Monday, April 8, 2013

Product review: Intocircuit Power Castle Series PC11200 11200mAh Heavy Duty 5V 2A/1A Dual USB Ports External Battery Pack with Nexus 7 Tablet, Samsung Galaxy 7.7 Tablet , and Samsung Galaxy Nexus cell phone

I tested Intocircuit Power Castle Series PC11200 11200mAh Heavy Duty 5V 2A/1A Dual USB Ports External Battery Pack with Nexus 7 Tablet (JellyBean 4.2.2), Samsung Galaxy 7.7 Tablet (ICS 4.0.4), and Samsung Galaxy Nexus cell phone (JellyBean 4.2.2).

I own several external battery packs.  To test their performance I run the same set on tests on each of them in order to provide unbiased results as the numbers speak for the performance of each unit.

To test Intocircuit power pack I ran my 10 minute test for each of my 3 devices on each of the 2 ports for a total of 6 tests. In addition I charged both Nexus phone and Nexus Tablet at the same time, one in each port. The results of these 7 tests are included in the tables below.

I am attaching a collage of 2 photos. You can locate this photo by following 'customer photos' link under the main photo.

Photo #1 shows the power brick on the digital scale, its weight is 9.9 oz. The size of the power pack is 2.625" by 4.375" by 0.875".

Photo #2 shows the top of the unit which has an LED screen showing the level of charge.  Next to the screen there is a small lack button which turns on the LED light. The light is pretty dim. Some other power bricks I have have a much brighter light, however this is not a key feature of the battery pack and the underpowered light did not effect my rating of this unit.

This power pack has two outlets, they are not labelled.

I use Battery App by Elvison to determine how each device recognized the charging source. 'AC' status means the charging is at full charging rate. 'USB' status indicates charging at a lower charging rate. 'Discharging' status means that the charging rate is below the power that the device is consuming so it slows down the discharge rate but does not re-charge.

My methodology is to charge each mobile device on each port of the unit for 10 minutes and measuring how much each unit was charge in that 10 minute period. Each line in the table below represents a separate 10 minute test.

The key findings:
(1) Both Nexus phone and Nexus 7 tablet (both running Jelly Bean 4.21) charged at AC rate on both ports.
(2) Samsung Galaxy 7.7 works, but show different behaviors on the two ports

The table below summarizes my findings:

Nexus 7 Tablet
--------------
right port.......AC rate.....1% charge increase
left port........AC rate.....2% charge increase


Samsung Galaxy Nexus Phone
--------------------------
right port.......AC rate.....5% charge increase (among the best rates in my tests)
left port........AC rate.....5% charge increase (among the best rates in my tests)


Nexus 7 Tablet and Samsung Galaxy Nexus Phone at the same time
--------------------------------------------------------------
Tablet...........AC rate.....1% charge increase
Phone............AC rate.....5% charge increase (among the best rates in my tests)


Samsung Galaxy Tablet 7.7
--------------------------
right port.......AC rate..... 1% charge increase
left port........AC rate..... discharging if screen is on, 1% charge increase if screen is off

In addition to the tests above we used Nexus 7 Tablet to navigate during a several hour trip while plugged into Intocircuit Power Castle Series PC11200 11200mAh external battery (rather than the car charger).  Nexus 7 remained charged at 100% at the end of the trip.

I received this battery pack from the manufacture for an honest review be it positive or negative. Running the same set of test on all my external batteries allows me to provide an unbiased review. By comparing the results of the tests for this battery to the other external batteries I tested, this power pack earned a 5 star rating.


You can find it on Amazon by following this link.



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