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Comment by williwu | Hacker News Reader

Does Apple allow licensing of MagSafe now?

That was my first thought. I remember reading a few years ago that a company actually had to stop making Macbook compatible external batteries because Apple threatened to sue them over use of the MagSafe connector.

EDIT: I found the article, and apparently the company was sued for using actual recycled connectors, not just using the design.

http://appleinsider.com/articles/10/09/21/apple_sues_hyperma...

But they used recycled connectors as a way of using the legal argument their product was a "customer modification" of a licensed and paid for product. You sent them YOUR charger and they modified it to work with their device.

They STILL got shut down by Apple because the Mag Safe also used circuitry inside the brick that they "hacked" to make their brick work like.. Basically DRM and DMCA for power bricks shut them down.

I have one of the original cables before they got shut down. It's just a magsafe end with a barrel connector on the other. No DRM voodoo.

DRM voodoo is in the charger, it speaks 1-Wire telling computer its make model and power. Most likely can also be controlled over 1-Wire.

The magsafe connector talks 1-wire, not the charger itself. It provides serial number and version info but no DRM/crypto. The Mac also uses the 1-wire to control the LEDs on the connector. See my teardown for the details: http://www.righto.com/2013/06/teardown-and-exploration-of-ma...

Nice, thanks. What about magsafe2? same deal? DELL also uses serial connection with the charger, with chip inside the charger. Kinda surprising Apple didnt lock it down like they are used to do.

I just took another look at the pictures. They are using the MagSafe to MagSafe 2 Converters!

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