Plasburst Laser Cannon Info

So one of my favorite tactics in XVT and XWA was to set my lasers to quad-fire when piloting a T/I or X-Wing. This gave me the ability in head-to-head matchups to fire off a big burst of four lasers and juke repeatedly, each time firing off another quad burst while crossing the incoming enemies flight path. This was very effective in the old games, and especially allowed the unshielded T/I to use its greater maneuverability to get off more powerful shots while dodging incoming fire.

The closest I can get to being able to use that tactic in Squadrons (where squishy T/Is need all the help they can get) is to load up with the Plasburst Laser Cannon, which deals good damage after a charge-up period. The thing is, I can also fire the Plasburst quickly, but I have no idea how much damage I'm doing. The loadout screen says the Plasburst has a max DPS of 882. Is that 882 damage from one second of charge? How much less damage is done if I don't charge for a full second? Is the slope of time/damage linear or exponential?

Right now I'm having a hard time cracking through those Republic shields, so this kind of information could greatly help me figure out which loadouts/tactics to use.