EQUIPMENT REVIEW: Innovatronix Explorer Mini : Part 2 - Battery Life

Part 2 of my review is all about the numbers, and of course the big question is...

"How many pops will I get with my _______________ strobes?"

In addition to results released by Innovatronix, I wanted to independently test the Mini with a variety of strobes ranging in power, some that are bi-voltage and one that has analog controls.

The strobes I had for testing were a combination of those I own plus those contributed by Peter (Petepix), David (dmward) and George (george m w).

It's a great selection of some of the most common strobes and those that are most asked about when it comes to portable batteries for location lighting.

Testing was done with the following strobes (listed in order of highest to lowest Watt second rating):

• PCB Einstein E640 (640 Watt seconds/bi-voltage/digital)
• Elinchrom 600RX (600 Watt seconds/digital)
• Elinchrom BX500Ri (500 Watt seconds/bi-voltage/digital)
• Elinchrom D-Lite 4it (400 Watt seconds/bi-voltage/digital)
• PCB Alien Bees B800 (320 Watt seconds/analog)
• Elinchrom 300RX (300 Watt seconds/digital)
• Elinchrom BX250Ri (250 Watt seconds/bi-voltage/digital)

The table below is pretty straight forward. The left hand column has the make and model of the strobe. To the right of that is the Watt second rating.

I tested at Full power, 1/2 power and 1/4 power to give a good overview of performance at different power levels and to be consistent with the way Innovatronix is presenting results for battery life.

Within each power level I've broken it into three parts. The green number on the left is the number of pops achieved from Full charge to the point where the inverter switches to Low battery mode. In red is the number of additional pops while in Low battery mode, and on the right and in bold is the total number of pops for that strobe at that power level.

After the individual lights, I tested the two pairs of strobes I had to show that you could power a pair of 600 or 640 Watt second strobes but it's not really want you want to be doing.... at least not at full power.

Ideally, small portable batteries like this are best suited for a single strobe or a pair of medium powered strobes. If you're planning on going out with 1200 Watt seconds of power then you really want to mate it with a more powerful battery.

On to the numbers....

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Thanks much for doing this Rob. Doing pop tests on that many flashes must have been positively mind-numbing. Was this testing done manually (as opposed to using an intervalometer) and what was the interval between pops?

Based on your numbers, the endurance of the Mini is actually quite disappointing. The 189 total pops you recorded for the full-power 600RX test definitely does not compare favorably with the 474 full-power pops I was able to get from a fully charged Vagabond Mini Lithium. The 152 pops from the E640 is also surprisingly low and hard to explain. The battery in the VML is rated at 8.8 Ah which, I believe, is comparable to the capacity of the SLA battery in the Mini.

Will there be a part three that reports on recycle times?

Dave F.

HI Dave,

I can certainly understand the disappointment when comparing the Mini to the VML but they are two very different designs.

To draw a more appropriate comparison, the Profoto Acute B2 is a 600 Watt second pack, using an SLA battery and it is rated for about 150 pops at full power.

Regarding recycle times... at this time I have no plan to test recycle times, and the recycle time on the battery will depend on the time when plugged in to a wall outlet. I may do some comparisons. May.

EDIT: Oh, manual or intervalometer? A mixture. When I knew what to expect I would set the intervalometer for a safe number and then I'd manually finish the test. For the full power pops with two strobes I did it manually, knowing it wasn't going to be too bad.

Rob,
I aplaude your effort.
I didn't think to send along the 25Watt modeling lights for the E640s. Does your test have the modeling lights turned on or off?

I agree with Dave that the numbers seem a bit low compared to my experience with the VML.

I wonder what impact battery technology has on these results. Lead Acid batteries have a continually decreasing voltage curve as a load is applied.
While Nicad, NiMH and Lithium batteries have a constant voltage until the very end of the power curve.

Not sure but that may impact how the inverters are able to deliver power to the light as the battery is drained.

Rob thank you for conducting these tests it must have been very time consuming

Good stuff, Rob. Sounds like it must have been fun

dmward wrote in post #12691446
Rob,
I aplaude your effort.
I didn't think to send along the 25Watt modeling lights for the E640s. Does your test have the modeling lights turned on or off?

I agree with Dave that the numbers seem a bit low compared to my experience with the VML.

I wonder what impact battery technology has on these results. Lead Acid batteries have a continually decreasing voltage curve as a load is applied.
While Nicad, NiMH and Lithium batteries have a constant voltage until the very end of the power curve.

Not sure but that may impact how the inverters are able to deliver power to the light as the battery is drained.

That's ok, David. Really, I didn't want to test other modeling lights and get into all that. I just took the halogen 150 Watt as an example of one that would suck the life out of the battery fairly quickly.

All my tests were with the modeling light off. Realistically, if you're using portable batteries, you don't want to be using the modeling lights.

Thanks for doing this Rob! Great info.

TMR Design wrote in post #12691444
HI Dave,

I can certainly understand the disappointment when comparing the Mini to the VML but they are two very different designs.

To draw a more appropriate comparison, the Profoto Acute B2 is a 600 Watt second pack, using an SLA battery and it is rated for about 150 pops at full power.

But the Acute B2 (SLA version) has a 5Ah battery while the Mini has a 9Ah battery. Profoto claims 160 full-power pops for the B2. Extrapolating, if the B2 also had a 9Ah SLA battery, it would produce 288 full power pops. Leveling the playing field by providing the Acute with an equal sized battery would, it seems, allow it to significantly out-perform the Mini.

Taking price point into consideration, I think comparing the $349 Mini with the $239 VML is more appropriate than comparing it with the $2000 Profoto Acute. But, regardless of price, Profoto or Innovatronix, SLA-based packs do not provide the kind of endurance we're now seeing from products like the lithium-powered VML. This is a technology question, not a brand question. Some time ago I conducted extensive pop tests of two 400Ws battery-powered strobes from a manufacturer in China. One model had a 7Ah SLA battery while the other had a 7Ah lithium battery. I was getting 3-4 times as many pops from the lithium powered strobe as I was from the SLA powered strobe. I'd really like to know why that is.

Dave F.

One thing to consider is that there have been reports of issues with multiple bi-voltage (non-PCB) strobes and the VML. The Mini is handling those non-PCB bi-voltage strobes properly without any of the power relays flipping.

Great stuff Rob. Thanks very much for the huge effort.

Shane

Thanks Rob,

Something I was really waiting for. I have been lurking in this forum for the past 3 years and it has
been very informative. I guess you can't really have it all.

I think I will go for the Tronix explorer mini rather than the VML. I really have no choice, I want something not heavy and will work for my BXri and Dlite4s. I also value short recycling times as I shoot
models most of the time. I cannot wait 6 seconds before I can shoot again. A model will have a
hard time holding her smile for 6 seconds. hahaha. Come to think of it, although I would really
want more pops per charge, it is not really that important to me as based on my experienced,
I only need about 50 pops per set up.
Many thanks again Rob! You have been a great help.

so based on the reports and reviews now circulating in the web,
if you want the lightest go VML, if you want more pops go VML
If you want faster recycling time - go tronix mini
if you want compatibility with bi-voltage strobes go tronix mini

Haay! Why can't a product have it all. hehehe I also like the fact that
a tronix mini battery would cost me only about US15.

There's this other poster on another thread here that stated that VML's would work with Dlites as long as the VML was a 230 version. I searched the net to be able to prove if his theory was correct and ironically i ended up on a you tube video that had the same username as the poster (c2thew).

Anyway, theres also a video of a Explorer Mini being used with a Dlite :

Vagabond Mini with two Dlite 4's (non IT)
Explorer Mini with two Dlite 4's (non IT)

I researched even further and came up with a little bit more info about Dlites . The first version (the ones on the two videos above) had very strict current requirements. If the power supply's current isn't able to recycle fast enough, it would either end up in an error or behave erratically (such as the extra - long recycling time that the VML tester in video # 1 experienced).

The Dlite 4 IT on the other hand, addressed this problem by adjusting the sensitivity to voltage drops. So unlike on the older version, it won't act erratically while the power supply is recyling. Ive seen a couple of Dlite 4 IT test's with the VML on the net, but couldn't seem to find any with the Explorer Mini.

Since the VML doesn't work as flawlessly as the Explorer Mini when used with Dlite 4's (regular version), a better comparison would be if we could get our hands on a video of a couple new version Dlites (IT) being used with an Explorer Mini.

Thatll also give us a clearer comparison on recycling time (which I think is important when shooting human subjects).


Great review though Rob, though I was quite disappointed that there weren't any tests performed on two BXRi's which is something I have been on the look out for.

Exactly my thoughts John!

Rob,
I too dislike using modeling lights when using a battery pack. Probably why I forgot about the low wattage units. My only reason for even getting them was because of some peculiar behavior when using the MC2 as a trigger.

Dave,
I think the difference between the SLA and Lithium results has to do with the battery technology.
It would be nice if someone with knowledge about battery tech could add some insight.

I wonder what spec Lithium battery would be compatible with the Innovatronix Mini.

As observed earlier in the thread, the I Mini's focus is on bi-voltage power supply compatibility and it sounds like it does that well.