How much power does the iPhone 4 dock put out?

[MotionMan]

How much power does the iPhone 4 dock put out? 500mA is my best guess?

I can't seem to find it on the Googles.

MotionMan

 

[Emulex]

energy waste exists - the iphone can draw more than 500ma btw - i had two charging into a kill a watt and i coulda swore it was at 3-4 watts

 

[MotionMan]

energy waste exists - the iphone can draw more than 500ma btw - i had two charging into a kill a watt and i coulda swore it was at 3-4 watts

I am looking at some third party dual dock systems and I need to know if they put out as much (or more) juice than the official Apple docks.

MotionMan

 

[MotionMan]

Bump for still looking for an answer.

MotionMan

 

[Evadman]

this one?

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC596ZM/B

It is USB powered, which means it can pull 500ma (1/2 amp) for USB2, or 900ma (9/10ths of an amp) for USB3 since the cable also supports data. If it was a charging cable only, 1800ma is maximum.

So you can end up with a absolute max of 1.8a * 5v = 9 watts if charging only. In reality, you will have .5a * 5v = 2.5 watts. IIRC, the iphone 4 has a 1800mah battery at 3.7v so it would take about 1 hour to charge at 1.8a rate with a little less than usb voltage. At 500ma, it would take about 3 hrs 15 min.

 

[MotionMan]

this one?

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC596ZM/B

It is USB powered, which means it can pull 500ma (1/2 amp) for USB2, or 900ma (9/10ths of an amp) for USB3 since the cable also supports data. If it was a charging cable only, 1800ma is maximum.

So you can end up with a absolute max of 1.8a * 5v = 9 watts if charging only. In reality, you will have .5a * 5v = 2.5 watts. IIRC, the iphone 4 has a 1800mah battery at 3.7v so it would take about 1 hour to charge at 1.8a rate with a little less than usb voltage. At 500ma, it would take about 3 hrs 15 min.

Thanks.

Can you tell if the Apple Dock is 500mA, or something else?

MotionMan

 

[Evadman]

Can you tell if the Apple Dock is 500mA, or something else?

The only way it would be > 500ma, is if apple was running outside the USB spec. Even if they were, the usb port would have to also put out more then spec. The only way > 500ma would be within spec is if the usb cable that comes with the doc has 2 connectors for 2 different ports on the computer. I have not seen a cable like that from apple before.

 

[MotionMan]

The only way it would be > 500ma, is if apple was running outside the USB spec. Even if they were, the usb port would have to also put out more then spec. The only way > 500ma would be within spec is if the usb cable that comes with the doc has 2 connectors for 2 different ports on the computer. I have not seen a cable like that from apple before.

I think I understand. The docks I have been looking at say 500mA and I just wanted make sure that was comparable to the Apple Dock. Sounds like it is.

Thanks.

 

[Emulex]

i show 3-6 watt drain on the griffin dual iphone charge station with various products

(iphone 2g,3g,4g,ipod) as i've charged them and peak around. it seems that 1-3 watts is nominal but i've seen a peak of 6?

 

[TheStu]

The only way it would be > 500ma, is if apple was running outside the USB spec. Even if they were, the usb port would have to also put out more then spec. The only way > 500ma would be within spec is if the usb cable that comes with the doc has 2 connectors for 2 different ports on the computer. I have not seen a cable like that from apple before.

Some (maybe all) Apple laptops put out more than 500mA on at least 1 (maybe both) ports. The first MBA I think did that in order to provide power to the external superdrive. And I know there have been times that I have noticed getting better results out of one port over another back when I have my MacBook, but I suppose it could have been all in my head.

 

[Emulex]

alot of cell phones charge faster with the 10-15amp feeds from the cig lighter in cars.

 

[MotionMan]

Some (maybe all) Apple laptops put out more than 500mA on at least 1 (maybe both) ports. The first MBA I think did that in order to provide power to the external superdrive. And I know there have been times that I have noticed getting better results out of one port over another back when I have my MacBook, but I suppose it could have been all in my head.

I forgot where I read it, but I did read that the forward USB port generally puts out more power than the back one on MacBooks.

Before I read this, I, at times, had problems with USB items not working properly. Since I went to using the forward port as much as possible, those problems seemed to go away.

MotionMan

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

I forgot where I read it, but I did read that the forward USB port generally puts out more power than the back one on MacBooks.

I also read that one port gives more interference than the other. I'm not sure which one though.

 

[Emulex]

yes the superdrive is powered off a special negotiated rate since nobody has figured out how to burn DVD+R DL 8x off 500ma YET. its proprietary and not available unless requested.

remember usb was intelligently designed (pc) to give 500ma only when asked.

the 500ma however is irrelevant you can feed the iphone 10amps and its draw is still going to be 500ma unless it decides to take more (intelligent feedback li-po charging systems can if they are programmed to).

iirc i had an old HTC winmo phone that would pull ~2000ma off the car charger for a short bit of time (rapid charge) unless it was warm then it would taper down and down until it reached like 90% when it dropped to a trickle charge. darn thing was either broken because the battery section would get quite warm.

also when i was doing tethering over wifi and charging the unit was quite warm (140F+) as a whole. The macbook air will start to throttle around 140-150F which is about when the fans get loud. it's not hard to make it throttle if you lap it and have the vents mostly blocked off. the newer air's i hope would have improved this fatal flaw because the o/s would back the heck off (shutdown 1 core, 1/2 fsb the other) pretty damn fast when it started to see 140F+ temps. Probably to stop fires.

Anyone know the temp ranges of typical li-po batteries? gotta remember the lithium part has always been a fire starter.

 

[imagoon]

From what I have seen on the "3rd party apple product world," iphone / ipad / iWhatevers can charge at more than 500ma but will only do so under certain conditions. Typically this is: no USB host detected (ie not attached to a pc) and the data lines are shorted to either power or ground via current limiting resistors or the host reports USB power of 1000ma or more. The current limiters are in the phone / device itself.

Example:
Resistor ohms are example only.
attached to a pc (host response to requests on the datalines): iPhone negotiates 500ma
attached to a charger with floating (not connected or wrong ohm rating) data +/-: iPhone: 'invalid charger'
attached to a charger with - <> 300ohm <> data - data+ <> 500ohm <> +: 1000ma draw etc