nerys71's Full Review: Black & Decker 20 Watt Power Backup Battery Pack #...
I love these things. They are so handy its crazy :-) Especialy when you get them for almost $5 a pop. Woot had a special on these2 for $9.99 $5 shipping and since you get get upto 3 thats $35 for 6 of them!
Its basically an external battery pack with a 110v inverter built in and a USB plug built in.
The USB plug puts out 350mah but I have plugged higher power things into it and its worked fine. I imagine either it can put out a little more than 350mah or the devices are able to take a little less than whatever they want to charge. Ipods's Zune, Zodiac, Zen Vision, PSP, Cellphone all charge fine.
Then it has the 110v inverter 20watt max. Lamps Fans whatever. As long as its not over 20watt it runs fine.
Its small compact light and holds a decent amount of power under the right applications.
If you plug a 13watt CFL into this its going to run for about 5 minutes maybe
but if you plug a 1.5 watt LED bulb into this that puts out as much light as a 40watt bulb well now it runs for a solid 3 hours 10 minutes (yes I tested it)
It will charge up any of my gadgets one full time.
Its a neat little gadget. Off course I had to tear it apart (I have 10 of them so one can be sacrificed)
Its surprising DIY friendly. 3 screws and it comes apart. First you have to remove all the "detail" stuff (rubber panels etc..) then it comes apart.
What do you know its actually 8 AA Rechargeable NIMH batteries inside! Oh yeah this is screaming hack. I already have some 2650mah batteris coming in from ebay. That will more than double it capacity for you see its only got 1200mah AA's inside!
I will be able to run my LED lamp for over 7 hours once I upgrade the batteries!
This has one more bonus. This means a few years from now when these batteries peter out it will be relatively easy for the average tinkerer to repalce the batteries and continue to use the device.
Though I have never been able to figure out hot to put the spring back for the spring loaded cover for the 110v outlet ehh its not important anyway :-)
These things are wonderful for scavengers and yard sale shoppers. Now I can pull this out and "TEST" things before I buy them. Even things like TV and Microwaves. While I can not RUN the microwave it will at least "turn on" and indicate if its going to work at all.
Power tools same thing. just "tweak" the button a tiny bit just to see if it spins "at all" does not have to actually run the device just indicate if its likely to work.
Lights Fans Clocks Appliances etc.. easy to test. Very nice and convenient. I ran a standard 8" clamp fan for about 35 minutes. Enough to let you fall asleep.
If the power goes out I just hook these up to run small fans or small LED lights etc.. I am going to rig one of these up in my TENT so when I go camping I can light up the entire tend nice and bright using my 1.5watt LED lamp and as long as I only use it 1 hours per night that will last me a WEEK with the upgrade batteries or 30 mintues each night stock for 6 nights.
They are durable and well built. I have dropped them more than once with no ill results from the experience.
OK a reality check. No matter what you want to do with this thing always consider this. its EIGHT DOUBLE A BATTERIES. How much do you really think you can run on 8 AA's
Will it run your laptop? sure for about 3 seconds. Be reasonable remember its 8 AA batteries.
If you have a USB power plug for your device Use that before you use the AC adaptor. Not only will it result in less for you to carry around but the conversion from 8 AA to USB is a lot more efficient than the conversion from 8 AA to 110v into your power adaptor just to reconvert back down to 5v anyway :-)
Its a slow charge. about 4 hours to fully charge the device. This makes sense 300mah power supply 1200mah capacity. So once I upgrade the cells to 2650 it should take about 7 hours to recharge.
While this may at first seem bad its actually very good for the batteries. The slower you charge them the longer they will last.
The Device is intelligent. It will turn off when its full charged (no overcharging) and when your using it the unit shuts off when its depleted so you won't "undervolt" the pack either.
It could use a wee efficiency improvement. Even when running my 1.5 watt LED lamp the unit gets a tiny bit warm. Thats wasted watts to me but its not too bad.
It comes with cheapy little cloth bag to carry it is which is actually nice to keep the dirt and crap out.
It also has a rubber cover for the USB port and a sprint loaded slide cover for the 110v port but no cover for the 12v charging jack.
I am quite pleased. If they come up on woot again I will likely buy more of them.
I am also thinking about replacing the AA's in one of them with those new Eneloop cells that do not self discharge so quickly. That would make this well suited foremergency packs I would only have to top of the cells maybe once a year or so and it would still increase the capacity since the Eneloop are 2000mah which is 800mah more than the stock cells. Bonus.
I could also see people buying these just to get that neat inverter out of it. I am alreayd thinking I can get 8 12,000mah (12 AMPS versus the stock 1.2 amp) D cells and rig them up for solar charge. Then I could run 10 lights for 3 hours.
If you need to power larger or higher power items this is NOT for you. But if you find it handy to be able to power your small stuff with a nice convenient hackable power pack then definately get yourself a few of these. You won't regret it.
For some pictures of the unit and some "guts" shots goto nerys.com/epinions/pocketpower
Fantastic prices with ease & c...(Stock status: N/A)
Black & Decker introduces the new Pocket Power, a compact portable source with rechargeable backup battery that powers and recharges personal electron...More at Amazon Marketplace
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