Aust appliances & computers in Japan?

When I travel to Japan, I understand that I will need an adaptor for electrical appliances like battery chargers etc, but will computers etc purchased in Australia run on the different voltage in Japan? Also, will Japanese appliances (like rice cookers) run on Australian 240 volts (with a plug adaptor of course)? I don't understand much about how electricity works, but if I have a plug adaptor are most things interchangeable between Australia and Japan? Please forgive my ignorance!!
Thank you for your help!

Your computer's AC adapter should be multi-voltage and say somewhere on it - Input: 100-240V. The rule is check the charger for the above info on things like cameras, phones, etc. If it doesn't say 100-240V, you will need a new multistandard charge.

A 100V Rice cooker pluged into an Australian outlet with just a plug adapter would burn out and possibly cause a fire. You can get voltage converters (inverter) that will step down the 240V to 100V, but they are quiet heavy and you must make sure that it can handle the wattage of the appliance that you plug into it.

has some 240v rice cookers.
This is the shop of Narita airport (sorry, japanese)
http://www.fasola.jp/fun/jar/index.html

Apparently you can get quite a fireworks display if you try to use a 100V appliance with a 240V system and just a plug adaptor- I don't recommend it. The transformers/ converters are quite expensive so it may not be worth it.

The 240V cookers above sound like a good option.

Hi, I'll be going to Japan from Australia in a couple of weeks as well, so just to clarify, I can use my laptop without a transformer if the battery pack has the "100V-240V" on it? I'd only need a plug adapter? And is that same for things like camera battery chargers, or would I need something in that case?
Thanks

check both your computer and camera battery charger. they should say 100 to 240 volts. If not you can't use them. ask your local elctronics shop for confirmation and/ or the manuals. laptops are pretty much built for universal use but chargers may not be.

As long as it has 100-240V written somewhere on it, you can use it with just an adapter, as that means it contains a built-in transformer/ converter.

Hi

I am also from Aust travelling to Japan soon, and am looking for plug adaptor as some of my laptop appliances have the 3 prong (2 slants and 1 vertical) that I need to convert to 2 vertical Japanese outlets, only problem is the only Aust ones I have seen so far are for 2 prongs. Where can I find one for 3 prongs??

thanks so much

If you don't have any luck with a 3-prong adapter (I could never find one either), what I did in my previous trip was just change the cord from the wall to the transformer with a Japanese one that I bought there for about 900 yen.

This may be a little confusing, but most laptop power supplies will have two parts: one has the thinner type of cable which connects to the laptop and has a box on the other end; the other will have a rectangular-ish shaped plug that connects to this box (the transformer) and then to the powerpoint on the other end. You will find that pretty much all have the same sort of connection, so you should be able to just buy this section of the cable in a computer shop or similar in Japan, and plug it into the rest of your cable. Easy! Just make sure that if it has a little bit of green wire hanging off it that you connect that to something on the wall or floor as it is the ground wire!

The connection is an IEC320 type c7, often called a "figure 8" power cable. I'm not sure where Razz gets the idea that they should have a green earth wire, I have never seen such a cable. Even in the UK, the earth pin that goes into the wall socket is plastic on these cables. The price should be about 300-400 Yen in an electrical store, you may even be able to find one in a 100 Yen store.

Yes, in fact most computer AC power leads in Japan have a green wire hanging off the wall end of the cable.

I have one of those green wires, but am technically very incompetent and have never known where I am supposed to actually attach it- can anyone offer advice?

Sandy, I think you are confusing an AC power cable for a computer with a power cable for the AC adapter of a laptop. The cable for the laptop is this one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_connector#C7_and_C8_Connect...

It comes in two versions, polarised and unpolarised. The polarised version can only be plugged in one way round. As far as I am aware, the only figure connection that is earthed is a non-standard cable used with Apple Macs:

http://www.dvwarehouse.com/922-5463---Apple-Replacement-Powe...

The connection for a PC, that would require an external earth wire in Japan, looks like this:

http://www.sfcable.com/cable/p/P7JA-06.html

I will be going to Japan for six weeks this summer. I am from the US and wondering if a few things will work in Japan. First, will my laptop work on a wireless network in Japan? Second, will I need a special adapter to charge my cell phone? Thanks for any and all help!

Thanks XXX and koala1 for the clarification. Checked all my stuff and it seems like I should be able to use them without a transformer!

Hi again! I've failed at trying to find a 3 pronged adapter despite going to every store I can think of - so, if I buy a C5 power cord (the sort my laptop uses) in Japan, it'll be perfectly compatible with my battery pack? Because I'm not electrically savvy at all and anything further than plugging stuff in is beyond me.

yeh, i have an IEC 320 type C5 (aka. mickey mouse or clover leaf cord).
Do you think i'll be able to buy one that has a japanese 2 prong plug at the end?
fingers crossed....

With all the electric gadgets the family travels with (iPods, cameras, lap tops, etc), having enough adapters is a problem. The solution we use is to take an Aussie power board, connected to a single 3 to 2 prong converter. No fights over the conveter plug & less likely to be left behind in the hotel. (But not impossible where teenagers are concerned......)

yes you can buy those C5 (mickey/clover) with Japanese 2 prong plug end at any big electrical shops..it'll cost you around 1500 - 2000 yen if I'm not mistaken.

We are going to Kyoto/Osaka on 25/9 and I just found out the AC Adapter of my daughter's Nintendo DS lite has
Input: 230v - 240v, 50Hz 3.4W
Output: 5.2V, 450mA

Is it easy to find the voltage converter in Kyoto/Osaka and around how much does it cost?