Home > Consumer Reviews > Black & Decker CPI100B 100 Watt Power To Go Cordless AC/USB Power Supply

I thought this power supply did better than I expected. Running a Dell D610 under normal use, I got about 50 minutes with. Given that it has 4Mah of storage, that is better than I could have hoped for. I would caution anyone that thinks they should get 9 hours of computer battery life to read the specs and understand what the power requirements of a computer are. There isn't an easily portable product on the market that can do that. A gas generator would but they don't allow those on airplane for some reason??? All kidding aside, one issue that anyone using this with a laptop should realize is that it won't automatically kick the computer into an energy saving mode like it does when you switch to your internal battery so the power draw will be higher and the battery won't last as long even though it is rated pretty close to the same capacity as a normal laptop battery. Anyway, it does well charging my gadgets which is the real reason I bought it anyway. It is worth spending the extra money on this instead of the smaller one because it will give a full charge to the palm, camera battery and the cell phone at the same time.

Looking that the three versions of this 10W, 20W, 100W, I found the technical details on the B+D site helpful:

The 10W has a 700mAh battery, the 20W has a 2Ah battery, and this Model # CPI100B the 100W a 4Ah battery. It looks like they are progressively heavier, but I can't find accurate figures on weight or dimensions.

Note that the tech specs imply that the 100W model has two USB ports as compared to the single USB port in the lower models.

Input - 9.6 VDC, 15A
Output - 115V AC 60Hz-100W for 5 minutes, 80W continuous
Battery - 4Ah, NiMH
USB - 5V DC (350 mA) each x 2
- *Approximate talk time based on average results using commonly used cell phones. Results may vary depending on features/cell phone used

Hi, I was considering buying this product, but I estimated how much the battery would last first. Here is a method to avoid you a headache.

First check the power consumed by your laptop AC adapter or any device.You can get an aproximate value by multiplying the output voltage ny the output amperage.

For example a typical value would de around 90 W for a regular laptop, 40 W for a netbook and 5 W for a cell phone charger.

The battery on this device is 4 Ah (means Amperes per hour), I guess that this is a 12 V battery. This means that this device gives 4 x 12 = 48 Watts-h (Watts per hour). The inverter is not 100% efficient, lets say its 90% efficient. Therefore after the inverter at 115 Volts we would have approximately 48 * 0.9 = 43 Watts-h. This is the real capacity of the device.

Therefore, for a laptop (a) or netbook (b) or cell phone charger (c):
a) 90 Watts adapter you will get approximately 43 Watts-h / 90 W = 0.47 hour = 20 min.

b) 40 Watts adapter you will get approximately 43 Watts-h / 40 W = 1.08 hour = 64 min.

c) 5 Watts cell phone charger = 43 Watts-h / 5 = 8.5 hours (as advertised)

Use this to calculate your own device
c) X Watts device you will get 43 Watts-h / X W = Y hour = Y*60 min

Hope this helps, please note that this is my OPTIMISTIC estimation of the time it will run a laptop

Use this device to charge your iPod, Zune, portable DVD player, boombox, whatever you need. It's only 100 Watts, so be cautious trying to power up a laptop - I wouldn't recommend it. Living in the Midwest, this thing comes in very handy during power outages!
For small personal electronics, this thing is great. I work construction, and my Zune won't last all day. I dont always have access to electricity, so this portable charger is a godsend. (At just 100 watts, it obviously will not operate my 6 amp circular saw!) Unlike many other inverters, this charges from regular household power, not your car. You can charge your device from this inverter via either a three prong household type plug in or a USB port. It's light enough to take on a plane (be prepared to explain to the TSA bozo what it is).
Its lightweight for current technology, and will undoubtedly will get smaller and more powerful over time. Really a cool thing!

I used this product to power four strings of 60 LED Christmas lights on my tandem bike for two hours between recharging. The power supply is a perfect combination of rechargeable batteries and an inverter to provide regular A/C current. All in a neat little package. Also provides DC current via USB outlets.

I've uploaded two photos of the bike here.