Google Glass, among the most wearable and the most iconic new gadgets hitting the market in the near future, is expected to be released later this year. It can serve as your smartphone screen extension to do a set of uncomplicated tasks and rests in place without obscuring vision much like eyeglass frames, but is a bit bulkier.

Google Glass features include many of the same feautures as smart phones, including voice search, texting, phone calls, Google Hangouts, turn-by-turn walking/driving/cycling directions, delivering search results, returning weather forecasts, capturing and sharing photos and videos through Google+, and a few third-party apps. It is speculated, according to Expert Reviews, that it will sell at $600 when it eventually becomes available to the general public after the Explorer phase is ended.

Due to Glass's small size and the hefty power demands of recording video from the device for any length of time, many users are turning to solar power or external batteries to keep the device charged. Both because it is convenient in that it need never be replaced and because it is good for the environment, solar power seems likely to win out in the end unless Google finds a way to improve battery life.

A solar power charger uses the energy from sunlight to provide electricity to gadgets or to charge batteries. Nearly all wireless chargers get energy from the sun. Although small, pocket-size solar panels have been on the market for a while, they tend to be limited in the amount of charge they can impart. Because the energy keeps flowing as long as the sun is shining, it can keep a nearly-dead device from dying for quite a while, but only the largest portable panels are able to impart a significant charge that lasts after the panel is unplugged. However, anything is helpful when one considers the notoriously limited battery life of Google Glass Explorer Edition 2.0, as reported by PC Magazine.