Inspired by Live Earth, I dug out my Solio solar charger over the weekend. Telecom actually sent it to me back in May, but it's taken the sight of the reformed Spinal Tap onstage with Metellica to sufficiently awaken my environmental consciousness to the point where I could be bothered opening the box.

Anyhow, the portable, 156g Solio ($139), when it's closed, is just a little bigger than your hand, and consists of three solar panels, one also housing a battery. The three panels fan out, in petal fashion, the better to catch the sun's rays. Leave them in sunlight for 10 hours then, via its battery, the Solio should be able to charge your cellphone (or iPod) at least twice. A cellphone recharge takes the same amount of time as plugging your phone into a normal power socket.

For emergency (but hopefully sunny) situations, you should be able to get 25 minutes' talk time from the Solio's battery after just 60 minutes of sunlight.

For me, in my laid-back, non-emergency office situation, two immediate problems have emerged.

One, on this glum Auckland day, my Solio is only intermittently getting enough sunlight to actually start charging (indicated by a red light). And to find that sunlight I had to leave the shadows of my office and leave it in a dangerously unguarded little alcove by our reception.
(Once you do manage to charge the Solio, it should hold the charge for up to a year.)

Two, although the Solio comes with a slew of adapters - including ones for Nokia, Sanyo, Samsung and Motorola phones - there aint one for my Sony Ericsson mobile (though I could fashion a workaround, since the Solio does have a miniUSB adapter - which is where it becomes so handy for recharging MP3 players - and my Sony Ericsson W880i, supports a full-size USB jack, which I guess I could find a miniUSB adapter for ...

Better news: our finance manager reports she (and a literal truckload of fellow adventurers) travelled all around Africa, charging their iPods as they went using a Solio-style device the whole way.

And new recruit Jan (nrJ) reports a member of his family got around Europe with a similar device, albeit with a slightly different paradigm from the Solio's petals: sheet-style solar collectors that could be glued to the back of a back-pack (Reseller News' subeditor Rodney Fletcher also points out that the Solio could be stuck on the top of a cap, propeller style, for the traveller with class).