In today's review, we will look at the charging adapter GaN Charger 100W from the workshop of the Czech company FIXED, which recently arrived at our office. This is a very interesting innovation that has the potential to quite possibly change your perception of charging electronics as such. Don't you believe? In the following lines I will try to convince you of this.
Technical specifications, processing and design
As you already understood from the name of the product, FIXED GaN Charger 100W is a charger using modern charging technology consisting of replacing silicon circuits with gallium nitride, which is more energy efficient. What does this mean for you? Firstly, it means that manufacturers are able to significantly reduce the size of adapters compared to classic silicon models, secondly, it means longer charger life, and secondly, it means lower energy losses during charging and miniminor heating, which is definitely not a small thing, quite the opposite. So if you are annoyed by large adapters that tend to heat up so much that it is practically impossible to hold them in your hand for a long time, you have just found an excellent replacement. In addition to the absence of overheating, which is prevented by protection in the adapter, your safety is also ensured by overvoltage and undervoltage protection.
Although the adapter measures just 62 x 33 x 113 mm, you can count on it to be maxoverall performanceonem 100W, which is spread over a total of four ports. There are a total of four ports available, two of which are USB-C porty offers up to 100W, the third USB-C port Offers maxat least 30W and the last USB-A port is the same. Considering the performance of the individual ports, it probably won't surprise you that there is support for Power Delivery 3.0, or Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0. You can enjoy Power Delivery with USB-C portQualcomm Quick Charge is then deployed on the USB-A port, and you can use it mainly on Android phones equipped with Qualcomm chips that support this standard.
Evaluating the design of a charging adapter is a bit strange on the one hand, but I will not spare a few words about it. This is because I am honestly amazed at how elegantly 100W of power can be packaged. When you realize how massive classic silicon chargers are compared to the FIXED solution, you are literally amazed at where the world has come technologically. I myself vividly remember the time when I used the last 16" for work MacBook Pro with an Intel processor. When I think about what "cube" I got for it, Apple for charging and I compare it with the FIXED GaN Charger 100W, I almost have to laugh. After all, this charger is not much bigger than the 30W charging adapter for my MacBooku Air M1. The only thing I would appreciate in the future is the color. White plastic is nice on the one hand, but if you have black drawers, it would be nice to have the option of white instead varianty to go for black. However, this is a complete detail that can be easily read in the result Applu and many other manufacturers. White is simply universal.
Testing
Since I've been struggling with a lack of power outlets under my desk lately, testing the FIXED GaN Charger 100W came in handy. I've been eyeing a similar adapter for quite some time, but I haven't been able to get around to buying one yet. So when it arrived for testing, I immediately filled three of its four ports with cables, leaving the last port free for connecting cables to products for reviews. Specifically, I connected a USB-C/USB-C cable to the charger for power MacBooku Air M1, then HomeUnder mini and thenonec USB-A/Lightning the iPad cable, which I always have connected to it. Given the composition of the products, it will probably not surprise you that all the products are powered without any problems, quickly and simply as they should be. Thanks to this, I have saved two sockets, because instead of three adapters I can use only one.
Since I have the adapter constantly plugged into the socket under my desk, of course in the first few days I was interested in how much the adapter would heat up, so as not to damage the secondary cabling. You may be patting yourself on the forehead now that such a thing is impossible. However, when I remember how brutally the aforementioned 96W power adapter for the 16” Intel laptop could heat up MacBookI still have the rash on the Pro. It only took a few dozen minutes for it to get so hot that I was almost unable to hold it in my hand, so I believe it would actually be able to damage objects around it. But that's not the case here. Sure, you'll notice a slight heating of the FIXED GaN Charger 100W, but I wouldn't be afraid to call it negligible. And I have to point out the complete silence. You've probably already encountered chargers that whistle at a very high frequency when plugged into the mains. However, nothing like that happens here, and you can use the charger next to your bed without any worries. In short, everything works exactly as it should, which is great.
Summary
Although testing charging accessories is not exactly one of my favorite activities, I have to say that I really enjoyed it. The FIXED GaN Charger 100W is the embodiment of what I imagine under the term "charging of the future". This small charger will not only help you free up sockets, but most importantly it will reliably charge everything quickly, safely and therefore completely reliably. The port equipment is also absolutely ideally chosen for me, because USB-C portyu charging cables are now more prevalent than USB-A. The 3:1 ratio definitely makes sense here, at least when looking at my drawer full of cables. When I add a nice design to all this, I get a charger that I simply want to have at home! Someone may argue that the price of 1899 CZK for a charging adapter is overpriced, but when you realize that you actually get four chargers for it, which can divide 4x 25W between them, or "overflow" the watts as needed, the price tag is immediately defensible. So if you need to charge multiple devices at the same time at high speed, or simply want to free up sockets under the table, you have just found a great solution. That is undoubtedly what the FIXED GaN Charger 100W is.
I wonder if the charger can really fast charge when all ports are connected at the same time. My experience with both classic and GaN chargers is that when multiple ports are connected, the internal electronics either disconnect one completely or stop charging in quickcharge/PD mode when one port switches to classic, 5V/2A max. (Confirmed by tester).
Additionally, when connecting another port, the electronics always disconnects all ports to re-evaluate whether it can send maximum to all ports and does not exceed that max. 100W. Unfortunately, when randomly connecting different devices to the charger, the charger behaved differently each time. Once it completely disconnected a port, another time it started charging only 5V from PD/QC, etc. I returned them all to one and the seller himself (the largest e-shop with electronics) confirmed to me that he also could not find a single one in their offer that would behave correctly (2-4 port ones were tested).