I read some where that an electronic device will only draw the required current for its operation but i dout a device working at 5 volt 500 mah will burn at 5 volt 3 amp source is this true or will it work fine?
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A device being a load on a power supply will draw current according to what its internal needs are. So, using your example, a load the operates at 5V and draws 500mA will work fine on any 5V power source that is capable of delivering 500mA or more. This means that if your source supply was rated at 5V capable of delivering up to 3A then it will quite happy powering your 500mA load. In this example you could add six of these loads in parallel across the power supply output and it would be loaded right to its capacity. If you added a seventh load then the supply may become unhappy. Any one of the following could then happen:
- The supply could simply shutdown due to over current detector in the supply kicking in and switching off its output.
- The extra load may cause the output of the supply to drop to lower than 5V.
- The supply could "burn" as you called it.
Michael Karas
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