Recently, I bought a NodeMCU with an ESP8266 and a Type-C port. Everything was fine until I tried to power the board with a wall USB Type-C charger using the port on the board. After 10 minutes of suffering, the board burned. It seems that the board is not able to negotiate the 5V from the USB Type-C. Can you confirm this? I don’t want to do the same with an Arduino Uno R4 in the future or a similar board. In the future, I will power the NodeMCU with the VIN pin, but I still don’t know the max voltage. Do you?
Can you provide a link to specifications of this particular board, and/or photos of it?
That would be odd. If you don't negotiate anything from a USB-PD supply, it should output 5V by default. That's at least what I've observed on my units, and it also makes sense from a viewpoint of backwards compatibility.
Not unless you provide more information on the board you use.
It's also very relevant to know what else you've got connected to the board. Is the NodeMCU board powering any other modules/devices? If so, which ones and what is the combined power draw?
Thanks
€0.99 is just a scam price; it’s actually around €5 if you try to buy the board. But don’t misunderstand, this is not a complaint. I was just looking for some help because I don’t want to burn another board in the future. I will receive a new board in 10 days, and I will try it and report back with an update.
OK, it has a common AMS1117 linear regulator onboard to make 3.3V from the incoming USB voltage (which should be 5V). I see no PD-circuitry on the board, which means that a connected USB-C PD power supply should output 5V to it. If it doesn't, I'd put blame on the power supply, not the ESP board.
Note that the AMS1117 will tolerate up to 15V input, but it may run (very) hot with an ESP that's accessing WiFi (up to 500mA current draw). If the USB power supply for some reason supplied 9V or 12V to the board, this could quite well explain why it failed.
Some more questions about the failure:
What do you mean by 'suffering'? Something may have been lost in translation here.
Can you show a photo that illustrates where the burning took place?
This was the entire circuit connected to the board. The resistance was around 500 Ohms. While the board was connected to the PC, everything was fine. Then I tried using a power bank, and the NodeMCU started rebooting in a loop. So I tried with a brand new and working Type-C phone charger, and the NodeMCU started working. However, after 10 minutes, the LEDs started flickering, lost brightness, and eventually everything turned off. In the end, it was impossible to see any sign of life from it.
I have bought a little board to test the Type-C output. In fact, both the charger and the power bank supply 5V only for a few seconds without a load, cutting the voltage to a few mV. So, I think that this bad power supplies fried my board. Now, I have tested a new NodeMCU (same model, same program) with a different power supply, and it works perfectly. On the left is the Type-C non-working power supply, and on the right is the Type-A good-working power supply.
Come on, USB C PD 'chargers' are often used as power supplies and in principle work fine in that capacity. Provided that both the power supply/adapter and the load are in general agreement on the protocol specifications. This is probably where the problem lies, with either one (or both) of the devices cutting a corner or two, like in leaving CC pins floating, or dealing with floating CC pins in an inappopriate manner.
But conversely a power supply doesn't make a reliable charger. USB Power Delivery is not a charger by itself but only supplies the power for a built-in charger circuit. These are designed to be power supplies. Chargers on the other hand are not power supplies as the are designed to provide the correct current/voltage profile to charge a battery that they are designed for. Since the voltage is not necessarily constant at various currents they make lousy power supplies.
What makes you believe that the devices pictured in #15 are 'chargers' by your quoted definition instead of power supplies that will simply output the requested voltage up to the current they're rated for at that voltage? I know for a fact that the one on the right is not a 'charger' in your definition. I have one and I'm quite familiar with it. It's not 'battery-aware' in any way. Based on experience with USB-C PD adapters (let's keep the wording a bit ambiguous), I have no reason whatsoever to expect the one on the left is any different.
While we may not be quite correct in how we generally use the term 'charger' on this forum, I don't think this matter of definitions has much to do with why OP is running into problems with this particular uC board/adapter combination.
