Have you ever noticed the small cylinder on your laptop charger cord? Have you ever wondered about its purpose?
You can usually a see these cylindrical parts on your laptop chargers and even power cords of keyboard, printer cables, etc. So what are they used for?
When electric current passes through a charging cable to power the device, it creates radio energy frequency within the cable and emits it as waves outside the cable.
The concept is similar to how an antenna actually works when it comes to converting electrical power into radio energy and the other way round. The cable will unintentionally transmit and receive signals to and from the gadgets that surround it. This will lead the unnecessary usage of electric power and can cause disturbances in the charging process.
Also, these signals that are transmitted will interfere with the nearby electronic devices and may
result in noisy signals that will result in distorted radio signal or inability to tune up to a specific channel.
This cylinders which are called ferrite bead or ferrite choke filters out the excess amount of radio energy and prevents the cable from acting as an antenna and receiving interference from other devices. A typical ferrite bead is formed by an insulated wire that is wrapped around a magnetic material.
