Note charges faster with.. - AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717

Note charges faster with Kindle fire's charger. Using white at&t i717 Note
Here is my find and situation. My Note was almost dead it was at 5%. Forgot charger at home and only available charger was from a Kindle Fire. Plugged it in. I know Note takes forever to charge so I thought ok Ill let it charge for about an hour it should put me at around 40%. About an hour later I checked phone and battery charge was at 87%. ???
Didnt believe it at first I thought OK maybe I was seeing sh*t and it really wasnt at 5%. Had to take off so didnt put too much thought into. Next day thought about it and said ok WHAT IF Kindle Fire's charger charges it faster. Completely drained battery til phone shut off. Plugged it in using Kindle's charger turned on Note, turned off data, background data, let it charge for exactly 30 minutes checked charge it was 39%. Unplugged it turned on data, background data and did some heavy usage to drain battery again til phone shut off. Plugged it in using the charger that came with Note, turned it on and again I turned off data/background data. Let it charge for 30 mins checked charge and it was at 14%.
So Im sharing my find and yes Kindle Fire's charger does charge it way faster and Im wondering if anyone else has tried/used the Fire's charger and has had the same result and if using the Fire's charger going to damage battery if I keep using it instead of charger that came with it?

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I have used my Kindle Fire's charger since I got my Note. The current rating on the Fire's charger is higher at 1.8a as opposed to the stock 1.0a. However, the Notes charging circuit likely cannot draw 1.8a, the highest I have seen it go with some battery app displaying current was about 1.2a. So yes, it might charge slightly faster. The biggest benefit I see though is the lack of a need for separate chargers.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using XDA

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I have been using my gtab 10.1 charger. Its rated at 2.0 amps and I can get a full charge from 10% in about 3 hours. Much faster than the 1.0 amp charge wart that came with the note, by about 2.5 hours.
EOS 2.0 @ MZ604 [XDA-HD]
Stock @ SGH-I717R [XDA-Premium]

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Pretty sure the Note charges at 1A max. If you're charging faster, it means your other charger isn't providing 1A.

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I have seen battery monitor widget display ~1150ma if it was in deep sleep and I quickly check it before it refreshes. It averages about 750ma if I'm using it while charging. This tapers off once it hits 80% or so when the charging tapers off. Battery Monitor Widget does say this is estimated. I would agree that the Note will never draw more than ~1.1a or so.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using XDA

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arsonizt said:
Note charges faster with Kindle fire's charger. Using white at&t i717 Note
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Thank you! Makes a huge difference...only thing that was bugging me about the phone was the slow charging...i was about to go crazy.

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khaytsus said:
Pretty sure the Note charges at 1A max. If you're charging faster, it means your other charger isn't providing 1A.
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False. The note can definitely handle more. I have also use a Gtab charger and it usually spiked around 1700mA
I currently use an Asus Transformer charger which is rated at 1.2A. I will say, I get about exactly that. 1281mA posted below
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I've had similar results with my HP TouchPad charger which is rated at 2A.

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I use my iPad charger.. 2.1 A... seems faster as well. I hardly ever charge though since I bought the QCell battery charger and two extra batteries, so one is always at 100 percent.

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I agree. I have used the Kindle Fire's charger on my note as well and it did charge much faster. I would bet that not all of the Samsung chargers that come with the Note are quality chargers.. The first one that originally came with my note would either charge very slowly, or flat out not charge at all. I would have to un-plug, and plug it back in to the wall a few times to get it to start.
AT$T game me a replacement charger after dealing with it for 2 weeks, and it has begun to have the same issue now after about 2 month use. If I use the SE charger that came with my Xperia X10 (750ma), I actually get a more stable charge than what the 1A Samsung charger gets. Albeit not any faster, but it doesn't just STOP charging out of the blue.
I think I will try buying a tablet charger, and stop using my Note's charger all together.

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Does Kindle offer vehicle charger?
¢ via SGH-i717

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You don't need a kindle charger to get the higher amp rating, just a higher rated charger. There are several vehicle chargers available that are able to charge at 1A or greater. You will likely want to find one designed for Android devices rather than iOS devices as iOS uses a different method to charge at higher amperage than most Android devices use. There are articles on modifying the charger but if you find a Kindle compatible charger online that may be a good bet.

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I've bought both Kensington 2.1A and 3.1A but haven't attempted shorting middle pins or cable as discussed in other threads. I use ProClip mounts in my car, but wife didn't want one in her Highlander (our travel vehicle) so I bought Samsung's mount for Note and it cosistently charges 1.0-1.2A and outpaces GPS' drain
¢ via SGH-i717

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slapshot591 said:
False. The note can definitely handle more. I have also use a Gtab charger and it usually spiked around 1700mA
I currently use an Asus Transformer charger which is rated at 1.2A. I will say, I get about exactly that. 1281mA posted below
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What current measuring widget is that? I use "Current Widget" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.manor.currentwidget&hl=en and I have never seen over 1003mA regardless if I use a 1A charger that I shorted D+ to D- on or my Touchpad charger that is capable of 2.1A. I wonder if Current Widget shows charging current and the one you use shows total system current?

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mtucker said:
What current measuring widget is that? I use "Current Widget" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.manor.currentwidget&hl=en and I have never seen over 1003mA regardless if I use a 1A charger that I shorted D+ to D- on or my Touchpad charger that is capable of 2.1A. I wonder if Current Widget shows charging current and the one you use shows total system current?
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Using Battery Monitor Widget Pro, I've been using it since launch. It is actually measuring the current usage of the battery, either charging or discharging. I'm using this on an Anker 2700mAh battery and it does charge pretty quickly for me.

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arsonizt said:
Note charges faster with Kindle fire's charger. Using white at&t i717 Note
Plugged it in using Kindle's charger turned on Note, turned off data, background data, let it charge for exactly 30 minutes checked charge it was 39%.
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This would indicate that the power source you are using is between 1.8A and 2A.
Assuming your using the 2500 MaH battery:
1% = 25 MaH
30 minutes charge of 39% = 975 Mah
If this was accomplished in 30 minutes you would do 975 x 2 = 1950 MaH.
Given the above statistics, you would assume your phone was being charged by something with the output of 2A. I would defnitely run the terminal command on this to verify output though..
THANKS TO PJ_RAGE for already doing work on this subject....This is from his post a while back
"cat /sys/class/power_supply/battery/batt_current_adc
The reported number will be the charge current for your charger. Divide the number you receive by 10, and that is the mA. For example, if a USB charger reports "4851", divide by 10 and the charge current is 485.1mA. Note that this only reports charging current -- it cannot report the current drain, and will just report "0" when you try it without a charger connected.
If you're really still curious, you can see what type of charger the phone actually thinks is connected to your phone (ie, whether or not the phone thinks the data lines are shorted) by entering the following instead:
cat /sys/class/power_supply/battery/charging_source
The reported number should be a 0, 1, or 2. 0 = no charger connected, 1 = data lines NOT shorted, USB normal charge, and 2 = data lines ARE shorted, AC fast charge.

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mtucker said:
What current measuring widget is that? I use "Current Widget" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.manor.currentwidget&hl=en and I have never seen over 1003mA regardless if I use a 1A charger that I shorted D+ to D- on or my Touchpad charger that is capable of 2.1A. I wonder if Current Widget shows charging current and the one you use shows total system current?
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Click to collapse
I assume this widget sleeps if the device is asleep? I had a widget once that updated very 30 seconds and did it ON OR OFF.. ie: The phone was basically always awake because this stupid widget was updating itself every 30s regardless of the circumstances.
That said, my note seems to be awake 80% of the time anyway..

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slapshot591 said:
False. The note can definitely handle more. I have also use a Gtab charger and it usually spiked around 1700mA
I currently use an Asus Transformer charger which is rated at 1.2A. I will say, I get about exactly that. 1281mA posted below
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is that LunarUI i'm seeing? How/where did you get that theme?

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Let me post a few observations of my own as I have worked with LiOn technology through my work since it was invented.
This isn't my first go around with this technology.
One of my past employers actually invented smart LiON technology (successfully suing all the big computer makers for royality payments due to their patents) and my current employer is involved in producing the battery actually used in our specific ATT Note device. Believe it or not. Your choice. It's the truth.
1--Lithium Ion charging current is controlled by battery temperature. If the battery is hot, the device won't ALLOW it to charge rapidly -- if at all. This is for safety reasons. Charge too quickly you reduce life, or risk a rupture. Not good, especially for latter. In most cases, the LiON batteries contain a computer chip and a data bus to communicate back to the device. In other cases, the device simply uses voltage alone to make a rougher determination of what is going on inside in the cell. Since there are a variety of applications available for Android that supply a specific temp for the battery, I suspect the former is true in our case.
2--Lithium Ion charging current is reduced as the cell nears full charge; which is why it slows down when it gets nearly full. Of course, it can slow down when it gets hot. This is why when you plug it in, it may not charge right away. Discharge of the cell produces a temperature increase. Putting it on charge reduces the temp but not right away.
3--the supplied adapter from Samsung is "less than ideal" when the first two conditions allow greater current (charging). Using another adapter works much faster if it has > 1A capacity. I use a iPad (gasp) adapter and it REALLY charges fast with the right cable (my next point).
4--the supplied cable from Samsung (the one that allows it to talk to the computer) is "less than ideal" for charging. Go to the ATT store and buy the $10 USB-Micro USB cable they sell. It will SCREAM in comparision, assuming all of the first 3 conditions listed above are met.
Take this information as you see fit. I don't work for ATT, I'm only sharing my knowledge of the technology, explaining what people are seeing, and providing my recommendations based on my observations. Yes, I have used a jig and an amp meter to confirm all my results -- rather than some software application. I'm not saying the application is bad, just that I can tell you for sure how to tell how much current is being supplied/taken in a circuit. You measure it with an amp meter.. the old fashioned way.
Peace

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If you havent read the post above mine, read it first. Very informative and all true. Everything I have to say expands on what was said above.
Ok, this is real simple folks, the USB STANDARDS state that the maximum power output is 2 amps. This means that ANY device that charges off a USB cable WILL charge at a maximum of 2 amps, period. You cannot make the amperage higher than 2 amps. This means there is no point in searching around for a 3 amp charger because the phone will NOT accept anything more than 2 amps and ANYTHING claiming more than 2 amps is simply lying.
Now, having said that, this also does NOT mean that you HAVE to charge at 2 amps, it means that the MAXIMUM amps that can be PROVIDED is 2 amps. The wall charger that comes with the Note is a 1.0 amp charger. This means you can find a different wall charger that outputs 2 amps and effectively HALF your charge time.
The other factor to take into consideration is phone usage. The processor does consume some power when the phone is on. Additionally, Android charges the battery by dumping high current into the battery until its at around 80% and slowly reduces the current as the battery capacity reaches higher levels. So even tho a 2 amp charger should charge the phone in about an hour and a half, it really is closer to two and a half hours.
So the last point I want to make is, it does NOT matter what charger you have, the charging process is completely software controlled. The charger just puts out power at a constant rate. All lithium ion devices have the same charging scheme that has been pretty much standardized. While there are some very minor differences, YOU dont need to worry about the technical side of it, this is what the software was written to handle.
I highly recommend looking at the battery university website and if you can afford it, purchasing their book for the skinny on everything you need to know about batteries and how they work.
+1 for Battery Monitor Widget Pro (by 3C). Its an expensive app at around $4 but gives you EVERYTHING you could possibly want to know about what is going on with your phones power including drain, charge rate, current battery condition, VERY detailed logging, HIGHLY customizable widget, etc. Just look at the screenshots in the appstore (make sure you are looking for the one by 3C as there are several apps with the same name). Oh, and did I mention, it uses less than 1% of battery power per charge cycle to monitor all of this?
System Tuner Pro by 3C is also very nice.