[General Accessories] vectron:
This is a review of Choetech 15600 mAh QC2.0 ext power bank (http://www.amazon.com/CHOETECH-15600mAh-Portable-Lightning-Efficiency/dp/B00ZCGLBT6/) and QC2.0 Dual USB car charger (http://www.amazon.com/Quick-Charge-Charger-Powerful-22AWG/dp/B00YX7Y3G8/)

External Battery and Charger market is probably the most saturated out of all smartphone accessories. From everything that I have tested, I think I shared only a third in my published reviews because the rest is either re-branded, or poorly build, or has low efficiency. But there are products that stand out not just with their quality but also technological innovations that put them ahead of competition. I recently reviewed Choetech USB/AC charger and surge protector which replaced a lot of my other multi-port usb chargers, and now I had an opportunity to test and to review their latest Quick Charge 2.0 (Qualcomm certified quick charger technology) external battery charger and QC2.0 dual car charger. Without exaggerating or hyping anything up, I can tell you with certainty these are two of the most advanced products in their corresponding category I have tested so far. Let me tell you why.

I will start first with Choetech 15600 mAh QC2.0 external power bank. I'm glad to see how a lot of companies adapted environmentally safe boxes with a plastic free packaging. This external battery was no exception, arrived in a carton box with a clean cover graphics. In addition to external battery, Choetech also provided a detailed instruction booklet in English and premium quality high current cable - 3.9ft long with 22AWG gauge rating!!!

QC2.0 enables faster charging of your mobile devices, but at the expense of supporting higher voltage and higher power. Cable is a bottleneck of your charging chain, thinner wires will not be able to carry as much current, can overheat, and will cause the efficiency and the speed of charging to go down. Regular USB data wires were designed to support a standard USB2.0 protocol rated at 0.5A. The thicker the wires, the lower its AWG rating and the more current it could handle. I do have some premium quality cables, but most of them don’t go beyond 24AWG, so I was very impressed with a high quality cable Choetech included with their external battery.

The battery itself is not as compact or lightweight: with dimensions of about 5.7” x 2.9” x 0.8” and a bit hefty in weight with about 355g. But that is expected since we are talking about high capacity 15600 mAh battery that has a number of charging cells. And speaking of charging, before you can start charging your phone the battery itself needs to be charged up. Usually, that’s where you have to wait a long time since most of the battery inputs are rated at 1A. Here you are dealing with a fast 5V @2.1A input which cuts down charging time by a half. And on top of that, the input also accepts QC2.0 charging at 9V @1.5A – an even further acceleration of charging time. Oh, and if that is not enough, Apple fans gonna love this – this battery also has a lightning input port to charge at 5V @2.1A. I have never seen anything like this before.

All these ports are located at the front edge of the battery with an easy access. Right next to the two Input charging ports, you have 2 Output ports to charge your phone. One port is a standard 5V @1A for your older phones or tablets, and another one – the star of this ext battery – QC2.0 port with an adaptive multi-voltage output to support either 5V @2.4A, or 9V @1.7A, or 12V [MENTION=4691858]1.3[/MENTION]A. The output voltage and current will vary depending on your phone/device.

On the top, you have a power button to check the battery status and to start the charging. Next to it there are 4 LEDs, corresponding to 25% power increments. What I found to be really cool, the right most LED is bi-color where it’s blue during normal standard speed charging and green during high speed QC2.0 charging, of either the battery itself or the phone. This is an excellent visual feedback and another innovation like I haven’t seen before. And when it comes to charging itself, battery has a healthy 90% efficiency, so you don’t lose as much of the rated capacity.

Bottom line – if you have a smartphone supporting QC2.0 fast charging, this ext battery is absolutely must have due to its high capacity, input flexibility charging from either standard usb input, QC2.0 input, or apple lightning input, and of course being able to quickly charge your smartphone at full accelerated speed. Add 18-month warranty on top of that and a very reasonable price under $40 – and you got one heck of a deal.

Next is Choetech dual USB car charger with QC2.0 quick charge port. This one also arrived in an environmentally safe box and, in addition to a charger, also included a premium 3.9ft thick 22AWG cable to handle high current without losing efficiency or charging speed. The unit is very compact at 2.4” x 1.2” x 0.8” and lightweight at about 30g. Even so it has dual USB ports, it’s still very small around usb port area. It’s quite impressive to maintain a size of a regular single usb port charger while providing 30W of power with over-current, over-charging, and short circuit protection.

When you look during the daylight, you can see QC2.0 port having a blue outline to easy find your quick charger port. That port is equipped with auto-detect charging which handles 5V @2.1A, 9V @2A, and 12V @1.5A. A regular usb port next to it is a standard port with a fixed 5V @2.4A charging speed. But where it gets interesting is in a dark when you look at the backlight. Without any cable connected, both ports have a cool blue light so it’s easy to find your charger in the car when it’s dark. When you plug in a cable into a regular charge port, the other open port remains lit up in blue. When you connect a fast charging QC2.0 port – the adjacent LED turns green. I absolutely love the visual indication with a different color for QC2.0 charging.

There are many car chargers, and I’m sure we are going to see more QC2.0 enabled ones soon. But a little detail like a background LED light and a changing color when QC2.0 charging in progress is what makes this product stand out from the crowd. And it's always a good option to have both charging ports because QC2.0 charging is fast and if you have a long drive - the annoying message of "unplug your phone" will stay up. In a summary, Choetech is a reputable company and offers 18-month warranty on their products, and for under $17 this is another must have product if your phone supports QC2.0 fast charging. Definitely gets my recommendation.