[pjmacklin]

have gone through some tribulations charging my new pb. specifically, charging my device using my computer. my understanding now is that particular cable is for data transfer only. am i correct?

also, probably not a good idea to drain my pb completely? too, wondering how beneficial is it having one of the rapid chargers?

haven't had my device long enough to develop a real baseline (working off my second charge!) but i am aware charging does take a while. would think, too, having a rapid charger would (could) facilitate simultaneous computer to device data transfer. correct?

any real guidance/advice would be appreciated. thanks

[stillzmatik]

The Playbook will not charge through the USB connection to your computer. Since RIM fixed the bug that didn't allow you to charge PB when off, you can drain your battery if you like. However, as you mentioned, PB charging can take a some time.

Not quite sure why you need simultaneous charging and cable tranfer. What are you transfering that is going to take more than 20 minutes that you can't just take your PB off the charger, connect it to your computer, than revert back after transfer.

With that said. If you bought the rapid PB charger, you could sync and charge at the same time.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[westcoaststyle]

The Playbook will not charge through the USB connection to your computer.

I charged my PB through my computer's USB connection just yesterday.

[wellard]

You can charge via the computers USB port but it's very slow. Also it won't show the lightening bolt charge symbol.

[peter9477]

@pjmacklin, I confirm that USB charges the PlayBook "just fine", though it's incredibly slow and doesn't have enough power for you to have the screen on while it's doing so. It will take about 10-12h to fully charge, while in standby.

Also discharging fully isn't a problem, though you would never want to leave your PlayBook discharged for long (e.g. many days) after doing so, or it would eventually damage the battery.

Lastly the rapid chargers provide only minimal benefit if you always charge with the PlayBook off or in standby. The bundled charger will manage about 3.5h for a full charge, while the rapid chargers will drop that to about 3.2h. The big benefit comes if you want to use the charger while the PlayBook is in use. In that case, you could definitely get the claimed "twice as fast" charging over the regular charger. I've posted additional details with hard numbers (power, voltage, etc) scattered over numerous other threads.

[FF22]

The "usb" cable that came with the pb can do both data and charge but as indicated, the charging will be very slow. If you use the pb while connected to the usb port, it might not show any charge and may actually get depleted.

AT&T does sell a CHARGE ONLY cable and that does work faster when plugged into the computer.

I did acquire the rapid charger and it is much faster. And if you use it and enable wifi-sharing, you can charge and still load/unload files to the pb simultaneously. Similarly, if you use the normal pb ac adapter, you can also use wifi-sharing to move files around and charge.