Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Mophie Juicepack Air: Apple Juice Defined
Posted by Vincent Ferrari in "Apple iPhone & iPod Touch" @ 01:00 PM
The claim: "The world’s thinnest rechargeable battery case for iPhone 3G & iPhone 3G S. Now available, the brand new mophie ‘juice pack air™’ is designed to virtually double the time you have to Rock, Talk, Surf and Send with your iPhone 3G or 3G S. The juice pack air™ is a rechargeable external battery concealed inside of a protective form-fitting case for the iPhone 3G & iPhone 3G S. It offers you the full protection of a hard-shell case while providing virtually twice the battery life of the iPhone alone; all in an ultra-thin, light-weight, low-profile design. The juice pack air™ is available exclusively through mophie.com and Apple stores world-wide. This is the first Apple certified “Works With iPhone 3G” attached battery in the world!"
The hardware: Packaged in a slim plastic shell, the Juicepack Air from Mophie offers protection and claims to double the battery life of the iPhone 3G and 3GS, but we all know how battery life claims work. Is this the one you should believe? Well, actually, I'm not telling you yet. Read on!
The details: When you open the box, you can tell one thing right away: the Juicepack Air is meticulously designed to fit the iPhone 3G and 3GS. The black model (the one I had) matches the plastic nicely and doesn't look out of place when clipped on. It comes in two pieces; the top half goes over the headphones, sleep switch, volume controls and silent switch. You can see those in the photo above. Below, you get a good feel for the bottom of the Juicepack Air.
The design remains clean on the bottom. A MicroUSB (not a mini; figures, I have 3,000 mini cables) and a power switch to turn off the battery. Doing so will turn the Juicepack Air into a standard case that does one heck of a job protecting the scratchable bits on the iPhone. A very nice feature is that you don't have to remove the iPhone from the case to charge it. You can simply plug the other end of the included MicroUSB connector into your computer and voila: charging and synching while inside the case. On the back is a button you can press and four LED lights will tell you how much of a charge is left in the battery pack.
Okay, so now you know what it looks like. Does it work?
