Intel Wireless charging to arrive in 2013
Intel has been chatting about Wireless Charging at the IDF in San Francisco. The company is placing its bets on the "resonant" method rather than "inductive", claiming it offers higher flexibility. The chip giant acknowledges that inductive charging offers the best efficiency when the device is placed in exactly the right spot but says inductive charging efficiency drops much faster over distance, which gives resonant charging a better overall efficiency.
The first Haswell-based ultrabooks with Intel Wireless Charging Technology may arrive in 2013, they'll enable you to charge a phone (that supports wireless charging) simply by placing the device near your ultrabook. At a later date you can also expect All-in-One PCs with the technology, paving the way for wireless charging for keyboards and mice.
Whether wireless charging is going to become the killer technology that Intel hopes it will be remains to be seen. One potential issue is the large size of the transmitter and receiver, according to Intel's documents, the transceiver has a form factor of 70mm x 30mm x 5mm, it takes up 2100 square millimeter, and the receive takes up 560 square millimeter. Size restrictions (and price) are probably among the main reasons why Nokia isn't building the technology directly into its Lumia 920 but requiring users to buy a wireless charging shell. However, the chip giants mentions that area savings of over 50 percent can be achieved when the technology is integrated on a motherboard, so eventually the technology will take up less space.
A second issue is whether the technology will be flexible enough, being able to charge your phone by placing it near your laptop sounds like a great idea, but will it be practical? Will it be flexible enough? Will it charge fast enough? Until the first reviews arrive we won't know.
And last but not least, what really displeases me about wireless charging is how grossly inefficient it is. In a time when the focus is on energy efficiency and green computing, wireless charging delivers exactly the opposite. According Intel's own marketing slides, efficiency of the current technology ranges from roughly 45% to 65%. In a time when computer power supply makers are slapping themselves on the back for delivering PSUs with efficiencies of over 90 percent, the efficiency of wireless charging is a huge step backwards to the time when energy consumption wasn't really a major concern.
In my mind, Intel would do everyone a favor by focusing on better batteries rather than inefficient charging gimmicks.
Intel Windows 8 beta driver for its IGPs - 05/08/2012 09:52 AM
Intel announced the release of a beta graphics driver for Windows 8 to support the 2nd and 3rd generation Core processors: Intel beta graphics drivers for the Microsoft Windows 8 Consumer Preview are...
Intel will EOL 20 CPUs in 2H 2011 - 08/09/2011 10:09 AM
Intel will phase out 20 chips in the second half of the year. In queue to go End of Life are the socket LGA1366 Core i7-970, socket LGA1156 Core i7-880, Core i7-875K, Core i7-870S, Core i5-760, Core i...
NVIDIA mocks Intel with cartoons - 11/06/2009 10:04 PM
NVIDIA (we assume) has launched a parody on Intel, it's a site with some funny cartoons that mock the chip giant. You can check it out here at Intel's Insides. ...
EU Batters Intel With More Charges - 07/18/2008 11:53 PM
After bringing the world's biggest and most profitable software corporation, Microsoft, to its knees with a record $2.6B USD total in antitrust fines, the European Union began a serious investigation ...
Senior Member
Posts: 3783
Joined: 2010-11-14
If it's only for one device, it's more novelty than practicality.
But if there's anyone who happens to have multiple devices that supports (inductive) wireless charging, all of them can be charged using just one socket with a single, sufficiently spaced, 'charging pad'.
Also useful if hotel rooms or coffee shops have these 'charging pads' available on every room or table, meaning you can just plop in your device for a (theoretically) quick charge without having to worry about finding a socket.
Especially if you cross countries a lot, where wireless charging would mean you don't have to worry about socket compatibility.
Might piss off travel adapter manufacturers, but they probably shouldn't worry for maybe the next 5 years or so, if at all.
Might also mean more hipster headcount per coffee shop, but that's to be expected.
...or so the theory goes anyway. =b
At the moment, it's still a bit of a chicken & egg problem.
Wireless charging needs to be ubiquitous to be practical, but it needs to be practical for it to be ubiquitous.
With new tech, the former is usually more achievable than the latter, provided there's sufficient funding (and hype).
Senior Member
Posts: 2087
Joined: 2006-09-28
Agree on the inefficiency aspect. I never found it particularly cumbersome to actually plug in a charger anyway.