We saw a lot of awesome accessories and cases from the popular company TYLT at CES last week. Sadly most were geared towards the iPhone, but what we have below has Android all over it. TYLT’s impressive Vu Qi Wireless charger was hiding at their booth but today it’s available for pre-order. More details on this charger that doubles as a stand below.
There’s plenty of different options when it comes to wireless charging. Energizer, PowerMat, JBL, and all those Lumia chargers come to mind. TYLT has a different idea though. Why drop your phone on a desk flat so you can’t see it when you can just add wireless charging right into a stand. The TYLT Vu does exactly that, and looks good doing it.
The TYLT Vu charger and stand will let you enjoy a book, watch some Google Play Movie rentals and more all while your phone charges at the same time. Why most wireless chargers lay flat is beyond us, this is the ideal design and something I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of. With devices like the Nexus 4, DROID DNA, and more all coming with wireless charging built-in expect to see a lot more stands like these.
What also helps make TYLT better than most is the fact that they have multiple charging coils throughout the stand. This means you can set the phone down any way you’d like. Landscape while viewing a video, portrait for anything else, and even toss more than one device on if you’d like. The TYLT Vu Qi Wireless Charger and stand comes in multiple fun colors like black, blue, yellow, and red, and is available right this minute for pre-order starting at $69.99. They’ll begin shipping on April 1st, so hopefully those Nexus 4’s have shipped from the Play Store by then. $70 is pretty expensive, but if you want wireless charging this is a decent solution.
Wow , these are really cool . I like the concept.
yea not bad..
From their website:
Output Voltage: 19V 1A
Output Current: 5 watts
… huh?
I think there’s some typos there… Watt is a unit of power, Amperage is the measure of current. And I think they mean to say the Output is 5V 1A. I don’t know what a phone would do with 19V.
I’m also skeptical of their claim that it “charges as fast as a traditional plug-in charger” as most are now a 1A design at minimum (some as high as 2.1A) and getting output to the phone’s coils wirelessly only works at 70% efficiency at best. So while it’s probably not TOO far behind, I still think it’s a bit much to claim that it’s “as fast as” plugging in a 1A charger, or even an 800mA charger.
The product looks nice, but their marketing is giving pause to my desire to purchase one. Fix the tech specs and tell us that it’s at the top end of the Qi specification when it comes to power output instead of claiming it’s as fast as wired, and I’ll gladly give it a shot.
WOW! TYLT did it again with their innovative products! The VU charger is a very styling wireless charger that offers the QI technology. I’m sure we all get tired of using cord chargers. check out the VU at Kickstarter…and see what I mean? Everyone needs to have a VU! STOP carrying all these wires around. With the VU your smartphone charges at the same speed as a cord charger!