The power of the pen! The Surface Pen is a mighty fine creation, it feels and works excellent. Yet, at the same time, it comes with one big drawback. That being the lack of a built-in battery.
Meaning, you are forced to stick with a traditional AAAA battery, which needs to be replaced every once in a while. If you own one, you know the sinking feeling when the battery runs out, and getting a replacement right away is not possible.
Major inconvenience.
Luckily, Microsoft knows this too. And the company appears to be developing a wireless charging solution for the Surface Pen, which would give users the ability to recharge the accessory when it is magnetically attached to their Surface.
This patent shows that work is underway at Redmond on wireless charging for the Surface Pen.
It reads:
“Inductive charging with wireless charging coils is a desirable method for charging peripheral devices. However, computer devices such as tablets are getting smaller and thinner. When accessories need to be charged from the main unit, integrating traditional wireless charging coils into the design of a smaller, thinner computing device can be difficult.”
Marvelous.
Not yet clear when this project will see daylight, of if at all.
But we may be a while away, it seems.
That’s because Microsoft will have to integrate a range of components in the Surface Pen and the Surface device that will charge it wireless. This would, obviously, require a new generation of devices, and wireless charging will not work on existing Surface PCs.
Perhaps, an upgraded pen will become available sometime in 2021.
