[UMWolve]

OK here is my dilemma. I have a crappy Motorola V197 phone that I have to carry for work but I have a Blackberry 8330 personal phone. My charger to the Motorola V197 would charge both of my phones but got stolen so I no longer have it. My charger that came with my Blackberry 8330 will not charge the Motorola V197. I don't quite understand the whole mini USB vs. micro USB and 5 pin thing. I tried reading up on it and just got confused.

Is the Motorola V197 mini or micro?
Is the 8330 mini or micro?

My understanding from what I read that they were both mini USB's. So why won't the Blackberry 8330 charger charge the Motorola V197?

Am I wrong here?

I see adapters cheap on the internet but don't know what I need to buy.

Anybody want to school me on this a little bit so I understand and help me determine what I need?

Thanks

[albee 1]

In general it's a bad idea to use any charger on the bb except the one that came with it. Stories of warped batteries have been posted. My old motorola i465 had a micro plug. Your bb has a mini. The difference is almost double the size. There have been those that got lucky with using other chargers but I think it was a coincidence they got one with the same specifications. There have been stories also of aftermarket chargers frying batteries, even though they were sold as bb compatible. Hope this may have helped you some.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[shfjcs]

If you could charge both phones with the Motorola charger that got stolen, then it was a mini-usb charger. The 8330 has a mini-usb port. The BB charger should charge the Motorola phone. Does the plug not fit?

I have 3 Motorola mini-usb chargers (that I don't need, btw) and 2 of them say 5.0v 550mA, the other one says 5.0v 850mA. BB chargers , as far as I know, are all 5Vd.c. 700mA, some 0.75A.

[UMWolve]

The Blackberry charger fits perfectly. The phone background lights up for a second and then goes back off. It doesn't say "charging" and the 3 battery bars don't turn on and off like when it got charged on the Motorola charger.

[shfjcs]

Does the charger work okay on the BB? If it does, then I'm stumped because it should charge your Motorola too. How are you charging the Moto now? Maybe it just needs to stay connected longer.

[UMWolve]

Yes the Blackberry charges like a gem. For some reason the Motorola doesn't though. I have just been borrowing someone charger in the office at work here and there when it needs it.

[RadioRaiders]

Yes the Blackberry charges like a gem. For some reason the Motorola doesn't though. I have just been borrowing someone charger in the office at work here and there when it needs it.

Some of my older Motorolas will only charge with a Motorola branded charger.

[Linsb07]

The two devices take completely different amperages to charge the battery.

A motorola OEM (brand-name) charger outputs 5v / 850 mA
A RIM OEM ac charger of the same end outputs 5v / 700 mA

(I just checked the ones I have in my store...)

The motorola charger is a higher amperage and this is why it is charging your blackberry like a "gem" because it's too high and will eventually ruin your battery, and possibly your charging port.

The rim charger is not charging your moto phone because it does not output enough...
Though you may have not experienced any issues now, I would STRONGLY recommend not using the moto charger on your 'berry anymore :-)

Interchange data cables as you would like, but I would avoid swapping chargers... even the CLAs (car lighter adapter)...

Micro USB is what would fit a "Razr2", which is the standard jack almost all companies are switching to, or have switched to already. The earlier Pearls, Curve, Worlds, all use Mini usbs. Pearl flip, curve2, tours, storms, etc all use the new Micro ends. Hope this helps!

[Tiassa]

I used to have the Nextel version of the Moto V series (I think it is the IC502). I have a Moto OEM charger and 2 non-OEM car chargers that will probably work for you. Make a $25 contribution to one of my favorite charities and I'll send them to you.

[UMWolve]

The two devices take completely different amperages to charge the battery.

A motorola OEM (brand-name) charger outputs 5v / 850 mA
A RIM OEM ac charger of the same end outputs 5v / 700 mA

(I just checked the ones I have in my store...)

The motorola charger is a higher amperage and this is why it is charging your blackberry like a "gem" because it's too high and will eventually ruin your battery, and possibly your charging port.

The rim charger is not charging your moto phone because it does not output enough...
Though you may have not experienced any issues now, I would STRONGLY recommend not using the moto charger on your 'berry anymore :-)

Interchange data cables as you would like, but I would avoid swapping chargers... even the CLAs (car lighter adapter)...

Micro USB is what would fit a "Razr2", which is the standard jack almost all companies are switching to, or have switched to already. The earlier Pearls, Curve, Worlds, all use Mini usbs. Pearl flip, curve2, tours, storms, etc all use the new Micro ends. Hope this helps!

This is absolutely great information. Now I know I just need a cheap Moto charger. Thanks for checking this out and explaining it for me.

[jcastilloalonso]

The motorola charger is a higher amperage and this is why it is charging your blackberry like a "gem" because it's too high and will eventually ruin your battery, and possibly your charging port.

The rim charger is not charging your moto phone because it does not output enough...
Though you may have not experienced any issues now, I would STRONGLY recommend not using the moto charger on your 'berry anymore :-)

That is NOT true!!!! the mA reading is the maximum output of the charger, the important thing is voltage, current is delivered UP to that amount. Either your cellphone uses that extra capacity or it doesn't and goes without use. But will never fry a cellphone unless it has a hardware problem.

I used to have long time ago a V3 and a Nomad Zen (Creative's MP3 player) that both used mini-USB, the Nomad would charge using the Motorola, yet the Motorola would not charge using the Nomad even while the Nomad charger had almost double the mA capacity. It appears that the Motorola devices look for a voltage drop to acknowledge that an "approved" charger is being used (or so I found out testing in that time). If you plug a Motorola to your computer, it won't charge the cellphone until the drivers are installed (you can check that) which goes as more factors regarding my theory and the BS of the mA thing (USB ports theorically give 500mA)

Hope this helps, but it looks like you need a "motorola approved" charger... (Any Motorola OEM charger SHOULD work)

[RadioRaiders]

The motorola charger is a higher amperage and this is why it is charging your blackberry like a "gem" because it's too high and will eventually ruin your battery, and possibly your charging port.

Don't phones have a regulator to limit the input to whats needed? For example, my laptop has a 60W power adapter connected to it, but right now is running on only 15W (I have a power meter connected)

[FF22]

My Creative Zen mp3 player would also only charge from certain chargers. Apparently, there was a separate signal (maybe something like that voltage drop mentioned above) that was needed or the Zen would not charge.

[Linsb07]

here, I talked to my "supervisor" so to speak lol:

"
He's right that voltage is more important than amperage. He's right that the amperage rating is the highest output the charger is capable of.
What he's not considering is how a charger works and what the fuse is rated for. When a charger is rated for say, 500 miliamps, that means the fuse inside can only handle 500 miliamps and will blow if it has more than that put through it. It's similar to a breaker in your house flipping but the fuse has to be replaced rather than a switch being closed again.
The problem with using a lower amperage charger is that it will simply not provide enough power.
The problem with using a charger that is rated higher is that if you get some sort of power surge there is nothing to protect your phone from the extra juice coming down the wire.
The phone can only handle a certain amount of power and if your charger is not properly limited a surge from the power source can cause problems. A difference of 150 miliamps isn't usually going to make your battery or phone blow up or fry. It will however cause damage to your battery and possibly the phone with prolonged exposure to too much power.
Imagine for example if you were to put a 40 amp stove plug on your toaster. (It would be bad for a lot of reasons like the stove having one too many hot leads in there and starting fires but we'll ignore that for the purpose of the argument) Plugging your toaster in to a source that is capable of providing too much power will not cause any issues assuming that power is properly limited. With a power bar for example. If however there is no limitation to the power (the power bar, the fuse in a properly rated charger) then any surge in power will cause a big problem (fires, things melting, children developing strange mutations and handicaps from fun electrical fumes) under these circumstances.
Remember that a wall charger get's plugged in to a 15 amp circuit. That power source is capable of providing 15 thousand milliamps of electricity. A blackberry only wants 700 milliamps. Generally a device will only pull what it needs but if a surge comes through the only thing stopping that extra power is the fuse in a properly rated charger.

Hope that helps.
"

... I love this man. I feel like I've learned something hahah

[BergerKing]

It is fairly common for Moto phones to be quite finicky about their charging source. BlackBerry, on the other hand, isn't. I haven't found a miniUSB Moto that would charge off a BlackBerry charger, but I've used Motos and others to charge my BlackBerry with no ill effects. USB charging runs 100 ma, car chargers about 250 ma, wall charger at 700, and as I read some time back, BlackBerry could take up to 1300ma without harm. I even used my Moto Bluetooth charger until I broke the wire.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[FF22]

I've seen a periodic message on my BB saying that the charger I'm "trying" to use does not have sufficient power.

[jcastilloalonso]

here, I talked to my "supervisor" so to speak lol:

"
He's right that voltage is more important than amperage. He's right that the amperage rating is the highest output the charger is capable of.
What he's not considering is how a charger works and what the fuse is rated for. When a charger is rated for say, 500 miliamps, that means the fuse inside can only handle 500 miliamps and will blow if it has more than that put through it. It's similar to a breaker in your house flipping but the fuse has to be replaced rather than a switch being closed again.
The problem with using a lower amperage charger is that it will simply not provide enough power.
The problem with using a charger that is rated higher is that if you get some sort of power surge there is nothing to protect your phone from the extra juice coming down the wire.
The phone can only handle a certain amount of power and if your charger is not properly limited a surge from the power source can cause problems. A difference of 150 miliamps isn't usually going to make your battery or phone blow up or fry. It will however cause damage to your battery and possibly the phone with prolonged exposure to too much power.
Imagine for example if you were to put a 40 amp stove plug on your toaster. (It would be bad for a lot of reasons like the stove having one too many hot leads in there and starting fires but we'll ignore that for the purpose of the argument) Plugging your toaster in to a source that is capable of providing too much power will not cause any issues assuming that power is properly limited. With a power bar for example. If however there is no limitation to the power (the power bar, the fuse in a properly rated charger) then any surge in power will cause a big problem (fires, things melting, children developing strange mutations and handicaps from fun electrical fumes) under these circumstances.
Remember that a wall charger get's plugged in to a 15 amp circuit. That power source is capable of providing 15 thousand milliamps of electricity. A blackberry only wants 700 milliamps. Generally a device will only pull what it needs but if a surge comes through the only thing stopping that extra power is the fuse in a properly rated charger.

Hope that helps.
"

... I love this man. I feel like I've learned something hahah

While he is correct, he is talking about old technology. Current battery technologies allow a battery to be "charged" with even less current than what the cellphone is using (in reality it's still getting drained but just slower) What your guy is saying is that if I plug my tv in a 20A circuit instead of a 15 or 10A (or the exact AMP rating) plug, I will fry my TV... Which is true, but is a lie. You control the voltage not the amps, if the voltage goes way up, then you have a leak and the amps go up, otherwise you are save; same with the charger, as long as the charges outputs 5v and nothing more or less (within limits...) it will charge, and a higher amp charger will indeed charge it faster. Modern power supplies are not longer "simple" transformers, they are switched-mode power supplies which allow the charger to be plugged in America and Europe (110-240v input) and keep the output at 5v no matter what; this power supplies are very safe to this kind of problems as their design includes a failsafe in case of a power spike. If that failsafe is not enough, the type of charger and their output will not matter; your cellphone will fry... So trust me when I say it doesn't matter, as I've designed a lot of this power supplies and heard my teachers answer the same question over and over.

[Radius]

While he is correct, he is talking about old technology. Current battery technologies allow a battery to be "charged" with even less current than what the cellphone is using (in reality it's still getting drained but just slower) What your guy is saying is that if I plug my tv in a 20A circuit instead of a 15 or 10A (or the exact AMP rating) plug, I will fry my TV... Which is true, but is a lie. You control the voltage not the amps, if the voltage goes way up, then you have a leak and the amps go up, otherwise you are save; same with the charger, as long as the charges outputs 5v and nothing more or less (within limits...) it will charge, and a higher amp charger will indeed charge it faster. Modern power supplies are not longer "simple" transformers, they are switched-mode power supplies which allow the charger to be plugged in America and Europe (110-240v input) and keep the output at 5v no matter what; this power supplies are very safe to this kind of problems as their design includes a failsafe in case of a power spike. If that failsafe is not enough, the type of charger and their output will not matter; your cellphone will fry... So trust me when I say it doesn't matter, as I've designed a lot of this power supplies and heard my teachers answer the same question over and over.

Yep, you hit it. Power spikes are not a factor unless you're talking a serious surge on the line.

As for the whole issue of that amperage the phone actually uses to charge the battery, the answer is: it changes as it charges.

The battery is indeed charged at whatever they specify, for BB's it is a minimum of 500mA. They use a 700mA power supply to allow for slightly faster charging if you're plugged into a wall as opposed to a USB port on your PC.

Now, when a battery is being charged at let's say 700mA, when it reaches 100% it is actually at 70%. In order to top the battery off the circuits start to ramp down the amperage and trickle the power in more slowly. Have you ever noticed how your power indicator reaches nearly 100% very quickly but then the lightning bolt stays there for a long time? That's because it's being charged more slowly now.

LIon batteries have a 2 stage charging procedure. First it is charged real fast, then charged at increasingly lower rates until the battery feedback circuit says it can take no more and it starts to bleed excess power out of the battery to keep it from bursting.

That in a nutshell is how they charge LIon batteries.

[jcastilloalonso]

Exactly Thanks for the Li-ion battery comments, Li-poly are exactly the same.

[LiamKnuj]

Thanks, @jcastilloalonso for your info.

My ignorance: if a higher-amp charger (say 850mA) will charge the battery faster (then a 700mA), and if it doesn't hurt the battery nor phone, then why doesn't Blackberry switch to a higher amp charger?

Something's missing in this picture... ;-)

I ask because I just found an extra Motorola 850 0.5v 850mA charger, and was wondering if I can use it on my BB Tour 9630 (for which the original charger is 0.5v 700mA).

I can't imagine that it costs any more for the higher-amp charger.

So what's the reason?

Thanks again!! :-)

[ramocan]

I just loved the whole discussion above, folks! Thanks!

So, from what I got, using a higher amp charger won't kill the BB or it's battery, right?

LiamK's question is valid, though. Is there a "safe cap" allowed or something that prevents RIM from releasing a "quick charger" or higher amp?

[spiraleze]

Higher output amperage requires heavier wiring to prevent overload and that of course costs more. There are higher output chargers available such as the Playbook charger that has a 1.8 amp output rating. Believe me when I say it charges my 9650 FAST.