How to power ANYTHING using USB-C Power Delivery and the ZY12PDN PD Trigger Board

USB-C PD allows you to negotiate 5V, 9V, 12V, 15V, or 20V over the standard USB-C connector. The colors used on the ZY12PDN board for these are:
Red: 5V
Yellow: 9V
Green: 12V
Teal: 15V
Blue: 20V
Purple: Highest voltage possible
White: Cycle through all the possible voltages changing every few seconds.

[RaveTracks]

Kenneth, I can't tell you how useful this video was. You were correct, there's very little clear information about these board on the net, especially on the sellers listings. Your video was well filmed with clear audio and articulate explanation. Thank you very much!

[rogerthomas]

Since this video the market has started to provided what are often called a "PD/QC Decoy Board", these are fixed voltage boards, with the result that they are a lot cheaper and smaller so work very well for when trying to create a usb to power jack cable solution. The one I ordered even came with a plastic cover for the board/cable as standard.

[Inkling]

Thanks for an excellent explanation. Those who don't want to risk the wrong voltage being programmed in for a specific device can get USB-C to barrel connector converters designed for that device's voltage—9 volts, 12 volts or whatever.

[brentfitzgibbon]

Glad to see others excited about this nuanced feature of USB C. I did something similar using a TC66C USB C “tester”. Bonus is that it has an LCD to show voltage/current, minus in that it’s significantly more complicated to use than the single button on your pcb.

[brookerobertson]

Did this with a car stereo. PSP. And a laptop. Have a bunch of triggers.. 5v.9v.12v.15v20v It’s good to have a power bank that charges and gives power at the same time. That way you can use it as a UPS. You can also charge the power bank with solar and keep things running 24/7. Like a mini Tesla Powerball.

[loren]

These will be great for charging ham radios that have barrel plugs. Ordered a couple today to give them a shot, thank you for the video!

[RaduTek]

I found a different board online that has a set of DIP switches to select the voltage and chose it since it's much more straight forward to program and makes it very hard to accidentally put too much voltage into a device.

[voicevoicelessKrzysiek]

Thank you very much for this video, it solved my problem with using my PD Trigger board. I was going crazy trying to figure out whether it was my board, my multifunction charger, or the wrong cable.
Turned out, some time ago, when I just got the PD T board, I have put it in permanent 5V mode and forgot about it, so it was always outputting 5V. Only, after I re-watch your video, I figured out how to "handle" this little board. Also learned, that pressing the program switch a little too long (like maybe 1/2 sec instead of 1/4 sec, will not switch to the next voltage output level). That's an excellent video. Thanks again.

[tiloalo]

What is missing is a 12V home network.
Don't know why we have tens of power supply when we could have one central power supply to power all small device, pc monitor, pc, phone charger, modem, router, .... except big appliance almost everything could be powered by 12V.
Even modern fan or motor are powered by 12V.
Especially wasteful with solar, as we go from low DC, to AC back to DC and loose a lot of power on the way.

[lukwagobrian]

This is so useful for those who want to boost their Bluetooth speaker battery I see myself using this thing on a JBL speaker and play the whole week Non-Stop

[danielthechskid]

I just wanted to add that most of the Linksys blue routers like the WRT54G internally run on 3.3 volts supplied by a buck converter, so it falls under the category that you mentioned where any of the PD voltages should work, or even just plain old non PD 5v USB. Some of the old 3Com network gear was even brave enough to admit this, I have a 5 port 10/100 switch that says right on it that it will take anything from 10-30 volts.

In this case I would just choose whichever voltage gives you the least input wattage from the source, IE the best efficiency.

[AcCeSsDeNiEd]

Thanks buddy. Knew something like this would exist and kept googling with different keywords and your video was on top of the search.
Needed to power my goto mount scope. Didn't want to purchase a separate powertank with a specific 12v output.
I can now re-use my PD portable powerbank.
Saved me lots of money, and one less item to carry.

[JessicaFEREM]

the highest voltage would be good for a multi-voltage device too. a lot of power banks will support more than one voltage via DC in if it doesn't already have a USB C charger mode

[mateialexandrucoltoiu]

There is something else to remember, if your power supply does not support the current, it will start blinking. Usually only USB c mains power supply do support greater current. For example a given power supply might support 40W by using 2A at 20V, it does not mean it will support 40W at 15 v, which would mean more than 2A.

[KFIJZ]

These will be super handy to power various 9, 12, and 15V electronic musical instruments/effects. I can imagine this will be very popular with the Digitakt/Digitone crowd.

[SheriffJackCarter]

I have some trigger boards that don't have the LED or the button. It just has 3 sip switches that you set to the desired voltage. I'm making a rack-mounted VU display that will be powered with one of these. I plan on using these bad boys for many, many projects.

[nobodynemoq]

Great explanation, thanks! This tiny piece seems to be quite useful 😁
However, it would be nice it it also had - like some buck converters - lines that you can solder in order to have permanently 9/12/15/20V etc. On the other hand, we could have it set to 20V and then use the buck converter - just to be sure we won't get anything else than desired voltage. For perfect output, a linerar stabilizer at the end would give us exactly what we want 😎

[vince]

Great video, didn't know about the mode that will negotiate for the highest voltage the supply can provide, it's just what I needed for a project.

[NullaNulla]

With a 3v buck converter and a pair of resistors I could use this to power my Resmed S10 CPAP machine (humidifier turned off) from my laptop/phone battery pack when travelling, so this really has my interest. I'll have to check the output levels of my battery and Choetec 240v pack in my bag.

[INSTRUMANROBOT]

Awesome demo there. I was going nuts about how to fix the voltage to a preset and this made it super clear. Very appreciated especially since there isn't really an instruction set coming with these circuit boards