robgendreau
Explorer
I recently obtained some RAVPower USB lithium battery packs to review: their 3rd Gen Deluxe 13000mAh and 15000mAh devices, and a 2d Gen Mini 3000mAh battery.
In short (no pun intended...), I loved them. The two bigger units (being relative, only a bit bigger than a pack of cards) have TWO ports, one at 2.1A and one at 2.4. Awesome. I used them to charge an iPhone or two, a Galaxy Tab Pro, and a recent iPad. Went as fast as a wall charger, up to about 95% then slowed a bit, especially on the iPad, as expected. The batteries took about two or three cycles before they themselves charged as full, as indicated by the units themselves (I could sorta verify this by measuring voltage, but I'm not sure how accurate that is, or useful). I then noticed that my AC to USB charger maybe was the problem; when I switched to my Samsung adapter it went more quickly to full charge.
Anyway, great units...but I wanna do more than 5v in addition to charging USB powered devices. These things are now getting cheaper ($37 on Amazon) and I'm finding more and more uses for them. In fact, it's changing my whole electrical setup. I've got a Sportsmobile, and I started with fluorescents and incandescent bulbs. Then to LEDs. But then I realized that since LEDs draw so little power it was a waste of my time to be wiring them all up to 12v, since they needed far less. So I moved to lots of magnet mounted LED lights with batteries, usually nimh. But they stink for camping, since they self discharge quite quickly Aargh. So now I'm switching again, moving to using USB 5v as my power of choice, with batteries like these RAVPower units I tested. And the other cool thing is they charge quickly, so with a limited bit of solar, or shorter trips in the van with them attached to 12v, I get all topped up.
And these two bigger RAVPowers have two outputs, with each over 2A. And I've got a few things that require more than 5v, like my Baofeng. One charger wants 10v, which it steps down to 8.4 for the batteries in the radio itself, although I have another that uses 12-13v input. I'm pretty sure my camera batteries probably require that same input voltage to charge, from the charger to the battery. So now I'm wondering how to get the 2xUSB 5v in series (thinking one of those Y cables, like for portable hard drives? and then use that for these other devices. The wattage is within range, but somehow I think since the chargers are expecting 12v they won't operate with just 10v input. Anyone try anything like this? There are step up converters, complete with cabling, from eBay for cheap, but I would assume power in series might be more efficient.
In short (no pun intended...), I loved them. The two bigger units (being relative, only a bit bigger than a pack of cards) have TWO ports, one at 2.1A and one at 2.4. Awesome. I used them to charge an iPhone or two, a Galaxy Tab Pro, and a recent iPad. Went as fast as a wall charger, up to about 95% then slowed a bit, especially on the iPad, as expected. The batteries took about two or three cycles before they themselves charged as full, as indicated by the units themselves (I could sorta verify this by measuring voltage, but I'm not sure how accurate that is, or useful). I then noticed that my AC to USB charger maybe was the problem; when I switched to my Samsung adapter it went more quickly to full charge.
Anyway, great units...but I wanna do more than 5v in addition to charging USB powered devices. These things are now getting cheaper ($37 on Amazon) and I'm finding more and more uses for them. In fact, it's changing my whole electrical setup. I've got a Sportsmobile, and I started with fluorescents and incandescent bulbs. Then to LEDs. But then I realized that since LEDs draw so little power it was a waste of my time to be wiring them all up to 12v, since they needed far less. So I moved to lots of magnet mounted LED lights with batteries, usually nimh. But they stink for camping, since they self discharge quite quickly Aargh. So now I'm switching again, moving to using USB 5v as my power of choice, with batteries like these RAVPower units I tested. And the other cool thing is they charge quickly, so with a limited bit of solar, or shorter trips in the van with them attached to 12v, I get all topped up.
And these two bigger RAVPowers have two outputs, with each over 2A. And I've got a few things that require more than 5v, like my Baofeng. One charger wants 10v, which it steps down to 8.4 for the batteries in the radio itself, although I have another that uses 12-13v input. I'm pretty sure my camera batteries probably require that same input voltage to charge, from the charger to the battery. So now I'm wondering how to get the 2xUSB 5v in series (thinking one of those Y cables, like for portable hard drives? and then use that for these other devices. The wattage is within range, but somehow I think since the chargers are expecting 12v they won't operate with just 10v input. Anyone try anything like this? There are step up converters, complete with cabling, from eBay for cheap, but I would assume power in series might be more efficient.