It's prime vacation time here in the northern hemisphere. A good time to get away from all the heat and technology by, well, going somewhere hot, and bringing along your technology. With that ridiculous notion in mind, we thought it would be a good time for another portable charger roundup, to help you go somewhere nice, without suffering from gadget withdrawal. Go ahead, take your iPod to the far-off beach, your cell phone to the family barbeque, or your USB Fragrance Drive somewhere that should smell better. And don't worry about running out of juice. Gearlog's got you covered.

On deck this time around are the iGo powerXtender, the Tekkeon myPower All, and the Xantrex Xpower Mobile Mini. The good news is that not one of these chargers is a dud. They all have their strengths, and a weakness or two, but depending on what you're trying to charge, any one of these devices could make your tech-fueled travels more convenient.

The Xpower Mobile Mini wins the sleek and smart design award here hands down. For $60 (or a lot less if you shop around), this device packs a three amp-hour lithium-ion battery inside a sleek shell that incorporates not only a standard female USB port, but also a mini-USB connector on a pivoting arm. Even better, it's designed to be able to charge two devices at once. And at about the size of a point-and-shoot digital camera, it'll easily go with your anywhere, even if you have to stash it in your pocket. If it runs out of juice while you're traveling, you can recharge the Mobile Mini via wall, car or USB power. The only issue I have with Xantrex's charger is that, with the solid arm of the mini-USB connector, I'd be worried about breaking either my device or the charger, particularly if I was traveling while charging. And charge speed is of the trickle type: In an hour, this device upped my cell phone's battery meter about 20 percent.

The iGo powerXtender is the speediest and most versatile of this bunch. Similar to the Energizer Energi, which was my pick of the last batch of portable chargers, iGo's device is essentially a pod for two AA batteries, with a port for any of iGo's interchangeable tips for just about any gadget you can think of. The company makes something like 150 tips for different devices, which is great, but at $10 to $12 a pop, they're going to add to the $15.99 base cost of the powerXtender pretty quick. Still, if you've got gadgets that won't charge over a regular USB port, this is a fairly cheap and simple solution. And the use of regular old batteries means that when you're out traveling, more power is just a drug store stop away. Best of all, this charger is the jackrabbit of the bunch, as it charged my phone about 40 percent in an hour. That actually rivals the speed of my wall-wart charger. It'll burn through batteries fairly fast though, so my advice is to bring a few extra rechargables with you when you travel. My only other quibble with this device is that, like the Mobile Mini, there's no flexibility in the charger arm or tip, meaning that when I plug this into the bottom of my phone, there's some danger of breakage, unless the two devices couple on a stand or table. It'd be nice to have a short cable between the two, so you could just throw the two together in a bag and charge up while you're traveling.

Last, and more most than least, we have the Tekkeon myPower All. Ostensibly, this beast is an external laptop battery, complete with eight tips for laptops and other devices that use a DC jack, but no love for MacBooks. Still, the 50Wh battery has a regular female USB port, and the retractable cable it plugs into comes with a mini-USB tip as well, making this $160 (direct) battery as connectible as the Xpower, but with way more juice. If 50Wh isn't enough for you, Tekkeon even sells a $100 expansion battery that'll let you clamp two of these batteries together. And if you're using up any more power than that on vacation, you might as well just stay home and get an extra job to pay your electric bill. My only issue with the myPower All is that although it packs the most power, this was the slowest charger of the three, managing to only push my phone's battery meter up seventeen percent in an hour. Though if you need to charge a number of gadgets repeatedly, and just maybe a laptop, this is a solid choice. It should keep an mp3 player, phone and digital camera going for days without needing a recharge. No small feat, but at about seven inches long and approaching a pound, this is no small charger.

There you have it, three chargers that'll keep your gadgets going wherever you might roam, and (unlike last time) none of them are clunkers. Which one you chose depends wholly on what you need to charge and how much you're willing to pay. If you need a quick-charge for a device that doesn't do standard USB, iGo is the way to go. If you've got a few devices that rock mini-USB or a USB cable, the Xantrex Xpower is fairly cheap and smartly designed. And if your portable power needs are excessive, Tekkeon's myPower All should keep you going for days on end. All three are available now.

Post by Matt Safford