Forget PowerMats and wireless charging and the like, because the Airnergy Wi-Fi signal harvester is my new front runner for the future of gadget charging.
It’s not exactly new tech, as ohGizmo notes, but it’s the first application that’s of any real use to consumers. Put simply, Airnergy takes the energy created by Wi-Fi signals and stores it in a rechargeable battery. At CES, the device was able to charge a BlackBerry from 30 per cent power to full power in about 90 minutes.
Pretty handy, and supposedly available Q2 2010 for $US40. Not too shabby, and very appealing considering how ubiquitous Wi-Fi hotspots are these days. Very simple, somewhat cheap and incredibly useful if it works are advertised – by far one of the coolest things I’ve seen come out of CES this year. [OhGizmo]
Donnie
Monday, January 11, 2010 at 11:00 AMCouple it with a small solar panel and it would make my traveling kit awesome.
Cam
Monday, January 11, 2010 at 12:25 PMI want! Imagine leaving a couple of these in your bag as a backup. They’d charge automagically and when you need to use them they’d be ready to go!
It makes you wonder what wifi signals are doing to your body if that same signal can charge a phone battery in 90 minutes…
Ben
Monday, January 11, 2010 at 2:03 PMIt says it can charge a phone in 90 minutes but how long has the device been sitting around harvesting wifi to have enough charge to do this?
mtsa
Monday, January 11, 2010 at 4:41 PMI’d just like the handset manufacturers to incorporate this technology into the mobile phones themselves, that way my phone would just automatically be charged each night on my home wifi network, no more worries about forgetting to charge the phone
Jamie Borg
Monday, January 11, 2010 at 6:45 PMGeez… first they steal my internet signal and now they’re stealing my power! Outraaaaageous
Dave Jones
Monday, January 18, 2010 at 1:48 PMThis device simply will not work as intended, and is not as effective as people are lead to believe.
I do the calculations to debunk it in my latest EEVblog video (see website link).
Short story – under ideal conditions @ 1m from a typical WiFi router you can expect it to take in the order of 8 *years* (70,000 hours) to charge the internal battery enough to in-turn fully recharge a flat 5.6Wh smartphone battery.
Don’t be suckered into buying this sham product!