Transcript generated from the video audio for accessibility.

[0:01] Hey everybody it's LonSybe and we've got something fun and useful to check out today.

[0:06] This is a little device from Werewolf.

[0:08] It's called the V Flex and what it lets you do is turn any USB power supply like this

[0:13] battery or something you might plug into a wall into a universal power supply.

[0:19] So what I'm going to do here is connect up the V Flex adapter to this battery.

[0:23] You can see it's lighting up green.

[0:24] I've got the right adapter installed on here and I'm going to power an 80's vintage Atari

[0:29] 2600 using this USB-C battery.

[0:33] So if we flick the switch here, look at that.

[0:35] It's providing the proper voltage and we are powering this Atari 2600 with this battery,

[0:40] but you could very easily use a smaller adapter like this for the wall or anything else that

[0:45] can deliver USB power.

[0:47] These are all programmable so you can find the right voltage for your device and they've

[0:52] got lots of adapters that go with them as well.

[0:56] So you can get everything up and running and turn any USB power supply into a universal

[1:01] one.

[1:02] This one's a lot of fun.

[1:03] You got to be careful with it and we'll talk about that as we're working our way through

[1:06] the review here but I think this might be useful to a lot of you.

[1:08] Now I do want to let you know in the interest of full disclosure that Werewolf sent this product

[1:12] to the channel free of charge.

[1:13] It's not very expensive.

[1:15] However, they did not review or approve what you're about to see before it was uploaded.

[1:19] All opinions are my own and this is not a sponsored review.

[1:22] So let's get into it now and check out what these Werewolf devices are all about.

[1:26] Now the price point on this is pretty reasonable.

[1:27] The base unit here is $8.00.

[1:30] This is what connects to your USB power source and then you have to connect one of the power

[1:34] adapter cables to the base unit to plug it into the device that you're trying to power.

[1:40] They do have a starter kit here that's $48.00.

[1:42] It includes three base units along with cables for most popular devices here.

[1:48] Most of them as you can see are center positive more on that in a minute but of course you

[1:52] can buy other adapter cables here.

[1:54] I do think they might be open to making different types of cables.

[1:58] I did send them a request for that Atari 2600 cable and they were able to make it for me.

[2:02] This is a very small company so I think there's some flexibility if you need it and they also

[2:07] have an adapter cable that lets you make your own cables as well.

[2:11] So you've got some options here but again not all that expensive here to get started.

[2:15] Now there is some configuration of these little base units so what you do is plug it into

[2:20] a computer or a phone or a tablet.

[2:22] They have apps for Android and iOS and then there's a web version which I have up on my

[2:27] screen here that will work with a computer.

[2:31] When you connect it up what you have to do is tell the device here what voltage you need

[2:36] and that's where things can get a little dangerous and you have to be very careful about

[2:40] making sure you're dialing in the correct voltage.

[2:43] This is no different though than maybe one of those universal AC adapters that radio

[2:47] shack used to sell with a dial where you would dial in the voltage.

[2:51] So in order to figure out what you need the best thing you can do is look at the power

[2:55] adapter.

[2:56] So for example the Atari that I just plugged into earlier on its power adapter it tells

[3:02] you everything that you need.

[3:04] Nine volts DC so if we go back to our screen here and just dial in nine volts the unit

[3:10] here will be programmed to do nine volts of power when we boot it up next and that will

[3:17] make the request of the power source to supply nine volts and then it will power the

[3:21] Atari.

[3:22] One other thing to note though is that you need to make sure the polarity is correct on

[3:27] the adapter cable that you're using.

[3:29] So for example in the case of the Atari here as you can see the plus sign here on the

[3:34] right coming out of that center thing with the open circle that indicates that this

[3:40] is a center positive power supply and that is the polarity of the adapter that we need.

[3:46] When you're shopping for the adapters on the werewolf site it will tell you whether it

[3:50] is center positive or center negative and that's really important.

[3:54] So both the voltage and the polarity are going to be important to know upfront because

[3:59] these devices may not be able to stop you from frying your electronics if you configure

[4:04] them incorrectly.

[4:06] So just do your homework and make sure you've got everything dialed in before you set

[4:10] up everything.

[4:11] Now that you have your voltage dialed in it will remember that voltage setting inside

[4:17] of the little base unit here.

[4:19] So if I plug this into a power source what will happen is we'll get a light to indicate

[4:24] whether or not we're getting the proper voltage.

[4:27] Let me show you what that looks like.

[4:28] Alright so we programmed this for nine volts.

[4:29] I've got my USB power source here.

[4:31] If I connect this up you will see it light up and then turn green and that indicates

[4:37] it's getting nine volts.

[4:38] If it isn't able to get nine volts it will light up red and I do believe that it will

[4:43] cut power to whatever is connected but again you really need to be careful when you get

[4:48] all this stuff going.

[4:49] And then once everything is programmed you just pick out the appropriate adapter and slide

[4:53] it into the base unit.

[4:54] They can only go in one way you can see what the receptacle looks like here and so all

[4:59] you do is just snap it into place and then you can plug in the barrel connector to your

[5:03] device that needs to be powered.

[5:05] Now as far as USB-C power sources are concerned there are some things to know on that end as

[5:10] well so why don't we take a look at what you need to look for.

[5:13] So for example on my little anchor 30 watt power supply here there's a bunch of text on

[5:17] the back that my 49 year old eyes can't see very well anymore but you can take a picture

[5:21] of it and this should give you some ideas to what the capabilities are here.

[5:25] So this little power supply can deliver five volts, nine volts, 15 volts or 20 volts.

[5:32] But this one also has some new modern features, one of them called PPS and this allows you

[5:37] to more granularly dial in the voltage.

[5:40] So for example I could dial in any voltage between 3.3 volts and 11 volts and get three

[5:46] amps.

[5:47] I can also dial in between 3.3 and 16 volts and get two amps and those are settings that

[5:54] you can do inside of that web interface.

[5:56] So if you do have a device that's got some weird voltage requirement if you have a PPS

[6:00] power supply like this you can dial it in and get it but not all power supplies have

[6:06] PPS.

[6:07] So for example this older Kensington power supply can deliver 100 watts of power but it

[6:11] doesn't support PPS.

[6:13] So here I can only do five, nine, 15 or 20 volts.

[6:17] And then of course you have to think about the USB-C cable that you're using.

[6:21] There is a helpful guide on the werewolf site to guide you as to what cables you should

[6:25] be looking for.

[6:26] Now I'm finding some cables are labeling their capabilities on the connector like this

[6:31] USB-4 cable here but just because they can print capabilities on a connector doesn't

[6:36] mean they're meeting the standard.

[6:38] So you definitely need to be careful not only with the power supply but also with the cable.

[6:43] Werewolf does sell power supplies and cables that they have tested with their product which

[6:47] are going to be safer to use and something you might have hanging around in your basket

[6:51] full of wires that we all have sitting around our house.

[6:55] My recommendation is to stick to the name brands both for power supplies but also for cables.

[7:00] So Kensington for example is a good brand, anchors a good brand and also look for cables

[7:05] that are made by name brands as well just so you can have some peace of mind when you're

[7:09] plugging all of this stuff in.

[7:11] There's a lot of convenience that comes from using a USB-C universal power supply but there

[7:16] are some risks here as well given how wild the standard is and how some companies just

[7:21] don't meet it because they are just selling the cheapest cable they can get out onto

[7:26] the market.

[7:27] So buyer beware be cautious but if you are looking for flexible power delivery options this

[7:31] is a fun thing to play around with.

[7:33] I've got one more thing to show you here you know what we're going to do we're going to

[7:36] hook up a Sega tower of power to this anchor power supply so that's a Sega CD a 32X

[7:42] and a Genesis console let's see if we can get it all working through this one little power

[7:46] supply here.

[7:47] Alright the tower of power is assembled here I've got my Sega CD my Sega Genesis and

[7:53] my 32X of note the Sega CD here uses a 9 volt power supply but the 32X and the second

[8:01] generation Genesis used 10 volt power supplies so I've programmed in two of the V flex adapters

[8:07] at 10 volts one at nine and connected them all up to the appropriate device here and the

[8:13] power supply we're using here is that anchor prime.

[8:16] So this does support PPS so it can get 10 volts out to those two devices that need 10 and

[8:23] 9 to the one that needs 9 and what I'm going to do here before I fire everything up is

[8:28] pull up the real time data from the power adapter it's got this great feature that delivers

[8:33] a power meter to your phone over Bluetooth and as you can see we're at 9.9 volts on C

[8:39] 1 10 on C 2 and 9 on C 3 and why don't we power things up here and see what happens and it looks

[8:48] like things are booting up nothing exploded and I can hit the start button here and start loading

[8:52] from the CD what I'm playing here is a Sega 32X game off the CD so we're going to make use of the

[8:58] whole stack here and you can see the power draw we're about 10 watts right now as everything is

[9:03] booting up and it all seems to be working just fine we've got the voltages now dialed in so C1

[9:09] and 2 are at 10 volts each and C3 is at 9 volts and this is delivering the power that this system needs

[9:17] right now and the total capacity of this power adapter is 160 watts so we're barely scratching

[9:23] the surface of what it can deliver but we're able to provide clean and useful power here over USB

[9:29] to all of this stuff with a single power adapter versus having those three large ones that they

[9:36] require you to use back in its day so all good stuff here seems to be working just fine now where we'll

[9:41] have some good documentation on their websites to definitely check that out and overall I found it to be a

[9:46] very useful device to have in my toolbox here because I've got all sorts of stuff that I need to

[9:52] plug in from time to time and I can't always find the power adapter so now I can just dial in with that

[9:57] device needs I've got plenty of adapters here that came with my starter kit and I should be good to go

[10:02] for most of what I need to power you just need to be careful because you are dealing of course with

[10:07] the USB standard here which can be all over the place but when things are properly configured as you

[10:11] saw with the Atari and the Sega things can work really well using modern USB-C power sources just

[10:18] be careful with these you want to make sure that you're checking the voltage before you plug it into a

[10:23] new device because it's very easy to fry something if you've got the voltage set incorrectly before

[10:29] you plug something in but if you know what you're doing I think you will find this to be a very

[10:33] useful product that lets you use all of your fun USB power sources with your old and new devices that

[10:39] will do it for this one until next time this is Lon Seibon thanks for watching