The Maze of Cables
Once again, my maze of cables has reached “critical mass,” increasing my daily stress. I recently bought several new devices, including an Android tablet, a Bluetooth headset, and a new cell phone. Each has its own charging cable, and all the new cables and most of the old ones are black. And three of the devices use the same tiny USB connector, but I’m not 100% certain that it’s OK to use them interchangably.
So I just spent 20 minutes printing out and affixing 16 tiny labels to 8 cables (one on each end of each cable) to identify which cables go with which devices. (The picture at right is not mine; it’s just an example.)
A standard micro USB cable is a standard micro USB cable.
It isn’t the cable that you need to be concerned about. It’s that the other end opposite of the device, if it has enough power to charge your device.
For example, my wife has a Blackberry and I have a Samsung Galaxy phone. Both have the same standard micro USB port. The cigarette-to-car-charger adapter I have for my phone doesn’t output enough power to charge my wife’s phone, but my wife’s car adapter works both on her’s and my phone.
For the power adapter end, check that the rated output voltage that is labeled on it is the same (most likely it is). Also, find the device that has outputs the most current (or power). That’ll usually be rated in amps or milliaps (or watts). As long as the device outputs the same voltage and the same or more amps, it’ll charge.
Again, back to my phone and my wife’s phone, they both need 5 volts to charge, however my phone doesn’t require as much current to charge compared to my wife’s phone.