Over the past two years, Apple has made significant efforts to reduce
concerns over the audio run time of its portable media players: with
the exception of the 12-hour shuffle model, the company's iPod nanos,
videos, and iPhones now play music for between 14 and 24 hours on a
single charge. But when it comes to video -- or, on iPhone, making calls
or accessing the Internet -- their batteries run down 4 or 5 times
faster. Since there's no easy way to pop a replacement inside an iPod or
iPhone's body, accessory makers have for years released add-on battery
packs that connect using Apple's standard 30-pin Dock Connector port,
typically adding hours if not days of additional run time.
Best known by its APC initials, American Power Conversion has been
selling spare batteries and other power accessories for years—typically
large items that you’d never expect to toss into a pocket. Roughly
iPod-sized and made from glossy black plastic with a single chrome
button, the company’s new Mobile Power Pack UPB10 ($70) changes all
that. It’s a 10 Watt-hour battery with two USB ports on its top, one a
mini-USB port designed to recharge the Lithium-Polymer cell, and the
other a full-sized USB port designed to transfer the power stored inside
to virtually any USB device. APC provides a wall adapter and
USB-to-mini-USB cable to charge UPB10; you provide the iPod, iPhone, or
other USB device and a cable to connect it to the battery.
In practice, UPB10’s operation is extremely simple. Once you’ve
recharged it—a 3- to 3.5-hour process—you just plug in the USB-to-Dock
Connector cable that came with your iPod or iPhone, and the power starts
to flow from one device to the other. The chrome button on its face
serves to activate its remaining power indicator, a bar of white LEDs
that signals rough 25% marks of residual juice. If there’s power left
over when you’re done charging, you can connect it to a second USB
device, or keep it around for another go once your first device’s
battery is empty again.
Under ideal circumstances, a battery like this one could conceivably
add tons of run time to an iPod: the 10 Watt-hour battery has nearly
enough power to fully power an iPhone for twice its standard run time, a
60/80GB fifth-generation iPod 3 times, and a nano or 30GB iPod 5 or 6
times. However, unlike some of the batteries out there, UPB10 actually
recharges an iPod or iPhone’s battery rather than just serving as an
alternate power source, an inefficient process that substantially
diminishes its potential run time. Consequently, rather than promising
around 85 hours of added audio for a 30GB fifth-generation iPod, APC
says that UPB10 will add around 55 hours of audio or 10 hours of video
life.
Our testing generally agreed with APC’s findings. We were able to
recharge a repeatedly emptied 30GB iPod three times using a completely
filled UPB10, which added around 45 hours of audio play time, or 9-10
hours of video play time, under our (and Apple’s) standard testing
conditions. A partially or completely filled full-sized iPod will do
better, and a more power-efficient second-generation iPod nano or iPod
shuffle will do much better still. By comparison, the iPhone, which uses
much more power than iPods and iPod nanos, can fully recharge once off
of the UPB10, with a bit of extra juice to spare. On a cross-country
trip, this means that the iPhone can be used for extended video viewing
on a plane, as well as Internet and calling between flights in the
airports, without ending the day empty.
Because of its relative inefficiency and other concerns, using a
spare battery pack to recharge your iPod or iPhone isn’t Apple’s
preferred way for such a device to work. Rather, Apple recommends—and
apparently requires Made for iPod developers to create—devices that tell
your iPod to stop draining their own batteries, then drain the spare
one first and instead, which would yield longer run times than UPB10
assuming you’re willing to carry both parts around at once. By contrast,
APC’s approach fills your iPod or iPhone with more juice, eliminating
your need to carry two items in your pocket at once when the recharging
is finished. You’ll have to decide which sort of design works best for
you.
On that note, one aspect of UPB10’s design, namely its dependence on
an Dock Connector-to-USB cable, can be seen as either a positive or
negative. We tested UPB10 with an iPhone while on several coast-to-coast
flights, and liked the fact that we could toss it into the seatback
pocket rather than strapping it to the iPhone’s (or an iPod’s) back. But
once we left the plane, it was obvious that there were other, more
common situations where having something that was iPhone- or
iPod-form-fitting would have been a better idea. Thankfully, UPB10’s
iPod-esque 3.9” by 2.5” by 0.55” body basically doubles the size of a
full-sized iPod or iPhone in your pocket; it’s a bigger challenge to
manage the USB cable.
Ideally, APC’s UPB10 battery pack would be a little more iPod- and
iPhone-specific for the $70 asking price, with your choice of
battery-recharging or -augmenting power flows, a packed-in, detachable
mini Dock Connector cable, and a design that was shaped to strap on to
Apple’s devices rather than just dangling around. But as a well-made,
aesthetically neutral, and iPhone-ready solution—especially when found
at a street price of $55-$60—it’s a solid power option, and deserving of
our general recommendation.
Tiada ulasan:
Catat Ulasan