Technology: An Indoor Thing, Outdoors

We’re blessed with some great outdoor spaces here. Despite the challenges our winters bring, it’s more than made up for by the temperate season. Time out by the lake, the great camping spots, the state parks just a day trip away; making the most of warmer weather is easy to do in this part of the world. With technology such an integral part of our lives nowadays, how do we safely use some of it to elevate our outdoor experience? What’s important and what isn’t when we’re looking to level-up our yard, poolside or forest time?

I think the most important thing for me when seeking a piece of technology I intend to be using outside, is its resistance to whatever environment I expect it to function in. Of course when I’m buying things for my yard like lights and seating, it’s pretty easy to ascertain that it will indeed survive getting rained on. Picking portable technology which will hold up to a rainstorm, being dropped or even submersion is a little trickier, though. Bluetooth speakers, phones, cameras, even some laptops are now designed with the outside in mind. A handy rating system actually exists to aide picking appropriate electronic accompaniments to our adventures; the IP Rating.

IP in this case stands for Ingress Protection. You may have seen phone manufacturers bragging about their new, higher ratings over the years as phones became more watertight. Taking the iPhone 13 as an example, it has a rating of IP68. The first number here indicating a rating of 6 refers to dust protection, with 6 being totally dust tight. The second is the protection from moisture, in this case an 8. The moisture scale is complicated, and actually goes to 9 for devices rated against being power washed and steam cleaned; 8 basically means “Waterproof, but don’t take it diving.” Worthy of note and something I’ve had to consider when videoing my kayaking trips: something’s ability to be submerged becomes moot if you’ve no means of retrieving it. Floating cases and enclosures are an amazing invention.

Gauging something’s ruggedness is a little more tricky, and can often come down to the rather unscientific “feel” of how sturdy it is. Some devices or cases will claim to have been tested to MIL-STD, which is a set of guidelines created as an internal benchmark by the military. The issue with that being that it’s not an actual ratified standard; companies are free to interpret these guidelines however they want, then slap the rating on their product without fear of audit. Something like a drop test is useless if it’s only being performed under highly curated conditions, as I certainly can’t remember the last time I dropped my phone paying careful attention to which way up it landed.

Battery life is the final thing I consider here as most modern devices, even given how compact some have gotten, offer more than enough runtime to complete their intended task. Even factoring in the cold weather, which negatively affects runtime pretty severely, I’ve not really run into issues. Plus with USB now having become the world’s default everything-charger, it’s no issue to bring along a power source! For a couple of hundred bucks, you can own something with enough capacity for 25 or more full charges on your iPhone. This can be extended even further with the addition of an inexpensive solar panel, so your return to camp can be met with a recharge for you, plus all of your devices also. Providing of course that your phone’s waterproofness isn’t currently being tested at the bottom of the lake…