When you’re away form the office or your house for extended periods of time, it’s often useful to have a portable battery handy. As a consumer who carries both an iPhone 6s Plus as well as an iPad Air with me, it’s essential that I’ve got a battery with enough juice to charge up both my devices in case I find myself short of power. Enter the Lumsing Harmonica series power bank. This is actually one the most unique designs I’ve seen for a power bank, and for a lot of reasons.
Design and features
One of the main things you’ll be concerned with when
dealing with an external battery is its ability to simply get the job done, but
since I usually carry mine along with me daily, design and feel is critical. Was
quite impressed with this power bank, as it manages to boast a large 16,000 mAh
capacity whilst still remaining very small and not at all too thick. It’s
no bigger than my iPhone 6s Plus and thanks to the curved edges and glossy
finish, it feels smooth and comfortable to hold; unlike those brick shaped,
sharp edged ones that you find all the time on amazon. The Harmonica looks like
just that, it’s a long rectangular box that
curves on one long end and is tapered on the other. The Lumsing power bank is
about 5.5 inches long and about 2.5 inches deep and 0.8 inches high. As I said before,
the curved design means its comfortable to hold in the hand for extensive periods
of time, should you need to.


It’s not too heavy at all, weighing
in at around 8 oz, which is hardly noticeable when you’re
throwing it in your backpack of briefcase, but if you’re
putting it in your pocket you’ll definitely notice it
there. The longer side of the Lumsing Harmonica power bank is where you’ll
find your micro USB input to charge the unit as well as a button and 4 LED cut
outs. This is what you’ll press to check the charge of
the device quickly and to activate the charging functions. There are 2 USB
output ports on the shorter side of the device, stacked on top of each other.
They’re not labeled with amps but instead simply “OUT”.
Now, in terms of charging the unit up, since its 16,000 mAh its going to take a
while. I found that leaving it overnight is the best option as it does take
several hours to fully charge from 0-100%, but when its there it’ll
last you all day and even weeks if you only charge your phone on it. This
brings me swiftly on to the second section of this review, capacity and
charging.
Capacity and charging
The Lumsing power bank has a 16,000 mAh capacity. To give a
little context to this, the iPhone 5s has a 1,560 mAh battery and the iPad Air
uses an 8,827 mAh battery. This means that, in theory, it could charge the
iPhone 5s over 8 times and the iPad Air once with capacity to spare however
there are factors which will increase inefficiencies and result in variations
in experience and results (heat primarily).


In my tests I found that when charged to 100%, the Lumsing
Harmonica was able to power an iPad Air from 5% battery all the way up to 100%
capacity in approximately 4 hours. When testing with my iPhone 6s Plus I found
that from 5% it was able to charge all the way up to 60% in just over an hour,
and in about 2 hours it was back to 100%. There’s also the ability to
charge 2 devices simultaneously, thanks to the dual USB output ports, however
keep in mind this does result in slower charging times.
Conclusion
Overall the Lumsing Harmonica power bank is a large
capacity, well designed, lightweight and stylish solution to power. It’ll
get you through your day and make sure you’re never without charge.
The power bank market is a saturated one, but Lumsing has done an excellent job
of standing out with designs and performance like this. What’s best is, it’s
only £18.99 on Amazon! Buy it here: http://amzn.to/2bZMWre