I was contacted by Gabriel from HisGadget at the start of February to see if I would be interested in reviewing one of their 6-port USB charging stations. They subsequently sent me one, but I’m free to say what I like about it.
This is a rather nice USB charging station from iClever. It has 6 ports, each giving a maximum current of 2.4A, which is more than enough to drive all models of Raspberry Pi (although the Raspberry Pi 3 is right on the limit if you plug lots of power-hungry devices in).
It measures 10 x 2.7 x 6.9 cm which is small enough to sit on your desk without taking up loads of room and is fairly portable. It comes with a standard figure-of-8 power cable that doesn’t have a brick attached, so that adds to the portability. The unit is in a matt-black soft finish and is kind of attractive if you’re into the minimal look.
I tried it out thoroughly by plugging in:
- A Raspberry Pi touch screen.
- A Raspberry Pi 3.
- A Raspberry Pi Zero with an attached LED board and Scroll pHAT.
- A Raspberry Pi 2.
- A Raspberry Pi B+.
- A Raspberry Pi B.
Needless to say, everything booted up correctly. I did get an undervolt warning on the Raspberry Pi 3, but that could have been the quality of the USB cable I was using to connect it up with. The warning went away, however, when I wasn’t really doing very much on it.
The charging station costs £14.99 from Amazon and you can get one here.
Summary
I really enjoyed using this station. It’s small, it’s powerful and can power or charge 6 devices at once. For £14.99, it is great value for money and I thoroughly recommend one if you’re looking for a power solution.
I use a similar item to power my Pis and charge my phone. They are a great idea.
I could use a few of these at the Raspberry jam Berlin