Review: Mugen Power 4500mAh Extended Battery for Samsung Galaxy Note

We are seeing a rapid growth in the mobile phone industry today with the development of fast multi-core chipsets, more and more memory, high-resolution displays but what most of the OEMs don’t give attention to is the Battery of those ever growing modern devices. Android phones have always been bugged with poor to below average battery life and this is where extended batteries come into play. We have reviewed extended batteries in the past and we are quite a fan of Mugen’s extended batteries for smartphones.

Samsung Galaxy Note, the smartphone-tablet hybrid is one hell of a beast with that huge 5.3-inch HD Super AMOLED display, a Exynos dual-core chipset and thankfully it comes with a quite modest 2500 MAh battery but still its not enough for power users like me and many of us. Mugen has been kind enough to send us one of its extended batteries for the Galaxy Note and we will tell you how the Mugen extended battery for the phablet fairs, read along..

ABOUT

Mugen offers its extended batteries for the both the international Galaxy Note and the AT&T Galaxy Note. We have the 4500 mAh Lithium Ion battery for the international Galaxy Note while the AT&T version has a more juicy 5400 MAh extended battery from Mugen.

UNBOXING

The Mugen Extended Battery comes in the known by now minimalistic packing with padded protection which we quite appreciate. The package had the backdoor, the 4500 mAh battery with a white branding and the warning card with all the instructions.

LOOK AND FEEL

Mugen offers 2 variants of back doors with this particular battery – a bluish one and a white one.

Mugen has done a fine job with the back cover of the battery, it is plasticky but to our pleasant surprise looks and feels better than the stock back cover. The back has the same bluish color as the stock one but it really improves the grip on the device quite noticeably. One great addition the Mugen’s back plate brings is the kickstand, it is a highly understated feature and with that huge 5.3 inches of HD Super AMOLED goodness, it’ll be quite liked by Note users. Although the kickstand is cool, it is disappointing that it has been made of plastic but it is certainly not a deal breaker..

Mugen has been quite thoughtful with the way they’ve designed the camera lens area, it is sloped at the edges so as not to throw shadow over the lens or distort the projection of the flash.The extended pack fits the phone’s battery slot perfectly.

The huge battery ruins the good looks and slender features of the Galaxy Note but it is expected when you get almost double juice as compared to the stock battery. It also makes the device noticeably heavier and we all know that the huge Note is already not considered quite pocket-friendly and the added width to the waistline by the Mugen battery makes it even more uncomfortable to pocket.

PERFORMANCE

This is what matters the most when choosing an extended battery, the battery performance. The Mugen Extended Battery is rated at 4500 mAH which is nearly double the capacity of the stock battery which is rated at 2500 mAh. Well we expect Mugen batteries to work wonders and this is no change but it certainly lives upto its name offering impressive battery life.

I use the Galaxy Note as my primary device and as one would expect from a tech geek, i use it quite heavily but the stock battery does not even a give me a full day of charge. I get a maximum 15 hours juice of the stock battery on moderate to mostly heavy use with constant data connectivity, push email accounts, a lot for browsing the internet, 2 hours of calling, being connected to Facebook and Twitter all along, a little gaming and media playback.  Plus i love to play around unnecessarily with my phone. While the 2500 MAh stock battery should be enough for most casual users but for a heavy user like me, i certainly need more time without needing to plug, this is wher Mugen battery comes into play.

I have used the Mugen battery for more than two weeks now. With the Mugen battery i managed to squeeze almost 32 hours with the same heavy usage that i aforementioned. With some moderate usage it easily gives two days of battery backup which is quite impressive to say the least.

INSTALL OR NOT

So we now know that the Mugen battery for the Galaxy Note quite pleases our demands with more than double the battery life compared to the stock Samsung battery but is it worth your money?

Well, if you have made up your mind to get a extended battery, you should go for the Mugen battery instead of others. Its very well worth the price it comes for with awesome build quality and the battery too lives upto the expectations.

The more tricky question is whether you can sacrifice the good looks of your Galaxy Note for the impressive battery capacity. Well this too depends on you. There’s no denying that the back plate Mugen offers looks and feels better better than the stock one but the added thickness and weight make it look quite ugly and uncomfortable to pocket. But still, it would still be quite useful when you’re travelling or you’re watching HD videos and you just can’t plugin.

Well all said, the battery is not for everyone out there but it’ll be quite useful to users who travel a lot and remain far from a power source. It costs $98.95 and it is pricey than other extended batteries in the market but it is worth the money you’ll spent.

You can buy the battery directly from Mugen here. Mugen offers free shipping to most of the countries.

Gallery

IMPORTANT: This battery is NOT for AT&T Version of Galaxy Note. For AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note SGH-i717 (USA) version of the battery please click here.