Cheap Tech: iPod/iPhone Charger

I was going through our storage room as I normally do at work and stumbled upon this gem: the iTurbo iPod charger. Basically, it’s an external battery for anything with an iPod dock connector.

In the package all there really was was the power tube, a AA battery, and the cable that connects the power to the iPod dock. The setup of it was easy as it can get; just put the battery in it, twist the cap on, and plug it all in. There’s even a little LED at the top that would blink to show that it was charging.

After reading the instructions, and allowing the iPhone to charge for 20 minutes, I realized that I should probably turn it off to allow it to charge “more efficiently.” I shut it off, since it’s not supposed to really be blinking, it’s supposed to be just on. Oops…that would explain the battery icon switching between “charging” and showing that it’s just using another power source.

[12 Minutes later] With the iPhone off, it’s kind of a pain, since I have no idea how much longer I have to go before it’s fully charged, so I’d figure I’d check. Needless to say, there hasn’t been much progress, but I’m still hopeful about it.

Sad to say, but watching this thing charge is a little boring, so during this test, I’ve been shooting random videos. So if you’re good boys and girls, I’ll post them!

[About 1.5 hours into test] The light’s started flickering again, so maybe the charge is almost complete, I’m going to check again in 30 minutes, ending the test [since, by then, it should be a full charge]

The Verdict:

The iTurbo isn’t as perfect as those $50-$100 solutions, but it does do the job well enough to allow your iPhone to survive long enough for it to last until you’re able to get to an actual charger. Personally, I would recommend the use of it, due to the price and performance, as minimal as it is.

New Segment: Cheap Tech

I’ve been contemplating this for a while, due to my current place of employment, and me kind of wanting to keep my job (no job, no blog), but I’ve decided to just go for it.

Cheap tech! What is it? Well, really, you don’t need to ask, it is what it is, tech for cheap! If you follow me closely on Twitter, I work at the local Big Lots, The World’s Best Bargain Place, as we say. We do sell cheap electronics, but I’ve been testy on whether or not I should even try any of it. But for you, my loyal readers, I’m going to go for it. I’m going to set up myself a little paypal so that you can send me donations to at least help pay for some of these (possibly) great products.

Now, I don’t want to sound like I’m asking for charity. If you’ve been to Big Lots lately and looked through our grand electronics department, the most expencive thing is $300, then the next is $50. Most of the things I’ll be reviewing will be around $20.

I also don’t want to be showing favoritism to my employer, so I’ll be going to other bargain stores, and sometimes grabbing sale items from Circuit City (if I ever go there again) or Best Buy.

If you’d like to e-mail me bargain items you’d like to see/hear/read me review (yes, I said see, I’m working on funding for a camcorder) send your tips to specialKolin [at] gmail [dot] com, or in the comments below.

Today’s Mission: Computer Repair

dusty, eh?

I was given a mission today. Rid a computer of all it’s problems (without just buying a Mac), something I haven’t done in a while. What seemed to be the problem with the computer? (pictured above) Well, it was dusty as HELL, but it was also bogged down by viruses and other mal-ware. (typical Windows stuff) What I found to be most painstaking was that the power supply was completely unable to power my external drive if it needed to write something, thus causing data corruption to the backup.

Any computer tech will know my pain the second I say that it was, in fact, a Dell.

It wasn’t just the computer I was working on today. I fixed up another computer (practically the same model) and it gave me the exact same problem with the power supply. So, here’s the thought: why put a PSU in a computer (whether it be Mac or PC) that will not be able to power everything the computer can offer simultaneously? I understand that the computer is not meant for the power user, but for low-end consumers, but it should be able to work at it’s prime no matter who’s using it.

One could argue that the age of the PSU would slowly make it less powerful (small pun, lol), and I see where you’d be coming from, but I’ve got computers as old, if not older than these two I’ve worked on in the past couple days that can power more than they can.

My diagnosis: it’s one of two things: either it’s a bad PSU or it’s an ID 10 T error.

Just as no one will ever know how many licks it takes to get to the center of a tootsie pop, the world may never know why these power supplies are bad.

PS: I actually fixed them both completely, minus the PSU problem

No Music Challenge [Day 4]

Another day on my No Music Challenge. It’s getting quite difficult due to the absolute battery drainage that happens, and for whatever reason, I forget to put my USB cable in my car [my FM Transmitter has a USB port for charging]. Unlike most of the past days I was working in the morning, the prime time for me to listen to my own music instead of the muzak at my unnamed place of employment. [aparently some of it is new music, I just can't stand it, I'm sorry] I attempted to play Last.fm, but I’m guessing the stream bandwidth is too large for EDGE, so instead I listened to my beloved Pandora radio.

My Pandora radio station is called DanceDance, since it has music to dance to on it. The peak of my work day started as soon as I heard the intro to Fatboy Slim’s “Weapon of Choice” [pictured above]. Somehow, in my mind I became Walken in the hotel. Needless to say, I was the only person in the whole building dancing.

What I’d like to know is: if you’ve been following this challenge, and have been doing it also, how have you been doing? Do you miss your iPod yet?

Zuckerberg and Facebook Connect

Zuckerberg was up on stage today, talking about social media giant, Facebook. Here’s all that I really caught from the webcast. [or just what I really cared to listen to]

- In regards to Apps: they’re going to be less annoying!

- There’s a new layout to Facebook. I haven’t heard too much good out of that, but, like Myspace, you can revert back to the old layout.

- Facebook Connect!

Facebook Connect seems to be quite interesting, actually. From what I understand it’s similar to OpenID, giving users the ability to log into a site using one identity instead of creating a new ID for each site you go onto. Facebook Connect is nifty in that it uses your Facebook security settings, so that people who you don’t want to see you, won’t. Also, it means that friends can see some of your activity, say…if you post a comment on your favorite blog [what? you mean this one? aw, how sweet, but there's no WordPress support yet *sadface*] your friends could then see that lovely comment in their News Feed.

Sounds like fun? It sure does! But first, I’m gonna check my Myspace, looks like I still have more friends on there.

Second WordPress Post! [a ramble]

ZoMg!1!! WoRdPrEsS!!1!

Ah, my second WordPress post. I’ve gotten quite familiar with this site, although I’ve been distracted most of my day today. Needless to say, my iPhone 3G has finally gotten to the imfamous 20% mark [in the red, if you will], and it’s reporting to me that it has received over 127 MB over EDGE. I somehow don’t think that that is enough.

Tomorrow [this being written at 1am, so essentially today], for me, is another lovely day in the wonderful world of retail. I think I’ll be home mid-afternoon, which could be good so that I might actually produce my podcast finally…however I might do that with WordPress, I’m not 100% sure, but I’m bound to find out the long way [just like I found out about WordPress's greatness...the long way].

In the event that you haven’t seen all of my posts either here or on twitter, I’ve recently upgraded to Leopard on my, at least, 1.5 year old MacBook [which I like to call the MacTop, cause I prefer the term laptop over notebook since I use notebooks regularly to collect my thoughts] and I absolutely am loving it, as any Mac nerd would. The only problems I’ve had is that it’s crashed twice on me, and every time I reboot it, Spotlight seems to want to index the drive all over again, thus killing my CPU. Maybe rebooting it without forcing it to shut down could fix that. Then again, I may have not updated recently.

We’ll see how tomorrow goes…you shall hear from me later [haha, literally]