is not grab and go, its magnetic, you need 2 hands to de-attach the device
If you put the iPhone face down (on a soft surface) and the MagSage on top, then it is indeed grab and go one-handed.
Well, this may be the case. But I love my MagSafe. Hitting 15w and able to hold my phone a lot more naturally compared to a cable sticking out. I for one will not returning mine. Love it
My case and Airpods have been low on juice several times for me. Sometimes I just forget to charge the case for days. Ironically, when I'm traveling far, I seem to keep tabs on the charge.
I don't see any disadvantage from it. Don't see it affecting pricing nor the thickness of it. And with the iPhone 12 lineup, Apple hasn't introduced any REAL necessities, besides much better low light shots.
I tried talking to two different Apple reps but they were not educated on MagSafe at all. Apple: Oh yes it supports 50% charge in 30 minutes for both iPhone 12 and iPhone 11 @20W. Me: iPhone doesn’t support MagSafe only Qi at 7.5W. Apple: ...let me transfer you
Like I said, Apple never really implements just-in-case type of hardware inside the iPhone.
Needs extra power connectors for bilateral charging and extra QA testing heat dissipation would be big factors on a large scale (perhaps a design and/or material change would be needed to accommodate two phones getting hot on top of each other while the bottom phone is plugged in ).
- Apple is developing realityOS, so lidar/U1 will play a critical part of Apple's ecosystem
- 5G for longevity of the phone and affects daily usage
- MagSafe is, in my opinion, to prepare for the inevitable portless phone future. you can't just introduce a phone without a port and expect everyone to switch overnight. this is a necessary transition step.
maybe you can argue ceramic shield and water proofing are just-in-case design features, but those deal with life or death situations of the device. lack of battery is not going to kill the device.
Just like the butterfly keyboards that took many years before Apple admitted it was a failure?
Ironically, this doesn't work with the MagSafe Charger because you have to use 2 hands to attach/detach the magnets.
Might as well just use a lightning cable in that case.