What's inside a Tesco Power Hit disposable phone charger.
yewtu.be
Well, this is a bit of an ecologic disaster. It's another singe-use product that seems to contain a fully rechargeable lithium cell. I can understand why they did it, since lithium ion cells have a very high energy density and are cheap to mass produce, but it still seems a terrible thing to make a disposable item that could be reused 1000 times if it had been designed around a standard power bank chip and fitted with a recharge socket. On a plus note, for people like us it's a handy source of a decent capacity lithium cell for a low price on the high street. Note that this cell will be a typical low current cell and is not recommended for use in a high current drain application like a drone. I have recharged the cell in one of these units completely without incident and believe them to be standard rechargeable cells, but as it's not specifically sold as being rechargeable the usual precautions should be taken when experimenting with lithium cells. the cell is bare and would require external overcharge protection. It's interesting to note that the original manufacturer of these (Hopepower) also does a dual connector version that suits both Apple and Android devices, and does a very similar rechargeable version. If you enjoy these videos you can help support the channel with a dollar for coffee, cookies and random gadgets for disassembly at:- http://www.bigclive.com/coffee.htm
  • @altair222@beehaw.org
    4•2 years ago

    The first sentence of this post is exactly what came to my mind as I read the title: “This is a disaster”

  • @pingveno@lemmy.ml
    4•2 years ago

    They aren’t on Tesco’s website anymore (this is 5 years old), so maybe no one wanted to pay a good chunk of money for a little battery life only to throw it away.

          • @pingveno@lemmy.ml
            6•2 years ago

            There’s something more, though. Disposables consumerism is a creature of the past few decades. Take something similar: soft drink bottles. They used to be glass that was rinsed and reused. Now they are either single use or inefficiently recycled. From what I can tell, the main driver is that producers don’t pay for waste management.

            • @pingveno@lemmy.ml
              1•2 years ago

              An addendum to my doom and gloom: there is a company, Loop, that is working on container reuse. So far they’re pretty small and have a limited catalogue of containers, but they have interests from some big players in the markets they’re active in. Tesco is on the list, so maybe they can even add this product.

  • CHEF-KOCH
    2•2 years ago

    Fun fact the new power chargers from Samsung and some other brands going back to USB-A which is also a disaster because newer phones are all USB-C standard so you need to buy new cable or adapters.

    Only iPhone seems consistent, their new power chargers are all USB-C.

    The whole situation is not entirely well thought out.

    Since the power chargers are overall bigger I practical wait until some smart-ass abuses the site to put malware device into it.

    • krolden
      6•2 years ago

      Usb-A chargers are not a bad idea. Its still a heavily used standard so it can be much more useful over a USBC adapter. There are plenty of A to C cables out there. Not to mention the image you linked also has a C port.

      As for using them to deliver malware,size is not much of an issue as they can cram exploits into the cables now.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le6LP43SHcM

      • CHEF-KOCH
        1•2 years ago

        No the adapter I linked is A because the power charge is not done on the above C device, nice try anyway. The C port there is normal 5-15W which is often what you get if manufacturer does not include an real adapter solution, because those adapters are expensive. Also the reason why people complain about different charging times.

        The point is that you can easier add and manipulate devices if there is more room available without that anyone will notice, it is much easier to open a big case add your stuff and glue it together.

    • @southerntofu@lemmy.ml
      4•2 years ago

      Why is USB-A a bad choice in this situation? I feel like the connectors are more robust but maybe i’m wrong?

      Also a lot of devices are still powered by USB-B, micro-USB or mini-USB and there’s an abundance of USB-A adapters to those. USB-C adapters are way more expensive and can’t be found everywhere (certainly not in your existing cables), so i think it makes sense.

      • CHEF-KOCH
        -1•2 years ago
        • EU enforced one standard for everything which was or is USB-C so newer devices must come with one design.
        • USB-C is easier to use and there is less chance of failure rate.
        • New charger usually come with adapters, this is why you maybe call it much more expensive, but in truth they are not more expensive to produce.
        • Problem is that USB-A is not designed for power-charging or fast charging, people will plug whatever fits in there and this can heat up your device pretty badly possible even causes damages if you buy products from china that are not really designed to handle 45W, instead they use cheap as possible materials that have no certification because the Chinese market has other standards.
        • @southerntofu@lemmy.ml
          7•2 years ago

          USB-C is easier to use and there is less chance of failure rate

          I’m wondering if you have more information on this. I’ve never seen USB-A cables go bad but i certainly have seen micro-USB/USB-C cables dying… but maybe i’m not representative.

          this can heat up your device pretty badly possible even causes damages if you buy products from china that are not really designed to handle 45W

          Well from what i understand this is also a problem with USB-C that not all cables are created equal and plenty of manufacturers try to save on materials?