Energizer XP18000 Universal AC Adapter with External Battery for Laptops, Netbooks, and More

by Xpal

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 4.5 x 7 x 1.6 inches ; 5.6 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B002K8M9HC
• Item model number: Energizer XP18000
• Batteries: 2 Lithium ion batteries required. (included)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (58 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: January 24, 2004

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

The Energizer XP18000 Universal Power adapter and external battery for laptops, netbooks, and more. This top of-the-line rechargeable external battery works with laptops, netbooks and MacBook models. Use it as a power adapter or charge three devices at the same time--powers most portable devices.

Charge 3 devices at once (see larger image).

Features

• Powerful Charges up to 3 devices at the same time
• Safe Charge Temperature and short circuit protection
• LED Light Indicator Smart LEDs display battery and charging status
• Lightweight No more bulky AC adapters and messy cords
• Reliable Longest industry 3-year limited warranty
• Rechargeable Can be used again and again

Provides most laptops up to 5 extra hours of use.

Extra Power On-The-Go!

The Energizer XP18000 allows you the recharge up to 3 of your electronic devices at the same time.

• Cell Phones up to 72 hours
• Smartphones up to 42 hours
• Digital Camcorders up to 24 hours
• Portable DVD Player up to 12 hours
• Netbooks up to 8 hours
• Laptops up to 5 hours

Note: All of the above results vary by device and usage patterns.

Powersafe Technology

All products integrate a minimum 12 safety logics into every cell for maximum protection of the battery, device, and user. In addition, each product uses a mathematical circuit control unit with built-in proprietary software to control and regulate temperature, voltage and current.

Trusted Brand

The Energizer XP18000 External Battery is just one of a full line of Energizer Energi to Go solutions that is bringing convenient power to consumers, making mobility easier. Energizer continues to fulfill its role as a technology innovator by redefining portable power solutions to meet people's active lifestyle needs for today and tomorrow with Energizer Energi to Go chargers for portable devices.

Free Tips for Life

FREE Tips For Life offers you an easy way to get two free tips a year for the life of your registered product. So if you change or upgrade any of your mobile electronics, you don't have to worry about having the right tip for it.

What's in the Box

Energizer XP18000, AC adapter, 3 charging cables, 15 tips, travel bag, user's manual

Product Description

The Energizer XP18000 is the best in class laptop battery and charger and is guaranteed to work with ANY laptop in the world! Use it as a power adapter or charge three devices at the same time like your cell phone, iPod and laptop. Less than a pound and compact - this rechargeable power pack fits in your bag easily! Provides up to 6 hours of additonal laptop power. Three power outputs allow you the flexibility to charge and power multiple devices simultaneously. The Energizer XP18000 comes with 3 power cables, 6 cell phone tips, 3 media tips, 9 laptop tips, an AC adapter and a carrying bag. Simply plug your Energizer Power into your electronic device for emergency ENERGI. On The GO! Energizer also offers FREE TIPS FOR LIFE.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

151 of 159 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Ultimately useful after you buy accessories, September 27, 2009

By 

Jerry Saperstein (Evanston, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Energizer XP18000 Universal AC Adapter with External Battery for Laptops, Netbooks, and More (Personal Computers)

Ever been frustrated when you bought a toy for the kids or maybe one for yourself, opened it and then learned you needed things that weren't in the box, like perhaps batteries?

Well, here's a twist: a battery that comes without the accessories you need to make it work with your devices.

Adding insult to injury is the fact that Energizer's offer of the "free" tips you need to make the device operative is more or less false. They claim the adapter tips are free and that all you pay is shipping and handling. Guess what folks: the "shipping and handling" brings the cost of the "free" tips of what other power supply vendors charge. There's nothing "free" about the offer. Of the 15 supplied tips, only 4 were for devices I owned. I had to order 3 others. What is interesting is that each of the tips carried its own "shipping and handling charge". Adds up quick that way. In my opinion, the offer of "free tips" is utterly bogus.

To their credit, they do have tips for Dell and HP computers which some of their competitors don't. Of course, no tips for the Dell and HP computers I have access to were included.

The battery itself seems to work. I have no means of accurately measuring its output and how long it will power various devices, so I have to go with the manufacturer's estimates. It is a cleanly designed unit, well constructed, relatively compact and weighs just over a pound. It will add some weight to your travel kit, but if you are stuck somewhere and need power, this is a good alternative.

Energizer claims you can charge three devices at once. This is another dubious claim. You can charge three devices at one time IF a) one of them uses 5vDC, b) another uses between 9 - 12vDC and c) the third needs 16 - 20vDC. More realistically, you'd charge two devices at a time, let's say a laptop computer and an MP3 player (if you have the right tips). That' a nice feature, but headlining "charge three devices at the same time" is a bit of a stretch. It is unlikely you'd be toting devices using 9 - 12vDC and another requiring 16 - 20vDC. Not impossible, but unlikely.

Initial charging takes about 8 hours. Subsequent recharges are supposed to take about 4. The AC adapter is a good size brick and adds another 11 ounces to the package, bringign the total weight to over 2 pounds, a not inconsiderable burden in a shoulder bag.

Three power adapter cords are supplied, one each for 5v, 9 - 12v and 16 - 20 v DC. All are short. The USB cable is of the coiled variety and feels very stiff when extending it. I don't know if that means the material is cheap, but the cable does not recompress to its original length. The USB cable, fully stretch, extends just over 30 inches which means that in most cases, you could not put the battery on the floor while your device is at table height or greater. Think about that in relation to sitting on a airplane or someplace where no table surface is available. It is, in my opinion, too short.

The higher voltage cables are pathetically short: just over 2 feet. That means in most circumstances, you are going to have this battery in your lap or tucked awkwardly nearby. As it happens, on fairly frequent occasion, I use an external battery to power a laptop and I can assure you that you don't want it in your lap. You want it on the floor.

The Energizer/Xpalpower site does not seem to offer longer cables as an accessory.

Finally, with this and other external batteries you have a lot of stuff to carry. The battery itself, the AC adapter brick and its necessary power cord and the tips. You need a case. Energizer provides a cheap velveteen bag. Yes, you can cram all of this into it, but it is not pretty. Nor is it convenient. If you want a better solution, plan on buying another case or carrying bag. Yep, another added expense.

Seemingly a good product, but frustrating in its lack of completion. The "free tips" are anything but free. The cables are too short. (The argument of the manufacturer might be that this device is intended to recharge the batteries of your device and it the device should not be in use at the time. Think that one through: it makes no sense.) You'll probably want another carrying case.

In all, figure on spending another 25% or so about the cost of the unit on accessories unless you're lucky enough to find all the tips you need in the package and can make do with supplied carrying case.

Overall and subject to acquiring long-term experience, the XP18000 battery appears to offer good value. But the false promises of "free tips", the short cables and cheap carrying case have made my experience far less than exhilarating. To the good, I got the unit on sale. If I had paid full price, I might be a lot more unhappy. If nothing else, this battery provides an interesting twist to the old cliche of "batteries not included". You get the battery with this unit: but not necessarily the accessories to make it useful.

Jerry

53 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dont buy an extra laptop battery! This WORKS great., March 2, 2010

By 

Cannon K. Ghelani "Galaxy Trader" (Charlotte, NC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Energizer XP18000 Universal AC Adapter with External Battery for Laptops, Netbooks, and More (Personal Computers)

I was trying to decide whether to buy a second battery for my laptop but then decided to buy this instead. Keep in mind that when you eventually upgrade your laptop, all the extra batteries probably wont work with the new machine. There are a couple of things I like about this unit.

1. Once you charge it up, it seems to HOLD the charge forever. I charged it up when I received it in November....and then went on a trip in January but forgot to put it on charge right before my trip....no problem it had a full charge already. I've heard from others that it stays charged up for months at a time. If you're like me, you cant always predict exactly when you are going to need the extra power.

2. The unit is sleek, not too heavy, and very compact. I only travel with the cables required to connect to my laptop.

3. It seems to power my laptop forever. My original laptop battery lasts maybe 1.5 to 2 hours.....and with this power pack, I can take that to 4+ hours.

4. Great for international flights in economy....you can tuck this unit into the seat-back pocket and tap away on your computer.

5. There is a USB charging port that you can use for pretty much any type of mobile device out there.

6. I can take this from laptop to laptop and it will stay with me long after I upgrade my laptop.

I truly cant think of a downside except the high price. Everyone seems to be whining about paying $4 shipping for a new tip. If you cant afford to spend $4 on a tip, you shouldnt be buying a $100+ battery for your laptop. The purpose of the $4 charge is to ensure that the people dont abuse the "Free" tips service. It is designed to serve as a 'hurdle' that requires people to ask themselves if they really need the tip before placing an order. I doubt that $4 even covers the administrative/fulfillment costs for Energizer.

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tips are now only $3.95 shipping/handling, January 15, 2010

By 

D. Bell "hbear" (Angwin, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Energizer XP18000 Universal AC Adapter with External Battery for Laptops, Netbooks, and More (Personal Computers)

I bought one of these on January 10 on [...] for [...]...a real steal considering the regular price.
Apparently it has been offered there before at [..]. Who knows if it will come up again.

I bought it to carry in my laptop bag to recharge my blackberry or extend the run time of my laptop in case I find myself away from AC for too long...like on a cross-country flight.

Although it came with a lot of different tips, the mini-usb and micro-usb are the ones I will probably use the most.
It came with a tip that fits my Dell Latitude E6500, and appears to power the system just fine, but Dell, in it's infinite wisdom, has some technology that refuses to charge the battery if you use a non-Dell power supply. I did check online with the Tip Finder, and discovered that the site recommended that I get the AB14 tip (the one supplied with the unit is AB08). I went ahead and ordered one in case that would make the laptop a bit happier with the XPal.
My sense is though, that to get the most run time out of the laptop, I should run the laptop battery down completely, then plug the XPal in and set the laptop to NOT charge the battery so that all of the energy from the XPal will go to running the laptop rather than the much-less-efficient task of trying to recharge the laptop battery (a function key combination can set it to not charge...on my Latitude it's Fn+F3)

Some reviewers have complained that the 'free tips for life' carry a shipping and handling charge of $10.
While that may have been true in the past, after I registered the unit for warranty, then went to the tip finder, at checkout I was only charged $3.95, which seems pretty reasonable to me.

I haven't had a chance to do extensive run-time tests yet, but if I can get an extra hour out of my laptop, and resurrect my phone from the dead, I'll be happy.

My one gripe, is that the carrying bag supplied will only hold the unit and a couple cables. The separate power brick and cords will have to be tucked into my computer bag somewhere else.

The size of the battery pack is similar to an external hard drive (bigger than the USB-powered ones that use laptop drives, smaller than the bigger AC powered ones).

Total weight of battery + power brick and AC cord + laptop charging cord and tip + USB charging cord and tip + carrying bag
is almost exactly 2 pounds...so if you're used to carrying just your netbook around, it will add significantly to the weight.

This should work for any laptop up to 15.4." If you have a 17" with a power-hungry graphics card, it may not have enough juice.
If you use a 90-Watt AC adapter, you're probably good to go...if you need a 135 Watt adapter, I wouldn't try this device.

You should be able to recharge your iPhone, Blackberry, Droid, etc. off of the USB port multiple times before having to recharge the battery pack.

I'll report back specifics after I've had more time to test.

db