Despite our desire to travel lighter and with less gear, we seem to be carrying more and more gadgets with us when we set out on our own adventures. Now days, we rarely go anywhere without our iPod, cell phone, and GPS devices. And if you’re like me, someone who writes while he travels, you’re probably lugging a netbook/laptop along for the ride too. I won’t even mention all the camera gear that makes the trip as well, which can be a necessary evil at times.
One of the issues that we’re constantly dealing with is how to keep all of those gadgets charged while we’re away in some remote place. Fortunately, the good folks over at Brunton, are coming to our aid in a big way. They’ve been making solar chargers for some time, that allow us to collect power from the sun to recharge our devices on the go, but, they’ve got a new products, called the Brunton Restore, that looks like it might be just the thing for connected adventurers everywhere.
The Restore, which is set to hit stores this month, has two built in solar cells to collect energy and store it in an onboard battery. It can then be used to connect up a variety of device to recharge their batteries via a USB port. That means it can charge your iPod and iPhone right out of the box, and many GPS devices have USB charging these days too. There are also a variety of adapters that will be available to charge other devices as well, making this, potentially, one of the best on-the-go charging options available, and the whole thing weighs just 7.2 oz. The price is reportedly $125, with a smaller, and presumably cheaper, unit in the works as well.
I really need to get my hands on one of these things. I think it could be a very useful for my upcoming trip. Seems like a great solution, and if I do manage to find one, I’ll write up a review of what I think. Stay tuned, but in the meantime, check out the video below from TrailSpace who saw the device back at the OR Show in January.
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I'd definitely look into one of these solar chargers for my iphone… especially while out on the slopes when I use my iphone for snapping pics and video. It kills the battery!
Agreed. I think this would be great for keeping my iPod and iPhone charged while traveling and adding an iPad to the mix soon too. I'm guessing it'll work on that too.
Seems like a great little product. I'm working on getting my hands on one to see if it lives up to it's billing. 🙂
The post in Chinese characters (above) by "somebody" is an advertisement for "Hotel Workers" (aka: prostitutes). Just in case you were wondering.
Thanks! I figured as much, but that "somebody" spammed my blog while I was in Nepal with literally thousands of those posts. I haven't tracked them all down, but I'm getting them slowly but surely.