Yes it's time to throw away your old mobile chargers again!

If you've changed your mobile phone in the past couple of years, you must be familiar with the torment of dealing with yet another new interface to charge your charger. With every different manufacturer comes a different charger, which worst of all isn't compatible with the charger from the previous manufacturer. Borrowing a charger from a collegue today entails a compatibility check, for the same manufacturer, sometimes even the same model.

With technology as advanced as it is today and with almost all mobiles using the same type of batteries, one would think having the same charging mechanism would be rather a trivial job. Now mobile manufacturers such as Apple, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Research In Motion, Samsung and Sony Ericsson along with electronic chipset manufacturers such as NEC, Qualcomm, and Texas Instruments have come together in an effort to end this needless confusion.

Although the agreement made recently isn't legally binding, you can expect, from 2010 onwards to have all mobile phones work on a standard charging system using the microUSBport. Such as the one already present on the Nokia N97.

Soon you will be able to use any charger from anyone to charge any phone. Not only is this infinitely more convenient, but also more environment friendly, as it will lead to less electronic waste, from discarded chargers. What follows though is a brief period of discomfort as you deal with yet another charger format, but nothing we aren't already used to!