Inova microlight STS - Cool new keychain microlight

I just stumbled across one of these and had to pick one up from REI. It does not use a standard switch or squeeze to activate but a capacitive swipe. It has two output levels, a beacon, and variable level control. Pretty cool features for such a tiny light.

One thing that I really appreciate is the use of two CR2032's instead of the wimpy CR2016 lithium batteries as is typical in these tiny lights. This gives the same capacity as a AAA cell in a very small/flat profile. You can pick these cells up cheap on the Internet so you can keep a supply. Lithium batteries keep good in storage too.

All-in-all a fun little light with decent runtime. I just got the light so we shall see how reliable the switch is. For $12 list, I thought it would be fun to try out.

Any photos? I'm a sucker for keychain lights.

Looks like it has a capacitive switch, too.

https://www.niteize.com/product/INOVA-Microlight-STS.asp

There are some YouTube videos of the light also. It's pretty solid construction.

Wow. I just noticed in the the add that it lists ANSI lumen ratings. This is the first time I've seen this for one of these types of lights.

I like the UI, I needs one. (Or two)

what's the standby current battery drain please?

shelm said:

what's the standby current battery drain please?

Click to expand...

Don't know if my DMM is working right, but I just got a reading of .27 milliamps. Good luck getting those two tiny screws out. I ended up drilling the heads off. The two plastic halves of the light seem to snap together real well, so I'm not worried about the thing coming apart without the screws in there.

Like many Nite Ize products this has a "Try Me!" mode that allows shoppers to activate the light in it's packaging. This will present 2 problems:
1. As with all of the products with Try Me! mode, there will be more than a few negative reviews on amazon because the light won't stay on for more than a minute. Read the manual comments will follow.
2. Due to the nature of the switching method, these will eventually ship with dead batteries. If Mockingbird's reading is correct I'm sure some of you battery gurus can figure out exactly when they'll start to die.

This didn't deter me from ordering one though! I'll see if my meter agrees with Mockingbird's on the standby current.
At that price it might be a useful driver for other projects, depending on how bad the PWM is.



edit: Looks like it has a 4 minute auto-off, they may have skipped the demo mode entirely and just let it shut off on it's own.

Let's see now. 2032 battery has a capacity of 220 mAh. Batteries in series don't add capacity, so 220 mAh divided by .27 mA = 814 hours. 814 divided by 24 = 33 days.
Since my batteries now test at 2.8 volts each and I have had the Inova for more than 33 days, my .27 mA reading was INCORRECT.
Has anyone managed to remove the screws using a screwdriver?

Picked up x3 at the local NEX and like them. x2 in our emergency chest, x1 to play around with. I like the rubberized casing. I must say, I wasn't sold on the idea until I saw one on the shelf and it advertised "Try Me!" as bansuri stated.

These are not dunk worthy incase anyone is wondering.