| Official Gadgeteer Hands On Review: Power Inverter by Andrew Baker Last date revised: 03/25/99 |
Well this page is about gadgets and what better to
review then a power inverter, that allows you to use all of those nifty gadgets on the go.
First some people don’t know what a power inverter is, ok I will
explain. A power inverter takes the 12 volts DC from your car and inverts them into 110
Volts AC. You can run you PC in your car. How it does this I won’t go into, all you need
to know is that it works
I bought my power inverter on Aug 7, 1997 and have loved it from day
one. I bought the PC300HS by power-to-go for $59.00 at Wal-Mart (California). PSC300HS
will supply 300watts of continuously, and will
peak upto 600watts. I own 3 power inverters, a 50 watt given to me by a friend, this
300watt, and a 1600watt and my favorite of the 3 is this one.
You have two options on wiring it to your car, they first is simply
plug it into your cigarette adapter, they second is connecting it directly to your battery
with the included cables. There are 2 outlets on the back of the inverter that allow you
to plug in household items (if you need more then 2 outlets you can use a power bar, just
make sure
the total watts of all items does not exceed 300watts). Other nice features that it has
are auto shutoff, when watts peak too high for too long, fuses that are designed to blow
before your cars fuses blow (much easier to replace fuses in inverter then most cars)
Battery protector is a feature that I have only seen in this inverter, the inverter
monitors your battery and if it drops near the point where the car won’t start the
inverter shuts off.
Will power cell phones all laptops, stereos, fans, lights, TV’s
computers, even a microwave oven, and much much more.
This inverter also saved me from embarrassment. During our homecoming
parade we got caught in the worst storm that I have ever seen in my area. a lot of the
floats were destroyed and one even blew away but our float survived the downpour, except
the gas generator shorted out and started fire, we did get the fire out but the generator
was gone for good, what good is a light float without lights. Then I remembered my power
inverter, decided why not, the worst that can happen is my inverter dies. Well it pulled
through powering all 10,000+ little lights for over 3 hour powered by the battery in the
truck pulling us.
I rate this great tool:
Construction: A+ (worked great in a raining downpour, UNIT DOES NOT CLAIM TO BE
WATERPROOF, AND WE ISOLATED THE WIRE POINTS)
Battery Life: A+ (Depends on what you are powering)
USABILITY: A+
Overall Rating: A+
I think this is the single most practical gadget I own.
Andrew Baker
ab***@cv**.com
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WOW, This review got brought up during the 25th Anniversary post for The Gadgeteer. I was in HIGH SCHOOL when I made this post, I now have a kid that is not far off from going INTO High School.
About 2-3 weeks ago we had a storm that came through and left us without power for about 5 days. I had a small generator to run a few critical things like our fridge, and freezer. One problem we had was our Sump Pump, it has to run every 6-20 hours (depending on weather) or we will start flooding the basement.
The SAME power inverter I reviewed above has been in the trunk of every SINGLE vehicle I’ve owned since 1997. I used this same inverter less than 30 days ago in my basement clamped to an old car battery to power my sump. I’ve used it a few times a year since I’ve had it, where did the time go? I gotta say tho, I’ve gotten my moneys worth out of this thing. About 25 years worth.
Ran outside in my Car (yes I put it right back again after using it) and took some pictures. It’s seen some rough days as you can see from the pictures, but it still working perfectly.
https://ibb.co/album/31x4h3