vB Easy Archive - My "spare battery" solution

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My "spare battery" solution
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Posted by: toomer

I picked one of these up at Circuit City last week, and just had a chance to use it today ...

http://www.apc.com/resource/include...10&tab=features

My phone dropped down to about 15% charge on a road trip we were taking today. Since I didn't have a car charger handy, I simply plugged it into the APC unit and left it alone for a couple hours while we finished up our trip. Sure enough, by the time we got to our destination - the phone was topped up to 95%!!! (that's all my phone ever shows)

And as far as I can tell, the APC unit still had about 20% charge left to it ...

Very worthwhile investment. Is it as ideal as a swappable battery? No. Will it do in a pinch, or on a business trip? You bet! With the added bonus, that you can charge anything else that charges off of USB as well (bluetooth headsets, hand held GPS systems, etc.)

Posted by: Fray Adjacent

I'm thinkin about making one of these:

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/how20/...ecbccdrcrd.html

Maybe set it up in my study (panel outside, the rest of it inside) so I can plug multiple other things into it.

Posted by: JerryNY

If you feel you want more juice on the go these don't look too bad:

izap-external-power-for-the-iphone

Looks relatively compact but I don't feel like I need much more than I am getting from the iPhone as-is.

If you want a cool portable solar charger ready-made this looks pretty cool:
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/travelpower/7d34/

Posted by: BIGMERF

Quote:

Originally Posted by JerryNY

If you feel you want more juice on the go these don't look too bad:

izap-external-power-for-the-iphone

Looks relatively compact but I don't feel like I need much more than I am getting from the iPhone as-is.

If you want a cool portable solar charger ready-made this looks pretty cool:
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/travelpower/7d34/

80 dollars? geez is anything for this phone cheap..? lol

Posted by: oldManinFL

If you expect to be able to USE your phone while being charged, you need to read the fine print of these devices. Some say not to use while being charged. I have emailed APC and asked if their APC model will work with the iphone and they would not commit or deny that it would work.

Posted by: toomer

Quote:

Originally Posted by JerryNY

If you want a cool portable solar charger ready-made this looks pretty cool:
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/travelpower/7d34/

I also own a Brunton Solarport 4.4 (http://www.amazon.com/Brunton-Solar...85714684&sr=8-1) and overall I'd say my experience has been hit-or-miss with the unit. I bought it for camping, and when traveling to 3rd world countries where power availability might be questionable. Best part about it, is it has a USB port on the side, and a cigarette lighter port in the hinge.

Sometimes it seems to work well, and other times it does not. I haven't had enough reasons to test everything out, but I believe it most likely be due to whether or not I left a gadget on while trying to charge it with the solar panel. I get the feeling for best results, it's better to have the device powered off while charging with one of these, since the power delivery can be rather inconsistent (i.e.: clouds moving by).

Posted by: toomer

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldManinFL

If you expect to be able to USE your phone while being charged, you need to read the fine print of these devices. Some say not to use while being charged. I have emailed APC and asked if their APC model will work with the iphone and they would not commit or deny that it would work.

My phone was on yesterday, while getting charged up from the APC ... and everything seems to be working fine. Still on that charge right now, as a matter of fact.

Posted by: BeyondTheTech

When my local CompUSA store was closing, I picked this up for less than a dollar.

http://www.supermediastore.com/appl...cy-adapter.html

I used it to charge my Nano a couple of times, didn't have the opportunity to use on the iPhone yet, but I imagine it would work just as well.

Posted by: cowboy1964

Quote:

Originally Posted by BeyondTheTech

When my local CompUSA store was closing, I picked this up for less than a dollar.

http://www.supermediastore.com/appl...cy-adapter.html

I used it to charge my Nano a couple of times, didn't have the opportunity to use on the iPhone yet, but I imagine it would work just as well.

This seems like a great solution. Compact, and 9V batteries are available all over. Hope it (or something similar) works on the iPhone.

Posted by: pfreitas

Quote:

Originally Posted by cowboy1964

This seems like a great solution. Compact, and 9V batteries are available all over. Hope it (or something similar) works on the iPhone.

That is pretty sweet and I see no reason why it won't work on the iphone. I'm going to pick up one for myself and my wife.

Posted by: JerryNY

There is a USB version of that as well which could come in handy as you can find USB ports all over if you need one in a pinch, also doubly so in the future when iPhones become more open to being used as flash drives:

USB-iPod connector keychain