Friday, May 27th 2022

340 Watt GaN Charger for Gaming Laptops Displayed at Computex

Somewhat unexpectedly, there were a handful of exhibitors from the PRC at Computex and walking around the mostly empty show, we spotted a company called Wii Power (no relation to Nintendo) that had a range of rather interesting Gallium Nitride or GaN chargers on display. The headline product wasn't even the most interesting model on display, but at 340 W, it's by far the most powerful GaN based charger we've seen to date. Although it wasn't a final product based on the looks of the housing, it gives us some insight into what to expect from future laptop chargers. It's still a rather large power brick at 150 x 86 x 34 mm, but it can deliver 20 V at up to 17 A over the fixed power cable. In addition to that, it also has a USB-C port with support for USB PD and a range of other charging standards that can deliver up to 45 W.

The company showed off another charger that has a combined output of 240 W and the primary USB-C port supports revision 3.1 of the USB PD standard and can deliver 140 W on its own. The secondary USB-C port can deliver another 100 W, but what makes this product interesting outside of this, is that Wii Power offers an adapter that can combine both of these outputs into a single 240 W output for charging more demanding laptops. There's even a third USB-C port and a USB-A for peripheral or phone charging, although each port is limited to 30 W and the total output can never exceed 240 W. A built-in display shows the Voltage, Amperage and Wattage that's being put out. It's still rather chunky at 130 x 80 x 32 mm, but considering the power it can put out, it's more compact than most similar non GaN chargers. Finally the company had a compact USB PD 3.1 travel charger that can again deliver up to 140 W, which is the equivalent of 28 V at 5 A. We're not expecting to see any of these products in their current guise in retail, but it's a clear sign of what to expect in terms of future charging products.
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30 Comments on 340 Watt GaN Charger for Gaming Laptops Displayed at Computex

#26
Chrispy_
Ugh. This is as dumb as those DTR laptops that weigh 6 kilos and require a pair of 200W power bricks.
Laptops that can use >300W aren't really portable, and don't really have batteries to "charge", they have miniscule UPS units that can buy someone five minutes to find a different power outlet.

IMO these massive gaming laptops should just do away with the internal battery altogether and use the space for larger speakers and cooling surface. If they have to have a battery for aforementioned short trips to a different power outlet, they could just have a small one in the power brick itself that literally holds up long enough for you to unplug, move to another room, and plug back in again. That's just about the only thing a DTR battery is good for.
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#27
TheLostSwede
News Editor
ValantarWhen I went backpacking through India more than a decade ago I remember trying at least six clearly distinct types of banana. Most of them taste very different from what we're used to in Europe - richer, sweeter, etc. If those deep red ones in the second pic are the same kind I tried, they're so sickly sweet and incredibly dense that finishing even one is a challenge. And the variations in size, shape, and density make them poorly suited as a standardized measurement, sadly :(
Nah, they're not that sweet here, the really tiny ones are the really sweet ones. But yes, very different texture, especially the short and fat ones.
Much more flavour across the board than the boring stuff in Europe though.
Then there's plantain, which is also a kind of banana...
Chrispy_Ugh. This is as dumb as those DTR laptops that weigh 6 kilos and require a pair of 200W power bricks.
Laptops that can use >300W aren't really portable, and don't really have batteries to "charge", they have miniscule UPS units that can buy someone five minutes to find a different power outlet.

IMO these massive gaming laptops should just do away with the internal battery altogether and use the space for larger speakers and cooling surface. If they have to have a battery for aforementioned short trips to a different power outlet, they could just have a small one in the power brick itself that literally holds up long enough for you to unplug, move to another room, and plug back in again. That's just about the only thing a DTR battery is good for.
Well, it could be used for powering anything really, but I guess they are targeting the 6 kilo laptop crowd...
My first laptop was a 15" Dell that was around 4 kg with a 500 gram charger. I think I took it on a trip once.
I'm very much a fan of smaller laptops, but even 14" is pretty reasonable these days in terms of weight and size.
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#28
Mussels
Freshwater Moderator
TheLostSwedeI don't normally carry one of those around with me...
No wonder you're lost, surely you can see the a-peel?
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#29
TheLostSwede
News Editor
MusselsNo wonder you're lost, surely you can see the a-peel?
Sorry, I can not, but this thread sure went bananas...
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#30
GreiverBlade
TheLostSwedeSorry, I can not, but this thread sure went bananas...
and here i was about to write : " and another thread that got complete full banana about power brick/PSU" (glad i did read the posts till the last one .... redundancy is for server PSU ... not for me )


kinda feel like a recurrent topic ...

that aside, that first power brick look a bit like my USB-A x4 (1x QC3.0 3x 5V/2A) USB-C x1 (PD), i got twice recently (one for my dear mom and one for me ) but with GaN and 10 time the wattage o_O

mandatory:


nonetheless :lovetpu: these 2 last thread i read in the news made my weekend much brighter ... thanks (about banana yellow bright... ok, i'm out ... )
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