Gadgetory

now it's no great secret that I hate the cables and fragile connectors that modern electronic devices use for battery recharging but we're just stuck with cable clutter right ah what the heck seriously guys like next time just find something on Shutterstock to represent lots of cables huh all right yeah that would have been fine anyway thanks to modern technology and by modern I mean demonstrated about a century ago by Nikola Tesla but now finally becoming a commercial product wireless power is here and we are very close to saying goodbye to cables forever but how does it work I could just say magnets and leave you to infer the rest but the actual science is much more interesting than that electricity and magnetism are actually much more closely related than many people realize a current-carrying wire coil around an iron core is called an electromagnet because it uses alternating current electricity to generate a fluctuating magnetic field reversing the situation and applying a magnetic field whose polarity is constantly reversing to our wire coil will generate AC electricity this is called electromagnetic induction and is the basis of the wireless power solutions that we find in consumer grade devices like phones and electric toothbrushes and what's great about it is that unlike microwave based wireless power it is safe to have next to your head while you sleep or you know in your mouth and stuff all right so let's summarize the pros and cons and then it's number one is a big one and it's convenience put your device down on its pad when you go to bed in a compatible doc in your car or even on the table in your favorite coffee shop and boom it's charging sign me up advantage number two is no more worn out connectors microUSB can be as fragile and generally terrible as it wants if I only have to use it once in a while to load a new ROM on my phone love it but nothing is perfect so drawback number one is that it's still not ubiquitous it's still too expensive for many manufacturers to include with their devices and most charging pads I mean however cool this might be aren't built into anything yet and still need to sit there and be plugged into the wall the good news is that aftermarket solutions aren't too bad a rear cover for a Galaxy s5 thirty bucks and a compatible pad on ebay is less than twenty bucks number two is in efficiency compared to wired charging your device will charge slower and heat up more for me personally this isn't a big deal when I've got time like when I'm sleeping I can charge wirelessly and when I'm in a hurry I can plug in number three is that range is very limited right now you pretty much put the two surfaces right next to each other and orientation is picky with most devices but solutions like using grooved surfaces or additional magnets to help with alignment have been used successfully to help with this and next-gen solutions should help alleviate both of these issues a fair bit now the last point here is something that I wasn't really sure how to classify in my list of pros and cons and that's the speed at which this technology is developing it's advantageous because it means amazing new solutions are coming but it also ties into the biggest disadvantage yet which is compatibility folks who remember beta versus VHS and HD DVD versus blu-ray you all know what I'm talking about there are two main competing standards today and while they both rely on a power transmission pad and a compatible receiver either inside or attached to your device they don't work with each other Qi backed by the wireless power consortium is by far the most popular amongst consumers right now but PMA the standard backed by the power matters Alliance is likely to continue to gain support with corporate organizations and governments with their cloud-based controller software feature that allows these entities to better manage their wireless charging network the Alliance for wireless power is yet another group and their residents branded resonant magnetic coupling wireless charging standard looks as super exciting and promises to enable more convenient solutions by offering dramatically better range and multi-device charging while maintaining reasonable efficiency they recently closed a standard consolidation deal PMA though so my point isn't which one you should invest in now in terms of buying a bunch of gear but just that the standards war is just warming up with new developments coming hard and fast at the end of the day though whether you're a time child a human or an otter hopefully the thing we can all agree on is that wireless charging rocks and the future is going to be freakin awesome with like wireless charging that can basically be in the same room as you and provide power all your devices space-age stuff men speaking of space-age stuff Shutterstock isn't it's actually really simple you head over to shutterstock.com where you can use their super-powerful image search to browse their entire 35 plus million image library for free pick the ones you want and pay a reasonable price to download them and use them with no royalties they're a la carte service is great for individuals and they have reasonably priced subscriptions for small organizations like mine and they've even got enterprise plans that include more flexible usage rights an unlimited number of users and even research assistants so whoever you are and whatever the scope of your project whether it's a PowerPoint presentation for school or a professional newscast that you need like stock photos and footage for if you want high quality media and the peace of mind of knowing that you've got the correct usage rights for the content you're using Shutterstock is an option that we 100% recommend oh yeah and you can also save 25% off your new account by using offer code texture day and editing time and I'm sure you'll be as happy with it as we are guys thanks for watching this tech quickie like this video if you 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