Yahoo! News - PluggedIn: Gadget Lovers Seek Reliable Power After Blackout
This is exactly the issue now after the blackout, and per my earlier post. Phone worked fine, but no internet for nearly 24 hours is not an option. There has got to be a way.
Yahoo! News - PluggedIn: Gadget Lovers Seek Reliable Power After Blackout
Yahoo! News - PluggedIn: Gadget Lovers Seek Reliable Power After Blackout
Sat Aug 23, 7:32 AM ET Add Technology - Reuters Internet Report to My Yahoo!
By Eric Auchard
NEW YORK (Reuters) - High-tech New Yorkers who sport the latest electronic devices like haute couture fashion are reconsidering the value of lower-tech emergency gear after the recent meltdown of a major chunk of the U.S. electrical grid.
Gadget addicts who were literally power-less for 24 hours or more are revising their checklists of must-have features so they will never again be left in the dark, cut off from friends, family, colleagues and reliable information or news.
"Maybe we consumers will need to have communications options because we don't have a clue what will work in an emergency," Tom Wolzein, a Wall Street media analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, mused in a note to clients after the blackout.
Cellphone networks, overflooded by frantic callers eager to communicate their difficulties, initially failed from the sheer volume of calls rather than any specific electrical problems. Rechargeable computers gave out within hours. Network equipment petered out as back-up battery supplies wore out.
One by one, feature-packed gadgets faded to black as power died. The high-speed high-tech world ground to a halt from Detroit to Toronto to New York, as the modern conceit of limitless, cheap and pervasive electricity found its Achilles Heel.
"As consumers, our focus may well shift from the deal in a bundle to affordable redundancy," Wolzein said of the unexpected failure of the most sophisticated phones, wireless (news - web sites) devices and computers.
As power returned, a steady stream of consumers flocked to electronics retailers, hardware stores and supermarkets to stock up on batteries, flashlights and transistor radios.
"Everyone wants to know where the batteries and flashlights are," electronics salesman Carlos Zabala, 22, said as he directed shoppers at the entrance of an office supply story in Manhattan on Monday. "They can think of nothing else."
A mini-maglite flashlight that runs on two "AAA" batteries offers an adjustable light beam and can be converted quickly into a free-standing electric candle. It carries a back-up lamp inside the tailcap and retails for around $10.
SharperImage.com offers light-emitting diodes for $15. The size of a piece of candy, they can fit on a keychain and throw off a beam up to 30 feet. In contrast to old-fashioned light-bulbs, the Mini Torch is meant to last 100,000 hours.
There's also the "five-in-one" rechargeable radio and spotlight hybrid for $40. It features an AM/FM radio, a spotlight, and a siren. It recharges by solar cell in the sun or hand crank in the dark.
MAKE YOUR OWN POWER
The most industrious geeks sought to manufacture their own power during the crisis. When one Manhattan technologist's cordless phone failed, he taped together six "AAA" batteries to reproduce the 12-volt power supply necessary to run the phones. By fiddling with the wires he was able make calls.
Power inverters and battery chargers typically are sold in camping stores. These convert the direct current of batteries into the alternating current rechargeable devices require.
Chicago-based Tripp Lite has a portable model for around $30 that allows high-tech gadget users to plug into a car cigarette lighter like any AC office outlet.
An industrial-strength version of the Tripp Lite inverter sells for $300 that can run whole appliances off a car battery as long as the motor is running and gasoline is available.
With the lights out, automobile batteries emerged as distributed power generators for city blocks. Neighbors turned to car owners for help recharging appliances. Car stereos became the center of impromptu street parties around the city.
A few were far better prepared than others.
"I've got everything I need," Julio Carmona, a New York Stock Exchange (news - web sites) trading clerk, boasted last Thursday as he stood on 42nd Street after commuter trains stopped running to his home in Poughkeepsie, 80 miles north of New York City.
Carmona carries an emergency kit with flashlight, face mask, whistle and first aid items with him as he commutes to Wall Street and back each day. It is a precaution he said he has taken since the September 11 attacks nearly two years ago.
Also part of his kit is a handheld Casio television with a 2.3 inch screen that he used to keep tuned in to local news updates. For a time, Carmona may have been the best informed pedestrian among the many thousands left stranded along 42nd Street after power failed.
For a detailed discussion of what devices worked and which ones didn't during the blackout, Gizomodo (http://www.gizmodo.com), a New York-based Web site devoted to the latest high-tech gadgets, featured a lively discussion on Monday.
August 23, 2003 at 07:10 PM in Web lifestyle | Permalink
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