Use your old (Mini-USB) charger to charge any USB chargeable phone/MP3 Player/iTouch/iPhone/iPad for $1.61

Intro:
Now you can have a charger at home and at work! Or simply have a spare in your bag.
This instructable provides a practical way to use an old stored away Mini-USB charger from previous cell phones or devices you own(ed).
An alternate method to “reduce, reuse, recycle” your Mini-USB chargers, don't throw it away!

Assuming the following:
You already own 1 or several Mini-USB chargers from other device(s) typically phones.
You already have a USB sync cable that came with your phone. (i.e.: white cable that comes with iPhone 2G, 3G, 3Gs, 4G).  
Your device charges while plugged into a computer, if it doesn't then most likely will not work for you!

1. Voltage Verification of Old Charger: (go to step 1 for more info)
99.9% of the time, if the charger has a Mini-USB connector then it will have 5 Volts to power/charge any USB device.
It’s always good to confirm just in case some idiot company decides to use the same Mini-USB connector for some other application which uses a higher voltage...It's possible but not likely.

2. $1.61 Item Purchase: (go to step 2 for more info)
You will need to purchase a "USB Female to Mini USB 5-Pin Female Adapter". You can use the link below to purchase one from Dealextreme
Copy and paste the link below:
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.26780~r.88371207

3. Setting up device to charge: (go to step 3 for more info)
All you do is connect both the old charger and USB charge cable to the adapter. That’s it! Your phone should start to charge.
 

Step 1 Voltage Verification of Old Charger

99.9% of the time, if the charger has a Mini-USB connector then it will have the correct voltage to power/charge any USB device.

It’s always good to confirm just in case.
* The voltage can usually be found on one side of the charger. (See photo for example).
   Label example: “OUTPUT: 5.0VDC 550mA”
You will need to verify that the “Output” is “5.0v” (five volts) More voltage may damage your phone, less voltage may not work but shouldn’t damage your phone.

* The “550mA” is called “Current” this will vary from charger to charger. The simplest way to describe its function in this scenario is: The higher the current the faster it will charge the lower the current the slower it will charge.
* Ideally a charger will have 1A… but most chargers use half of that which is: 500mA.

iPAD users NOTE: iPAD requires 2.1A but can slowly charge or maintain its charge with lower current only when it’s in sleep mode.  In some case when current is really small like 200mA or 100mA it will not charge at all.

Comments

[eddy14777]

I'm sorry to tell you this but the Ipad will not charge on this because it takes a different amount of amperage .

[dafoofoo]

I tried not to clutter the intro. with redundant info that is mentioned on the 1st step. In my 1st step you would have seen in BOLD the following: "iPAD users NOTE: iPAD requires 2.1A but can slowly charge or maintain its charge with lower current only when it’s in sleep mode. In some case when current is really small like 200mA or 100mA it will not charge at all." You do bring up a good topic since most old chargers hardly go over 0.5A it is very unlikely that an old charger will have 2.1A to charge while using the iPad. Although I did find an old charger that provided 1A at the swap-meet which brings me hope. If anyone has tried please make a comment with Amperage i.e. 500mA, 0.8A, etc.

[Fiction]

Any updates to this?

I'm trying to build a minimal solar iPad charger and would love to find out the lowest possible charging amperage.

[crzy engineer]

Great info.

Thanks!