Customer Reviews

Powerline By Original Power 0900-66 200-Watt Coffee Cup Inverter with USB Charging Port and Two Outlets

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This worked for maybe 20 minutes, but after that, any time I so much as plugged this unit into the car's outlet, the car's fuse would immediately blow (even with nothing plugged into the inverter).

The concept is great, having a place to put the inverter that is convenient and doesn't dangle or shift around, yet also isn't a big device that has to plug right into the accessory outlet (which isn't always placed to facilitate a device like this, and also precludes being able to simultaneously use the outlet to power anything else.) And enough people have left good reviews that I assume they're not all so prone to quick failure. Nevertheless, I will not buy another PowerLine. I previously had the PowerLine 0900-36A which also failed (though I did get more than 20 minutes out of it). So I just don't consider them reliable, and I don't know how long other reviewers have had their units.

Luckily, there are numerous other cup-holder-sized inverters to choose from, just do an amazon search for "inverter cup"

UPDATE: I purchased the Black & Decker PI100CB. It only has one outlet instead of two, but at least so far, it's working perfectly. It is possible that the Powerline failed quickly because of a design flaw other reviewers have noticed... the Powerline needs air around the fan toward the bottom of the unit and that air flow will generally get blocked once the device is actually placed in a cup holder, possibly leading to overheating and failure. The Black and Decker has a clever design which solves this problem. It comes with a rubber insert that goes in your cup holder, and the device in turn goes into the rubber insert. The smart thing is that the rubber insert itself is designed to make sure air flow to the device's fan is not blocked.

This little guy is GREAT. The shape allows it to sit in your cup holder out of the way unlike the bigger odd-shaped ones that fly all over the place while you're driving.

This device is perfect for road trips. It handled my laptop and cell phone charger at the same time, and the USB port let me charge my iPod too. The plug fit just fine, and the low-power alarm is quite effective.

The only bummer is when you have a real cup of coffee and no where to put it...

Used this inverter once so far. Clever design. I was hoping I might be able to leave it in the car, maybe stick a disk of paper on the top to hide the outlets, and thieves would think it was just a coffee cup, but the white cord sticking out the back near the top makes that hard to pull off. Still, I love the design. Charging my shaver and my iPod at the same time was no problem, and the fan did not come on, at least not audibly. Will have to try some higher powered devices and see what happens. I have some concern, like others have, that tucking it into a tight cup holder will not leave enough breathing room for the bottom vents, but with the fan not even turning on for my typical uses, I'm not too concerned. If it ends up being an issue, I can always stick a small piece of wine cork on the bottom to give it some additional space. The 12V plug has a two-position switch to adjust the tightness of its fit in the socket, a nice touch.

UPDATE: recently when my iPhone was nearly dead, the USB port on this device appeared to not be able to charge it. After 30 minutes of charging, I still had the iPhone displaying a red "depleted battery" graphic. The graphic normally goes away within 10 minutes of initiating charging. Subsequent tests using the Apple iPhone 3G AC adapter in the inverter's 110V outlet, then the USB iPhone cable in the AC adapter, exhibited no problems. Either the 500mA provided via USB is not enough, or the iphone is picky about its USB power source. There is some info on the web suggesting the iPhone is just picky. Google "iPhone reference voltage"

Let's see..the description says 200 watt continuous 400 watt peak..Well, I bought this inverter to power my coleman inflater (170 watt)..SO I plug it in and plug into my coleman and there it goes, right? NO!! it can't handle the load..What?? isn't 170 less than 200..Why yes it is, except in powerline land...All kidding aside, if you're looking to power something close to the 200 watt range look somewhere else..if you're looking to power something less i.e. under 170 watts than this might work, but who knows..What I do know is that it WILL NOT power 170 watts so saying 200 continuous is a stretch...THANKS

But the instructions say to not cover any of the vents while in use. That makes putting the inverter into your cup holder (as it was seemingly made for) a big no-no. The bottom of the cup is filled with vents and you can feel air blowing out when it's in use. So, they market this cool inverter that fits into your cup holder, but then give instructions that discourage you from putting it into your cup holder.....
When I put it into my cup holder, the light ended up turning red, meaning it was turning itself off.

I bought this product for a recent trip from my hometown to visit my sister near Ft. Knox, just south of Louisville. Since my mom was driving I decided that it would be prudent to buy GPS software for my computer to provide navigation from here to there. But of course I couldn't exactly run on the battery for ten hours, thus I needed a good solution to plug the computer into the lighter port that neither required me to buy an expensive adapter or risk my warranty for using a third-party product.

I went with this product based on the cup shape, and combined it with an extension cord so I could use a back cupholder and keep mine free for...well, cups. I thought this would be perfect.

Well, it did a great job, but not in the way I expected. First, it seemed to actually do better, as others have touched on, if the inverter was not in a cup. I set it behind my seat and it still worked perfectly and even stayed much cooler than it did in the 15 minutes I put in the cupholder, though I blame a humid day and high noon sunshine more for that than a product failure. It never died, only struggling in the first few minutes the car was turned on while it distributed and settled it's power where it had to go.

Meanwhile, the product kept not only the computer on a full charge, but an iPod and a couple of accessories (digital camera and iPhone) plugged into the laptop via USB to charge. Everything ran smoothly and although there were some power rundowns here and there, once the product was being used at highway speeds, it kept distributing the power and purring on. I used this for twenty hours in four days and enjoyed using it, although the cup fan issue is still vexing to me a bit. I'm guessing a 2.0 product would better address this in the future.

Definitely buy this if you have a car trip and you need multiple outlets. This may not be an everyday product, but for using power on laptops, cell phones, small radios and other items, you can keep everything charged and humming with this.

EDIT on April 25, 2010 - I am taking the yearly trip anew this year in a few days, but I'm now thinking the fan issue mentioned above might have to do with the issue of the car battery; we had the factory original Motorcraft battery in a 2003 Mercury Sable that ran reliably for seven years under my mother's ownership and that of the original lessee, and it was only this month that it gave up the ghost and died. I'm have a feeling that the charge using the cup last year was too weak and will be testing it with the new car battery this time. I will have a review addendum judging the performance of the unit and battery after this trip and see if the fan issue was the result of a low charged battery rather than an issue with the product itself.

EDIT on May 14, 2010 - Well, it's been a week since the trip ended, and I can say without a doubt that the problem from last time that I thought involved the old battery did turn out to be true. The product kept a steady charge throughout the entire trip (20 hours of traveling this time) and was able to stay in the cupholder without struggling, except for a small period of time where I had it plugged into a strip featuring multiple 12 volt outets, which was to be expected. So I definitely recommend this product, but I also would advise that if you plan to use this that it wouldn't be a bad idea to check the battery before putting it into normal use.

I really loved this while it worked but alas after just over a month of use it just stopped working. Now when it is plugged in it makes a continuous high pitched annoying noise and doesn't charge anything.

very disappointed because I was really enjoying the convenience

Ran my Dell Inspiron, daughters Mac and IPOD at the same time furing a long trip. Everybody happy

This is a poorly designed device. As someone else has written in their review, mine worked a few times and now alarms as soon as it is plugged in, even if nothing is attached. The fan is at the bottom of the unit, where it can't get air in most cup holders, so it's an inherently bad design.

I really like this product. I originally got it so that I could recharge my video camera while I'm on one of my offroad adventures. Instead of wasting money to buy new camera batteries, I just got the Power Line Coffee Cup Inverter and it does the job well. I especially like the USB outlet. I've used it to charge my mp3 player while on my way to the gym and it worked fine.

It can't be used for any heavy-duty devices, like an air pump for a camping mattress, but I've used it with my laptop and a few other low wattage devices and it's been very reliable. I bought an 800 watt inverter that I bring with me for other higher power needs, but this one is great to keep in the vehicle for charging phones, cameras, mp3 players, laptops and similar devices.

I agree with another review that the design really isn't going to fool anybody looking into your vehicle. It's obvious from the outlets that it isn't a coffee cup. But the novelty of the design is more of a functional thing that a security thing. It fits well into a cup holder and that keeps it steady and close to my Jeep's power outlets.

The "lid" on mine didn't seem like it was completely attached when I took it out of the package. But I just pressed down on it and it snapped shut and I haven't had a problem with it since.