Behold, the Mophie Juice Pack for the Samsung Galaxy S4. This guy brings an extra 2,300 mAh to the GS4 in a big but stylish case. That's the gist of the Juice Pack, of course. Protect the phone while offering up more battery life. Specifically, this model adds about 80 percent more battery to the stock GS4.
Obviously it adds a good bit of bulk, too. Specifically, it more than doubles the thickness of the GS4. It's more than a half-inch taller, too, and adds nearly a quarter-inch to the waistline.
The Juice Pack will run $99.99 direct from Mophie and will be available in black, white, pink and red.
Specifically, size-wise, we're looking at:
- Samsung Galaxy S4: 5.38 x 2.75 x 0.31 inches
- Mophie Juice Pack: 5.91 x 2.92 x 0.66 inches
It weighs in at a total 4.59 ounces, case and phone combined. But we now we're bulking up. That's no surprise. Mophie manages to do all this in a pretty attractive package, however. And, more important is that Mophie (at least in this one unit we've received) appears to have cleaned up any of the messy manufacturing flaws we experienced in the four Galaxy S3 units we tested. There are no sharp edges anywhere to be found. (In fact, the chin — a previous problem area — has been completely redesigned.) The buttons all work as they should, it's easy enough to insert and remove the GS4, and the two parts of the case snap together nicely.
Worth noting, however, is that you lose all NFC functionality when using this battery case. That means no direct NFC, and none of Samsung's on S Beam. You also lose USB OTG capability.
The Juice Pack input — the rate at which the case itself charges — is 1 Amp, and output — how fast it charges the phone is 500 mA, Mophie tells us. And as always is the case when you're talking about Samsung phones and battery cases, you have to ask yourself if it's worth the extra bulk and the cost for such a product when you can get a spare battery (and a much slimmer case) for so much less.
That said, (and assuming retail units are consistent with this one) we're plenty impressed by the Mophie Juice Pack for the Samsung Galaxy S4. In and of itself, it's a good product.
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