On: An open competition to build a smaller power inverter, with a $1M prize

[nsxwolf]

What's the difference between a picnic cooler sized inverter, and the one in my Jeep, which is nowhere near the size of a picnic cooler?

[AlexMuir → nsxwolf]

The one in your jeep probably puts out 150W, as opposed to the 3kW that's needed to run household appliances.

[nsxwolf → AlexMuir]

Makes sense. I've never plugged anything more powerful than a laptop charger into it.

[obvious_throw → nsxwolf]

Likely peak and typical power output( order of magnitude difference ), as well as waveform( automotive inverters tend to output square-ish waveforms ).