Naztech Power BankYou can’t have too much fuel in your tank – unless you’re on fire!

That’s the motto many pilots live by. Fuel buys time. It’s no different with the “fuel” in power banks like the brand-new Naztech units we received on our desk last week. They buy you extra time on your mobile phone and lots of it.

Let’s have a look at these two gizmos.

We’ve done our fair share of reviews of power banks over the years. They all deliver to some degree and they haven’t changed significantly in features either. So is there anything different here?

The PB2200 model gives away the battery capacity: 2200 mAh of power. This universal power bank comes with a micro USB cable. Always handy to have a spare one. It’s compact, the size of a large cigarette lighter but isn’t flat for easier storage. The thicker and rounded curve along one side makes it look fancier but I’d rather carry a flatter device – even if it is somewhat larger. There are In/Out ports for charging on the flat side along with a test button. Press this button to see how much juice is left. Four LEDs indicate battery life in the following increments: 15%, 35%, 65 and 100%. This differs a bit from the more or less standard convention of 25, 50, 75 and 100% capacity indicators. In fact, the bigger model, the Naztech PB6000, has the same 4 LEDs but they indicate capacity along the conventional way…  Not a big deal.

The PB6000 – yes, a huge 6000mAh capacity – has plenty of grunt to power two USB devices, hence the 2 USB ports rather than the one with the more compact model. This is a 3 ½ inch square unit, about an inch thick. Bit heavier to carry but easy to stow. You don’t charge this beast via USB but from mains. A handy flip out set of prongs enables you to plug it into a wall socket. These are US prongs of course as they are the only ones with the right compact shape. Here in Australia we use slanted prongs. Not as handy but a little adapter will accommodate quite nicely.

The Dual USB Power Adapter could deliver about 2 full days of extra talk time! I hope you don’t force anyone to listen to you for that long simply because your phone now has that extra endurance…
Anyways, you might opt for the extra 10 days of playing MP3s instead… In general, you can charge your mobile device up to 4 times fully from this Naztech unit. And because we not only travel with just one phone but with a bevy of gadgets these days, including some small tablets that can be charged from a USB port, this PB6000 is probably the better of the two units when you plan to go bush for a few days. The PB2200 on the on the hand is quite handy to take along on a daily basis if you have a phone that normally struggles to make it through the day.

Naztech Power BankPricing?
The PB6000 weighs in at a shade under 80 bucks and its smaller sibling, the Naztech PB2200 at around the $50 mark. It promises 14 hours of extra talk time which for certain will get you through the day…

Conclusion
Both units are quite handy to have if you’re away from mains power for any length of time. They look good, deliver as advertised, are reasonably easy to carry along and miss just one feature that I always like to see included in these devices: an LED torch. If you go camping for instance or with power failures, what could be handier to have than a torch? In fact, my idea is to have an extra button that will increase the brightness of the status LEDs 10 fold or so! Anyways, there’s always a next model that will incorporate this, I hope.

Highly recommended for value and usefulness.