CES 2010: Airnergy WiFi Harvesting Charger

[morrowindbalmora]

Stop telling us lies, you bitch

[PirateRadioPoland]

Harvesting energy from fart pressure is more serious than that...

[mantaz111]

Harvest energy form you fuckin' brain signals.

[Zed1967]

Inverse square law. Come on in!

[darthwinst]

Am I the only one that noticed the doubletalk here? They ask how long it takes to charge and he says it depends on proximity to WiFi... then he quickly says he used it to charge a Blackberry in 90 minutes. But the question was obviously not how long it takes the unit to charge a phone, but how long it takes to charge the "internal battery" in the unit, and he knew that. The way he phrases it, you hear "90 minutes to charge the unit" but that's not what he says. Good salesman. Bullshit product.

[007akdc007]

i do admit its a waist of money for the common person but for someone who flys alot for buisness can benifite alot by being able to charge thing if there plane supports wifi

[NOCNOTCAUGHT]

Now does it come with snake oil too?

[Mustakari]

The claims RCA make are not just misleading but downright lies. Even in ideal conditions that device's energy harvesting power does not even cover the internal battery self discharge! It would be orders of magniture more powerful if that tiny box was covered with solar cells, even in night time...

[HHH100]

Love it! This device has saved me big bucks and time... Thanks RCA!

[mulbuddy]

90 minutes? holy crap. pretty useful though

[khomeyni1]

i have one and it works

[reason0808]

yeh it has HUGE potential. but do urselves a favour.. forget mobile batteries!

aim to create devices that operate while receiving energy from WIFI!! if the wifi routers arent good enough.. then be the ones to make them!

imagine the possibiltiies.. one obvious example is truly wireless speakers!

[INVENTOR3]

@shazzbot007

/watch?v=XN_p1O7ESF8

see the dragon now! hehehe

[jdcncsolutions]

I would hate to say that this device is fake without using it myself; however, a wireless router can output a maximum of 100mW (without a license of course). Knowing this limitation and assuming the system is 100% efficient, at maximum power, the battery is 1000mAH and charges off of 5VDC from USB:

Using P=VI for DC signals, 100mW/5VDC = 20mA. This means that it would take 50 hours to fully charge a dead battery. Since this system is not 100% efficient, the actual charge time will be longer.

[falinx101]

Shame, this dude doesn't realise it but he's already dead. Oil companies will neeeeeeever let this happen even on such a small scale. All I can say is "yeah right, sure it will be available this summer pffft"

[jigglesnap]

@falinx101 Are you making fun of free energy nutjobs, or are you one of them?

[damphear2]

last time i checked Tesla had this and was trying to sell this

[ChristianMusician777]

cool beans!!!

[TheLoneparot]

stupid.. that device stil neds battery............. solar charger is still the best...... its every where... moron

[semomonkey]

@TheLoneparot

Yeah here in the netherlands we always have sun! every day! NO REALLY!....

[carnagerpm]

@TheLoneparot

what about night time when your sleeping and the lights are out?

[grompymonkey]

omg all we need now is wireless batteries with energy transmitters at every corner! no more need to charge :D

[seansfc]

I WANT ONE DAMMIT

[QrafTee]

This is awesome if it actually works. I can see new Android devices jumping on this technology--having it built-in--if it proves as useful as it seems.

[Abyyss3344]

Amazing how many detractors are pouring here screaming that this is impossible! RCA is a major company that would NEVER make such a claim unless this was proven and have working models. It is almost like the government shills are working overtime to discredit this great invention or take attention away from it until they are able to stop RCA from marketing it, or putting pressure on them until they retract the product and force RCA to publicly say it has bugs... Wake up people, watch this one.

[TypeTuber]

Yes the new green energy, 100 mW out of your Wi-Fi antenna returns a few microwatts a meter away, brilliant!

(Note to "RCA", a 1 meter long wire is a lot cheaper and quite a bit more efficient.

[RustyNex]

i heard this is how jesus works!

[revolxaohemwolb]

This guy could have STFU at the phrase 'free energy.' What rubbish. At least you get some snake when you buy snake oil.

[marcan42]

Who wants to bet when this comes out it just has a BS antenna inside, dummy circuitry connected to it, and a DC input so you can charge it from the wall "in case the WiFi signal doesn't work for you".

[igor197855]

да это фэйк, скока тогда ест сама точка

[laveywow]

QUe!?!??!

[TheEvilcavedragon]

well a microwave can cook food so I'd have to say this is something I will look for and at least try.wifi is in the microwave spectrum ghosts are real harvest and conversion of signals NAH!

[jblackrupert]

Can't wait to see the suckers buying this.

[Cypern]

HAHA.......thats fake - he is a great actor..

[entypelo]

Oddiooooo... allora è tutto vero , il grande nikola tesla voleva liberarci dalla tirannia del controllo energetico, dai petrolieri i banchieri.... è tutto veroooooooooooooooooooooooo

[philbx1]

Direct from the RCA AirHeadergy department.

Special offer with free bottle of snake oil I hear.

[FatoDrunkoAndoStupid]

This works!

Sure, the charge time is 23 years.. but you didn't pay for the electricity that was gathered over 23 years to charge the battery!

[CoolTsarina]

Never mind ´regular´ people. I cease to understand how geeks (supposable extra I.Q.) can go for this. If there is WiFi nearby there is also a power outlet! Duh!

[MarionetteKazuko]

@CoolTsarina It provides a way to charge things without the need of cords or wires. That's like saying "Why use a cellphone when there's a payphone on every corner?" it's about convenience.

[bastian74]

Wifi wireless transmissions are far from the most powerful radio signals. Even the most powerful signals are not powerful enough to charge a battery. What they are selling is a spare battery with included snake oil. It will not self charge. Put a amp meter on it after the built-in battery is drained.

[Lokivoid]

The concept is viable however his wording show's that hes overexaggerateing his claims, such as the use of the term "Free energy". Techniquely its the same function as a aircore transformer converting the RF signals back to Direct current, so its plossiable. However its highly questionable that it will produce enough current to charge standard li-ion cells, that is unless you want to stand right next to a Disruptive discharge coil or broadcast tower..

[myrdale]

Bull shit video. This is pure lies. It will NOT charge your phone. These people are liars!

[bighands69]

This technology may not fully charge a phone with to days technology.

but it could be added and improved with future technology to make pocket gadgets have a further battery range.

in other words make your phone last longer without charging.

[roidroid]

this seems rediculous.

mobile phones are also themselves "wifi hotspots". Charge one wifi hotspot - via another wifi hotspot?

no.

pick up a physics book

[rlameiro]

This is so BS. Only o a fool would buy this

[newtongfd]

Sorry guys.. This is just BS....

DO THE MATH!

[ArthurHinds]

Well he's proven that an "Airnergy" battery can charge a Blackberry battery in 90 minutes.

He has yet to prove if a Wifi Signal can RECHARGE an "Airnergy" battery.

I'll stick with my Proporta 3400mAh aux battery.

[BL4RG1S]

I agree with Gbjerke, WiFi signals would be mostly ineffectual at charging a smartphone given the amount of time required.

[BL4RG1S]

This technology is, or at least it seems like, Electromagnetic Induction, which is the production of a voltage potential by way of a magnetic field. Since WiFi signals are EM waves, they could conceivably be converted to a DC current. But the amount of current wouldn't be very significant, so i'm not sure how efficient this device would be...

[erikxmusic]

ok one more time...

why would nokia spend thousands on developing this type of technology if they didnt think it would work...

i understand the skepticism..but this is 2010 we have come a long way..

here is an article that might be more convincing....search google.......

nokia developing a cell phone that never needs recharging

[MrCHISOL]

I don't doubt that they are dev. batteries that "don't need recharging", but I don't think we'll see it on the market this year (or the next). There are energy "everywhere", and the simplest energy to use is probably kinetic (motion) energy, and then there's heat (body, sun) etc..

But this idea of using WiFi (etc) to charge something (in that small amount of time) is impossible.

A rule says: Energy can't be destroyed nor created, only "transformed". So you can't extract more energy than there is

[Vlakpage]

People should be put in jail for such lies to public. With more new and more complicated technologoy coming there are more such lies and misleading information to people who don't understand how/why it doesn't work. I wonder what manager/marketing guy came with the idea.

[SomeMoreVideos2468]

Of course 'free energy' can be harvested from the air - that's how crystal radios work without a battery. However they only need tiny amount of power to work - you would need far more to even power the charging circuit, let alone start to charge the battery. The typical maximum power received by a WiFi antenna is around 100µW. Average is around 100pW. My phone charger outputs around 4.5Watts...

[EEVblog]

My video blog response to the Airnergy:

watch?v=P8s3Xjeg0sk

[FenderGibsonWashburn]

Cool idea, too bad it won't work.

[Gbjerke]

I've done some calculations. If you have ideal conditions, this device is 1m away from the router, it will take something like 70 000 hours, or well, 8 years to charge a pretty usual smartphone battery.

It's great

[andreasm]

Just like Dave Jones' put it, hmmm.

[215858452845]

Why not harvest radio waves too.

[hoppes9]

I'll bet the small solar cell in a calculator harvests 1000 times more power from ambient light than this thing does from stray RF.

[BlueShr00m]

Why not? He says it has an internal battery. So the internal battery charges up slowly over a few days. Then its ready to use in a emergency.

Or maybe he has made some wonderdevice using cosmic rays or whatever that will give free energy to everyone. Two weeks later he winds up dead from a "heartattack". :p

[reddevil82]

for me it takes the energy from the usb only... hahaa useless!!!

[MrPacMan36]

WHAT if the thing dies before you get to a hotspot or something, then it can't turn itself back on to pick up wifi signal to charge itself back up, and if it reserves power for such an occasion, what if you let it sit too long and the power gradually decreases? Then you're screwed. If the thing can plug into a wall and charge the internal battery, then it's good. lol

[madmike6537]

Holy hell imagine if they could get this small enough to put INTO THE PHONE ITSELF?!? Then your phone could charge anytime it was in ANY WIFI AREA! I would by that even if it was made by nokia!

[throwaway0]

Snake oil. This doesn't work at all. Don't buy it.

[Aaberg123]

It's a scam.

[EEH5555]

Imaging this for bluetooth :P.

[KralTube2]

I wonder how many people will fall for this.

[VideosbyDan]

@KralTube2

I know I will. ;D

[Fordi]

1) Attach a bridge rectifier to an antenna, and any RF buzzing through that antenna will be converted to DC voltage. That much, at least, is accurate.

2) There is not enough RF is buzzing through the air to overcome the 1.2VDC/cell required to even begin recharging a LiIon battery or the 1.4VDC/cell for a NiCD.

3) There is not enough RF buzzing through the air to meaningfully refill a cell phone battery, even without the voltage requirement.

[ozweblogs]

The Air Energy this bloke is talking about is making money from hot air.

There are plenty of people who will fall for this kind of non-science and waste their money.

[dave28lax]

Why does it have a USB input? Surely not because that's the only way to actually charge the battery, as WiFi only produces tiny amounts of energy and would take years to charge it?

[erikxmusic]

get with it people!!!

of course this is real!!

hundreds of people have already built the circut!!!

here it is

watch?v=WQeG4Qfi0YQ

ohh and if you still dont believe that the technology exists....one word "Witricity"

watch?v=Bdp9BhSW0cM

[chromebeats]

witricity is nothing like airnergy, witricty is kinda like a transformer.

And airnergy is complete bullshit.

[erikxmusic]

i disagree... i believe energy can be harvested from any electromagnetic or radio frequency traveling through the air...even if its a small amount

[chromebeats]

I didn't say it couldn't, it's just so small it would takes years to actually fully charge a device.

[darktrayu2]

can this idea work with wimax

[Cab0cl0]

this is bullshit

[HeLLkAt31]

cant wait for the battery to go into production but im definitely starting with the WiFi charger

[krutchaz]

Nice.

[kenyob]

Seems almost too good to be true. Can't wait to see a teardown on this.

[pizzagorgonzola]

there is probably a microprocessor in there that has an input of 0.0000001 volts, and just multiply's it, it's so simple :D

haha !

[gomesbascoy]

man.. there are APs everywhere, here in my home I've 20, and I live in the 3rd world xD

this stuff is awesome

[jmsaltzman]

Nope, not going to work! Not very much "free energy" [cough!] in wi-fi signals. Nice dent btw.

[nyc863]

Not practical. Unless you place the device right next to the 500mW max output of a wifi antenna (creating a shadow interfering with other users) you are only going to soak up a tiny percentage of half a watt. Do the math, it doesn't work out except in weird places like CES, or at home, if you dump your charger on top of your wireless router at night.

Also, there is a patent out on this already 7084605 .. I wonder if they are paying a license fee?

[tybloun]

C'est trop fort! J'aimerai bien connaître le principe.

[TugaPipeJunior]

this technology is so epic. charge a gadget through wi-fi?! OMG!

[sjeffery50]

I want to beleive....but I don't know if I can.......

[wongjunhao]

anyone knows what's the website that sells this? or the company website?

[pizzagorgonzola]

well, it's obviously NOT on the company's web site !

[itsCLICHE]

wow you're a dumb ass, it's said to be released during the summer. open your ears.

[pizzagorgonzola]

sure, by the summer they will have changed the laws of physics :D

[pizzagorgonzola]

for those who aren't following, the real RCA didn't even publish a Press Release.

of course they didn't because this is a joke, and not by them.

[putznutz]

Cool product, but this guy explaining it is dead weight.  The most boring representative they could have for this.

[pizzagorgonzola]

probably an actor

[Nickkyboy36]

imagine this built into a mobile phone. the battery life would soar!

[abmaris]

I'm sorry to dissapoint you but this thing can create some heavy interference with WiFi signals that won't make the users very happy. If they'll integrate this into a phone it'll be a disaster.

[MedivexXx]

Sorry, but how do you can you be so sure? I'm quite sure this technology isn't ready for everbodys using yet, but if they go one developin, mybe Airnergy will, doesn't it?

[abmaris]

hey! there is always the practical approach to the problem. I tried to "play" around the WiFi spots with different EM devices and signal quality degraded for all users connected to that specific spot. This device will metaphorical "eat" the waves.

[MedivexXx]

How were you already able to test it? Did I get it right, that you say, the quality of the signal gets worse for other devices when you start using the Airnergy? That would definatly become a problem..

[pizzagorgonzola]

that would not just be a problem, that would be a miracle !

on the scale of a black hole, without the mass !

a device that ABSORBS radio waves ?

that's like having a lamp that absorbs all the light in the room.

this is 100% impossible, a huge, and fantastic hoax !

[Weiney1995]

@derflamy

mit diesen gerät wandelt man wlan signale in nutzbaren strom um ,sodass man z.B. sein BlackBerry über nacht aufladen kann.

[nexus42x]

scam..

[jongwoonkim]

i gotta sew this baby to my crotch..

[animes25]

I bet it uses any kind of radio signals not only 2.4 ghz, also celular uses 2.4 ghz, it would be fun to use it in your microwave to get more power, because they use also 2.4 ghz

[Chronos014]

@animes25 If I were you I wouldn't put the phone IN the microwave, just lay it on top of it else it'll be royally screwed.

[pizzagorgonzola]

well, i can believe that a microwave could do the trick, it could recharge the battery before melting it, without any problem, not very practical :D

a microwave oven is TEN THOUSAND times more powerful than a WIFI base station !

[depro9]

This has Nikola Tesla written all over it!

[ericjay71]

our unsung hero, master tesla. this is his dream in action. i love it.

[ibpointless2]

Image it powering you laptop?

[pizzagorgonzola]

or a laptop powering another one, right ?

:D hehe, April is early this year, springbreak ! wouhou !

[kaiban42]

looking fwd to getting rid of most of my charging cables iduring year..... hope that goal is not too lofty.

[hstrobel]

Lasst euch nicht verarschen, die Selbstentladung des Akkus ist 1000 mal höher als die Energe die in gleicher Zeit mit dieser Minischachtel abgegriffen werden könnte.

[derflamy]

ich hab noch garnich richtig verstanden was der typ verkaufen will?funkstrom?

[ComONeal]

@derflamy

Über W-Lan kannst du Strom sammeln um damit dein Handy, Notebook etc zu laden.

Er sagt, es sei "freie Energie" etc

Ist auch denkbar möglich und auch umsetzbar

[hyperthreaded]

OK, let's do the math here: WLAN transmitter at full power transmits 100 mW in a more or less spherical fashion, at 5 meters distance this amounts to 100mW/(4*PI*(5m)^2)=3.18e-4W/m­^2. This thing seems to have about 50cm^2 of area, so charging power is 50cm^2*3.18e-4W/m^2=0.0016mW(!­). Blackberry battery 2/3rds charge is 2/3*4V*1300mAh=3.4Wh. Time to charge that is 3.4Wh/0.0016mW = ~2,200,000 hours = 251 years 51 days. Where is my mistake? :-P

[ibpointless2]

Your mistake is you dont believe in magic.

[the1l8niter]

you didn't carry the 1 :p

[pizzagorgonzola]

thanks hyper :)

[carnationberlin]

In 1928 one used the HF-power of strong radio stations to light up garden parties.

One needs for it only one dipole antenna (1/2 Lambda), as well as a coil, calibrated on the transmitter frequency and a diode. According to nearness to the transmitter one wins with it a strong direct current.

But these receivers considerably reduce the reach of a transmitter. So the energy production with diode receivers is forbidden in Germany.

[RoboTekno]

My...God...

[badmanners411]

Maybe it charges a Blackberry from 30-100% in 90 minutes, but it has its own inbuilt battery. How long does it take to charge *this* device's inbuilt battery?

It must be longer than 90 minutes, because Wi-Fi transmits with a low power (e.g. 100mW in UK), and it reduces very quickly as you move away from the Wi-Fi antenna

[manilaenglish]

Did I hear him correctly? He said he did a 90 minute demonstration on a blackberry and it charged the battery BETWEEN 30% to FULL capacity? That's a pretty giagantic GAP for a supposed already done test.

And what kind of company releases a product without testing it?

[Platypi007]

"from 30% to full capacity in 90 minutes." Means the phone was at 30% when they started charging and it was at full capacity after 90 minutes.

[manilaenglish]

Thank you for clearing that up for me.

[CraigViewer]

cool, if it works!??

[PJMDS]

ahahahah those guys are scamming people because there's no way that it will get enough power to charge a phone, wifi signals aren't powerful enough and you are far away from them that means even less received power, not even cell phone signals would charge it, save your money.

[Platypi007]

I can't imagine RCA pulling a scam like that at CES, that would be the ultimate in bad publicity.

[pizzagorgonzola]

well, it's not RCA, it's not anyone, it's a joke !

[kav123]

if those other dudes are inventing wireless electricity isn't this basically the same thing?

[badmanners411]

Tesla incented wireless electricity.

It's one thing to transmit power and then catch it a few metres away. It's another to catch free power; there's not enough power floating around the ether at Wi-Fi frequencies to have this thing charge itself in any useful time period.

[Skydive4ever]

Now this I like :-)

[younnat]

The future is coming

[badmanners411]

The future is always coming!