Cheap Car Charger/USB Cables

[Tommygun45]

I am sure most of you savvy Incredible owners out there are aware of monoprice.com but I still can't get over the cheap prices/high quality products they have. I was looking for a car charger for my incredible plus a couple extra usb cables to keep around and went there. They sell a cigarette lighter to female usb adapter for $1.16 and the right USB 2.0 micro cable for $1.22. Plus shipping to me was 2.40 so I got a car charger that works perfectly for 6 bucks shipped. Beats the 29.99 Verizon charges in the store, and is even cheaper than most of the products on ebay. It is also a great place to get hdmi cables or mini hdmi to hdmi, even though our phone doesn't support that :-(.

Product Qty. Price Total
3523 Car Charger (Cigarette Lighter) to USB Female Converter - Black 1 $1.16 $1.16
4868 USB 2.0 A Male to Micro 5pin Male 28/28AWG Cable - 6ft 2 $1.22 $2.44
Subtotal : $3.60
Shipping & Handling Cost : $2.41
GRAND TOTAL : $6.01

 

[sting0387]

I love monoprice. I just recently spent like 100 on the site buying just tons of cables, car chargers, 15ft micro usb cords and whatnot so I have them on hand and I only paid 5$ for shipping because they have a local Tristate overnight shipping service. =D

 

[filet0fish]

I bought two of the car chargers assuming one would break. Neither worked well. They fit too loose in the socket and couldn't supply a steady current to either my Dinc or my old GPS. Both would announce a charger was just connected every 15 seconds, which is incredibly annoying.

I mentioned on the accessory board yesterday the iPhone windshield mount from monoprice works pretty nicely with the Dinc. Fit isn't great, but for $3 it is a really good deal.

And I'll third the quality of the cables. Every cable I've ordered from monoprice has been really good quality.

 

[frunkiss]

I bought a cheap car charger once. During a road trip at night it blew a fuse and I was left with no dash lights or radio for over 80 miles.
I'll pay for quality.

 

[Qazme]

I bought a cheap car charger once. During a road trip at night it blew a fuse and I was left with no dash lights or radio for over 80 miles.
I'll pay for quality.

The charger blew it's fuse and you had no light or radio? That doesn't sound right at all. As far as the quality aspect I'm willing to pay for quality but not pay for a name. For instance I'm using the $20.00 special from Verizon. It's branded Verizon and it has last prior to a 4000 mile road trip, during the trip and still working right along. It kept my phone charged nice while I was using the GPS coast to coast and streaming internet radio. I think it would be about the cheapest charger I would go for, it's 1A and works. Worked good charging my wife's Moto Droid out there and back too.

 

[dyastrab]

Be careful. Some car chargers will freeze your screen. There have been several threads about this.

 

[MA2GA28]

I bought a cheap car charger once. During a road trip at night it blew a fuse and I was left with no dash lights or radio for over 80 miles.
I'll pay for quality.

That doesn't sound right at all. What kind of car were you driving? The lighter jack would also have a fuse to be blown as well, thus saving the other electronics, unless your car had some funky wiring going on. In any event, wouldn't be the charger's fault. How did you get the lights fixed?

And in this day and age, price does not equal quality. Plenty of tests have been run on Monster's $100 HDMI cables that they sell at Best Buy v. the Monoprice cables sold for 1/10 the cost or less, and no difference in picture quality has been found.

 

[Qazme]

Be careful. Some car chargers will freeze your screen. There have been several threads about this.

You're correct......only when you buy cheap china junk that isn't built to the usb specifications to begin with. Kind of what you expect for a $1 charger or $5 bundle. Get an appropriate priced one from a trusted source and this will never happen. Least it hasn't to me yet.

That doesn't sound right at all. What kind of car were you driving? The lighter jack would also have a fuse to be blown as well, thus saving the other electronics, unless your car had some funky wiring going on. In any event, wouldn't be the charger's fault. How did you get the lights fixed?

And in this day and age, price does not equal quality. Plenty of tests have been run on Monster's $100 HDMI cables that they sell at Best Buy v. the Monoprice cables sold for 1/10 the cost or less, and no difference in picture quality has been found.

Well cables are a whole different story. People like Monster found out a long time ago that the vast majority of people who mess with home audio/video are idiots. They all think that if it's gold plated with a high price it's got to be better, and they are willing to pay $100+ for a $5-20 cable that performs the same because it's gold plated, and says it's better. Now it's turned into "You want Monster cables they are the best on the market!" when you go to do anything at a Best Buy etc.

With chargers we aren't messing with Gold plated items etc. The only differences in quality really comes from the internal components(transistor, resistors, capacitors) and the connectors themselves. If everything is built correctly to USB spec. with parts that aren't going to go out within the year a charger shouldn't cost you more than $10 in reality. Have you ever taken one apart? There isn't much to it. So with that arbitrary number in mind I try staying in the $10-20 range so I don't feel ripped off or in the junk bin.

 

[funchanteen]

I got this car charger for my Droid Incredible. I bought it for my trip from NY to VA and it worked great (even though it's a Motorola charger, worked like a charm as I was using as my GPS for the trip) and it's less than $6 if you have Prime or qualify for free shipping.

Amazon.com: Motorola P513 Vehicle Power Adapter MicroUSB Rapid?

 

[frunkiss]

That doesn't sound right at all. What kind of car were you driving? The lighter jack would also have a fuse to be blown as well, thus saving the other electronics, unless your car had some funky wiring going on. In any event, wouldn't be the charger's fault. How did you get the lights fixed?

And in this day and age, price does not equal quality. Plenty of tests have been run on Monster's $100 HDMI cables that they sell at Best Buy v. the Monoprice cables sold for 1/10 the cost or less, and no difference in picture quality has been found.

Toyota Echo.
After this happened I noticed the car charger's contacts touched the outer metal part when the car charger moved, like when I hit a pot hole or bump on the road. The contacts touched and the fuse blew. The fuse protected all the inside lights, most of them. The dome light still worked, which I turned on while I drove the rest of the way to a WalMart so I made sure I wasn't speeding, but the lights in the dash went out, speedometer, odometer, etc.
I simply changed the fuse at the WalMart parking lot. And bought a better car charger. No problems since. I drive a lot. Never happened before or after.
It was the car charger defect, not the wiring on my car.

 

[MA2GA28]

I'm not sure I trust Motorola charges/car accessories at all. I had their old iPod player hooked up at one point. Started the car, and it surged and fried my iPod. Was not pleased. Called Motorola customer service and asked them if they would do anything about it, and they said only if I could prove it was their player that fried it. Asked how I could do that, and the CS person said, "Well, you'd have to figure that out. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

In any event, I got one of the cheap chargers off Amazon, and so far, so good. I only use it when I need it.

And if the charger was lose in the lighter port, why use it? Of course its going to short if it touches the metal and the ports at the same time.

 

[eRod v1.0]

Best charger that I have found that lasts and actually charges:

Amazon.com: OEM Rapid Car Charger with IC Chip (SPN5400) for…

 

[nickbike]

I ordered the Verizon car charger when I ordered my phone:
Micro Dual Vehicle Power Charger

Its pricey, but I like that is has an extra USB port so my gf can charge her "other brand of phone that we don't talk about in these forums" at the same time. The only thing I don't like about it is the cord is coiled and very springy. I had to stretch it out overnight so it wouldn't constantly try to pull the phone off the dash. I'll probably use my 6 foot cable from monoprice plugged into the USB port whenever both phones aren't charging.

 

[AllBackJack]

There seems to be a power surge with the HTC Hero

I've noticed this problem also, and I think it's an issue with the HTC when it's first plugged in. I'm speculating that it's high initial current drain spike, or some initial drain spike that confuses some chargers or cigarette lighter splitters.

I say this because we travel a lot, and we have used generic chargers and splitters with three HTC Hero's, and have tried it in 3 cars and a bunch of rental cars. In most cars, in most situations it works fine. No problems.

On one cheap USB charger I bought, its internal 2A fuse blows if I have the HTC plugged into it when I turn on the car. Very reproducible. On another charger, its 3A internal fuse blows in the same situation.

On a Toyota, on another USB charger with no internal fuse, the Toyota's 15A fuse blows. Very reproducible. If I don't have the HTC plugged in, or have a different device plugged in (the GPS, iTouch charger) it works fine. All three of the HTC's will do this.

On a rental Jeep Liberty, it would do the same thing with a different non-fused charger (I know because I bought another charger while traveling). It would repeatedly blow out its 15A fuse. The cigarette lighter is the only device on that 15A circuit.

Does it happen on all cheap chargers or splitters. Absolutely not. We have cheap chargers and splitters that work. And I'm not changing them to experiment any more. Does it happen with a brand name charger. The only problem we had was into a generic splitter.

So is it an issue with cheap chargers? Probably. Is it something to do with the HTC? Probably.

Sorry that I can't provide an exact fix, but if you're having problems, try another charger.

I just wonder what it is that can cause 15A fuses to blow. That's a lot of current.