Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler For Mac OS X is Now Shipping! Download The Free Fully Functional 60 Day Tryout at www.typestyler.com

OWC: Mercury On-The-Go FW800+USB2 up to 1.0TB. Bus Powered, no external power supply needed. Macworld ‘Editor’s Choice’, CNET ‘Very Good’ Starting from $99.97, 500GB $159.99. Click here

Poker Mac Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker application such as Full Tilt Poker Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, apple laptops, apple macs, and LCD Monitors side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for new mobile phones, sat nav systems, or MP3 players. The Ciao online shopping community makes searching products easy for you.

Recycled Computing

The AC Power Adapter Blues

- 2009.05.11

Popularity: LEMLEM

del.icio.us Bookmark in del.icio.us Slashdot Suggest to Slashdot

Yep, the G4 is still down for the count, even with the power switch connector resoldered to the main board (see The iBook Can't Replace the Hard Drive Blues). Soooo, I guess it's teardown time again and a trip back to the main board to see if the speaker connector has to be soldered to the board for the G4 to power up. Future developments will follow.

Cell Phone Power Adapter Hell

And now it's time for my rant of the day. I recently watched the charming Pixar production "Wall-E" (I'm not exacting culturally current). A brief recap - an old recycling robot is stuck on an Earth that has been left as a vast junkyard. Humanity has left for the stars, intending to return once the mountains of trash are cleaned up.

I have a bone to pick with the movie. In all this vast area of junk, there should be mountains of cell phone power adapters. Yes, one of the banes of the 21st century, that old cell phone power adapter that came with your first, second, third, and even fourth cell phone.

No cell phone manufacturer can resist changing the power plug with each new line of cell phones it introduces. Of course, you end up buying car adapters for each car you own and, of course, an adapter for your office. No two cell phone manufacturers can use the same adapter, so if you switch brands, you have to buy another set of adapters.

And so it goes, from generation to generation to the point were poor Wall-E does nothing but compact and crush old cell phone power adapters.

Not as Bad with 'Books

Things are not so dire in the old laptop arena. No matter what, someone has packed away an old adapter for that PowerBook 100 you got at a yard sale and is just dying to sell it to you. And with laptops, you have to have the power brick. As they say - you must, you must, you must.

Still, it is my constant concern that someday, I will run into that "Paris" G3 Clamshell without a power brick at a yard sale or an aluminum PowerBook or a PowerBook 5300. That's why my spare parts box has a collection of power bricks. It's not like I'm obsessive or anything.

But what can I do with all these cell phone power adapters? No secondary market exists for such orphans. Nobody is going to want old Nokia, LP, or Motorola adapters. I'm going to have to do something my parents (depression era pack rats, the both of them) warned me about. I'm going to have to throw them out.

I suppose I'm just ensuring that Wall-E has something to do. LEM

Editor's note: The good news is that the GSMA (Groupe Speciale Mobile Association), an international organization for mobile phone makers and mobile service providers, announced on February 17, 2009 its intention to adopt a universal mobile phone charger. The group has set a target date of 2012 to make Micro-USB the standard for all new mobile phones.

Micro-USB is even smaller than the Mini-USB port found on many contemporary cell phones, digital cameras, and similar devices. Of course, this won't do anything for all those cell phone chargers we already have. Wall-E has a secure future. dk

Recent Recycled Computing Columns

Links for the Day

Recent Content on Low End Mac

Recent Deals

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2009 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
  LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
  Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
  Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
  PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
  Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, iPhone, PowerBook, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.

Custom Search

Amazon.com

Navigation

Used Mac Dealers
Apple History
Video Cards
Email Lists

Favorite Sites

MacSurfer
MacMinute
MacInTouch
MyAppleMenu
InfoMac
Macs Only!
The Mac Observer
Accelerate Your Mac
RetroMacCast
PB Central
MacWindows
The Vintage Mac
   Museum
DealMac
DealsOnTheWeb
Mac2Sell
ramseeker
Mac Driver Museum
JAG's House
System 6 Heaven
System 7 Today
the pickle's Low-End
   Mac FAQ
Abandonware
   Petition
Mac vs. PC Info

Affiliates

The Apple Store
Mac Connection
B&H
MacMall
TechRestore
ExperCom
Crucial Memory
batteries.com

Advertise

All of our advertising is handled by BackBeat Media. For price quotes and advertising information, please contact at BackBeat Media (646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.

Open Link

Problems viewing this page with Internet Explorer 5.5 or 6? It works fine in other browsers, including IE 7. We recommend Firefox for those using Windows, as it is standards based and more secure than IE 6 (and earlier). More LEM visitors use Firefox than any other browser.