Bushwalk Australia

I have come across those external backup battery chargers on eBay (Capacity: 5000mAh) shipped from the US and was wondering if they are reliable qualitywise.

Alternatively there is also the MiPower for iphone.

Is anyone using any of these devices?

I have found batteries on ebay to vary from good value to utter crap. It's a bit of a lottery.

Have seen good reports on Mipow, but have not tried them myself.

I see, which on eBay are good value? The ones shipped from US to UK? I am after a 6000mAh unit at least.

Nothing smaller since I will have the GPS activated when hiking in difficult areas if I get a signal.

I've never bought anything up in the 6000MAh size range.

I have one that looks exactly like this one: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Amaze-Universal-Lithium-ion-Portable-Battery-5000mAh-Dual-USB-power-outputs-/300817626756?pt=AU_Webcams&hash=item460a20b684&_uhb=1, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't advertised as 5000mAh, I also paid somewht less. It has been very good, recharges my iPhone 1.5-2 times or so.

I also have one of these http://the-gadgeteer.com/2009/09/23/duracell-powerhouse-charger-review/ It works well - about 80-90% iPhone charge.

I also had one of these: http://www.usa.philips.com/c/power-solutions/22544/cat/ Complete waste of space, very heavy as well - I have discarded it. Perhaps it was a fake I bought??

Also have 2 of these: http://www.kensington.com/kensington/us/us/p/1412/K39265US/charging-dock-with-mini-battery-pack.aspx They work well and give about 40-50% charge each.

I've also bought numerous camera batteries etc. on ebay, some have similar performance to originals, some not even in the same ball park.

I have Voltaic and New Trent, chinese via US. Both have been ok, Amazon is a good place for reviews for these things. Anything would match the quality of the iphone battery, 12mths and its life has taken a dive (which is probably good considering the sneaky $1200 bill for the last 2 months!! )

$1200 bill = downloading a lot = draining battery quick?

Yeah, even overnight it seems to dump power.
Easy to upgrade plan but you have to call them.. to downgrade, whats with that!!.. and slowwww, even with full bars, is that the cranky customer payback scheme

I have an isound - works fine
http://www.isound.net/shop-by-type/acce ... 0-mah.html

Bought mine for Aust equiv for just under $80 from UK on e-bay (must have been some promotion as it has the name of a Las Vegas casino on it)

That powertube is certainly smaller, tho less capacity. Pretty colours!

sthughes wrote:I have one that looks exactly like this one: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Amaze-Universal-Lithium-ion-Portable-Battery-5000mAh-Dual-USB-power-outputs-/300817626756?pt=AU_Webcams&hash=item460a20b684&_uhb=1, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't advertised as 5000mAh, I also paid somewht less. It has been very good, recharges my iPhone 1.5-2 times or so.

I took the dive and just bought one of those. I hope it works well out there in the wild.

Nuts wrote:Anything would match the quality of the iphone battery, 12mths and its life has taken a dive (which is probably good considering the sneaky $1200 bill for the last 2 months!! )

Ouch! I won't use the iphone live. Better loading those maps on the phone and watch them offline. Too easy to go overboard and exceed the monthly data limit especially if one is on a non-unlimited plan like myself.

iPhone battery life sucks. It is a joke. I can't understand why Apple are ignoring this so important issue, in the XXI century! We need phones with at least triple the given amount (1420mAh for the iPhone 4). But no, things are still the same:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/43 ... 0&tstart=0

Onestepmore wrote:I have an isound - works fine
http://www.isound.net/shop-by-type/acce ... 0-mah.html

Very nice! That's the ideal output for GPS use in the bush.

..............................

Do you hold those batteries when charging the unit while hiking? A power block would be ideal but the output is still low for GPS purposes:

http://www.mophie.com/juice-pack-PRO-Ru ... p4-blk.htm

I have the Mophie (older version - iPhone 4 version on the 4S phone) it gives me about one full charge (just a little over) and I can plug the iPod into it if I want to.
It is my normal case which is quite sturdy and may have prevented the odd broken glass once or twice.
I am sure there are better ones around now.
I dont use the phone much more than as a phone or camera (normally use the waterproof shock proof camera)

Hi

FleaBay batteries is a total chook's lottery. As for mAH the ratings have more to do with what is printed on the battery than the actual capacity at times.

Also beware that unless the rules of chemistry have changed it is highly unlikely to get more mAH for any given battery size as most original batteries have already taken advantaged of the best bang for buck.

Trouble is lot of claimed mAH are achieved by measuring low current draw where in real life charging high current draw is the rule. Also the charging battery needs to be a higher voltage than the receiving battery so step up electronics are required on the battery pack else the batteries will equalize out. There is a vast difference in the quality of those circuits.

The best battery packs I have found are the Energizer ones. The 2000mah will charge an iPhone fully flat with some capacity to spare to top up my Garmin Fenix. A Jaycar 2200mah gets the phone to only 93%.

Cheers

gbagua wrote:I have come across those external backup battery chargers on eBay (Capacity: 5000mAh) shipped from the US and was wondering if they are reliable qualitywise.

Alternatively there is also the MiPower for iphone.

Is anyone using any of these devices?

I have been testing out a Powertech Plus Powerbank Model MB3642. Input 5V 0.45-0.8 amps. Battery Li-Ion 3.7V 2600 mAh - weight 81 grams.
download/file.php?id=21743&mode=view http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=MB3642
Fully charged from a 240V USB power charger or from my laptop, it will fully charge my iPhone 4S twice from 15% to 100%. It also charges from a solar panel which takes 6-7 hours of full sunshine for the full 2600mAh, but the great think about the solar panel is that even on an overcast day it still charges the Powerbank although much slower. There's more details and photos in this thread - viewtopic.php?f=21&t=509&p=173067&sid=b5bf33c95ce8f06fe0bad0d9d3968497#p173067