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In the 1950s, switching power supplies were complex and expensive, used in aerospace and satellite applications that needed small, lightweight power supplies.īy the early 1970s, new high-voltage transistors and other technology improvements made switching power supplies much cheaper and they became widely
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Switching power supplies are now very cheap, but this wasn't always the case. The switching power supply gets its name because it switches power on and off thousands of times a second, which turns out to be a very efficient way to do this conversion. Most consumer electronics, from your cell phone to your television, use a switching power supply to convert AC power from the wall to the low-voltage DC used by electronic circuits. Many electronic components work together to provide smooth power to your laptop.
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