Black and Decker PowerToGo 20W Review

To conclude, I personally think that unless you plan on being stuck in the desert and need emergency electricity to a cell phone, you should just buy a cheap non-OEM battery and keep it on hand as a backup.  I don’t think I could find much entertainment value when it comes to the PowerToGo, aside from maybe charging an iPod, but they are electricity suckers as well.  I believe that many of the home-made products on Instructables.com have done a much better job than this has, and all you have to do is replace batteries in many of them (i.e. the Minty Boost).

Another factor in my final decision is that it is common for this model to lose power on its own after a couple days without use when not plugged into the charger.  I find that very unsettling for a product that costs upwards of forty bucks.  The funny thing was that when I contacted Black & Decker to question them about the charge retaining issue, I never received an email back.  I put off this review for a week, in fact, just so I could give them a chance to explain themselves.  So much for that.  So want to get the most for your money?  Spend that forty bucks on a brand new OEM battery or five generic ones.  You’ll get more play time out of them..

	REPORT CARD : Black & Decker PowerToGo category rating comments Innovation 3 Great idea, but nowhere near efficient Durability 4 Tough plastic casing, but could be stronger Reliability 1 There are many cheaper substitutes that can do a much better job… and keep a charge after two days. Usefulness 2 Like I said, there are many, many substitutes out there… Value 2 Fourty dollars is way too much for something that takes this long to charge without delivering a decent life. FINAL VERDICT: 3 out of 5 stars