USB-C Cable Specs Launches With 240 W Power Delivery For Power Hungry Devices

A recently released USB-C cable specification reportedly comes with the 240 W of power delivery that will be enough to supply energy to a list of power-hungry devices.

On May 25, Benson Leung, Google engineer and intrepid USB-C cable tester, went to Reddit and Twitter to reveal the release of a new specification on USB-C. Leung said that the new specification allows the delivery of up to 240 W power as it can bump to a maximum voltage of 48 V at 5A.

He added that the specification, which has been under development for two years, does not bring any significant physical change between the new USB-C 2.1 and the current USB-C 2.0. The major leap is seen in their power delivery capability.

The Reddit post contained a link to the published copy of the specification about the new power levels in the USB-C version 2.1. The copy came from USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the industry group that develops the technology.

The current USB-C 2.0 standard provides up to 100 V power delivery. It has the capacity to bump up to 20 V voltage at 5 A. The new Extended Power Range (EPR) specification on USB-C 2.1 standard clearly provides more than twice its predecessor’s capacity at 240 V.

The 240-watt capacity is enough to supply power-hungry devices such as workstations, gaming laptops and docking stations with sufficient energy. Examples are HP's 17-inch Omen gaming laptop and Dell’s UltraSharp 32-inch 4K monitor that consumes up to 230 watts peak power usage, CNET reported.

The current 100 V power cables called the Standard Power Range (SPR) will still be available in the market along with the EPR.

Meanwhile, USB-IF added they will require manufacturers of cables that support 240 V power delivery to put on a specific icon on their products. This is so that end-users will be able to identify if the cable supports EPR specifications just by looking at them.

Ars Technica reports that the upgrade could pave the way for manufacturers to standardize their entire laptop range’s USB-C chargers similar to the ones that Dell 240 W DC barrel jack charger support. However, this does not make chargers universal as there will be a significant difference between SPR and EPR chargers.