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-- Batteries: Alkaline vs. Rechargable? (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/showthread.php?threadid=1047)

I'm anxiously awaiting arrival of my Visor Deluxe, my first PDA, and I'm trying to decide how to handle the battery issue.
Do I buy a large quantity (to bring the per battery cost down as suggested elsewhere within visorcentral) of reg batteries?
or
Do I buy 2 sets of rechargeable batteries expecting to get 12-14 hours from each charge?
I've read through posts on battery life but haven't really gotten a feel for what experienced users would suggest. Also as I don't know exactly all that I will doing with it, I can't really say what I will or will not be using..aside from Avantgo and HotSync'ing Outlook.
Thanks in advance!

For most users, 14 hours of runtime probably translates to 1 to 3 weeks of use. Heavy users may get less, light users more. In the long run, rechargeables are more cost effective and much more friendly to the environment. They may have to be changed more frequently than standard alkalines, but it only takes a few seconds; no big deal.

I need to get a ton of rechargable batteries for all the little kids toys, flashlights, games, etc. that we have at home. I had planned on Renewals.

Anybody know the best place to get these in large quantities for a good price?

Also, is there a charger for these that holds a lot of batteries at once?

bregent1,
Thanks for the reply. That makes a lot of sense. It's just changing batteries, I might as well do the right thing enviromentally considering how often I'll be changing them either way.

Yeah, my Energizer ACCU 650 mAh NiMHs are supposed to last for up to 1000 charges. I figure the cost per use per battery should come out well under a penny, even figuring in the cost of the charger. I haven't factored in the cost of the electricity required for charging, but I doubt it is too much. Seems like a no-brainer to me.

I just bought 12 AAA NEXcells from www.thomas-distributing.com. They sell just about any battery type you could need and the chargers. The more batteries you buy the cheaper. The 12AAA's I bought brought the cost down to $2.30.

The AAA NEXcells are 650mAh, the higest I could find. The quest are only 550mAh and the YUASA are 600mAh. (Higher mAh == longer battery life)

[This message has been edited by Voltaire (edited 02-08-2000).]

Rolando,
I've been using the Renewal cells (rechargeable alkaline batteries) for awhile in my minidisc player. They are allright for a while, but I've had problems with the batteries leaking in the recharger. This has happened twice (two different chargers), so I'm starting to think this is a problem with the technology. Also, the number of rechargings you get really does decrease a lot if you let the batteries run all the way down. I'm not as big a fan of them as I was at first, I think I'll get NiMH cells for my Visor.

walmt24,

Was your experience with leaking with the newer renewals or older? The newer ones claim up to 100x recharges opposed to 25x.

I've been using renewals for about 5 years and have only had one leak. But I am really not that big of a fan of the product because of frequently getting batteries that would only charge a few times. I'm hoping that the new ones are better.

Nimhs are probably a better option for the Visor/Palm, but I've got kids with a lot of electronic gadgets and Nimhs are just too expensive to put in a toy that they might lose or damage.

Do they only leak when they are charging? Not once they are charged up, right?

I was considering Renewals because they are cheap and I've been told that alkeline batteries work better in Palms that NiMH batteries. Something about NiMHs dropping from 50% to 0% really quickly.

In reality, the cost of the disposable batteries for my Visor isn't that bad, but the kids toys and these little stickup, rechargable lights that my wife bought are killing us.

Well, I've been using NiMHs in my Visor for a while, and it still reports 100% (after doing the .7 (or was it .8 ..I forget) shortcut to NiCAD). I'm not a heavy Visor user (I use it primarily to store my grades using four.zero, b-days, importat dates, phone nnumbers/address, etc), but it works fine. I got NiMHs hoping it will eventually pay for how much I pay for alkaline AAAs.

Anyway, I did also get them from thomas-distributing.com (or batterysupply.com..same site)

If you get them, get the SLOW charger, I know how tempting the fast charger may seem, but having a slow charger allows you to recharge the NiMHs more times than the fast charger. Besides, you can always keep one set of NiMHs in your charger. (The documentation that comes with the charger is wrong, and they posted on their website that you can keep it in.) So, I just have a set in my charger always, and a set in my Visor)

I've also heard that with NiMHs that it's advisable you don't drop them down to zero completely to recharge them, but then again, they have no memory effects and such (so I've been told..)

I'll see what happens.. just giving my 2 cents.

--Jonathan Lin

quote:

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Originally posted by Rolando:

I was considering Renewals because they are cheap and I've been told that alkeline batteries work better in Palms that NiMH batteries. Something about NiMHs dropping from 50% to 0% really quickly.

---

I am currently using Energize AccuRechargeable NiHM's in my VDx and have not had any problems. With beam receive off, 3 to 4 hot syncs a day, and little backlight use I get 13 to 14 hours of Power on usage. I have not had a problem with the voltage dropping off suddenly.

According to the NiHM documention, you should be able to get upto 1000 recharges out of the batteries. The renewals will give you only 25 to 30. I guy in my office has been using them (renewals) for a while in a number of different items and said that the AAA ones tend to leak once they get close to the end of their usable time period.

Henry

I have had similar problems with Renewals. After only a few charges a couple batteries started popping in the charger.

I just recently started using NiMH and I have had no problem with them so far. They work really well and while the discharge tends to accelerate once I get down to about 25-30% I still have more than ample time to replace the batteries. I usually let them go to the first or second low battery warning.

I have a fast charger, which I like, but I think a slow charger (especially one with a trickle maintanance charge) is a really good idea. It's worth it. That way you can keep the batteries in the charger and they won't over charge, nor will they slowly run down when sitting on the shelf. I bought my charger on the spur of the moment, which wasn't all that smart.

What batter profile are people using for their NIMH batteries? I've just put my set in (alkalines finally ran out) and have been trying to find the proper .7 setting. If I set it to NICAD the batter metter in LauncherIII rarely drops below 100% (will drop to 87 occasionally but then right back up). Rechargeable leaves the metter in constant flux. The alkaline setting seems to be the most realistic so far. Any suggestions as to which is the proper setting?

I was thinking of getting the MAHA MH-C204F charger. I just would like to know if anyone has this and if you can in fact leave batteries in their if you don't have a use for them yet. I am asking, because I heard the data sheet on the website, for this device, is incorrect.

Thanks!

quote:

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Originally posted by Voltaire:
What batter profile are people using for their NIMH batteries? ...If I set it to NICAD the batter metter in LauncherIII rarely drops below 100% (will drop to 87 occasionally but then right back up).

---

bregant1, Rolando;
I've had problems with both the "old" Renewals and the new ones (I noticed the difference in the # of claimed recharging times, but I wonder if they've changed the batteries or just the packaging.) The main variable in # of recharges seems to be how low you let the battery discharge. I got about 8 recharge cycles with mine, but I was not kind to them (letting them discharge very far most of the time--which is exactly how your kids are likely to treat them, recharging them when the toy no longer functions).
The Renewals have never leaked in the device they are powering. They ooze black liquid into the charger during the charge cycle. By the way, if this happens to you, be careful with the liquid, it took the paint off a metal surface it sat on.
I think NiMH are the best choice for a high-value item (camera, Visor, minidisc palyer, etc) which you'll not likely misplace. Maybe Renewals make sense for a child's toy that will be lost within a few battery cycles. But with the NiMH batteries costing about $2-$4 per (depending on size), they're cheaper than alkalines if you don't lose them before about 4 cycles.
For what it is worth.

I have tried the Alkaline and the NiCad settings and have found that both show the battery going down a line or two and then coming back up.

I believe the reason the battery meter show 100% for a while on the NiCad setting is because of the following. An alkaline battery is 1.5v, while a NiHM and NiCads are 1.2v. If you select the NiCad setting it tells the VDx to expect a voltage of 2.4v as full instead of 3.0v. If you have a battery monitoring program installed, you will notice that the low voltage warning is raised from 2.1v for Alkaline to 2.26v for NiCad. The rechargable alkaline setting is 2.35v

Henry

Peter,

In response to about you getting the Maha C204F charger. That is a fast charger, and if you really want to get more charge life (like be able to recharge it more times) its been recommended by someone else in a earlier post (and by me) to get a slow charger. I use the Maha C124S charger. Like I said, despite what the the printed documentation says, it says on the website that you can leave the batteries in even after being charged. I always keep a set in my charger, so when the need comes to swap the AAA batts out of my Visor, they'l be ready.

IMO, the slow charger (it's about 10-20 hrs, but what's the rush?) is the way to go.

--Jonathan Lin