2009 Toyota Highlander 12/120volt outlets

And you believe everything you read on the Internet too, right?

The cigar lighter type outlets are 12 volts only. I don't know why they are marked the way you described. I believe that a 115 volt outlet comes with the rear seat entertainment system. If the owner's manual doesn't show a conventional 115 or 120 outlet, then you will have to continue to use the inverter.

snip

"appropriately" - what kind of reasoning is that????

You only get the 120V outlet with the Rear Seat Entertainment System.

I expect that what they meant by "12V/120V" is that the outlet provides sufficient current to power an inverter. I've seen some 12V outlets that only provide low current for stuff like cell phone chargers and can't be used for higher current devices like inverters.

In any case, for the laptop you're better off buying an auto/air/AC power adapter for the laptop than using an inverter and going DC-AC-AC-DC with an extra gadget cluttering up the vehicle. I picked up an extra one at the Circuit City going out of business sale for "70% off" ($42)--one of the few things I saw at the "sale" that was actually a somewhat good deal (about 33% less than the Amazon price of $63).

"

" It's kind of nice to have an extra power adapter so you don't have to keep packing up your standard one when you take the notebook out.

I have an 08 Highlander limited - assume its about the same as the 09 - mine says very plainly on all the adaptors 12V/120W (watt)

Ron in Idaho

Ah, that explains it. He mistook 120W for 120V. Actually the voltage is closer to 13 or 14V.

I probably wouldn't use an inverter combined with the laptop's regular power brick. Some of the newer laptops have 90 watt adapters, and by the time you factor in the losses of the inverter you'd be close to the 120W limit. It's better to buy a DC-DC auto-air-home adapter as I mentioned in my earlier post, i.e. ""

".

could be someone was being a bit "funny" with the lettering on his.

Sorry, Sorry, Sorry, to Jeff for my curt reply - Ron was right 120W - need to wear my Glasses, not a bad idea when driving - I just listened to the Salesman and never looked closely. Well I have been taught a valuable lesson buy you guys - look, read and wear my glasses while I'm doing it. Sorry again Jeff, please except my apologies.

Bill Middleton

Actually with most modern high frequency modified sine inverters and power bricks it would be: LV DC-HF AC-HV DC-LF AC-HV DC-HF AC-LV DC. Put another way it is battery-MOSFETs-chopped PWM HF AC-transformer-HV HF AC-rectifier-HV DC bus-MOSFETS-HV LF AC-cord-diode bridge-HV DC-MOSFETs-chopped PWM AC-transformer-LV HF AC-diode-LV DC output.

Using an auto adapter instead knocks that down to: battery-MOSFETs-chopped PWM AC-transformer-LV HF AC-diode-output DC.

As you can see the auto adapter only uses 1 set of mosfets instead of 3 and only 1 diode/rectifier.

Besides even if the vehicle does have stock 120v outlet(s) there is still an inverter involved, it is just hidden. Don't think that vehicles with these outlets have a generator head or something because they don't. Now if the vehicle were equipped with something similar to the auragen that would be a different story.

HF/LF= high frequency/low frequency HV/LV= high voltage/low voltage

Right, you're just eliminating one DC-AC-DC conversion cycle. But the power brick, with its high frequency DC-DC converter, is much more efficient than making 60 HZ 120VAC. It's not just eliminating half the conversions, it's eliminating the least efficient conversion.

I tried using a 75W rated inverter to power a 65W Dell power brick. No dice. A 100W inverter worked, but it was dicey since it was right at the limit of the DC outlet, though the fuses have some margin.

The 120W lets you know how much current you can run through it. You use ohms law to calculate..

120W divided by say 14 volts for a running system equals about 8.5 amps current draw. I'd probably use 8 amps as the safe limit. It'll blow the fuse if it gets too high, so you can't really hurt it if you pull too much, but then you get to change the fuse..