Portable power for desktop replacements

Those of you that want an extra chunk of power to take anywhere may have looked at the power gorilla by power traveller before, a very well made product and one that promises a great deal, there is one problem, you cant really use it for desktop replacement laptops, as its amperage is seldom up to the task, for example most clone power laptops require 19v at 4.5amps, and the power gorilla only provides a max of 2.5amps when on its 19v setting, a strange situation as its precisely these kind of power greedy laptops that would benefit from an extra source of power, this is not a reflection of the power gorilla its self, i have one and love it, I use it to charge my phone, net book and AA/AAA batteries when on the go, but my main laptop (a Compal FL92) sulks and flashes power lights at me if its plugged in when already turned on, though it is happy to charge when turned off (power traveller do make this plain on the FAQ for the power gorilla, and it should be noted that power laptops with smarter power management’s systems such as the macbooks seem happy, although they still only ‘run’ rather than ‘run and charge’ ).

I was however browsing the power traveller site and discovered the soon to be released powergorilla silverback, a monster of a portable power supply that made me drool, but it did look a tad big even for me to lug around the place (though im willing to try it), and it would be a sod to explain at an airport, enter power travellers twitter account, I asked them about the problem, and was told that you can run 2 power gorillas in parallel with a y-spliter cable, much excitement, a travesty to my credit card latter, and im the proud owner of 2 power gorillas and an extra cable, and you know what, it worked, instead of the normal 2.5 amps, I’m providing with 5 amps~, I still seem to need to have them plugged in on start up, but this turns out to a spike drain that my laptop makes when a power supply is first plugged in rather than anything I can attribute to the power gorillas, now I have a full 2.5 charges to my laptop before its own battery is even touched, enough for a serious days work at full power, all for just over a kilo and without a reboot to swap batteries in sight (happy sigh)

 

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