I’ve had the Proporta USB TurboCharger 3400 for a quite few months now so I’m in a good position to be able to give a accurate account of how the TurboCharger 3400 might fit in to your daily smartphone usage. If there’s one item that has remained underpowered on all smartphones throughout 2009 it’s the battery. For those impatient types, or for those of you who are actively looking for a portable battery backup solution, let me cut to the chase. You need a Porporta TurboCharger 3400. With is 3400 mAh capacity and swappable charging heads, it’s hard to see why you wouldn’t want one.

I’ll give you three common scenarios – all real life examples – that should resonate with many readers.

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Don’t want to pay for MobileMe and have to use a me.com email address? I’ve been using the latest apps that bring push email (sort of) to your iPhone.

GPush and Pushmail are currently racing up the App Store, so which would I recommend?

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I woke up this morning to a dead device. Hmm…. I pressed the ‘Sleep’ button, to see the Apple logo and a boot up sequence, followed by a quick battery warning pop-up message. And then, a few minutes later it was off again. The strange thing is that I had charged it fully yesterday evening. And this isn’t the first time this has happened in six months of ownership.

Low battery

Looking round the forums online, it seems that is phenomenon has been seen by others. No definitive explanation has been given, but with 15 years of mobile computing in my blood I’m going to offer a few thoughts anyway…

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My Apple iPhone doesn’t need charging anymore! Well, at least that’s what I’d like to say.

My intention, while testing the Brando Solar Charger Sheath (called the ‘Solar powered leather case‘ on their site), was to not have to plug my iPhone into the wall or into a PC or Mac – I wanted to run completely green. And the weather’s been playing ball too, with back to back sunshine for 3 days in the UK Autumn. 

Brando solar charging case

In terms of design, the case itself is as converged as the iPhone, although I have to report that there are a few serious caveats and flaws that should be noted. Read on…

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It’s certainly encouraging to see Apple providing ‘Bug Fix’ firmware updates every few weeks. For me at least 2.0.2 does indeed seem to iron out a few of the strange crashes and laggy keyboard issues. However, one huge ‘bug’ is the rather depressing battery life. There are numerous ways to squeeze every minute of life from the iPhone battery, but by far the best that I have discovered is Airplane Mode.

If you are about to dive in for an hour’s worth of gaming on Galcon, or looking to channel water droplet during train ride home in Enigmo, then Airplane Mode will greatly increase your chances of coming out of the experience having only lost 15-25% of your battery life.

Sure you’ll be out of contact for duration, but your extra focus might just help you on your way to that ever elusive score of 6,000,000 on Pinball RC!

Well that’s my top tip for gamers, what’s yours?