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Options for Minimizing All Your Travel Gadget Chargers

Last week we did a post on universal cell phone chargers, the upshot being that soon you'll only need one charger for all your family's cell phones. In the comments section cantera asked "OK, But... What about all the other crap I'm carrying chargers for?!"

Quite right. What about all the mp3 players, PDA's, cameras, GPS's, and bluetooth headsets that people carry when they travel?

First thing's first. Fundamentally you need cables for two things: recharging batteries while they're in your peripheral and connecting your peripherals to a laptop. Ideally you'd want one cable that can do both. That might seen obvious. And yet there are entire classes of peripherals - *cough* Blackberries *cough* - where the default is to have one cable for charging and a different cable for syncing. Lame.

The next consideration is bulk. We're not sure how many peripherals the average traveler carries. Even with convergence devices the over/under has to be around three. Imagine an iPhone-addicted jet setter who uses that device as an mp3 player, PDA, and GPS. That still leaves at least a camera and a bluetooth earpiece (the first fanboi who leaves "my iPhone has a camera" in the comments, by the by, will be summarily executed as a warning to others). Two cables per device times three devices still equals a huge pain in the ass. And that's before we begin counting your travel companions' devices.

This simply will not do. So join us please as we venture into the magical world of retractable, dual sync/charge cables.

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