{"id":8989,"date":"2016-08-03T14:00:26","date_gmt":"2016-08-03T11:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/?p=8989"},"modified":"2016-09-09T14:58:28","modified_gmt":"2016-09-09T11:58:28","slug":"electrical-power-in-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/electrical-power-in-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"Electrical Power in Europe"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the legacies of having spent so much time off grid in my RV is that electricity is at the forefront of my mind. When I was preparing my packing list for my European adventure<\/a>, I looked at the ridiculous amount of things\u00a0plugged into my uninterrupted power supply and knew I had to reduce my electrical needs dramatically because I wouldn’t have the luxury of access to lots of outlets in Europe. In fact, I would have just one, into which I would plug an adapter to go from my North American style plug to a European style plug.<\/p>\n

It was easier than I expected, but not cheap, to reduce my electrical needs. I replaced my large external\u00a0hard drives requiring AC\u00a0power with slim credit card sized\u00a0drives that only power through USB. I bought a 1TB Western Digital My Passport Air external hard drive<\/a> for my backups and a slightly thicker 3TB Toshiba Canvio external hard drive<\/a> for media. In this way, I also went from four external drives to just two. I’d been “collecting” drives for years, starting with a 500GB one in 2009 and then getting increasing capacity every year as prices began to drop, so it was nice to consolidate everything into two drives. The reason I put my media on an external drive is that I have a Macbook Air, which has a solid state drive. When I replaced my computer in 2015, I went with the smallest drive possible because a SSD is crazy expensive. So I have to store my media on another hard drive or else I’d run out of capacity.<\/p>\n

Next, I had to find a better way to power my iOS devices. At home, I plug them into the USB AC adapter that I then plug into a wall socket. You can, in theory, charge iOS devices through their USB cable plugged into your computer, but I didn’t want to have to rely on that. My computer only has two\u00a0USB outlets and they are always in use, with one dedicated to the backup drive and one powering a USB hub into which I plug a mouse, the media drive, the keyboard (which I didn’t bring with me), and, of course, my transcription foot pedal. Little did I know that the solution for that would present itself.<\/p>\n

iOS devices notwithstanding, I had reduced my power needs to just my computer. The computer charger has a built-in voltage adapter, so I just had to find an adapter that would let me plug into a European socket. After doing some research, I decided to go with a much larger unit than I had hope for, but that would let me plug into just about any socket in the world, the\u00a0FosPower FUSE worldwide universal AC international adapter with dual USB charging ports<\/a>. Notice that last part! The two USB sockets are well powered and charge my iOS devices perfectly.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5112\"<\/p>\n

I’ve now used my adapter in two modes. First was in the UK, which has enormous sockets! I had a hard time getting the adapter to work (didn’t help that it was the middle of the night and I was still half dead with jet lag) until I remembered reading a review by someone who had the same problem, where I’d learned to push down on the plastic part in the middle to get it to pop up.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5114\"<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5115\"<\/p>\n

\"UK<\/p>\n

Now, I’ve been using it in European mode and it is still working great! I was a bit (lot) nervous when I saw the\u00a0Schuko<\/a> outlets, but the prongs on my adapter fit it perfectly. The thinner Europlugs<\/a>\u00a0also fit in the Schuko outlets.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5111\"<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5107\"<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5109\"<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5110\"<\/p>\n

\"IMGP5108\"<\/p>\n

As long as I’m plugged directly into the wall, the adapter does not get hot. I once wanted to charge my iPad while I was in bed and tried to combine the adapter with an extension cord, but the adapter got really hot!<\/p>\n

The\u00a0FosPower FUSE worldwide universal AC international adapter with dual USB charging ports<\/a>\u00a0is proving to be very robust and reliable. It does take a lot of room in my luggage, but I’m sure it’s less than if I’d had to bring multiple adapters. The only negative thing I have to say about it is that\u00a0I’m annoyed by the incredibly bright blue light it emits to show it’s working as it actually lights up a whole room! But I can cover it with a scarf or sock and it doesn’t overheat, so that’s what I do when I have to sleep in the same room where it’s working hard to charge my things.<\/p>\n

Converting to European electric power has been really easy for me because I only have the computer to worry about and it has its own voltage converter. You’re on your own if you want advice on how to power things like a North American hair dry or curling iron here!<\/p>\n

My biggest complaint about power in Europe is that\u00a0I can’t just blindly reach down and try to plug in something because I’m trying to align very slim prongs with tiny holes. I thought it would be easier with sockets that fill the whole outlet, but nope. Still, that’s just a minor inconvenience!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the legacies of having spent so much time off grid in my RV is that electricity is at the forefront of my mind. When I was preparing my packing list for my European adventure, I looked at the ridiculous amount of things\u00a0plugged into my uninterrupted power supply and knew I had to reduce […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[636,9,3,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-europe","category-tech","category-travel","category-work"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8989\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.raecrothers.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}