Thinkpads Forum

Wouldn't that be cool at the beach? Pull out a solar panel and plug the TP battery into it for charging. Haven't figured out the power req'd or the circuitry, but I have an old TP570 board and a T40 here with a DC-DC circuit on it someplace.

Does anyone offer such a gadget?

Actually running the TP itself straight off solar might be more practical. A battery can guzzle down 30w most of the time, as opposed to 10-15w just to run most of the time (yes, the peaks are higher).

Pricing, guessing $100 for a 1x3 ft panel for 15w, $200 for a 2x3 ft panel for 30w. Already talking about a lot for just the panel, and since if anyone sold this, they'd make it universal (universal AC adapters cost around 80), it seems like such a gadget would be 180-280 total and thus pretty rare.

The panels seem to output 16v already so that might make it easier to hack one together.

This is a neat idea. After googling for DIY solar battery chargers found all sorts of neat stuff from this year's CES. There's linkage to bunches of new gadgets starting here: http://www.news.com/8301-11128_3-9845561-54.html

All too pricey but solar is more appealing than Lenovo's external battery charger. Can anyone guide DIYing such a device?

There's a very informative post on this on the Lenovo Forum.