There have been several threads discussing the ultimate charging solution. Those threads have focused on the chargers...Skiva, Antec, etc. And much of that focus has been on which charger offers the most power with the most ports, etc.

But what has not been given much attention is how much of a difference the actual cable itself can make to the speed of recharging of a device. I think I have found the ultimate charging cable solution!

Kopi Cable Info


You can buy the Kopi cables on Amazon: here.

I bought several of these cables, and I can confirm that they do indeed speed up the recharging of my various devices (assuming my charger has enough power). In some cases, I have noticed dramatically faster recharging - probably because I was using cheap retractable cables in those cases. OEM cables do tend to charge faster in general compared to cheap knock off cables, altho so far I haven't tried any cable, including my Monoprice heavy gauge AWG cables., that perform better than these Kopi's.

These Kopi cables appear to be made of very high quality components...I know it sounds odd, but these cables just have a "premium" fit and finish to them. Hopefully they might prove useful to other Flyertalkers as well.

+1. Cables definitely matter. Another that is good:

http://www.amazon.com/Fosmon-Vivid-Series-Micro-Cable/dp/B009IZF594/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1367759944&sr=8-2&keywords=fosmon+cable

These Fosmon cables come in different colors. For travel, I picked some bright colors as red and green make them easier to spot in a bag and less likely to be left/lost. They are also flat so tangle "resistant". At home, where I have some permanently plugged in to some multi-chargers, color coding tells me which cable is 10A vs 5A. They are designed / rated for 2.1V / 10A.

When I tried to purchase the Kopi ones, they weren't yet available so bought these and have been pretty happy. I may have to get the Kopi cables to do a test.

As an aside, I bought this dock

http://www.amazon.com/RND-Dock-Google-Nexus-Tablet/dp/B008NP7R7S/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1367760997&sr=8-1&keywords=rnd+dock+nexus

For my Nexus 7 3g and it charges 2-3 times faster than anything else I have. I need to figure out if it is the charger or cable that came with it.

I too have a Nexus 7, so I'd love to hear if you figure out whether it's the charger or the cable that charges your N7 faster. I'm always on the lookout for the fastest charge! Right now, based on the research I've done, I'm pretty confident that as far as the cables go, nothing is going to be faster than the Kopi's. However, it looks like the Fosman's are quite comparable, since they appear to be designed/engineered in the same way.

The USB cable that comes with recent Samsung phones is also "fast", as are some Motorola cables. No idea what makes them "fast", but I suspect it is something as simple as some extra pins.

If a samsung phone detects that the data pins are shorted (either in the charger or in the cable) it will draw much more power from the charger. If the pins are not shorted, it will only draw 350 or 450 ma. It's their way to get people not to purchase generic chargers

In most instances it's the charger that shorts the pins for some Samsung and Motorola brands, the cable can't be used as a data cable if the cable shorts them.

It's also sort of a safety check so the device doesn't draw too much power from a charging port that can't supply it.

This does not apply to all phones or devices, as many will draw whatever power you give them without having the data pins shorted. Other phones however will only charge at a faster rate if they are shorted.

There are tons of pages online showing how to modify cables or cheap chargers into fooling the phones.

As to the cables, cheaper cables with thinner wires, or longer cables may offer too much resistance to allow a fast charge. Shorter cables, thicker wires, offer less resistance and you are not giving up as much energy to heat up the cable.

Good stuff, thanks!

Hilarious. When Apple makes a proprietary cable many people complain about it. Samsung does it and "meh, who cares". Nope, no double standard there.