Is there any way to power up laptop from car?

[AirForceElite]

I don't know where else to post this, I hope this was correct.

I have few questions:

1) Is it possible to power up a laptop from the car's cigarette's lighter? I could say I am smart with electronics...but I have no idea anything about electricity. I do know that cigarette lighter says its "12V" but the wall outlets in North America are 110V...so how would it work out? Is it possible?

2) What are my options if I want to power up my laptop in an airplane? 6-cell batteries barely last 2 hours and I fly often from Toronto to Moscow and that's a 10 hour flight. I am dieing of boredom the other 8 hours...so any way to power up from airplane?

3) What will happen if I will plug my laptop from North America that uses 110V into a Russian outlet which uses 220V? Will my laptop blow up because it gets double the voltage....or will everything be ok?

 

[AmberClad]

I'm not sure about questions 2 and 3, but at least for my Dell laptop, it comes with a car charger. It looks just like the regular battery brick, but with the car charger on the end instead of a wall plug. Your laptop manufacturer might sell one for your model.

 

[0roo0roo]

you can power any laptop in a car. just buy an inverter, they are sold at most electronics stores, frys radio shack whereever. it converts the 12v to 110v and has a normal wall plug so you can use anything that is within its power limits. don't go too cheap, the dinky plastic ones that are made for laptops tend to suck. get a decent one with a metal shell for decent heatsinking and enough capacity to run any laptop safely. 15-25dollars for 150watter generally. sometimes 9.99 at frys if lucky on sale.
they look like this.
http://www.amazon.com/Vector-4...034BCA/dp/B000EJTHVA/r
http://www.amazon.com/VECTOR-V...nverter/dp/B00009W3ZC/
seems even black and decker makes them now
http://www.amazon.com/Black-De...1045BD/dp/B000EJQIX0/r
you can get much more powerful ones if you want to power other more power hungry devices
you have to buy for the max your device you will use at any moment, some stuff has a spike at startup even if it uses little after, so its good to have headroom.

mine is a cheap wagan one that looks about the same as above. works fine as far as i can tell. i had a cheap tiny plastic cased one that was smaller before but it tended to wig out on any more power hungy laptop and was hot and unreliable.

for plane, there are universal batteries. basically a large slab of battery with plug adaptors that can really boost battery life. like this http://www.apcc.com/resource/i...dex.cfm?base_sku=UPB70
http://www.valence.com/products/ncharge_overview.html

 

[oynaz]

3) Look at your power brick. The label on it states which voltages it can handle.

 

[Gusty987]

I've always wondered, how long can a car battery run a laptop with the engine off? And with the engine running, does the alternator produce enough power?

 

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: Gusty987
I've always wondered, how long can a car battery run a laptop with the engine off? And with the engine running, does the alternator produce enough power?

http://www.templetons.com/brad/burn/burn-power.html

some inverters say they detect low battery and give warning, but i've never tested this. maybe they sense a voltage drop, i have no idea. the car battery has to have enough left to crank that starter, and car batteries don't like being deep discharged either. i wouldn't run stuff off a car battery for long. bigger cars tend to have bigger batteries as well.