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Anker Solix C800 Plus Portable Power Station Review | A Camper's Best Friend?
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Feb 27, 2024
Photographer Dustin Abbott shares a detailed review of the Anker SOLIX portable power solution - complete with 1200W/1600W peak inverter, 768Wh battery capacity, fast charging in under an hour, portable lights, and UPS function - all for $500! | Read the Text Review: | Purchase the Anker SOLIX C800 Plus @ Anker | Amazon https://amzn.to/3OXPwAp | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/42WuJDg | B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/3Id1ti7 Purchase the B80 Expansion Battery from Bluetti Store https://shrsl.com/49bpb (use Code DustinEB70S for a discount) | Amazon https://amzn.to/3rSWBKe | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/3ZMoHTY | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/45qIR7t | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/46M7pZH Check out the DA Merch here: https://bit.ly/TWIMerch | Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/dustinabbott | On the Web: http://dustinabbott.net/ | Sign up for my Newsletter: http://bit.ly/1RHvUNp | Instagram: http://bit.ly/DLAinsta | Facebook: http://on.fb.me/1nuUUeH | Flickr: http://bit.ly/1UcnC0B | 500px: http://bit.ly/1Sy2Ngu Follow Craig @ https://www.instagram.com/craigstoffersen/ Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo: http://bhpho.to/1TA0Xge Adorama: https://howl.me/cjU0LKdp3LN Camera Canada: http://bit.ly/DLACameraCan Sony Canada: https://www.thesonyshop.ca/?ref=abbott Amazon: https://amzn.to/3HrY64d Amazon Canada: https://amzn.to/3qG1p18 Ebay: http://bit.ly/DustineBay Into the AM Clothing: https://bit.ly/intotheAMda and use code DUSTIN10 for 10% off Make a donation via Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/dustinTWI ============================= Table of Contents: =============================
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0:00
Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott, and I'm here today to give you my review of the Anker Solex C800 Plus
0:18
This is a mid-tier, mid-size portable power station with a standard 768 watt-hours of
0:25
battery capacity, but it has an extra powerful 1200 watt inverter along with some unique
0:31
and innovative features for camping and backup type situations that we'll explore as a part
0:37
of today's review. So to give you an idea of some of the basic specifications, this unit is 371 millimeters wide
0:44
That's 14, right over 14 and a half inches. It is eight inches deep or 205 millimeters, and it is 253 millimeters tall
0:53
That's 10 inches. It weighs in at right under 11 kilograms or right over 20 pounds
1:01
Now obviously, one of the things that stands out here is that it does have a very high
1:05
number of AC outlets for this class of unit. There are five AC outlets that are rated at 1200 watts
1:13
It has a total of four USB DC outlets here, and that includes one 100 watt, USB-C, one
1:22
30 watt USB-C, and then two 12 watt USB-A outputs. It does have the standard DC output, the car or cigarette lighter style, and it puts out
1:35
120 watts of power. Now as far as other specifications, there is no external power brick, so just an AC
1:44
input here and a standard cord. And then also our input for solar or DC is the XT60 style plug
1:54
Warranty on the unit is five years, and the price point is $499 US dollars
2:00
So as mentioned, some of the overall features of the unit itself, it has battery capacity
2:05
of 768 watt hours. It does have a 1200 watt inverter, and we'll explore that a little bit more because it
2:12
is 1200 watts, but then it has surge power, what they call surge pad of 1600 watts
2:19
Now that's a little bit different than just having a peak, you know, kind of spool up
2:23
of, you know, say if it's 1200 watts to hit 2400 watts for the startup of things
2:28
This goes a little bit further than that, and we'll explore that in some of our tests
2:32
It has the ability to charge both at normal rates, but also what they call a hyper flash
2:37
charging that will allow this unit to charge via AC really, really fast
2:42
You can go from zero to a hundred percent and right under an hour, which is very impressive
2:48
Solar input is 300 watts, which isn't the highest that I've seen in this class, but
2:52
it is better than many that I've seen in this class. Many of them are limited at 200 watts
2:57
Best I've seen in this class is 400 watts. So 300 kind of splits the difference there
3:02
As noted about the various ports, there are a total of 10 different ports
3:07
It does have app control via Bluetooth that allows you to do a number of different things
3:12
and also to monitor what's going on with the unit itself, even to remotely monitor it in
3:18
that sense. It does have one of those unique features that I mentioned is that inside the top, there
3:25
is a cabinet here where you can open things up and inside on the plus unit
3:31
Now on just the standard C800, this is a storage area and the plus unit that I'm testing here
3:37
it has some unique features for camping or for power outage. That includes having a couple of these portable lights that are staying charged inside
3:45
And so they have the option of operating like a spotlight as a camping light or a backup
3:51
situation light, and then also a lower power mode that if you're just wanting some subtle
3:56
mood type lighting, they stay charged inside of here. And then interestingly, there's also this wand inside of here that can extend out extensively
4:05
And there is a place on the top to screw that in and mount it
4:09
It's so high that I can't even fit it under here. And so by doing that, it gives you a place to either mount one of these lights or as
4:18
we're going to see something else to get the light up into the place where you need it
4:24
So a unique feature there that we'll explore a little bit more in our test
4:28
It also does have what has become more and more ubiquitous, and that is a UPS mode, which
4:33
they claim will cycle in under 20 milliseconds. And we will also test that to see if it'll work for a UPS mode
4:41
So how about some of the tests that I ran? Now typically some of the things that I do, I like to test are some household appliances
4:48
things that you might use in a power outage, or maybe you might want to use if you're camping
4:53
And so that includes a couple of different blenders. And so I used my more powerful 1100 watt blender and it drew 923 watts initially and
5:02
it's settled down into 842 watts. It ran without issue, which we would expect because it did fall underneath that 1200 watt threshold
5:12
Now where things typically fall apart for this grade of unit is when I try to run my
5:16
1500 watt tea kettle because it is, it exceeds the power output of basically all of these
5:24
and it continues to draw that current in a strong way. Here's where the surge pad came into place
5:30
I didn't have to enable any kind of special feature. It was just prepared to do it
5:34
And so initially the draw was ramped up at 1477 watts from this
5:40
And so near the 1500 watt rating. It was able to handle that fine
5:44
And then what happens is that it slowly throttled that back to where it settled in at right
5:49
under 1200 watts. And I was able to get a boil in just about three minutes, which is not much slower than
5:56
what I see by a normal AC power. Most of these units won't run it at all
6:01
And for example, there is a feature in some of the Blue Eddy models that allows them to
6:07
kind of ramp up in a similar fashion for something like this, though at a lower power rating
6:12
And so I found doing the same thing with something like the AC 70 from Blue Eddy
6:16
It took a full five minutes before I got the water to boil in the kettle, which shows
6:21
it was operating with much less power. So in this case, we're able to maintain a very high level of power and it kept things
6:30
cool and stable. And I did note that when that surge pad kicks in, the fans ramped way up to keep the batteries
6:37
cool, but everything ran stable. There was no glitch. It ran through no problem
6:41
I was very impressed by that. Now another test that I do like to do is with a hair dryer
6:47
That's a 1700 watt rated hair dryer. Now a lot of times units like this, they won't even touch something like this
6:54
It's just too much draw. And so in this case, when I plugged it in, it initially drew 646 watts
7:00
And when it continued to try to draw more than that 1600 watts of rated power in the
7:05
surge pad mode, the unit shut off the AC port. And so it didn't cause damage to either the inverter or the batteries
7:13
That's about what I expected. And then so it is useful, but it is only that surge pad is useful only if the actual continued
7:20
draw is underneath that 1600 watt threshold. I also tested in terms of its ability to recharge via AC and solar
7:30
So when it came to recharging via AC, the normal draw was about 470 watts
7:37
But then if I threw the app, I put it into the mode where it goes into its ultra fast
7:43
charge mode. It was able to draw over a thousand watts. It was running at 1028 and it does give you a little bit of a pop up when you enable that
7:52
to only use it when necessary because that kind of hypercharging does put more wear and
7:58
tear on the batteries. And so you might diminish your longevity. So if you don't need it, don't do it
8:04
The, you know, the typical rate is still pretty decent. Nearly 500 Watts, whereas most of these units in the first generations that I tested, they
8:11
would draw a maximum of 200 Watts. And so we've gone, come a long way since that point, even in the standard mode and being
8:18
able to quick charge in less than an hour is very impressive, but only use that where needed
8:24
I also tested charging via solar and while the limit here is 300 Watts, what I did find
8:30
interesting is that it had no issue in actually using one of my 400 watt panels
8:36
And so it still only took that charge in at about 300 Watts. But what it meant is that I was able to maximize the amount of solar energy going into it
8:44
And so I can get quite a fast recharge via solar, which was impressive to me as well
8:50
When I hooked up a 200 watt panel, you know, you're dropping down more into the typically
8:55
in the 150, 160 watt range of current. And so I really like being able to attach the 400 watt panel because it means that even
9:03
though it can't draw it 400 Watts, it will take it all the way up to basically that 300
9:07
watt threshold. And so I can get a quicker recharge. So anyway, that was good as well
9:13
Now another test that I did was testing the UPS function. So I connected a computer monitor that just to have something on the screen, I was feeding
9:21
that from my laptop, but the computer monitor was plugged into AC for the unit
9:26
It showed that it was drawing 60 Watts. I unplugged the power supply to the C800 plus to simulate a power outage
9:34
And you'll see that on the monitor, there's no reaction at all. There's no flicker
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There's no blip. It just continued operating. I ran this test multiple times
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I got the same result every time. And so that's really encouraging to me because I do think that if you have delicate equipment
9:47
attached, you are going to be able to just continue uninterrupted, which is the whole
9:52
point uninterrupted power supply. You're going to be able to continue uninterrupted and not lose any kind of sensitive data
9:59
So let's talk about some things that I like and some things that I don't like
10:03
Things that I like is that as noted, this is a more powerful inverter than is typical
10:07
for this class. And that just means that there's more things that you can power off of it than you can
10:13
with most of the competing units. Obviously I like that very much. I also like the fact that the surge pad technology, it just worked
10:20
It worked without me having to do anything. It just was smart in the way that it handled it
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And I found it to be more efficient than some of the competing technologies
10:29
I also like the fact that with these camping slash emergency lights that they are the way
10:35
this is designed. It's got little place where it sits down. It's got little charge points where this attaches and stays in that place even when you're moving
10:44
it around. And so as a result, these are always charged and ready to go
10:48
You know, one of the things that you sometimes run into in either a camping or in particular
10:52
a power outage situation is that because you haven't been thinking about your, you
10:56
know, your backup lights, be they flashlights or whatever, you go to use them and the battery's dead
11:02
So I really like the fact that this keeps them charged at all times. And that just means that they're going to be actually useful when you need them
11:10
I also like the fact that this telescoping pole here helps to keep, get this light up
11:16
into a useful place. So maybe if you're in a camping situation, you know, being able to put that up higher
11:21
means that you're going to get the light up where it's going to illuminate a bigger area
11:26
So obviously that's going to be useful. And so I appreciate that. I also appreciate the fact that part of this design is it's magnetic in the way that attaches
11:33
to this. So by the way, you can rotate it in whatever direction you want
11:38
If you want to use it to kind of directly illuminate something here, like I demonstrated
11:43
using on my electrical panel. But what's interesting is because it uses that magnetic technology, it means these are
11:49
also flexible and you can attach them to anything metal. And so that includes putting it on the side of your vehicle as long as there's metal in
11:56
the side of your vehicle. So if you have a flat tire or you're working in that situation, you can put one or both
12:02
of these to help to bring light to that area. And so that's useful
12:06
Also clever in the design here is there is a little hook that would allow you to hang
12:12
them for example, in a tent or something similar. So just a lot of kind of intuitive design that's a part of that
12:20
Also useful about this is that that ball that's at the top of this, which is useful in its
12:24
own way, but it can also be screwed off. And so if you screw it off, it leaves a standard quarter inch attachment point there, which
12:32
means that you could put a camera on there. You could put anything that will attach to that kind of, you know, universal quarter
12:39
inch expansion port, which means that you could use this as, you know, for, for filming
12:44
If you're not bringing along a tripod or something similar. I also like the fact that there are more AC ports than usual
12:51
And that's been one criticism that I've had is that some of the more recent models that
12:54
I reviewed, they actually have fewer AC ports than what previous models did
12:59
It's been something that I've criticized. So I appreciate the fact that we have got, this is actually the highest that I've ever
13:04
seen in this class. So that's fantastic. I also like the intelligence in the power output, particularly with the USB-C ports
13:12
but with the USB-C or USB-A ports as well. They're all intelligently ran
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And so you're going to get the correct amount of power output that you need for running
13:23
or charging your particular device. The app itself, it's not super fancy, but it is easy to use
13:30
And I have had zero issues with actually using it. It was intuitive and quick to pick up
13:36
And so I really appreciate the Bluetooth app support. And I particularly like being able to monitor
13:41
For example, if I am using solar panels and charging this out of doors, which is my preferred
13:45
way of doing things. Another thing that I think is really clever about the integration on this is the fact
13:51
that you actually have control over the front LED lighting strip right off the app
13:56
So consider in a power outage, you may have the stored somewhere where you can't see to
14:00
get to it. And so being able to turn that light on gives you some light to illuminate in that space
14:06
Or maybe if you're coming back to your tent at night, being able to turn that on allows
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you to, again, have a little bit of a light already in that area
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So just some, again, clever and intuitive things there. I appreciate the fact that it has stellar inputs on both AC and solar
14:25
And so that you can get quick charges there. And also I appreciate the fact that the UPS mode seems to work as specified
14:32
It's easy. It's intuitive. I don't need to kind of program up something to make UPS function, which I have had to
14:38
do with some other units. It's just automatic. If it's plugged into the wall and something's plugged into AC and that AC is turned on
14:45
UPS mode is engaged. You don't have to think about it. Let's talk about a few things that I don't like
14:51
I don't like the fact that there is no IP rating on this
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This really seems like a fantastic camping oriented unit for a lot of reasons
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And the fact that it's not IP rated means that it probably could handle a little bit
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of light rain, but I wouldn't want to have it out of doors
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And sometimes weather can be volatile. It could start to rain while you're away hiking or whatever, and being exposed, I think
15:15
I would have more peace of mind if it had some kind of actual rating for being out in
15:20
the elements. I also, while I appreciate the functionality on top, and so this is not a serious criticism
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but some of the competing units do have a wireless charging pad on the top where you
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can just drop your phone on there. Obviously we don't have that functionality here
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So that's one thing that's lost to accommodate for the camping lights
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And so you may love the camping lights and that may be the killer app for you, but if
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you think I'm never going to use those, well unfortunately neither this unit nor the standard
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C800 has a wireless charging pad. And so it's one thing that is missed there
15:57
The other thing that I will criticize just because some competitors have embraced it
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and that is that there are some units, even at this kind of storage and output level
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that do have access to expandable batteries, expansion batteries that allow you to extend
16:12
the battery life. This one is, at least at this point, doesn't seem to be functional and I don't really see
16:17
any kind of actual connection port. This shows that it's designed with the thought of expansion batteries in the future
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Some of Anker's higher end units do utilize that functionality. So if you want that, you may need to move up to the C1000 or higher units
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So in conclusion, this is actually one of my favorite power stations in this class that
16:40
I've used. I love the fact that it gives you a more powerful inverter, it gives you more AC plugs, and
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it gives you some extra and intuitive feature points for the $500 price point
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So to me it's a very strong value, particularly because it works really, really well
16:55
There's not been anything that's kind of left me frustrated in the way that it actually
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is incorporated and it actually operates. And so kudos to Anker. I've liked the company for a while for smaller power stations or adapters
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Even I've got some of their Bluetooth earbuds that I really like, but this is their first
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kind of large or portable power station that I spent time with and I like what I see here
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There's some real thought in the design process and it's a real value at the price point of $500
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If you're interested, you can look in the description down below. There are buying links there
17:28
There's also a summation of my tests and findings available on my website if you want
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to go check that out. That's linked in the description as well. As always, thanks for watching
17:38
Have a great day and let the light in
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