Mophie Juice Pack Air follow up review
I've been using the Juice Pack since February 2010. It has not been my exclusive case during this time. I alternate between it an the Otter Box Defender. Still, I have put in enough time with the Mophie to draw some conclusions.
First off, I haven't experienced one of the more common complaints that I hear about the Juice Pack-signal degradation. I NYC, where I use the case most, I have not observed any change in signal strength with the Juice Pack on. For the record, this has been my observation with both the old and new Apple signal meter display.
I have also not picked up any scratches on my iPhone's back from the Mophie either. I could see how this could happen though. I you were to put the Juice Pack on while there was some sand or grit on either the phone or the case, a scratch would be easy to get. Wipe off the phone and case before putting them together and all should be well I think.
The exterior of the Juice Pack , at least the black one, is slippery. This issue bothered me enough that I bought some egrips to make the case more secure in hand. This has made a big difference in preventing drops in my opinion.
As for battery life, the Mophie has been performing flawlessly for me. It does roughly double my run time. Much appreciated indeed.
I was very concerned about the sturdiness of the Mophie. The top part, in particular, seems flimsy to me. Still, the case and phone did survive a fall from about 4 feet to a carpeted surface a few weeks back. I was genuinely afraid that my iPhone was a goner but there was no damage to either the case or the phone. Mind you, the Mophie is nowhere nearly as tough as an Otter Box but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be in this category either.
I can understand why some folks are reporting issues with the cable connector breaking. You do have to be careful when plugging the Mophie in. The area around the connector really could stand a redesign in my opinion. It is pretty tight right now and too much pressure at the wrong angle would probably break the cable connector.
In summary, the Juice Pack Air is a good compromise between size and power. It does make the phone somewhat thicker but the increased battery life is worth it in my opinion.
posted by Ed at 5:59 PM
2 Comments:
Let me start out by saying that Mophie has poor customer support.
I've owned my Juice Pak 3G/3GS for over a year now. It worked fine for about 6months then I had to send it back in for connector problems. (for the connector on the front edge.)
Now, the connector problems are back plus the case is broken and
cracked near the iphone power switch plus, I get the "This device not supported" pop-up at certain points during discharge.
Looking at the connector under a microscope, it looks like the contacts have been worn or scraped off. Poor design in my opinion.
I would think that, if I were "Mophie" I would consider (at least) that the connector issue is a design defect and provide customers with some "good will" and get it fixed. When I asked the Mophie tech support person about that he said..."Our warrenty policy covers 1 year only."...but provide a 15% off the purchase of a new case.
If they do not (apparently) want to fix their design problems, and there's no proff that they have or will, I do not want to purchase ANOTHER PROBLEM CHILD of theirs!
I'll be looking at their competition.....
That stinks. So far, my example has been holding up pretty well. That being said, I agree that the power port should be more robust.
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