Anker 521 Portable Power Station Upgraded with LiFePO4 Battery 256Wh 6-Port PowerHouse 300W Peak 600W Solar Generator Solar

I bought this as an auxiliary power source for use in a vehicle--I need to carry a 12 volt refrigerator with me (special dietary needs, road food, etc.), and occasionally charge up Milwaukee tool or DSLR batteries even if the vehicle is not running. The packaging of the 521 is ideal, although I wish the two 120V outlets had "real" 3-prong outlets. The size is perfect when a vehicle is loaded up--it uses little space. I ran two tests with the refrigerator connected to the 12 volt outlet. The refrigerator operates in both ECO and MAX modes. The ECO mode draws 30-35 watts while operating, while the MAX runs at anywhere from 40-50 watts. I ran the refrigerator indoors somewhat near a heat outlet, to simulate being inside a warm vehicle. The refrigerator is rated to deliver 256Wh of power, so I calculated that worst case would be the refrigerator running constantly for 5.5 hours. Turns out that with the refrigerator cycling on and off, it ran over 20 hours before the battery was down to about 2-4% capacity. EDIT: I had a charging issue that was partly my own misunderstanding and partly my car's wiring. I was at first unsuccessful in getting the 521 to charge from both inputs. First, I had to use a USB-C PD charger, which provides higher voltages than standard USB chargers. This allowed a full 65 watts on the USB-C input for charging. But I would add the 120 volt charger that came with the 521 in tandem with the USB-C charger wasn't getting the ~120 watts of charging. I later realized that for battery health, the 120 watt charging through both DC inputs only happens when the battery's state of charge is lower. If it's nearly fully charged, it cuts back to only a single DC input. Yet, I still could not get both to work in the car. I have a 150 watt 120-volt inverter in the car, which plugs into a rear accessory outlet using a lighter plug. It turns out that if I have both the 521's 120 volt charger and a USB-C PD charger plugged into the inverter, the inverter stops working. Likewise, if I use a separate USB-C charger that plugs into the accessory outlet (I have a 1:3 adapter with a voltage readout), the inverter cuts out. It seems the inverter is cutting out when voltage drops below a nominal value like 12.8 volts. In essence, the wiring from the fuse box to the accessory outlet cannot provide full wattage without voltage sag. When I plug the USB-C PD adapter into an accessory outlet in the center console (which is on its own 15 amp circuit), I can get 120 watts of charging to the 521. I will wire up my own circuit with 6-gauge wire to run a 300 or 400 watt inverter and a pair of accessory outlets, as this will eliminate the voltage drop. With ~120 watts, this provides a quicker recovery for the battery while the refrigerator is operating, which is exactly what I needed. Read more

I've unboxed and charged up my Anker 521 PowerHouse and it's pretty awesome. It's pretty light for what it is. Seems to be pretty sturdy as far as electronics go. I charged it up fully with the wall plug to 100% like it said to do. (likely to calibrate the battery management system so the battery % is accurate and the actual capacity is maximized) I powered a bunch of LED AC lights while charging my laptop, phone, a smaller anker powerbank, and some other devices plugged into the car power hole and it lasted for several hours. I feel like it actually lasted longer than I expected for not being a huge device. It will power LED lights for many hours. I bought some Ultra efficient 4 Watt Philips LED bulbs and it says it will power two lamps with those bulbs for over 16.2 hours at 90% State of Charge!! Great for power outages or for staying in off the grid Airbnbs which is what I bought this power station for. I saw another review that stated it draws power even when nothing is plugged in and after testing it I've found that isn't the case unless you have the AC outlet button turned on when you aren't using the AC outlets so it's a none issue. In case you are curious it said it was drawing 5W when there was nothing plugged in and the AC outlets were turned on but then when I plugged in two 4 Watt LED lamps it said it was putting out 10 Watts so it seems it's more efficient with a load but again you can use the other ports without having the AC outlets turned on and there's no extra draw. This is a none issue. It seems to charge up in the timeframe advertised with the wall plug charger but I haven't tried the dual plugs using that in combination with the USB-C plug on the front. If that doesn't work as advertised I'll update my review. I like the light on the front and handle on top but I do wish there was a carry case available for it. Maybe there is but it wasn't listed with it on the anker website so I'm assuming there isn't. The light on it is nice and the SOS feature is setup in a great way, I like that you just do a quick press to turn on and off the light and to activate the SOS mode you have to hold the button for 2 seconds so you don't have to cycle through either of those modes to get to the other. I would recommend this, it seems like it's pretty fool-proof and seems like it'll automatically shutoff if you try to charge it in damaging temperatures so it's pretty worry free as long as you don't store it with a low state of charge for long periods which can damage all Lithium based batteries. Read more