Chinese manufacturers are making progress in the development of wireless and air charging technology. Late last month, Xiaomi became the first company to announce a charging technology that works through the air. At the 2021 Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Shanghai, OPPO also demonstrated the latest air charging technology. The company showed a 30-second demo video that shows this technology. The video also shows the OPPO X scroll screen mobile phone.
According to reports, the OPPO air charging technology reaches 7.5W. This is slightly higher than Xiaomi’s 5W. In November 2020, OPPO launched the OPPO AR Glass 2021 and OPPO X 2021 scroll screen concept phones at the Future Technology Conference 2020 (OPPO INNO DAY 2020).
The OPPO X 2021 uses a stepless OLED flexible scroll screen with a minimum of 6.7 inches and a maximum of 7.4 inches display. OPPO uses its self-developed Roll Motor powertrain, dual matrix embedded clutch structure, and screen dynamic area skeleton stacking to achieve almost “zero crease”.
Xiaomi Mi Air Charge Technology
The newly released Xiaomi Mi Air Charge Technology is a significant attempt to turn the whole house into a wireless charger. With this technology, you can charge your device anywhere you are in the home. Whether you are walking, gaming or sleeping, your device could be charging without a socket. You do not also need any cables or wireless charging stands. Announcing this technology on Twitter, the company said
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“We’re excited to bring you the remote charging technology – Mi Air Charge Technology! Charge multiple devices simultaneously while you’re gaming, walking around or even when something’s in the way, no strings attached. Another giant leap forward in wireless charging technology!”
How does this technology work?
This is probably the most important question that many people will ask. In fact, it is the first question I asked when I first saw the report. The company had to design a special charging pile that comes with five-phase in-built interference antennas. These antennas will detect the location of the smartphone. To get power to the phone, Xiaomi also includes a phase control array of 144 antennas. These other antennas can then transmit millimeter-wide waves via beamforming to the smartphone.
Furthermore, there is also a small antenna array with an in-built “beacon antenna” and “receiving antenna array”. While the former serves to broadcast the phone position information, the latter with 14 antennas convert millimeter-wave signal from the charging pile into electric energy. It does this via the rectifier circuit to make the charging solution complete.
Is this technology safe?
This is another very important question that many may ask. Well, we do not expect Xiaomi to say it is not safe so we look at its workability. For now, the Xiaomi Mi Air Charge Technology only outputs 5W. This is hardly enough to cause any harm over the short term. However, we can not tell the effect of exposure to such charges over the long term.
This technology supports charging multiple devices simultaneously. Each device will get 5W charging. According to the company, works over several meters. However, it did not give a specific distance range. It is important to note that physical obstacles do not reduce the charging efficiency. This technology works for only smartphones for now.