Now here’s a unique solution to a common problem. Does it annoy and/or worry you when your smartphone heats up? Even if it does not blow up in your face, the overheating device could lag and spit out battery juice like phlegm-filled Chinaman. Not good considering how much we rely on the device these days.
Chevrolet comes to the rescue with a new system called Active Phone Cooling, which will be available in the 2016 Chevy Impala and Malibu equipped with wireless charging.
An air vent connected directly to the car’s AC system is directed to the charging bin where the phone rests for wireless charging, sending cool air to help lower the phone’s temperature. Active Phone Cooling operates only when the air con is turned on by the driver.
Yup, that’s it. No rocket science, but somehow no one has thought of it before. We now have Qi wireless charging and cupholder cooling vents – APC combines both ideas.
While testing a smartphone wireless charging feature, Chevy engineers noticed some smartphones would suspend charging or shut off altogether after only a few minutes in high temperatures. Then something clicked. “Innovation doesn’t mean reinventing the wheel. Sometimes simplicity offers the most elegant solution to a problem,” said Impala engineer Dan Lascu.
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Great. But I want my phone to be cooled down when I use it for GPS. That is when it gets hot. So a factory installed smartphone mount that is cooled would be great.
Yo! kadajawi, your phone should not heat up when using GPS. Or are you using a Lumia? That would be understandable because that’s a pretty lousy phone.
3310 user here battery life can survive for days
I’m using iPhone 5s and Galaxy S3….Both also hot when i using the GPS…
Every phone gets hot when using GPS. Samsung Galaxy Nexus. Xiaomi Mi3. Asus Zenfone 5. It does not matter at all. Maybe some cheap entry level phone that has no power won’t heat up, but otherwise…
Really? People need that? I handed my charging phone to aircond blower like 10-20 secs in traffic jammed will do most of time.
Great thoughtful feature!!
Similar feature that is really needed for a long time in our climate is to connect the boot/luggage compartment for all cars with aircond too since we have been putting all our laptops, nice leather bags, documents etc there and it’s just too hot over in the boot.
What I normally do since my car has the arm rest that also opens up to the boot compartment, I will keep it down so that some cold air from the cabin can enter the boot area.
Its just a simple piping to transfer cold air there.
what happen if the heater is turn on?
the phone get lagi panas?
when the heater is on, the climate would be so cold – even lower than 0⁰C. which is not good for electronics either.
no one in malaysia will use heater at any time of the year. even in genting highland. just unlikely.
When does the phone gets heat up usually? Its playing high intense games. Do you play games while driving?
Anyway this “invention” is stupid.
Guess you never touched your phone while it’s charging…
So u must be charging your phone at home in a fridge. Is that even a problem for a phone to heat up when charging? Why suddently so concern about heat issue in a car when it is ok to charge at home without any cooling device?
It is a problem, it degrades the battery.
The article already said, the phone will heat up while charging.
U Still stuburn and link to play games.
Ioma, ask your boss to put VSC in Axia better.
You should ask proton to produce car that can sell.
Why dragged in p1? At least it’s much safer cars and the rest up to buyers to buy
A waste of time and engineering. If your smartphone overheats while charging change it! There is something abnormal about your phone. There is no need for complex solution to a non-existent problem.
You are rite! Stupid innovation by stupid engineers. My never get heated when charging especially inside car since my car already in cool condition. If u phone heated up while charging, its means u r using pucking china phone. Either u chg it or live up to it. Rather than inventing this, makes gps, dvd video a compulsory built in feature in all of ur car. Put massage seat .. Etc… There is many old technology u can put in place rather than intro this shitty tech!
Er, my Samsung also gets hot while charging, and that was a flagship device.
Oh that’s a shitty Korean phone.
honda civic has a small vent in the area in front of the gear selector with air vent with does the wsame thing la….
or you could just put it in the glovebox
No wonder chevrolet is losing market shares.
Because they emphasize on useless car features,
And not forgetting the ‘cross’ emblem, majority of Malaysians are allergic to ‘cross’ sign
living in cave?
chevrolet is a giant in America (no doubt, stiff competition comes from Toyota, Ford)
but chevrolet is people’s car in USA – a part of GM group which also owns Opel, Vauxhall & Holden.
it employs over 200,000 people worldwide and has business in 120 countries.
Chevrolet alone has at least 20 models in its line-up including the 5 models sold in malaysia. and the camaro – made popular by transformers movie. and corvette.
by statistics every 1 in 15 cars sold worldwide is a chevrolet.
all the chevrolet sold in malaysia has ESP, rated 5 star euro ncap and 6 speed automatic gearbox. 5 years/200,000km warranty. 15,000km service interval. all that paultan commenters want.
I guess a lot of people commenting here never use a wireless charger for their phone, let alone using a build-in wireless charger in their car.
Very few phone models support wireless charging, and even fewer cars have a wireless charger.
A phone do get hot when using wireless charger, but the one I’m using is on the center pedestal and it is exposed, therefore the heat generated is dissipated somewhat.
For those who are saying that phones shouldn’t overheat, try using the wireless phone charging feature. As this is a new technology, it is a pretty inefficient way of charging ie. lots of energy wasted in the form of heat. I personally wouldn’t use wireless charging but it’ll be nice to know there is a cooling station for my phone
Kia dah lama buat glovebox cooling with ambient lightning lagi. Ambil powerbank charge kat dalam glovebox tu. Settle.
And everyone is saying this site is good at bodek. All 4 wheels car get thumbs up. This stupid innovation also need to jilat.
My phone always get overheated when running Waze and the car charger plugged in at the same time.. Have to always hold the phone at the aircond blower to cool it down..
Gee… now we know what kind of budget Chevolet has for R n D….
Useless car feature if you ask me.
Money should be better spent on better features.
Seems like Chevrolet has learn a lot from Proton on spending money on useless stuff
Pls read comment above