Posts Tagged electronics
Brunton Restore Portable Solar Power Supply
If we’re not all charging up our music players and cell phones with solar power, it’s not for lack of trying on the part of device manufacturers. Some of these solar devices actually work quite well too, like this portable power supply from Brunton.
The first idea here is you can charge it up at home or in a car ahead of time, like the iGo Power Extender and CallPod Fueltank Charger we reviewed before. Then you take it with you on a trip, using it to charge up your devices when you can’t get near an outlet, like on a plane or bus.
This goes a big step further though. The second idea is to use it as a solar charger when you are on a long camping or mountaineering trip off the grid. With the Brunton Restore and ample sunlight, you can restore your devices to full power. If it’s fully charged, it’ll reload your iPod or regular cell phone two or three times. It’ll fully charge a smart phone or gaming device one or two times. It has enough juice to recharge four AA batteries and can recharge your Bluetooth headset seven to eight times. For an iPod, one hour of sun equals six or seven hours of music—that is far superior to what most other competitors promise.
I left the unit in the sun for seven hours and it was all charged up—I could tell from the handy 4-light LED system. I was then able to fully charge my iPod twice and a half-empty phone and still have juice left in it.
This Brunton version is a bit heavier than some others I’ve tried, at 7.2 ounces, but it’s rubberized and really solid. It feels like it could be dropped off a roof and survive. It’s water resistant too. It flips open too and exposes two rather large panels, making it easier to operate (especially with one hand) than the three-panel Solio charger I’ve tried before.
There’s a handy design to this whereby you can plug in a USB cord to charge up anything attached to that, or you can pull out the male USB plug and insert it into the device. Or pull out the other end of the cable instead and it goes into a mini-USB slot like you see on Google phones and the SlotPlayer for example. There’s an adapter for micro USB as well, which other devices use. So basically you’re okay charging up any music player, communication device or camera, provided it uses some version of USB.
“But Tim, my damned Nokia phone and my damned Samsung phone need different adapters than these!” Well, there’s the biggest drawback with this. Eventually we’ll get to a happy place where every device shares the same standard charger setup, but until that time you have to keep fooling with tips and adapters. Brunton doesn’t offer any help in that department, so if your device doesn’t come with some kind of USB charger, you’re SOL unless you can find some adapter on eBay that will do the trick. For Apple devices, you’ll have to bring along the USB cord to connect the device to a USB port on the charger.
The Restore retails for around $90, but the packaging says it’ll give you the output equivalent of 1,372 AA batteries. You can use this charger 500 times before the internal battery will wear out, which is probably plenty for a lifetime unless you’re a hermit moving to Death Valley. If you’ll be in the wilderness or you’re just a backpacker who will be in a place where sunshine is far more prevalent than reliable electricity, this is a solid solar charger that really works.
Get the Brunton Restore Portable Power Device at REI.com
Posted by Tim in Adventure Gear, General Gear on March 4th, 2010
Hands-On Review: Sony Reader Touch Edition
When the Kindle e-Reader became Amazon’s hottest item, other companies began to take notice. Among those companies—now competitors—is Sony, with the competitively-priced Reader Touch Edition that’s sized just right for travelers.
The Reader Touch Edition PRS-600 is one of Sony’s three entries in the fast-growing field of electronic books. With a 6″ grayscale screen made by E Ink, the standard for readers, the Sony slips into a jacket pocket and is only 0.4″ thick. It weighs in at just over 10 ounces.
One feature that gives Sony bragging rights over the similarly-sized Kindle is a touch screen. I found the screen responsive in changing or bookmarking pages with just a finger swipe. Pages can also be “turned” with hardware keys.
Adjusting the font size is easy and you can take notes with a virtual keyboard or stylus.
The controls are simple and intuitive. The built-in memory will hold up to 350 of your favorite books and even more can be stored on two expansion cards.
Books are available from Sony’s Reader Store. Also, more than one-million free titles are available from Google Books. A built-in dictionary is included.
But you’ll need to connect the Reader Touch Edition to a computer to add books, since it does not have wireless shopping capabilities like the Kindle Wireless Reading Device. On that feature, it’s advantage, Kindle.
The Reader Touch can also play MP3 and unprotected AAC audio files. And it can display pictures, though I’m not sure why you would want to look at your favorite photos on a grayscale screen.
One annoying thing about the Sony Reader Touch Edition is it cannot be used while it’s charging, which is done through a mini-USB port. Sure, a battery charge lasts a long time—about 7,500 continuous page turns, or up to two weeks of normal use. But when I’m around batteries, they always seem to run down at the worst possible times.
Overall, this Sony e-Reader performs well and boasts a solid set of features at an attractive price, $299.99 retail. Some discounts can be found at online merchants, including Amazon and Buy.com. Three color choices are available—black, red, or silver.
Of course, there are other ways to read e-books—on cell phones and other portable devices, including Apple’s upcoming iPad. Based on what I saw at the 2010 International CES, a lot more readers with new features are on the way in the coming months.
Who’s going to be the big winner? It’s too soon to say. So stay tuned.
Posted by JohnG in Kids and Family, Travel Light on February 23rd, 2010
Portable Speaker Kit From Eagle’s Nest Outfitters
We’re suckers for portable travel speakers here at the Practical Travel Gear blog because hey, music is best when it’s shared. If you’re in a nice luxury hotel with an iPod/MP3 dock that’s easy enough, but it’s not so likely when you’re paying $20 a night for your digs or you’re camping somewhere.
Speakers for travelers have to be easy to pack though, which leads to all kinds of variations on size and weight reduction. This version takes the case approach: the speakers are built into a case that also holds your music player and cords. It zips up tight so your player is protected in a semi-hard case. When you’re ready to crank the tunes, you unzip it, turn both the player and the speakers on, and you’re set.
Eagle’s Nest Outfitters is a company best known for its great hammocks that pack up small. I’ll be reviewing one of those when this damn snow stops and the flowers start blooming in the south. They put out a line of accessories you would want to take along for your chillin’ time though and this is one of those.
As with most all of these portable speakers, there’s a major trade-off when it comes to sound quality. Labeling this as a “Hi-Fi Speaker Case” doesn’t make it so. On the plus side you get the separate stereo channels you don’t hear with the likes of the one-speakers solutions we have reviewed (see links at the end). On the minus side, the usual lack of bass response is joined by noticeable distortion, especially at a volume level that goes past halfway. On a sliding scale, electronica sounds best, followed by country/Americana, classic rock, and jazz. Anything dominated by a heavy bass and vocals mixed way up front—like rap—ends up sounding pretty lousy, even after tweaking your iPod’s EQ.
The thing is, they’re not alone in these deficiencies. For 25 bucks and eight ounces of weight, what can you reasonably expect? This “hi-fi” speaker case is not going to fill a large room with crystal-clear sound. What it will do is accompany your campfire weenie roasting or provide some musical accompaniment as you play backgammon in a cheap guesthouse room. For most of the time when you’re traveling, that’s good enough. It uses two AA batteries too, which makes things easy. The specs say the batteries will last 7 to 12 hours and I’m already at 11 in my testing, with rechargeable batteries I’ve used at least 20 times already, so this set of speakers is definitely efficient.
Shop for the Eagle’s Nest portable speaker case at Rock/Creek,
Related reviews:
Sony Ericsson MS410
iHome IHM7 mini speaker
X-mini capsule speaker
Posted by Tim in General Gear, Kids and Family, Travel Light on February 17th, 2010
Rebit Automatic Backup Hard Drive
Backing up your computer is something that most people think about but seldom do. Kind of like flossing your teeth or exercising more. It needs to be done, but it’s not an enjoyable task and it’s easy to put off. The products from Rebit take care of that by making it automatic.
Much of your data can be backed up “in the cloud” now anyway, so a hard drive crash isn’t what it used to be. But what about all those photos? What about all that music? Backing all those up online can get expensive since they are very big files. If you’re traveling for a long time or are an expat in a developing country, you also may not always have a fast Internet connection for all those gigabytes to flow through.
I used to use a basic portable hard drive from Western Digital until out of the blue it died while I was on a ship in the Galapagos. Apparently that’s common with these small portable drives, which makes me wonder, “Do I need a backup for my backup?” There I was with 400 new photos stored and praying that my laptop wouldn’t die or disappear. Their warranty on the old version I had was quite limited, but the company kindly offered to restore the data on it—for a mere $800. Um, no thanks. Now they come with a longer warranty though: three years. (See John’s Western Digital portable hard drives review.)
So now I use this Rebit, which is billed as “ridiculously simple backup.” The promise is that you plug this thing into a USB port (or two ports if extra juice is needed) and follow the installation wizard. After that it figures out what’s on your computer, and then it backs everything up. You don’t need to press any buttons or launch any software. It’s all automatic.
If you leave it plugged in it keeps backing up files as you work (and deleting what you delete), but if you only plug it in now and then, that’s fine too. The Rebit figures out what’s new since the last time and it goes and grabs it. In the event you need any files later, you just drag them off the Rebit and onto any computer.
The product has improved over time. I tried out a version a few years ago that was twice as thick and twice as buggy, failing to work properly on two different PCs with XP. This time I plugged it into my HP dv3 laptop with Vista and everything went without a hitch. The Rebit backed up 100 GB of data while I slept and then every time I plugged it in later (getting nagged every day I didn’t by the software), it would usually take 20-30 minutes to get updated. In theory it works in a way that doesn’t slow down your system—waiting until your mouse isn’t moving to work—but there was a little bit of system lag when the Rebit was plugged in, especially if I was typing. But this is true with most any backup system, so if it’s a concern you can plug it in when you’re going to lunch or something.
The device is sleek, light, and thin, with just a blue LED light to show it’s on and a place to plug in the USB. It comes with a cloth carrying case. This would be easy to pack up and take on the road for making sure you don’t lose any photos or files from your travels. It can also serve as a way to transfer said photos or files to a different computer. In my tests I was able to plug this into a home PC and drag over picture folders using the usual Windows Explorer drag and drop system.
Personally, I would prefer more feedback than what is provided. There’s nothing telling you what’s being backed up or scanned like you get with cloud solutions such as SugarSync. It doesn’t even really tell you when it’s working and when it’s not. Mousing over it or clicking on what’s in your system tray just brings up a message that it’s working.
The one real snag I ran into initially was this was supposed to be a two-computer version, but I could only get it to work on one. Since there’s no way to control the thing, there was nothing to try as a fix when it just installed itself and then did nothing more on the second computer. A call to tech support fixed the issue though when they walked me through a workaround—they do have a phone number answered by humans available during working hours. [Review updated 2/15/09]
Note that you can also buy Rebit just as a software solution (for less than $20 at Amazon) and install it on your own external hard drive. So if you’ve already got a regular hardware-only portable drive, you can put this software on it and then back up without thinking in the future. Just plug it in. It only works with Windows but that’s okay: with a Mac you can do the same thing with the included TimeMachine.
The prices on the actual drive are quite reasonable though—if you ignore the list price. The 160GB version goes for under $80 at Amazon and the 320GB version is under $110. Both ship for free.
See other reviews at Rebit.com.
Posted by Tim in Business Gear, General Gear on February 11th, 2010
Travel Essentials: Power Strips with a Plus
One of the standard, go-everywhere pieces of gear in my suitcase is a power strip. That’s because I got tired of searching behind beds, nightstands and desks in hotel rooms looking for plugs to power and charge all the gadgets I carry when traveling.
Two companies, Voltage Valet and Kensington, are making power strips even better for road warriors. Not only are they light and compact, but they offer another bonus—USB ports for charging more gear!
Kensington’s Portable Power Outlet is a solution that turns one outlet into five. There are three AC plugs and two USB outlets. I’m able to charge my MP3 player and smartphone at the same time using the USB plugs, with three AC plugs still open for the laptop, Bluetooth headset, a charger for camera batteries and other gear.
The AC cable wraps around the power strip for neat packing and it weighs less than half a pound. The plug unit is about four and a half inches tall, three inches wide and just over an inch deep. The list price is $24.99.
One limitation with the Kensington is that it works with a maximum of 125 volts, making it less useful for international travel. But Voltage Valet’s PS2 Travel Power Strip solves that problem by handling up to 240 volts. The PS2 does not convert or reduce voltage to the AC plugs. So be sure whatever you plug into it can take the higher voltage if you’re in a country that uses 240 volts.
The Voltage Valet model has one USB charging port, instead of two on the Kensington unit. The PS2 weighs half a pound and measures about five and a half inches high, two inches wide and one and a half inches deep. The cord wraps around the strip and plugs into one of the AC outlets for easy carrying.
The price is comparable to the Kensington at $25.00. Voltage Valet also makes a big assortment of plug and voltage adapters that are part of my gear on every international trip.
Either of these power strips would be fine for travel in the U.S. But if you’re traveling in other countries, the Voltage Valet PS2 gets the nod because of its ability to handle higher voltages.
Get Kensington’s Portable Power Outlet at Buy.com or get it at Amazon.com.
For now anyway, the only place to find the PS2 is at VoltageValet.com.
Posted by JohnG in Business Gear, Travel Light on January 4th, 2010
