Can I use a regular old power bank with my Nexus 6P?
August 27, 2016 6:40 AM Subscribe
I have a couple of 2600mAh power banks that I used with my old phone. They're Duracell units I got from Costco but I can't find a link online, sorry. My new phone uses USB-C to charge which apparently draws 3A; can I still use these old power banks with my fancy new device?
The power banks use micro-USB to charge and have a plain old USB-A output. I have USB-A-to-C cables that I already use in my car. What I'm concerned about is that the lower output of these power banks might harm my new phone's battery. Is this even a thing? I'm not good with electricity.
I've asked three cell phone stores and gotten different answers. The first store said "no you can't because they only put out 1A" and the second store said "no you can't because the phone will overpower the battery and what will happen is the phone will charge the bank and not the other way around". The third said "yes you can but because the banks are only 2600mAh and the Nexus has a 3400mAh battery you can't charge it but it will extend your usable time".
I've also googled but all the information I can find is about USB-C power banks and I can't seem to filter that out from my results.
I'm going on a trip where I will be at least three days without access to an outlet so I'm hoping I can use these older but still lively units.
The power banks use micro-USB to charge and have a plain old USB-A output. I have USB-A-to-C cables that I already use in my car. What I'm concerned about is that the lower output of these power banks might harm my new phone's battery. Is this even a thing? I'm not good with electricity.
I've asked three cell phone stores and gotten different answers. The first store said "no you can't because they only put out 1A" and the second store said "no you can't because the phone will overpower the battery and what will happen is the phone will charge the bank and not the other way around". The third said "yes you can but because the banks are only 2600mAh and the Nexus has a 3400mAh battery you can't charge it but it will extend your usable time".
I've also googled but all the information I can find is about USB-C power banks and I can't seem to filter that out from my results.
I'm going on a trip where I will be at least three days without access to an outlet so I'm hoping I can use these older but still lively units.
Yes you can use them. The 3A charging is an optional "fast charge" mode, it still retains the ability to charge from normal chargers.
If you're using a charger that can't supply enough power, what happens is that it will charge for a few seconds, stop charging for a few seconds, start again, stop again, etc. It's easy to spot because if you turn off the screen, a few seconds later it's back on again.
If this is happening, you can sometimes get the charger to stay on by reducing non-charge power draw (put it in airplane mode, dim the screen, etc).
It's also more likely to happen when the battery is low, because batteries are charged slower and slower the closer they get to full, so less current is used.
posted by anonymisc at 7:22 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
If you're using a charger that can't supply enough power, what happens is that it will charge for a few seconds, stop charging for a few seconds, start again, stop again, etc. It's easy to spot because if you turn off the screen, a few seconds later it's back on again.
If this is happening, you can sometimes get the charger to stay on by reducing non-charge power draw (put it in airplane mode, dim the screen, etc).
It's also more likely to happen when the battery is low, because batteries are charged slower and slower the closer they get to full, so less current is used.
posted by anonymisc at 7:22 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
> the phone will overpower the battery and what will happen is the phone will charge the bank and not the other way around
ahahhahahahhaha hahahhahhahhahahah hahahahhahah no
posted by 7segment at 7:24 AM on August 27, 2016 [7 favorites]
ahahhahahahhaha hahahhahhahhahahah hahahahhahah no
posted by 7segment at 7:24 AM on August 27, 2016 [7 favorites]
There are two figures you need to know about a battery: the current it can supply (how fast it can transfer energy, in Amps, A) and the capacity (how much energy it can store in total, in Amp-Hours, or milliAmp-Hours, mAh - a thousand mAh = one Ah).
Your battery can't supply energy at 3A so it won't charge your phone as fast as a wall charger can, but it should still charge. The capacity is less than your phone, so it won't be able to charge from empty to full.
It should still work, and happily provide two thirds of a charge or so.
posted by chrispy108 at 7:47 AM on August 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
Your battery can't supply energy at 3A so it won't charge your phone as fast as a wall charger can, but it should still charge. The capacity is less than your phone, so it won't be able to charge from empty to full.
It should still work, and happily provide two thirds of a charge or so.
posted by chrispy108 at 7:47 AM on August 27, 2016 [2 favorites]
2600mAh is the capacity of the power bank. It is not the charging current. There are a few different standards for charging via USB - many of these are proprietary, and that's why phones will often come with a phone-specific 'fast charger'. Charge never flows from the phone to the battery - that's just not how they work.
Pretty much any power bank will charge pretty much any phone or tablet. The issues are capacity and speed. I have a 25,600 mAh power bank and that one will keep two phones charged for a week, or will charge my kids' tablets a couple of times. They're about the size of a small book; the only down-side is that certain airlines won't allow you to carry them because of the battery size.
Anyway... your third store's answer is the correct one. Two of the banks will charge your phone one-and-a-bit times, but a lot more slowly than the dedicated charger. Might be useful for a couple of overnight top-ups though.
posted by pipeski at 7:52 AM on August 27, 2016 [3 favorites]
Pretty much any power bank will charge pretty much any phone or tablet. The issues are capacity and speed. I have a 25,600 mAh power bank and that one will keep two phones charged for a week, or will charge my kids' tablets a couple of times. They're about the size of a small book; the only down-side is that certain airlines won't allow you to carry them because of the battery size.
Anyway... your third store's answer is the correct one. Two of the banks will charge your phone one-and-a-bit times, but a lot more slowly than the dedicated charger. Might be useful for a couple of overnight top-ups though.
posted by pipeski at 7:52 AM on August 27, 2016 [3 favorites]
Pipeski has it. The chargers are probably good for maybe 1A max output (the exact output current spec may be written on the fine print of their casings) which will chsrge your phone, but more slowly than a better charger. It's even possible that if you're using your phone heavily the phone may still discharge while connected to one of these chargers, albeit more slowly than it would do otherwise. The capacity of the chargers is 2800mAh, which is less than the 3400mAh of your phone's battery, so you won't get a full charge from one of these batteries either.
They will function, but they're so dinky relative to the needs of a modern phone that I'm not sure I'd bother keeping them. If you need a battery bank, I'd pay the $20-$30 for a nice modern one, which would serve your phone much better.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 8:17 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
They will function, but they're so dinky relative to the needs of a modern phone that I'm not sure I'd bother keeping them. If you need a battery bank, I'd pay the $20-$30 for a nice modern one, which would serve your phone much better.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 8:17 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
Of course it won't break anything, but you should get a bigger battery for "at least three days".
My Nexus 5X recognizes both 3A USB-C and 2A USB-A as "charging rapidly", and a crap 500mA solar charger as "charging slowly".
> the phone will overpower the battery and what will happen is the phone will charge the bank and not the other way around
haha, there were jokes about making a perpetual motion machine out of two Nexuses connected to each other with a USB-C cable.
But actually — when you connect a device (that's smarter than a charger), you get a notification where you can choose whether your phone charges that device or charges itself from that device.
posted by floatboth at 8:55 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
My Nexus 5X recognizes both 3A USB-C and 2A USB-A as "charging rapidly", and a crap 500mA solar charger as "charging slowly".
> the phone will overpower the battery and what will happen is the phone will charge the bank and not the other way around
haha, there were jokes about making a perpetual motion machine out of two Nexuses connected to each other with a USB-C cable.
But actually — when you connect a device (that's smarter than a charger), you get a notification where you can choose whether your phone charges that device or charges itself from that device.
posted by floatboth at 8:55 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]
They'll work just fine. If you want to be on the up and up consult this spreadsheet of tested cables as there's quite a few out of spec A-to-C products.
posted by llin at 10:26 AM on August 27, 2016
posted by llin at 10:26 AM on August 27, 2016
The other folks have got it, but if you haven't checked out prices lately, batteries are pretty cheap these days, so if budget and time permits, +1 on upgrading. The most popular power banks on Amazon at the time of this writing are two Anker units, $15 for 5200 mAh and $26 for 10000 mph and lots of other off brands for even more mAh/$. Or walk into your favorite electronics store and you're likely see a bunch in the sale bins.
posted by troyer at 6:19 PM on August 27, 2016
posted by troyer at 6:19 PM on August 27, 2016
Basically, Nthing what everyone else has said:
1. Yes, it will charge. Just really slowly.
2. Ankers are awesome. The last one I stress tested was ~16000 mAh and is selling for about 30 bucks at the moment. My "stress test" was running 3 apps for essentially 6 hours non-stop. One of which required GPS, data and a lot of calls to the phone's CPU. (Ingress, if you are curious. It's the precursor to Pokemon GO, in a sense.) The phone stayed charged all day and the battery still had about 25% charge by the end of the day. if you are going to be away from an outlet for 3 days, that would be the way I would go, to ensure charge.
(If you are going to be away from cell towers, you also might want to choose airplane mode, so your battery doesn't drain just looking for signal.)
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 8:00 AM on August 28, 2016
1. Yes, it will charge. Just really slowly.
2. Ankers are awesome. The last one I stress tested was ~16000 mAh and is selling for about 30 bucks at the moment. My "stress test" was running 3 apps for essentially 6 hours non-stop. One of which required GPS, data and a lot of calls to the phone's CPU. (Ingress, if you are curious. It's the precursor to Pokemon GO, in a sense.) The phone stayed charged all day and the battery still had about 25% charge by the end of the day. if you are going to be away from an outlet for 3 days, that would be the way I would go, to ensure charge.
(If you are going to be away from cell towers, you also might want to choose airplane mode, so your battery doesn't drain just looking for signal.)
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 8:00 AM on August 28, 2016
This thread is closed to new comments.
- I'd test them by letting the phone discharge down to at least 50% and seeing if the Duracell units can bring the charge up to 100% or at least into the high 90s.
- if you're going to be THREE DAYs without access to an outlet, it might be worth investing in some batteries/power banks that are bigger, better, later, greater.
posted by randomkeystrike at 7:10 AM on August 27, 2016 [1 favorite]