Ostation 2 Pro 3-in-1 Battery Storage and Charging Station Review

Ostation 2 Pro 3-in-1 Battery Storage and Charging Station Review

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Takeaway: Fast, efficient battery charger and storage device that's super simple to use.

The Ostation 2 Pro is a 3-in-1 Smart Battery Charger that analyzes the health of your rechargeable batteries, charges, and conveniently organizes and stores them. You’ll receive the charging station, instruction manual, USB-C power cable, and AC wall adapter.

This is the Ostation 2 Pro. It has a touchscreen LCD on the front, measures 8.25 inches tall, 3.5 inches wide, and 6.25 inches from front to back. At the bottom is the AA battery dispensing drawer, AAA battery dispenser above it, and a push-to-open discard drawer for defective or incompatible batteries. At the back is the USB-C power port for the unit, and I’m going to plug the right-angle connector in here as it doesn’t stick out as far. Then the other end goes into the wall adapter which has flip-out prongs that fold up for travel or storage. On the right-hand side is a fold down charging stand with two magnetic MCC ports for charging Olight flashlights, although I don’t have any so I won’t be able to show that functionality. And on the bottom are rubber feet at the back and front of the unit to prevent it from sliding on your desk.

On top of the unit there are two doors. The one towards the front is the compartment for AAA batteries and you can see that there are two slots you can drop the batteries into. Similarly the door towards the back is for AA batteries and when placing a battery on the top section it will roll down into the queue. When inserting batteries, its polarity doesn’t matter, that is, whether or not the positive end faces left or right, however, just make sure it goes in horizontally or it may get stuck. And you can see the batteries simply drop into the queues in each section and you can see how full the compartment are through the translucent sides. You can insert up to 12 batteries of each size in their respective queues.

This device is able to charge any brand’s 1.2V NiMH rechargeable batteries of either form factor. It can also charge 1.5V AA Li-ion batteries from Ecolast, Ostation’s private label batteries. The reason for this is to ensure safe charging and compatibility, since the controllers in these batteries also provide the device information like a unique ID, recharge cycle count, and battery health statistics.

When the unit is plugged in it will power on right away. Any batteries that are waiting in the queue will be picked up and individually checked for health and compatibility. You may hear a bit of clattering from the machine as batteries are picked up or deposited into the holding trays. If the battery can be charged, you’ll see its stats appear on the LCD. The smaller batteries represent AAA and the larger icons AA. Each has its current charge level displayed above it and the battery type along the top. Just under the battery is a running timer that records how long a battery has been charging.

While charging times vary, fully depleted batteries can be charged in as little as 2.5 hours. However, actual performance can be affected by variables like battery temperature, as the machine employs Intelligent Thermo-Adaptive Charging for faster charging when the battery is cool and slower charging when hot to protect the battery’s health and keep charging efficient. There’s also 5 layers of protection to safeguard against overcharging, overcurrent, overheating, overvoltage, and short circuits. To the right of the screen, the upper icon indicates how many batteries were successfully charged in the current cycle and the lower one shows how many were discarded.

From the status screen, tapping the back icon in the top left brings you to the main menu. Tapping the red power button allows you to turn off the unit, after you confirm this operation by swiping to the right. Then to power it back on, tap the screen to wake and slide the bar to the right. Note that the batteries will be breifly checked again before continuing to charge. Tapping the leftmost icon brings you back to the battery status page. Tapping settings in the middle, lets you toggle Screen Off mode to turn off the display but continue to charge the batteries. Just tap the display to wake it up again. The schedule toggle allows you to set an exclusion period when you don’t want the machine to operate, for example if you only want it to run during off-peak electric hours, or want to limit noise during the night.

The ‘Connection’ toggle allows you to enable WiFi connection mode for use with the smartphone app, Olight. You’ll need to register an account so you can add the Ostation as a device by tapping the plus. Then select your Ostation model. Provide your WiFi network name and password, ensuring the network is set to a 2.4 GHz bandwidth. Next, you’ll go to your WiFi settings and switch to the Ostation’s network which will appear as SmartLife followed by 4 characters. Once added, you can update the device’s firmware. You can even toggle on auto upgrade for automatic updates during idle periods.

In the app you’ll see the same stats as displayed on the device’s onboard LCD. Here it’s showing that 1 battery has been discarded, so if I check that drawer, it appears this NiMH battery is no longer healthy and can’t be charged anymore. The same will happen if you place non-rechargeable batteries in, like alkaline, Zinc Chloride, and Ni-Cd, even though the latter are technically rechargeable, this machine will not accept them and you’ll find that they’ll get deposited in the discard bin during the checking phase. The discard bin can hold up to 4 AA or 6 AAA batteries at a time and if full, the machine will stop charging until it is emptied.

You also don’t have to worry about loading in an odd number of batteries, as the machine is capable of charging just one of each battery type on its own. Just note that if you add additional batteries of that type, it won’t pick them up until the next charge cycle. You can also mix and match 1.5V Li-ion with Ni-MH as they will charge separately once loaded. However, the next cycle won’t begin until both of those batteries have been fully charged, so the one that takes longer to charge will be the determining factor. Fully charged batteries are deposited into their respective storage areas, which can hold up to 12 batteries of each type. When the dispensing tray is opened, you can collect two batteries at a time. To retrieve the next two, simply close the drawer and open it again. Keep in mind that the machine will stop charging batteries if the storage area for charged battteries is full, so be sure to remove batteries from the dispensing tray, if you need to continue charging more batteries.

Overall, the Ostation 2 Pro makes charging and storing your re-usable batteries dead simple. So you can keep your devices like smart locks, remote controls, and gaming gear powered and ready to go. Just load up any brand’s 1.2V Ni-MH rechargeables or Olight’s Ecolast 1.5V Li-ion rechargeables and the machine will analyze, charge, and store them for when you need them.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. #CommissionsEarned
Buy it at Amazon: Ostation 2 Pro 3-in-1 Battery Storage and Charging Station [Affiliate Link]