Quantcast
GTrusted

GTrusted

Discover Products, Check Compatibility, Share Your Experience

Energear 18W USB-CPD and 12W USB-A Charger

by Energear

Benchmark Ranking

Interested in this product?

Explore Connectivity Technologies

Get More Devices Charged in Your Car with the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger

The Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger is part of the first USB Power Delivery enabled chargers released in Japan that have been certified by the USB Implementers Forum as meeting the USB compliance specifications. This means that the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger will have a high degree of compatibility to charge other USB compliant devices that you want to charge in your car.

The logo shows that the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger's USB Type-C port can provide 18 watts of charging. The charger also has a USB Type-A port which can independently provide 12 watts of charging (5 volts @ 2.4 amps).

This means that while you can use the USB Type-C port to supply 18 watts which is enough for most mobile phones sold today while using the USB Type-A port to charge an iPhone with a USB Type-A to Lightning cable or Android phones with a USB Type-A to Micro-B or USB Type-A to Type-C cable.  The USB Type-A port doesn't use USB Power Delivery to provide the 12 watts of charging but this level of charging still provides decently fast charging to a lot of phones.

The Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger supports two power profiles for charging- 15 watts (5 volts @ 3 amps) and 18 watts (9 volts @ 2 amps). The power input into the charger is DC 12 volts which is standard on most cars.

The packaging also has a 3 ft. USB Type-C to Type-C cable and user manual.

The Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger comes in black and white color options and is slim enough to look good in any car it is used in.

The additional USB-A port is one of the nicest features of the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger which you can use with any mobile phone.

For faster charging, the USB Type-C port can be used to charge phones which support USB Power Delivery technology like the iPhone XiPhone 8Galaxy S8HTC 10, and LG V20. Note if you need to charge your iPhone you need to use the Apple USB-C to Lightning Cable.

The Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger is great for charging two devices at the same time in your car but if you need 27W of charging for a tablet or phone, Energear also offers the Energear 27W USB-C Car Charger.

Using the USB Power Test App from Granite River Labs with the Granite River Labs USB Power Delivery Compliance C2 Tester, we generate the following test results for the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger.

The USB Power Test App first negotiates a power contract for every PDO supported by the Energear charger, and increases the load gradually to find the threshold where over current protection (OCP) kicks in and voltage and current start to drop for safety reasons.

Port1 Plot

The USB Power Test App reports out all the PDO's supported by the Energear charger and their OCP thresholds. OCP thresholds for the charger are set at about 26-89% above the maximum current levels for the fixed PDO's.

PDOOCP (A)
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 3A3.78
PDO#2 Fixed: 9V 2A3.78

The USB Power Test App from Granite River Labs also produces an I-V curve which graphically shows the relationship between voltage and current for each PDO. We can observe current fold-back behavior for the 9V 2A PDO where as the current increases beyond the OCP threshold, the voltage starts to curve down rather than immediately shutting off. The 5V 3A PDO shows the voltage immediately shuts off when crossing the OCP threshold.

IV Curve

Since the Energear 18W USB-C PD and 12W USB-A Charger is a multi port charger, the USB Power Test App can be used to determine whether each output port of the charger is able to supply power independently. For every PDO supported by the Energear charger, the USB Power Test App increases the load gradually for both the USB Type-C and Type-A ports to detect any power loss at the highest load limit for each port.

USB Type-C Port

Port2 Plot

USB Type-A Port

Port1 Plot

The USB Power Test App reports out the voltage, current and load limits for all the PDO's supported by the Energear charger for each port.

Port1 PDOPort2 PDOPort1 (V)Port1 (A)Port1 Loading(%)Port2 (V)Port2 (A)Port2 Loading(%)
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 1.5A 5.041.49100% (7.5W)   
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 1.5APDO#1 Fixed: 5V 3A4.991.4999.18%4.962.96 
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 1.5APDO#2 Fixed: 9V 2A5.011.4999.58%8.932 
 PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 3A   4.982.96100% (14.8W)
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 1.5APDO#1 Fixed: 5V 3A4.991.49 4.962.9699.61%
 PDO#2 Fixed: 9V 2A   8.952100% (17.9W)
PDO#1 Fixed: 5V 1.5APDO#2 Fixed: 9V 2A5.011.49 8.93299.88%

View Full Article

Latest Reviews