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The phrase wall wart is hardly used outside North America and this article should be merged with AC adapter anyway. Turkeyphant 17:42, 20 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed, I'm actually from the states and have never heard the term "wall wart" but am more familiar with the term AC adapter(almost all manufacturers i've bought from have called them this) or transformer plug. Firebrandjo (talk) 06:52, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The phrase is used in the UK, though more by technical people than the general public who tend to call them 'mains adapters' if they are aware of them at all. --80.176.142.11 (talk) 15:14, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The phrase is used in the German language area. "Wandwarze" (literal translation) yields ~7000 entries in Google. Saxbryn (talk) 16:58, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
How about an explanation of the term, since I never heard it before today and am still not sure what it means? 66.232.240.121 (talk) 01:56, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
"Inefficiency - typically wall warts waste a lot of electricity"
This isn't really true. Its more of a political football than a reality. If you do the calcs using real world numbers you quickly find the total wasted power is tiny in comparison to other household goods.
There are various sources claiming that if we only did something trivial the human species would be saved, and wallwarts are one of he things they like to latch on to, usually using ludicrous figures to try to establish their point, and avoiding the real issues. Tabby (talk) 12:30, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You say 'should' - the only thing we 'should' do is pick the best option, and wall warts frequently are that. Thats why theyre so widely used. Other supply types have pros and cons, and these all need to be considered. Making a choice on one aspect alone is not wise decision making.
Putting them on a lead does not alas solve their issues. The only thing it solves is the tendency to fall out with some countries' plugs. It also creates problems, such as increases fire risk. Tabby (talk) 08:47, 13 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We have a citation: http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/plug-in-transformer.htm To wit: "If you have ever felt one and it was warm, that is wasted energy turned to heat. The power consumption is not large -- on the order of 1 to 5 watts per transformer." Poorly built wall transformers allow too much magnetostriction, which means the iron plates in the transformer core vibrate a lot. Motion like that is a direct energy loss. Please add that citation and let the users decide. Thank you for listening. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.226.126.60 (talk) 01:13, 24 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed
because:
Tabby (talk) 08:47, 13 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Survey Finds Consumers Grow Weary of Wall Warts
This one does contain some useful data - though its bias shows through in places.
Tabby (talk) 09:10, 13 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Tabby is correct. I'm a designer of consumer electronics who just happened to stumble across this today while researching something for a new product.
It looks like a lot of hyperbole. A wall wart that runs warm might consume 2 watts of energy. Compare that to a single 100 watt light bulb. ONE 100W light bulb would draw 50 times the energy, so it looks like a typical home would have a tiny fraction of a percentage of power wasted in wall warts, certainly nowhere remotely close to what is stated and implied.
The largest problems and things disliked by consumers are the outlet space that is used and the large variety of wall warts required. From a manufacturing standpoint the largest problem is the large variety of connectors and the fact the voltage, current, and polarity is not keyed to a certain plug style. This means people can plug an incorrect wall wart in, damaging expensive electronics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by W8ji (talk • contribs) 20:22, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There is an entry Wall plug efficiency in the See also section which does not seem to pertain to wall wart / AC adapter efficiency at all. It seems to relate more to optics & lasers and a related concept called Luminous efficacy. Am I missing something? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.148.132.11 (talk) 02:29, 6 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
One real issue with warts today, not yet addressed in this article, is incompatibility. The proliferation is voltages, current ratings, polarity, regulation, and the occasional ac wart all limit the re-use possibilities, and mean that new goods must come with a new wart.
The good news is that despite the lack of any widely adopted standard on this, The migration of the USB connector to power supplies is seeing a move tward greater compatibility. There's still a fair way to go though.
PS its quite incorrect to say that warts can't be reused on any other appliance. Tabby (talk) 09:10, 13 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Diversity — Unlike[citation needed] a standard power cord, a lost or failed wart cannot immediately be replaced from the stock of a retail store, but must await delivery from the original equipment manufacturer (if the item has not yet been discontinued)[citation need"
is back in the article, will remove it again. I've reused countless wallwarts on other appliances, the reuse problem is that there are 5 parameters which must all suit the appliance, and this is too complex for the average consumer.
Tabby (talk) 01:37, 9 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
These are typically packaged with electrical devices that do not contain their own power supply. This can be .... due to the economics of getting devices including an internal power supply certified by government regulatory bodies, such as the FCC in the United States
This I understand is the principal reason why a lot of them are used (although the regularory issues are more related to Electrial safety rather than EMC certification). But surely a better approach would be to produced sealed pre-certified PUPS modules (Point of Use Power Supply) which could be fitted internally to the devices in question. AC supply could be via a an IEC series C connector (preferably grounded e.g. c7/c8 or c15/c16) on the PUPS module with a suitably placed access hole on the device ? There would be no need for recertification of the device. 86.112.254.104 (talk) 11:18, 19 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
> But many of these inefficient devices are low powered (e.g. devices that are used for Battery chargers), so although they have a low efficiency, the amount of energy they waste is less than 1% of household consumption of electric energy.
reference needed
> Switch-mode adapters, being more efficient, will not release noticeable heat even while being used. The drawback of switch-mode adapters is that they are considerably more expensive in production.
Wrong on all counts. Some smpsus are less efficient than their iron counterparts, some are cheaper and some run hot.
Its also quite wrong to equate warmth with inefficiency. There are some very inefficient supplies that run cold simply because the output power is small, and very efficient ones that run hot because output power is high for their size.
Unfortunately this is the sort of material the average person thinks they know about, but doesnt, making it hard to maintain a reasonable level of accuracy on this topic on wiki. Tabby (talk) 02:22, 9 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
There must be a standard number or a document number or *something* we can reference, aside from the ITU's own press release, that formally describes the USB "Universal charging system" plan. The ITU Web site is not helpful, couldn't find it in their weekly updated catalog of publications. --Wtshymanski (talk) 18:07, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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A ferrite bead is visible near the output plug of the power brick illustrated. Someone please write a sentence or two about this component. When a bead is present, it is always or almost always next to the output plug. Suggesting that the noise being blocked originates in the powered device. Thanks, ... PeterEasthope (talk) 16:59, 7 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]
An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect AC/DC adapter and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 December 9 § AC/DC adapter until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. fgnievinski (talk) 05:38, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]