Well I gotta be honest, even with 4 batteries fresh batteries (wired in 2x parallel... circuit won't work with higher than 3V) I'm still barely charging the phone from the 20% warning (goes to about 95% charged then batteries die). Of course, if you keep feeding it batteries then it will keep charging, but the iPhone definitely gives it a workout. I haven't tried a full charge with alkalines yet, but I suspect they will be able to give a full charge plus a little bit more.
The other bad thing is you need to disconnect the iPhone if the batteries in the mintyboost are dead, because it will start draining your phone otherwise.
It's not ideal, and there are probably better pre-built solutions out there for less money and hassle. But I still had a lot of fun making it and enjoy showing it off to other geeks.
And it does work in a pinch. Which is pretty cool.
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