There are plenty of dumb USB chargers out there. What is a dumb USB charger? Well, my definition of a dumb charger is one that charges at a fixed voltage/amperage regardless of what is plugged into it. Read on for the long story of why I switched to the EagleTec T073 40W Smart USB Charger.
First off, let me elaborate about what I consider to be a dumb charger. Here are a few examples of dumb chargers –
The EasyAcc 20W 4-Port USB Wall Charger –
This 4-port USB charger has the following fixed output ports –
1 – 5V – 1.3A fixed charging rate
2 – 5V – 1.0A fixed charging rate
3 – 5V – 2.1A fixed charging rate
4 – 5V- 2.1A fixed charging rate
The Powered 25W 5-Port USB Charger –
Similar to the one above with fixed output ports –
1-2 – 5V – 2.1A
3-4 – 5V – 1A
5 – 5V – 1.3A
Sure the USB chargers above look the same as the EagleTec USB Smart Charger (with Brainy Technology) ($19.99)… but they are different in one very important way. The USB ports in the dumb chargers can over or under charge your gadgets as they charge at a fixed voltage/amperage. The dumb charges do this regardless of what is plugged into them. The EagleTec charger utilizes Brainy Technology which is a nerdy way of saying they have a set of auto-detecting power management chips. This technology doesn’t care, for the most part, what you plug into it. If you plug into it an Apple iPad, a Nexus smartphone, a Samsung Galaxy S5, or an HTC One, it knows at what amperage (and voltage for that matter) to charge it. The amperage will move up or down to the proper amount for each individual device.
I have tested the EagleTec 40W T073 5-Port Intelligent USB Charger on just about every USB gadget I have with great success. It doesn’t charge too fast or too slow. By the way, charging too fast isn’t a good thing as it severely shortens the lifespan of your batteries. I now have this smart charger in two places in the house and one at the office. 
