Andrew Kay: More power to you
What’s in your bag? Right now mine is brimful of the sort of stuff that you pack because you might just need it. There’s a smart folding umbrella, essential you think as you set off on a promisingly sunny morning fully aware that our unpredictable weather can suddenly change and have you dashing for cover. For the same reason, and as I have not worn a coat or jacket now for several weeks, there is a fairly nasty cagoule. There will have to be a storm of biblical proportions before I don the offensive beige item, but you just never know.
In another pocket there is a small pharmacy of what I consider to be essential medication, wet wipes, cotton buds and toothpicks. One can never be too well prepared.
In another pocket I keep keys and pens, another houses paperwork that I will need each day, a rapidly reduced amount now as I keep so much on my much loved iPad.
In the final pocket I keep said iPad, cables to charge it and sundry other stuff relating to my wide collection of electronic gadgets, most of which are Apple Macintosh. Well, I know what I am doing with a Mac.
“There are batteries too, a clutch of them all now fallen from their packaging, some of them used and some new – in other words a power failure”
Oh and there are batteries too, a clutch of them all now fallen from their packaging, some of them used and some new – in other words a potential power failure.
Work takes me out and about rather a lot, so I can wear down the battery on my phone and my iPad rather quickly so extra power has become an issue. I did have a device that for a while worked well, but with time the plug input became loose and it simply fell out all the time.
But now I have a new device which I am delighted with. The Innergie PocketCell is a sleek device with nice clean lines. The gadget can recharge my iPhone twice or add 4.5 hours to the life of my iPad and according to the packaging will add 15 hours to a Blackberry or Smartphone and an additional five hours to any tablet – should you have chosen not to pick your devices from Apple’s lovely orchard. Now that’s enough to get me through the rest of an average day before I return home and do my regular overnight charges again.
Of course the proof of a new device is in the running of it so I allowed my phone to run pretty low and then plugged it in. As yet the supplied cable is not iPhone 5 compatible, but the cable I already own is so I simply used that one. I believe that a new iPhone 5 adapter has been approved and will be along very soon.
I am not a very patient man, as you may have gathered from my recent rants about seat hogs on buses, so I was constantly looking at the phone to see how well it was doing. At first I could not believe my eyes. In a space of less than ten minutes the PocketCell had boosted my phone’s battery by ten per cent. Now that could be a lifesaving amount of power for anyone who has become completely dependent on their mobile device.
I swapped the cable over, now using the supplied device which is rather versatile, and popped it into my iPad. It took a moment to negotiate the cover that I have, but once in it proved to be equally efficient.
In its favour it is also reasonably light. My previous device was bomb shaped and of a similar weight. It was also the sort of colour that could be easily missed in a busy bag of rubble. The PocketCell is white and pale grey, easy to find even in the dark. They also produce a new duo model with two parts that will enable you to charge two devices simultaneously – how neat is that for we gadget geeks! But for now the PocketCell is proving to be an ideal solution to boost power on the move:
visit www.myinnergie.com
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