Team Geared Up

WANAKA, NEW ZEALAND (Team Geared Up) - As some of you will become aware of, I’m a bit eco-minded. O.k., maybe a bit more :)

Since I was heading off on a long-term trip, I had a couple of criterias that were required, namely power. I’ve always been conscious that electricity can be somewhat questionable. My first experiences of Thailand stood up to that: diesel generators run from 6pm to 2am to supply the whole village on Ton Sai beach. From the visible pollution stains all over the cliffs, you can guess I wasn’t too thrilled! I didn’t want to think where the rest of the exhaust fumes were going…
So, I came across Solio’s device. It’s essentially three small solar panels strapped onto the front of a battery, which supplies power to anything of 5v (walkmans) and 6v (phones), the only thing I had that didn’t fit this bill was my camera. I could live with that.
And so to update: Mixed results, but what potential! If it’s USB-based or a phone it does exactly what it says on the tin, within reason. The battery on the Solio doesn’t have as much capacity as a lot of devices (the newest model iPod’s and my archos 604 wifi take almost two full charges of the Solio). However once you’re aware of the limitations, it means you get used to it.
Limitations? A quicker charge would help (it takes over a day for a full charge even in the sunshine of Thailand). And a larger capacity battery is absolutely critical, but I’m sure that’ll appear in the next model. Other than that, you have to adapt your attitude towards power a bit - every once in a while, you need to remember to re-point the unit into the sun for best charging, etc. - but you do adjust pretty easily.

Conclusions: if you’re looking for power while away on the road and really lacking in power supplies, this could definitely help you out. I will point out that we did end up buying a power invertor for the car while in Australia (due to it being Australian winter and a lack of sun).

Note: For anyone interested, Quiksilver, the surf clothing company, have co-sponsored a whole batch of these and are being sold world-wide in their stores at a discounted price (about 10Euro cheaper).
Also, original write-up in my own blog can be found here.

Image Credit: Author’s Solio out making the most of the sunshine on Ton Sai beach, Thailand. Photo by author.

- Neal :) -