Once you've had copper, you never go back.

We thought we knew power banks. We thought we’d seen them all, test-driven them through their paces, gotten to know what they were capable of. We thought nothing could surprise us any more.

We didn’t know jack.

We didn’t know this Duracell Portable Charger Set. It just feels so… right. Substantial. Weighty. Seams you couldn’t squeeze a razor blade into. Amazing what happens when a manufacturer says “Let’s spend a few extra cents per unit to actually build it well.” We don’t care about brand when it comes to those cut-rate power banks. Sometimes we don’t even list it. But we gotta hand it to Duracell: it seems they might indeed know a thing or two about batteries. It makes all the other power banks we’ve sold look like junk.

Then there are the features. Two battery units, for one thing: a hefty “long haul” 8800 mAh number with two jacks, capable of charging tablets; and a smaller “day trip” 1850mAh job with both Lightning and microUSB integrated connectors. For those of you still arguing over which kind of power bank is better, a big, heavy, powerful one or a small, light one, the answer is “both”.

You can plug them into the wall to charge them, sure - or you can just set them on a Powermat when you’re not using them. They’ll charge wirelessly while they sit there. A Powermat is only, like, fifteen bucks. Sounds worth it for the most effortless charge known to man, unless you enjoy reaching for a power bank to charge your almost-dead phone, and realizing the power bank is almost dead, too.

This changes everything. What have we been doing, clawing the scum off of the bottom of the power bank barrel? Why were we wasting ourselves on that crap? We had no idea we could be impressed by a power bank, but then came this Duracell Portable Charger Set, and here we are. All those cruddy power banks we used to deal in? They just turn our stomachs now. We’re almost too ashamed to ever sell them again. Almost.