Hi,
Im trying to determine whether it makes a difference to use this or the other charger. Im looking at this link form amazon:
and this one:
The first one I found because I was looking at a tutorial where they use a solar panel to charge a battery pack. From what I see it has 2 things that could make it special:
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Power IN on the same side as the miniusb port. That is obviously where I plug in the panel.
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And a TP4056 IC.
The second one (red) doesnt have these. Now the fact that it doesnt have the Power IN connectors could just be a matter of hijacking the pcb at some point. But the fact that its missing the other IC does worry me. I know from solar work that obviously the current produced by a panel is erratic and could end up damaging batteries, not to mention circuitry. I found this:
Which does mention something about current limiting due to thermal properties and fixed voltage etc.
Does anyone know for sure that the simple red unit from sparkfun does not have the required solar charging capabilities due to this tp4056 ic?
Thanks