One important aspect of battery life is how quickly you can get back up and running when you’re out of juice.
Qualcomm took the wraps off of their Quickcharge 2.0 tech, which will be built into new phones and tablets sporting the Snapdragon 800 chipset. Quickcharge 1.0 delivered 10 watts, 2.0 will deliver 60 watts. Quickcharge 2.0 will rely on a combination of the power management gear in the phone and the charger plugged into the wall, though 2.0 and 1.0 devices will be cross compatible for legacy support and future proofing.
The power efficient radio management should keep you out in the field longer, and when you do need to juice up, you shouldn’t have to stay tethered for long.
Full PR below with more info on specs and compatibility.
Qualcomm® Quick Charge 2.0: Less Time Charging, More Time Doing
FEBRUARY 20, 2013
You can’t go mobile if you’re stuck plugged into an outlet waiting for your smartphone or tablet to charge. Last year, over 70 devices launched withQualcomm Quick Charge 1.0, an in-device solution that enables smartphones and tablets to charge up to 40% faster. Today we’re introducing the next generation.
Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0 resides in both the device (offered as a standalone IC solution or as part of the PMIC power management integrated circuit of Snapdragon™ 800 processors) and in the AC/DC wall charger. It’s even faster and more flexible than Quick Charge 1.0, and will be inside smartphones and tablets powered by Snapdragon 800 processors.
Products with Quick Charge 2.0 can charge up to 75% faster than products without Quick Charge technology. In our labs we found tablets that normally take over 7 hours to charge were able to reach full charge in less than 3 hours with the Quick Charge 2.0 solution.
Quick Charge 2.0 devices are designed to play nice with Quick Charge 1.0 chargers and vice versa; they’re all backward and forward compatible. You can use a Quick Charge 2.0 charger with a Quick Charge 1.0 device, since by default the 2.0 charger safely provides only the voltage/power allowed by the 1.0 device. And while 2.0 devices will ship with 2.0 chargers, 2.0 devices can be charged safely by 1.0 chargers as well, but at ‘1.0 speed’. To get the fastest, most optimal charge, simply use a 2.0 charger with a 2.0 device. Then and only then will the 2.0 charger safely provide the higher voltage at the request of the 2.0 device.
Quick Charge 2.0 will soon be built into standard micro-USB AC/DC wall chargers, so these  chargers won’t look or operate differently and should be widely available. In fact, Qualcomm is already working with leading AC/DC chipset suppliers and their AC/DC power supply partners to fully enable the power supply ecosystem.
You’ll soon be able to charge even more types of devices faster. While Quick Charge 1.0 technology, with about 10 watts of power, was designed primarily for smartphones and tablets, Quick Charge 2.0 delivers up to 60 watts, not only improving charge times for smartphones and tablets, but adding support for larger mobile computing devices like slim notebooks.
We anticipate that devices and wall chargers with Quick Charge 2.0 will be available for purchase by early 2014; all smartphones and tablets with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor will have Quick Charge 2.0. Snapdragon 800 processors are an entire system-on-a-chip and feature a CPU, GPU, DSP, LTE Modem and much more, enabling UltraHD video, high-end 3D gaming, 7.1 surround sound, and up to 55 Megapixel image captures, so being able to quick charge means less time charging and more time doing!
The Snapdragon processor is designed to consume very little power, so once your device is quick charged, you won’t have to worry about charging for a while. Our website provides all the latest information on our upcomingSnapdragon 800 processors and about Qualcomm Quick Charge. Qualcomm Quick Charge is a product of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.