Anker battery ratings ... the are NOT what you think.

So I ordered a couple of the Anker Pro 10000mAh Multi-Voltage batteries.

http://www.amazon.com/Anker-10000mAh-Multi-Voltage-Camcoders-Recorders/dp/B005NGKR54/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1371785583&sr=8-4&keywords=anker

I read the directions.  Something caught my eye that didn't seem right.  They specified the 10000 capacity at 3.7V.  Huh?  There is no 3.7V output on this battery.  So I sent Anker support an email to ask what that was all about.  Here is their response acknowledging that the effective capacity of the battery is only about 7000 mAh.  Grrr!!!!   

3.7V is the voltage of the internal cells. The built-in battery cell has a voltage of 3.0-4.2V. The PCB will boost it from 3.0-4.2V to 5V or higher (12V / 9V) to give a USB output to charge you devices. This procedure consumes power, plus the power will also drain on the Resistance of the cable and phone's circuit, those makes the anker external battery have an efficiency of about 70% (most of other external battery products' efficiency in market is lower than 65%). Therefore, the actual output of this external battery is 70% (10000*70%=7000mah). Hope this helps.

-Allen

As you requested awhile back, I have been running mine without charging it between outings and I am up over 18 hours with my Eagle Cuda 300 and two of the four charge indicator lights are still showing.  I am happy with it. But I noticed that the last session it was only putting out 9.2 volts.  I was feeling a little bit disappointed, until I just went out to check and I noticed I had the 9V output option selected.   I assume this will screw up the test results.  So, my testing will be redone when I get back from Alabama in August during salmon season.

As you requested awhile back, I have been running mine without charging it between outings and I am up over 18 hours with my Eagle Cuda 300 and two of the four charge indicator lights are still showing.  I am happy with it. But I noticed that the last session it was only putting out 9.2 volts.  I was feeling a little bit disappointed, until I just went out to check and I noticed I had the 9V output option selected.   I assume this will screw up the test results.  So, my testing will be redone when I get back from Alabama in August during salmon season.

Did you have it on 9V the whole time?  It might be interesting to compare 9V lifetime to 12V lifetime.

-Allen

But still, I'm disappointed in the misleading marketing.

-Allen

As you requested awhile back, I have been running mine without charging it between outings and I am up over 18 hours with my Eagle Cuda 300 and two of the four charge indicator lights are still showing.  I am happy with it. But I noticed that the last session it was only putting out 9.2 volts.  I was feeling a little bit disappointed, until I just went out to check and I noticed I had the 9V output option selected.   I assume this will screw up the test results.  So, my testing will be redone when I get back from Alabama in August during salmon season.

Did you have it on 9V the whole time?  It might be interesting to compare 9V lifetime to 12V lifetime.

-Allen

No. I think I must have bumped the switch on Saturday. Actually, I was using the one I have sitting loose in a dry box. Not the one I photographed for the other thread to which I added foam to to secure it better.  If I remember right, I started out at 12V, but later on I noticed it was down to 9V.  It was pretty rough out of Depoe Bay for awhile in the morning and when we were heading back south from Government Point, I got the bow pretty high in the air several times.  I bet it got bumped while bouncing around in the hull.

Yeah, the marketing is a little disappointing.  I am sure you will be fine on the John Day with two.  If not, you can borrow mine if you need them.

"Battery specs-manship" in action.....my battery has a higher A/H rating than your battery......as a retired magnetics/transformer engineer, this crap was rampant early on with commercial switch mode power supplies in the 1980's-'90's.

Yeah, I'll be ok.  Gonna drive a FF off of it, although I doubt I'll need a FF much except for the integrated GPS.  The USB outputs will come in handy charging camera batteries though.

-Allen

"Battery specs-manship" in action.....my battery has a higher A/H rating than your battery......as a retired magnetics/transformer engineer, this crap was rampant early on with commercial switch mode power supplies in the 1980's-'90's.

Yeah, I half suspected before I bought it, as there has to be some inefficiencies when generating multiple voltages.  I just didn't know how much inefficiency.

It seems a bit of a shame that it takes 12V in only to charge a 3.7V battery only to boost it back up to 12V.  I'm sure even rawkfish could have designed a more efficient battery system, huh Jeff?     And I'm likely to take the 5V output and charge a 3.7V camera battery.

-Allen

Guessing I am not the only one that remembers those extremely small "Power Boosters" promoting amazing "Watts Per Channel" ratings....   What kid wouldn't fall for it's claims in hopes of having the loudest car stereo they could afford. 

Find any product where many of it's buyers feel "more is better" and not have any kind of governing agency that monitors and verifies their claims ....

I think these misc cheap Lithium battery packs we have tried fall into that "Not as good as they claim, but good enough to get the job done" area.   I am only hoping their built in charging / cutoff regulators hold up to their claims for safety reasons.
 

"Battery specs-manship" in action.....my battery has a higher A/H rating than your battery......as a retired magnetics/transformer engineer, this crap was rampant early on with commercial switch mode power supplies in the 1980's-'90's.

Yeah, I half suspected before I bought it, as there has to be some inefficiencies when generating multiple voltages.  I just didn't know how much inefficiency.

It seems a bit of a shame that it takes 12V in only to charge a 3.7V battery only to boost it back up to 12V.  I'm sure even rawkfish could have designed a more efficient battery system, huh Jeff?     And I'm likely to take the 5V output and charge a 3.7V camera battery.

-Allen

Pretty crazy how they're marketing their stuff.   It makes sense, but it ain't pretty.  It seems like it would make more sense to just stack some cells together to get the 12 volts and use only a buck converter instead of using only one cell and needing a boost converter for most uses of the pack.  I imagine that would probably make the pack pretty big though. 

It is my understanding these battery packs are made up of several cells in series. I think that is why they stated  "3.7V is the voltage of the internal cells" as that is the voltage of each cell.   My guess is the CSR that answered Allen's question really didn't phrase it in a correct manner.   The PCB must be dropping the combined voltage of those cells as needed for the 9 and 5.5 volt outputs.   What stumps me is the lower voltage outputs having a higher claimed mAh rating    RawkFish,  is that what indicates they are using a buck boost to step up the voltage from 3.7 volts

Craig or Allen,  One of you are just going to have to donate and dismantle one of your battery pack and tells us what you find .... In the name of science 

It is my understanding these battery packs are made up of several cells in series. I think that is why they stated  "3.7V is the voltage of the internal cells" as that is the voltage of each cell.   My guess is the CSR that answered Allen's question really didn't phrase it in a correct manner.   The PCB must be dropping the combined voltage of those cells as needed for the 9 and 5.5 volt outputs.   What stumps me is the lower voltage outputs having a higher claimed mAh rating    RawkFish,  is that what indicates they are using a buck boost to step up the voltage from 3.7 volts

Craig or Allen,  One of you are just going to have to donate and dismantle one of your battery pack and tells us what you find .... In the name of science 

Boost converters are notoriously inefficient.  70% is not unbelievable, although it seems a little on the low side to me.  So they may in fact be using a single 3.7V cell.  If they were indeed cascading multiple cells and used a buck to step the voltage down, I'm pretty sure they would have higher efficiency as a 70% buck is not acceptable in my book.

They probably have a specific size cell they work with, and put multiple in parallel to increase the mAh rating.  To increase the voltage they would have to then put these in series, with the mAh capacity staying the same.  As rawkfish stated, the size would grow.

-Allen

I just got the same unit but haven't had time to wire it yet to my FF/gps. Craig, your picture looks like you sliced open the male to male connector wire to expose pos and neg wires and then  connected those to trailer flat connectors, is that right? How did you do yours Alan? I'm hoping to get to it this weekend.
Tom

I just got the same unit but haven't had time to wire it yet to my FF/gps. Craig, your picture looks like you sliced open the male to male connector wire to expose pos and neg wires and then  connected those to the traler flat connectors, is that right? How did you do yours Alan? Im hoping to get to it this weekend.
Tom

I haven't wired it up yet.

-Allen