Todd Bernhard

The folks at Mophie basically invented the battery pack case. Mophie sent me its new Juice Pack Access ($99.95) for my iPhone XR and it's clear that the company is reinventing the battery case, leveraging the Qi-based wireless charging capabilities of the newer iPhones. As with its original line of cases, you essentially double the battery life of your iPhone, but this version does not interfere with your Lightning port. It charges your phone using the phone's built-in Qi wireless charging capability. You can still use the Lightning port to charge or use accessories like Apple's headphone and HDMI adapters. Ironically, if Apple had focused on making phones with larger batteries, even if they were thicker, the tech giant might have been able to leave the headphone jack in, and we might not need battery cases. But Apple's focus on thinness has hurt battery life, and led to the loss of the headphone jack, so Mophie has an answer.

If the Apple Watch is too geeky and a typical fitness tracker doesn't do enough for your overall health and well-being, the GoBe 2 ($169) from Healbe may be of interest. They sent me their "Smart Life Band" which is something inbetween a smartwatch and a fitness tracker. The GoBe 2 measures (or recommends) calorie intake, energy balance, sleep quality, emotional states, water balance, burned calories, heart rate, stress level, steps, and distance. In short, it addresses all or most of the health benefits of a smartwatch, and perhaps more, but without the excess capabilities many fitness users wouldn't bother with.

Nanoleaf sent me their Canvas Smarter light panels ($249.99) and as soon as I set it up, my colleagues couldn't keep their hands off of it. So what is this Canvas and why do people find it irresistable? They are square plastic panels that you mount on the wall using the included command strip style tape. You connect them to each other using special connector strips and then connect one panel to the wall outlet. They are programmable lights that can display colors or patterns of your choice, using the app. You can also make the panels respond to music or to touch, as a game similar to Simon. It's a lot of fun!

I recently upgraded to the iPhone XR and that meant searching for a new case. The folks at Nomad sent several to review and I had a hard time choosing. I ended up with the simple and elegant Rugged Case (starting at $44.95) but some users might prefer Nomad's folio options for a few dollars more. What I like about all of the cases is, despite having a leather surface, they have a protective silicone shell that completely encompasses the perimeter of the iPhone. The coverage includes the port area at the bottom, which is where some competing cases, particularly Apple's own cases, skimp on coverage.