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Portable power pack products prevent powerless problems

"Hello, my name is Rob, and I have a portable power problem. It's been six days, 13 hours, and 23 minutes since I last bought a portable power solution."

OK, so that's a bit over the top. But still, I find portable chargers appealing, as I don't like being without power when away from a wall outlet. Whether it's a long flight, a camping trip, or a Mother Nature-induced power outage, I like having alternatives. That's why there are currently eight chargers in my collection, as seen in the image at right (click for larger).

And while I can't pretend to be anywhere near as thorough as The Wirecutter, I thought it'd be interesting to compare all eight of these portable chargers.

The following table provides baseline specs on all eight chargers, and shows how much power you're getting for each ounce of weight you carry (mAh per Ounce) and how much you'll pay per milliampere-hour (mAh per Dollar)—so you can choose by power effectiveness or cost effectiveness. (The order of the table corresponds to the numbering in the above-right photo.)

My two favorites are highlighted; the Jackery is an ideal size to carry around nearly everywhere, and the EC Technology is excellent for camping trips or other extended periods away from power. Beyond the table, I share a few thoughts on each of these power bricks, in case you're really interested in these things.

#ProductSize (LxWxH, inches)Volue (cubic inches)Weight (oz)Capacity (mAh)mAh per OunceCost ($)mAh per Dollar
1OrigAudio w/ Oracle logo3.751.750.805.34.11,000243.9----
2Sony CPV3 Portable Power Pack4.001.500.754.53.02,800933.3
3Sony USB Portable Charger5.132.750.638.89.610,0001,041.7
--Sony Cycle Energy - 2+3 sold as a set13.312.612,8001,015.9$83.85152.7
4Zagg 6000 battery pack4.252.751.7019.97.56,000800.0$55.89107.4
5EC Technology Power Bank6.302.900.8014.615.422,4001,454.5$45.95487.5
6Jackery Giant+ Portable Charger4.303.100.8010.710.412,0001,153.8$39.95300.4
7Boostcase Hybrid Battery Case5.502.380.405.22.82,200800.0$99.9522.0
8JunoPower JunoJumper5.472.950.599.57.26,000833.3$99.9960.0

Read on for a little blurb on each charger…

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An odd iOS8 wallpaper placement issue

While creating and testing my iPhone 6 wallpapers, I ran into a little issue with how iOS 8 (I think that's the culprit) places wallpaper. You can see the issue by watching (and listening; yes, there's an audio track!) the movie at right.

You won't see this problem unless you try to use a wallpaper with a visible row for iOS's page indicator dots; I prefer this style of home screen, as I like the separation it adds between the dock and the icon area.

When placing such a wallpaper, however, if you don't bounce it off the top of the display, it winds up being positioned just a bit too low—the row that's supposed to contain the page indicator dots won't quite be in the right spot. As I wrote on my iPhone 6 wallpapers post, here's the workaround in text:

  1. Tap the desired home screen icon to see the full-size version.
  2. Disable Perspective Zoom. (It won't work right with the navigation highlight row I use.)
  3. Pinch and zoom out so the image is at it's 100% size.
  4. Now drag the image up and let it bounce—this is the critical step.

This really strikes me as a bug, because the images I'm using are 750x1334, which exactly matches the iPhone's resolution. So with perspective zoom off, and the image shrunk to its smallest (actual) size, there should only be one way to put that image on the screen. But, as seen in the video, that's not the case.

This is probably of use to only a couple other people on the planet who like divider rows for the page indicator dots…but if you're one of those people, hopefully this helps you get your wallpapers properly positioned.



Wallpapers: iPhone 6

Once I had my iPhone 6 syncing, it was time to get to work on my home and lock screen wallpapers. I have made these for every iOS device I've owned—here's the full collection.

My home screen wallpapers feature a bar to highlight the paging dots, and are typically "low noise" to make it easy to see icons and text. The lock screen wallpapers have no such restriction, and include a little bit of everything.

These wallpapers are 750x1344 pixels in size, and are designed for use on the iPhone 6, as that's what I have. (If you use a Plus, and really like an image or two, let me know and I can make one for the larger phone.) Note that the images shown in the image sliders below (hover and click to cycle) are low-quality 180x320 JPEG representations of the actual photos; to get the high-quality images, download the entire bundle [24MB] and install only those you wish to use.

Home Screens (16)Lock Screens (52)

Note: Due to a quirk in iOS 8, you need to use these steps when installing one of my home screens, otherwise the nav bar (the bar that shows the page navigation buttons) won't be located in the right spot. Here's how, assuming you're in the "Choose a new wallpaper" section of iOS:

  1. Tap the desired home screen icon to see the full-size version.
  2. Disable Perspective Zoom. (It won't work right with the navigation highlight row I use.)
  3. Pinch and zoom out so the image is at it's 100% size.
  4. Now drag the image up and let it bounce—this is the critical step.

If you've done the above steps right, then you'll see quite a few pixels of the nav bar above the Perspective Zoom button (top image). If you haven't done it properly, then the nav bar will barely clear the button (bottom image).

Given the images are the same resolution as the screen, I have no idea why this happens…but it does, and this is the only way to make sure the nav bar winds up where you want it.

License: All photographs in these wallpapers are © Rob Griffiths, and are freely provided for personal use only. You may not include these wallpapers on other sites, nor in any commercial product, without my prior permission. (I hate having to put this here, but prior experience has shown it to be necessary.)



A visual guide to iPhone screen resolution over time

While I was working on some iPhone 6 lock and home screens, I paused for a few minutes to put together this visual guide to the iPhone's changing screen resolution over the years (click to zoom):

Both the inline and zoomed image above are smaller than 100% scale, of course. But if you'd prefer, you can check out the massive full-size version. Be forewarned, this is a 3628x2188 pixel photo, and it's 1.7MB in size.

For the curious, the original photo was taken at Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, at roughly this spot, looking north-ish.

When viewed in this comparative manner, the iPhone Six Plus' resolution really stands out—there are a ton of pixels on that gorgeous screen!



An iPhone 6, (no) movies, and me

On Friday, I received my new iPhone 6, which I really like—a lot, in fact. Over the weekend, however, I discovered that my new iPhone does not like iTunes—at least not syncing my movies via iTunes.

Things started great, with the arrival of the new iPhone 6 on Friday afternoon:

From there, though, things didn't go exactly according to plan…and I documented my progress (or lack thereof) via Twitter over the weekend. Read on for the full story, as told in 140 character increments.

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