The Science of Practical Application: An Outside Look at TogoPower

Instead of touting our own horns, we are going to see what Tom from Hobotech and Adam from Hometown Acres have to say about our units.  It’s easy for a company to talk up our own products. After all, we are quite proud of our work and (let’s face it), we are a business! So, what happens when experts outside of our company test our products? You get honest opinions and results that will either make or break our product’s reputation.

Full disclosure, we did reach out to these creators to talk about our products. They made it very clear that their thoughts and reviews must be authentic, covering both the strong points and the weak points of our product. In other words, if these men found anything they didn’t like about the units, they had FULL creative liberty to say so. As a result, these guys put our products to the test and they came up with tangible results you can measure.

Let’s see what they have to say about TOGOPOWER:

HOBOTECH | Down to A Science

Tom, a.k.a Hobotech, is one of the most respected tech influencers on YouTube. Most unboxing videos will talk about specs and talk up the product for viewers to buy. While that is fine for small purchases, people are reluctant to trust online opinions with big purchases. That’s why Hobotech conducts a full-blown investigation by testing his products to the limit. With no partiality, he puts each unit under rigorous testing, seeing for himself if each company is telling the truth about the performance of their units.

You can see all the heavy-duty testing and analysis in his video, “TogoPower Advance 350| Advance 650 Solar Generator Portable Power Station Dual Review”. With his lab coat and fabric gloves, he shares with his audience, “We took both units into our secret laboratory where we performed all kinds of crazy experiments on them, INCLUDING a double fisted (bang! bang!) battery capacity test!” He proceeds to run a 12V test on the Advance 350 and the AC inverter test on the Advance 650. He did this because its more likely that people will use the smaller unit for 12V appliances while the inverter will be more likely to be put to the test on the larger unit. Tom reports that “the internals are nearly identical in both units”, so to save time, he split up the testing.

After the tests were complete, these were his findings:

Results for the DC capacity test for the A 350: 315wh/346wh or 91%

Results for the AC inverter test for the A 650: 560wh/634wh or 88%

According to Tom, “these results are above average compared to other similar products from different companies.” In other words, these units are “more bang for your buck”. You can watch the rest of the video here to see what other kinds of tests he puts our products through. In short, Hobotech is one brutally honest man. If he is happy with a product, he will loudly boast about his favorite features. If he finds any aspects that have failed to live up to expectation, consider it a reliable warning about what you intend to buy.

HOMETOWN ACRES | Practicality in Practice

Adam from Hometown Acres is another influencer on YouTube who has reviewed our units. He specializes in land management of his 44-acre property and shares all kinds of tips and tricks to taking care of a sizable property. When conversing with Adam, he emphasized his desire to convey practical application.

In his video, “ToGo Power Portable Power Station”, he starts his project off by saying, “I wanted to wait until I had a real-world real test for you guys…I wanted to wait until I had something that I actually needed to use this thing for and today I’ve got a real world application for you guys…”

We sent him the Advance 550 Solar Genset to test and he truly delivered with a practical demo. In his video, Adam needed to cut down some IBC’s (intermediate bulk containers) that he uses to store firewood. In order to cut them down properly he needed to use his reciprocating saw and an angle grinder. While most people wouldn’t have a problem powering their tools in their garage, Adam was no where near his. After all, a property of 44 acres is a lot of land to cover. While his reciprocating saw was battery powered, he still needed help powering his angle grinder which was corded. Thankfully, he was able to use the Advance 550 to power his angle grinder to finish the task.

“What I’m really curious about is how many watts this angle grinder is going to pull because I’ve always heard that, you know, power tools draw a lot more power than you think.”

He proceeds to plug in his angle grinder and begins to focus on the display of the power station:

“What I really like about this unit is the display on it. It tells you what percent battery that you have left, it tells you how many watts you’re pulling. So right now, with it even off, I’m pulling 6W and then it tells you how long at the amount of watts you’re pulling right now will the battery last. So, let’s go ahead and fire this on again and see how that changes.”

He reports that the starting power for his Milwaukee angle grinder was about 624W, and when the power tool was in use, it ran consistently at 500W. While this is at the top end of the unit’s power capabilities, the Advance was able to get the entire project done with plenty of battery to spare, coming in at 67%.

If you want to view what else he has to say about the solar genset, you can view the video here. While Adam may not be a crazy scientist like Tom, Adam’s ability to interpret practical daily uses for our products was worth noting. Most people who purchase products aren’t going to take the time to full blown testing of the things they purchase, and they need to know how these power stations can serve them in a practical manner. Adam delivers exactly that: pure practicality.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, these two creators follow two universal truths when it comes to product reviews: prioritize the viewer’s needs, and provide master level advice. I would argue most influencers create for themselves over their audience. I’ve seen many people creating daily vlogs about them, what they drink for coffee, all while exhibiting poor critical thinking skills in analysis of marketable goods. While I understand they are in the business of being in the spotlight (which requires a strong element of performance), I find the most successful people on the platform prioritize the audience over themselves. They don’t skimp out intelligent details, they negotiate product features with the viewer’s needs in mind, and they refuse to agree to giving reviews they can’t be honest about.

If you can’t take our word that our products are worth a try, just take a minute to listen to Hobotech and Hometown Acres. These guys put in the work, defended their audience, and came up with results that puts everything in proper perspective.