Tech Trends | At Home with Tech

July 17, 2016

How to Recharge Your Tech During Weekend Camping

If you’re the kind of camper who doesn’t enjoy being totally disconnected from your digital world, then you have to bring some gear to help keep your tech in the game…

How ironic… I’m going camping with my family where the whole point is to spend some quality time with Mother Nature where there’s no electricity. But I have remained determined to bring enough portable power with me to sustain my tech happiness for a few days… as if I’ve never left.
(Do those two equations not entirely sync up?)

And even though technically we’re ‘car’ camping, I’m not allowing myself the obvious failsafe option of simply running my Toyota RAV4’s engine for a bit and plugging in my hungry tech to feed like little piglets.

That would be so not cool, right?
In mastering my little kingdom in the wilderness, I need to be able to handle it on my own… using my available tech smarts.
(And who knows if that’s going to be enough!)

Power Up!
You may recall, I have something of an ongoing quest for power…

Last year, I went to REI and purchased the Goal Zero Sherpa 50 rechargeable power pack to support my tech while camping.

The Sherpa 50 is not cheap… currently $199.95 on Amazon, and it only offers 5,200mAh of power. But my Sherpa has a lot of flexibility being able to power my Goal Zero Light-A-Life 350 portable lamp and charge USB devices simultaneously. Plus, it can power a PC laptop. And with an AC inverter attachment, you can charge up other gear that uses standard wall plugs.

The allure is it’s a jack-of-all-trades… but again, with only 5,200mAh of power, it can only take you so far….

So this year, I decided I’m going to need some back up…

Assembling the Troops
I summoned my existing ragtag army of portable power…

-Three little power sticks ranging from 2,200-2,600mAh

-And a 7,800mAh PNY power block (T7800)

Hmmm…

‘I think we’re going to need a bigger boat!’

RAVPower to the Rescue
Next, I jumped online to purchase a little more juice…

I came across this 26,800mAh RAVPower Power Bank for $49.99 on Amazon.
A whopping 26,800mAh?
Yep.

It’s slightly bigger than my iPhone 6 Plus and about four times thicker.

It weighs just under a pound. So it’s not light.

But 26,800mAh?
Heck, yeah!

Click.

So I was done, right?

Not quite…

The Power of the Sun
And then I added in the solar equation.
I figured… why not harness the power of the sun, right?

First off, there are lots of portable solar panels out there ranging from fifty bucks to many hundreds of dollars.

Confronting the mind-numbing amount of choices, I decided to stay in the same ‘Goal Zero’ ecosystem and pair up gear I would be sure would work well together.

So I went with the Goal Zero Nomad 20.
$199.93 on Amazon.
(The sun may be free to use, but solar charging is clearly still not cheap.)

The Nomad 20 weights 2.5 lbs and delivers up to 20 watts of power.

And that translates to 6-12 hours of continuous use to fully charge up my Sherpa 50.
(So my solar charging plan is going to be a slow one… as an all-day project.)

But that’s still faster than Goal Zero’s Nomad 13 model, which only provides up to 13 watts of power.
(You’ll need 8-16 hours to power up the Sherpa 50.)

Sure, the Nomad 13 is a little smaller (1.6 lbs) and a little lighter on your wallet at $159.99.
But I figured for the extra forty bucks, it’s definitely worth it to have the faster charging capacity.

Click.

One other shopping note for you REI diehards out there… For some reason, REI doesn’t sell the Nomad 20… only the Nomad 13.

Going Off the Grid
So now I had my magnificent seven…

3 little power sticks
1 PNY power block
1 RAVPower Power Bank
1 Sherpa 50
1 Nomad 20

And then I juiced up the first six.
(The Nomad 20 solar panel doesn’t store power.)

And I was ready for my upcoming adventure!

Do you think I have enough?
(Can anyone ever have enough power…?)

Of course, how much battery power you need in the wild is entirely based on how much energy you’re going to use…

For me…truthfully, I’m not really sure.

I know there’s a mathematical solution to the question based on the specific draw of the power-sucking gear you bring with you. Plus…

How much will you actually use them?
And how many times will they need to recharge?

That’s simple arithmetic, right?
But honestly, I don’t yet know the exact power draw of the Lester family over five days and four nights of camping.

So I topped off of my portable power, clutched my solar panel close, packed up the car, loaded in the family… and headed out into the wilderness.

Here’s hoping the sun shines bright, and it doesn’t rain.

Wish me luck…

July 10, 2016

Technology Killed the Tollbooth

Nobody likes to wait on a tollbooth line. And even with E-ZPass, you’ve got to slow down. But bridges like the Tappan Zee have a little surprise for you…

I commute over the Tappan Zee Bridge on many days, and I’ve been marveling at the day-by-day construction on the New NY Bridge project for the past year. It’s really cool to see this bridge going up over the Hudson River north of New York City.

The Age of the Camera Gantry Begins
Some months back while I was driving home, I noticed a strange grid-based overhead structure going up on the Rockland County side of the southbound New York State Thruway. I could see multiple cameras on the top as cars whooshed by below.

Then, one day the Tarrytown toll plaza on the Westchester side just closed up shop.
(What?)

I thought for a moment,

So no more tollbooths?
(Manned or unmanned)

Did that also mean no more tolls?!
(No, that couldn’t possibly be true…)

The toll collection process of course was continuing…
What had happened is the giant gantry on the other side of the river had quietly been ‘activated,’ turning all of lanes into cashless toll lanes on steroids.

Now, it’s not like there wasn’t cashless tolling before at the old toll plaza via E-ZPass, but you still had to slow down while passing through.

With the new giant gantry peering at every car overhead, now you are free to maintain normal highway speeds.
(Eliminating the toll ‘slow-down dance’ will save drivers up to nine hours a year!)

Tolls by Mail
The arrival of the giant gantry also ushered in a back to the future moment for drivers… the U.S. Postal Service.

If you don’t have E-ZPass, no problem…
One of those cameras living on the gantry will snap a photo of your license plate, and then you’ll get a bill in the mail.
(How quaint)

You can pay on New York State’s website or the old fashioned way with a stamp.

The Phantom Tollbooth
About 50 million vehicles drive over the Tappan Zee every year, and about 80% already use E-ZPass.

As for all the others, welcome to Tolls by Mail.
(That’s a lot of stamps!)

Or they can sign up for E-ZPass.
(Hint, hint)

Does the cashless tolling gantry foretell the end of the manned tollbooth?

Looks like it… eventually.
(This technology is already in use elsewhere around the country.)

And with it terminates the need to develop the mighty skill set of the ‘quarter throw.’
(My father was a master at winging quarters at toll baskets when I was a kid.)

Look at me, getting all nostalgic.
Then, I remember all those blasted toll lines in the pre E-ZPass days.
(Shudder)

Resistance is Futile
I think it’s also important to recognize we’re passing through another ‘big brother’ moment brought to life by technology.

Other gantries will be erected on highways to help speed your travel, but it’s another example of more patterns of your life being integrated into the ‘Borg collective.’

Is that a problem or just progress?

A conversation for another day…

1 Comment

July 3, 2016

Why Would Anyone Buy a Finally Bulb?

This new ‘Finally’ bulb promises to take you back to the future in a big way where LED bulbs have failed… finally. But is the LED bulb juggernaut already too far ahead?

I know… It looks like I’m about to be particularly judgmental and disapproving. That’s not my intention. I’m just confused. Really.
(Admittedly, not the first time)

Here’s my back story…

Bumping into the Future?
So I was shopping at my local Ring’s End store last weekend for a replacement lawn sprinker.
(You may recall I had a meltdown last year when I realized that all of my garden hoses were very likely toxic… including the one that fed our vegetable garden.
So I replaced them all with hoses made by ‘Water Right.)

On my way out, I walked past a stack of boxed light bulbs on a table.

You know how I am about light bulbs.
(I’m like a moth.)

These were no ordinary LED bulbs.
No…

They were something new.

Newer than LED?
Well, I had never seen one before…

They were ‘Acandescent’ bulbs made by a Massachusetts company called
The Finally Light Bulb Company.
(No, not incandescent. ‘Acandescent.’)

I turned to the marketing rep, who was manning the table.

“What’s this?”

She explained to me that this new Finally light bulb used plasma to create its glow.

“Plasma?”

“Yes,” she explained.
“Finally emits a warmer light than LED bulbs, and it will help you sleep better at night.”

Uh huh.

“So this is a plasma bulb.”

She stared at me.

“That’s not the name of the bulb,” she responded politely.
(I actually think that would be an awesome name- the ‘Plasma Bulb!’)

And then she told me that Finally was running a promotion on its 100-watt model.
(Two for the price of one)

Well, I always love a deal. But I didn’t really need any extra 100-watt bulbs.

And then she told me that Finally bulbs can’t dim.
(That capability is coming next year.)

So I walked out on Finally, finally.
But I decided to do a little more research when I got home…

What is a Finally Bulb?
First off, the Finally bulb isn’t so new. This Acandescent bulb was introduced back in 2014 and released to the market in 2015.

Back then, I was still getting used to the mind-blowing introduction of LED bulbs.

Philips was one of the first out of the gate. Then Cree stormed the market.
(Other brands have also been showing up with lower price points.)

Beyond LED, I’ve had no clue there’s been a competing ‘breakthrough’ light bulb tech out there…

And what exactly is Acandescent technology?

Finally’s website describes it like this:

“Acandescence™ is a new lighting technology that utilizes induction to initiate and sustain a non-thermodynamic equilibrium plasma, coupled with state-of-the-art phosphors, to produce white light with the warm color of a typical incandescent light bulb.”

Make sense?
(Me neither.)

I think the bottom line is there’s a copper coil, a magnetic field and ‘plasma’ gas that together generate the light.

Here’s a page from Finally’s marketing materials that helps to explain…

Acandescence Vs. LED
Okay… so we’ve got here another kind of light bulb.
Does the world really need it?
Is it going to topple the dominance of LED bulbs anytime soon?

Well, let’s look for a compelling reason to buy one…

Price

Ring’s End sells the 60-watt equivalent Finally bulb for $9.99.
So does Amazon Prime.
If you want to save a little bit, Amazon’s got the 6-pack for $53.94.
So that just breaks the $9 barrier.

And how does that compare to the competition?

Cree’s 60-watt Equivalent LED with the stripped-down 4Flow filament design is $7.97 at Home Depot.
Amazon Prime’s got it for $5.11 as an ‘Add-on’ item.

And Cree’s ‘Classic’ 60-watt LED is also currently available at Amazon as an Add-on item for $5.07.

So Finally isn’t your cheapest option, but depending on the brightness of the bulb you’re looking for, it’s not that much more expensive…

Energy Efficiency

Finally bulbs are fifteen times more energy efficient than incandescent bulbs. But LED bulbs took that prize years ago.
(And according to CNET, many LED bulbs today are slightly more efficient that Finally bulbs.)

Light Quality

This is the big selling point for Finally:
It’s supposed to replicate the look and omnidirectional light of incandescence. According to CNET, the Finally bulb does have even light distribution, but the quality of the light doesn’t live up to all of the hype.

Functionality

It can’t dim. (yet)
And it doesn’t actually pop instantly on.
(Takes a few seconds to get to full brightness)

Eh.

Mercury

Yes, you read correctly. There’s a small amount of mercury in the bulb’s plasma. Finally says the amount is small enough that it’s safe for landfills.
(I say… “Mercury?! Why would I want to bring any amount into my house?!”)

Size

The 60-watt models are physically smaller than the 100 watt, although they both have the same standard-size base. So if you’ve got a fixture with a tight squeeze, the 60-watt Finally could solve your problem.

Longevity

15,000 hours is great.
But some LEDs promise up to 25,000 hours.

Not Ready for Prime Time
I’m just not feeling it. Are you?

CNET’s 2015 review by Ry Crist totally hammered Finally.
He said it’s essentially CFL tech.
(Shudder)

And the bulbs aren’t as bright as advertised.

It’s almost a year later, and now Finally is suddenly showing up in stores like everything’s fine.
(Actually, I’m only seeing it for sale at Ring’s End and Staples.
…and Amazon.)

I feel like I must be missing something…

In Search of Tech Truth
I just don’t understand the glow of the Finally bulb.

To be totally transparent, I admit to firming up my point of view without actually having purchased or used a Finally bulb. But facts are facts… right?

Sure, maybe the light quality is better than the LED competition.
(Maybe.)

Even so… Will that make it competitive in the marketplace? Or will it end up being the Betamax to VHS’s crushing success.
(I know… an old reference for most of you)

I’ve been pretty happy over the past couple of years with my LED bulbs….

So I conclude this post inviting someone out there to set me straight.
Why buy a new Finally bulb instead of an already established LED bulb?

Please, help me to see the light.

And then maybe I’ll stop writing about light bulbs.

Finally.

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