Mains + USB faceplate

vasselmeyer

Anyone tried these at all?

http://cpc.farnell.com/connekt-gear/27-2000/2g-switched-socket-2-x-usb-charging/dp/PL14097

Opinions? Success? Disaster?

joneve

Tried it at a hotel in Australia. That isn't much help, is it? 

Nitefly

vasselmeyer said:

Anyone tried these at all?

No, but now I've seen it I will do - looks a good idea to me.

vasselmeyer

joneve said:

Tried it at a hotel in Australia. That isn't much help, is it? 

Must have needed a very long cable.

boogieman

I saw them in the Screwfix catalogue recently, looks a great idea. I'm going to put a couple in when we get the kitchen redone.

joeyowen

They seem to be very popular now

Our local busses have plugs with a socket and usb.  And i'm in North Wales... we've never been ahead on anything, so chances are cities had this about 10 years ago haha

UnclePsychosis

They look clever. Do they have any kind of fuse or surge protection in them? 

vasselmeyer

The website says "surge and spike protection". I've just ordered a couple. Will report back.

Gagaryn

Brilliant idea but why is the USB limited to 2A, 5V - that's a bit annoying - would take ages to charge a tablet or Laptop. 

stickyfiddle

They have them a lot in hotels out here. Excellent idea. I really really like that USB has become the standard charging socket for small devices.

You can get those with clever sockets that accept EU plugs too. Those are the ones to go for if you can find them.

http://img.dxcdn.com/productimages/sku_309882_1.jpg

imalone

Pretty handy. Though worth noting that plugging into a strange one is potentially a security risk.

Gagaryn said:

Brilliant idea but why is the USB limited to 2A, 5V - that's a bit annoying - would take ages to charge a tablet or Laptop. 

Most USB connectors wont handle more than 2A. There's a USB power delivery standard which allows higher voltages, but requires the device to negotiate and the correct cables. Don't know of any laptop that charges over USB, though I could be wrong.

not_the_dj

stickyfiddle said:

They have them a lot in hotels out here. Excellent idea. I really really like that USB has become the standard charging socket for small devices.

You can get those with clever sockets that accept EU plugs too. Those are the ones to go for if you can find them.

http://img.dxcdn.com/productimages/sku_309882_1.jpg

That looks like a little sinister robot. 

digitalscream

Gagaryn said:

Brilliant idea but why is the USB limited to 2A, 5V - that's a bit annoying - would take ages to charge a tablet or Laptop. 

The USB 2.0 spec was designed long before it was commonplace to use it as a power source in its own right. The USB 3.0 spec has a variant for charging devices which allows up to 5A/5V.

EDIT: Correction - this is the current/voltage spec for USB 3.0:

Specification	Current	Voltage	Power
USB 1.x and 2.0	500 mA[a]	5 V	2.5 W
USB 3.x	900 mA[b]	5 V	4.5 W
USB 3.1 Type-C	900 mA	5 V	4.5 W
	1.5 A	5 V	7.5 W
	3 A	5 V	15 W
USB Battery Charging	0.5–1.5 A	5 V	2.5–7.5 W
USB Power Delivery	2 A	5 V	10 W
	1.5 A	12 V	18 W
	3 A	12 V	36 W
	5 A	12 V	60 W
	3 A	20 V	60 W
	5 A	20 V	100 W

holnrew

Bring back serial ports

Nitefly

holnrew said:

Bring back serial ports

LOL!  I was going through some junk the other day and found a 25-pin gender-changer, and a PS2 - USB adapter... 

vasselmeyer

Every techie has a box of cables they find hard to throw away. I finally got rid of a bunch of 10base2 cables, T-pieces and terminators last month along with a pile of ISA NE2000 network cards.

You never know then you might need a 9-to-25 pin serial adapter.

Gagaryn

Yeah, it was my work tablet I was thinking about Dell Venue - power supply is 45 watt.