Affordable Charging Solutions

I finally got around and ordered the four port USB charging device I mentioned a couple posts back. My first impression is good. It is small, about the size of my cell phone. It worked fine for my phone and an iPod touch at the same time.

It's only rated at 500mah, and the packaging does not say it works for the iPad. When I hooked up my iPad when it was at 10% if could not keep up with my using the iPad. I went down to about 4% while I worked.

I then left it hooked up while not using it, but with the iPad on with screen off, and it went up to 16% in an hour.

I then hooked the iPad up to its normal charger it and it gained about 30% in the first hour it was hooked up. I haven't solely charged the iPad on the device yet overnight, but I think as long as it is hooked up for nine hours or so it will charge. Test yourself to be sure.

Overall for just shy of $7 US, its a pretty handy device. It definitely goes into my travel pack.

There is a unit on Amazon claiming iPad compatibility with only 2 ports and for $18.

Thanks go the European Union for mandating a few years ago that all cell phones had to use a standard charger. That is why we now see cell phones all using the same charger; manufacturers do not want to have different models for the US and another for Europe so we benefit too. Remember when you could only order the charger from your cell provider for like $40 and then it was obsolete when you bought a new phone?

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