found out yesterday that there’s a shuffle shortage and gadget battery life can only be expected to get worse. bummer. at least you can make the most of your waiting-for-shuffle blues and solder yourself a ‘usb battery’. this little gizmo runs off a 9 volt battery and supplies your favorite little device with the proper 5 volts of mobile power.
in lieu of running an ipod off of it, i tested it with an mpx220 smartphone and it should work fine with any low power mobile device that can charge via usb cable. read more for instructions on how to make your own.