By Andrew Liszewski
While it’s not the first power strip to come along that attempts to intelligently curb energy usage in your home, the Power USB does bring some interesting functionality to the table. On one end of the strip you’ve got a 6 foot extension cable, but on the other you have a rather unique 6 foot USB cable. That’s because 2 of the 4 outlets on the Power USB can actually be controlled VIA an application on your PC.
The program allows you to assign hot keys for manually powering up those 2 controllable outlets as needed, or they can be programmed to automatically turn on or off at set times. They can even be activated after you’ve performed a certain function on your PC, like when you print a document, so your printer is only on and using electricity when you’re actually using it. I also like that all 4 sockets on the Power USB are universal, meaning it accepts plug designs from all countries. Orders aren’t being accepted until sometime in August, so pricing info has yet to be announced, but hopefully the extra technology doesn’t add too much to the bottom line since it’s not going to save much energy if no one buys one.