Solio Classic Hybrid solar powered battery charger
This is such a cool idea from Better Energy Systems. The Solio solar powered charger is a portable device (weighs 5.6oz/156g) that can recharge batteries in devices like mobile phones, PDAs, ipods and similar. They also offer a range of adapters/tips for most of the popular brands. This isn’t a device to store away and only use when traveling. Use it to replace your wall charger at the home or the office.
It is designed to fan out and has three solar panels that absorb the sun’s energy and convert it to stored power. For example, a fully charged Solio Classic will charge your typical mobile phone more than twice or give around 20 hours of music on your ipod. An hour of sunshine equates to about 20 minutes of talk time. The internal battery lasts for about a year and is easily replaceable.
The Solio solar powered charger can also be plugged into the wall so when travelling you only need it plus the adapter/tips for each of you devices. Much better than carrying a separate power adapter for each device.
More details about the Classic Hybrid solar powered charger at the Solio website.
Vers Audio 1.5R bamboo iPod dock
Vers Audio’s mission according to their website is to ‘craft a beautiful, better sounding system with less impact to the environment at the same time’. As a company they look for sustainable materials and in the case of the wood they use the entire tree including the roots, trunk, branches, leaves and bark. The paper in the packaging is 100% post-consumer waste. What is even better is they have looked to reduce the overall packaging as well. For example, no twist ties and paper pulp packing rather than styrene foam means a 12% reduction in the size of the box. The flow on means more boxes per container and the subsequent saving in transportation.
What about the product? The Vers Audio 1.5R Bamboo uses an energy efficient amplifier and by using 9.5mm thick wood rather than plastic the unit is more rigid and therefore the sound is not affected by the product. Most other ipod docks don’t consider this. Style wise they have adopted the less is more approach and left just the basic controls. Perfect.
Much more information including technical specifications are available at the Vers Audio website.
