Energizer Energi To Go Review

by Kevin O'Brien

Power sources while traveling can and will always be a pain in the butt to find. Airports have outlets few and far between, and trade shows are usually worse still. For the mobile device user who relies on battery power, this will frequently be the cause of much stress on the road. One option is bulking up on spare batteries, but for every device that might not be an option. The other option is a universal power source, providing both AC power and DC power from its own internal battery. Energizer's solution to this problem is the Energi To Go Portable Power Outlet.

Energizer Energi to Go Portable Outlet Specifications

• Output Continuous Power 480 watts
• Output voltage 120 volts
• Output Waveform Modified Sine Wave
• Input voltage 13.2 to 15V
• Internal Battery 4000mAh
• Average Charging Time 4 hours
• Weight: 1lb 4.5oz

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Setup

Setup for the Portable Power Outlet is plugging it into a wall to charge, and nothing more. When the red charging indicator on the power switch turns off the outlet is ready to power your devices. Users also have the option of charging the device inside an automobile with the included 12v power jack.

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In Use

To use the Portable Power Outlet for AC powered devices, the instructions tell you to turn the device on for 5-10 seconds, and then plug in your device. This method does not work for me, and it will only turn on the AC output if I have the device plugged in while the outlet is off, then I turn it on.

When the outlet was functioning properly, it worked great for a wide range of devices. Some of the estimated runtime claims were on the high side, but it was better than nothing. Powering my Lenovo T60 notebook, it managed to operate for 50 minutes. With a Dell 1525, the runtime was better coming in at 70 minutes. With a living room lamp drawing 50w of power, it worked for just under 45 minutes.

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Problems

The outlet would also not work with some notebook power adapters, mainly Dell branded 65w and 90w adapters. These would be powered for a few seconds, and then quickly shutoff. Another issue that cropped up after a handful of uses was the inability to power many AC devices that consumed more than 30watts of power. I had to turn on and off the unit numerous times before it finally started to work.

Noise was also a concern, with a cooling fan that sounded more like a weedwacker. A sound clip of this fan in action when powering an OLPC can be found here.

The last problem with this power source is its incompatibility with older transformer based power adapters. One particular adapter for an old weather station was shorted out upon being plugged into the power source. The weather station was not damaged, just the adapter for it. All new switching style adapters worked flawlessly. This may be a problem with inverters in general, with the modified sine wave output, instead of a true sine wave source like your home or office.

Conclusion

In concept a very lightweight inverter with battery is a great idea. So far in practice the offerings might need a bit of work. The Energizer Energi To Go Portable Power Outlet worked great with a handful of devices at first, but then ran into some problems with noise, compatibility problems, and had trouble turning on. Right now I am not sure if I would recommend it without knowing that some of these problems could be fixed in a later revision.

Pros

• Lightweight
• Charges from AC wall adapter or inside car
• Simple to operate

Cons

• Loud
• May not work with some older devices

 

Thanks for the review Kevin. Good idea, but even if they fixed the noise and compatibility issues, the charging capability is still not sufficient IMO.

 

I love the concept, and the run time is reasonable considering the size and power of the device, but the compatibility is an issue (though not dismal), and that fan is devastating (imagine using that on a flight).

 

I agree, great concept, but has some issues to work out it seems. That is also a pitiful amount of life for $100. I guess i'll stick with a 2nd battery for now.

 

I still weep for my poor poor spot weather station and its power adapter that blew up

 

I like the idea, but its not enough, and still too bulky for my taste. I like mobile devices that charge off of USB. I just power them from my laptop, and pray that I don't need the laptop for more than 5 hours.

 

I don't think it is useful for notebooks as it will be a lot better to have an extra battery ,but it may work for instruments that don't use batteries

 

Meh, so its a portable UPS (hence the "dirty" power).

I guess its interesting but for something that weighs 3x my 7.5 (6.5 real hours) battery I think I will just stick to carrying a space battery. Most of the things I use can charge via USB now so I can power them off of the lappy if need be.

 

Any idea of the voltage of the battery so that we can calculate the Watt-hours of capacity? The light bulb test suggests about 40WHr.

The underlying problem of trying to power a notebook with this type of solution is that we have two sets of power conversion losses: The power supply converts the battery DC to mains AC and the notebook's PSU converts it back to DC. In addition, a notebook tends automatically to throttle back its power consumption when running on battery in order to conserve power, but this external source looks like mains power.

I've used several inverters and UPSs in the past without blowing anything up so it looks as if this device has compromised on electrical performance in order to reduce the weight.

I will stick to carrying a spare battery for the computer and USB charging cables for the other items (which, fortunately, are tending to converge on 5V power).

John

 

nice concept, just doesn't seem to work in practice, id rather carry around a couple of extra batteries

 

Totaly agree-it might be useful,but it is too big and heavy

 

Now it could be nice if it had removable standard AA NiMH batteries, that allows you to swap for regular alkalines...when you really need to power up a device. On top of that, sub in as a charging unit for the said NiMH batteries for other items such as digital cameras. Saves me bringing another charger for the camera/batteries.

Other than that, I would just rather carry spare lappy batteries. With most newer lappies, 2 extended batteries will run it for over 12 hours.