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Power Portables Hardware

User Review of N-Charge II Laptop Battery 192

Posted by timothy from the sometimes-they-come-back dept.
Occams Razor writes to say "I recently moved from using an N-Charge I external battery to the next version, called the N-Charge II. The series I battery was really handy and well designed; it let me work/use my laptop continuously for the 10+ hour flights that I end up taking with some regularity these day. The series 1 is slim, maybe .5 inches thick (approx. 1.5cm) and has the same footprint as an IBM T40 or T41 laptop (which is what I have). This means it fit perfectly under my laptop. Unfortunately, the Series 2 N-charge (Saphion) battery appears to be the worst kind of marketing spawn. Here are the full details that I've written up in hopes that others will learn from my mistake. (And -- who knows? -- maybe the company will listen.)" Read on below for the rest.

First and foremost, the battery simply does not last as long as the first-generation battery did. I used both batteries on flights to Japan from the west coast of the U.S. -- that's about a 10-hour flight. The first-gen battery lasted close to seven hours, and was consistent in showing me the strength of its remaining charge through the whole flight. The second-generation battery lasted more like five and a half hours, and the battery went from showing moderate charge (two lights) to dying completely in less than an hour. That is not at all what I expected from a display.

Secondly, and only slightly less important, are the changes in the shape. The first-gen battery was the perfect shape and size to fit under my laptop, even when I used it with laptops with a slightly different footprint; the battery was large enough (length & width) that even larger laptops were still stable resting on it. It was also thin enough that having a footprint mismatch wasn't a big problem (either in terms of ergonomics or in terms of stability for the laptop). The second-gen battery is a horrible form factor. Just plain and simple, it doesn't appear to have been designed to take into account how people will use it. It's too tall to fit nicely under a laptop with a different footprint and the small size (length & width) ensure that any laptop resting on top of it will be completely off-balance.

I don't know what the company's use cases were for the device, but the most common times I use the external battery are either when I am sitting somewhere with no desk or power (and hence all my devices need to be on my lap or on the floor, but I have space to spread them out), or when I am on an airplane and have the same power scenario as the first case, but also am severely cramped for space in general.

If I have space (but no desk) then I need a long enough cord to get from my power supply to my laptop. That means that either the battery has to fit under the laptop (in which case it can have a short cord) or it needs to have a nice long cord (much longer than the short non-extendable one provided). N-Charge has failed to provide for either of these options.

If I'm on an airplane, the battery needs to fit under the laptop. Period. I might be willing to place it in the seat-back pocket, but the second-gen battery is too thick to fit well there. I might be willing to have it in my backpack on the floor in front of me (though that is so awkward that it is almost certainly dangerous if I have an emergency) but the cord is far too short for that.

I think the change to three charge lights (instead of 5 in the first version) was pointless, and that more information is better than less -- but I can accept it, so long as they are accurate. Unfortunately, they aren't. They don't seem to represent 1/3 of the charge each, more like 1/6, 1/3 and 1/2 respectively.

The new power adapter tips are easier to lose and don't fit my laptop port as well as the first-gen plugs. This has caused my laptop to end up being disconnected from the battery spontaneously and it appears to be slowly damaging the socket in my laptop, possibly due to wiggling.

At this point, I am planning on trying to return the second-gen battery and go find someone who will sell me one of the first-gen batteries on e-Bay. I'm tremendously disappointed and hope that N-Charge's third generation shows better design.

Thanks to Occams Razor for the review; Slashdot's new Hardware section could use your reviews, too.
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User Review of N-Charge II Laptop Battery More

User Review of N-Charge II Laptop Battery

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  • Newer Laptops (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mythosaz ( 572040 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @03:47PM (#12092940)
    While 10+ Hours is nice, most of the newer laptops I'm reviewing (Dell D410's and D610's) have multi-hour battery life right off the shelf, and a spare battery fits nicely in the bag.

    Newer laptop batteries are making these sort of gadgets not-so-nifty.

    • Seriously, this guy is going on and on about how this company is screwing themselves by doing something new, when in reality they were screwing themselves by keeping with their old "outdated" product. They realized that they need to keep up with technology. Or get left behind. I keep two batteries on my TC1100 and continously get 7-8 hours off of them combined and they only weight like a half a pound a piece because they are the 3-cell batteries instead of the standard 4 or 5 cell.
    • No battery for a laptop that is actually USED for anything lasts more than a couple hours. Sure, you can buy extras and start swapping...but why?
      • By "using", I'm not quite sure if people would be running DVD's or word processing or code writing or playing Quake. The whole centrino thing is tailored toward light usage, thats how they save battery time, but then many laptops nowadays claim to play DVD's continuous for 4 hours
        • Someone who routinely travels from the US to Japan likely has the coin to buy a new laptop.

          If you have a Thinkpad T-Series with 3-5 hours of battery and an external battery pack, you'll have more than enough juice to use your PC in the airport while waiting around and to do something productive on the 10-hour flight.

          Swapping batteries is a pain... plus the clips holding batteries on most laptops are not meant for daily use. At a company that I worked for, field techs often had to duct-tape batteries to ma
      • I disagree completely. Doing something hardware intensive, like, playing a DVD from your remavable media on your LCD screen at high contrast takes power - lots of it, but NEW laptops, used for something other than playing Quake, have FANTASTIC battery life.

        PC-Mag says the 4:10 has a "BatteryMark" of 4:05. Four hours and five minutes of REAL battery life in a form-factor that compares to the ThinkPad, and power that blows away the X40.

        http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1757493,00.a s p [pcmag.com]

        Those numbers

      • I recently bought a Dell laptop for my mother, one of the Inspiron 9300s. It has the nine-cell battery for extra life. Her practical use point on it is about 3:30, running various Office apps and listening to music. She can get through an entire two-hour DVD and still be able to work for another half-hour easily before she goes and plugs it in. This is with the 1.8GHz CPU, 1920x1200 screen on a 128MB X300, 60GB 7200RPM drive, and DVD burner. Pretty impressive, if you ask me. I've always been lucky to
      • you can buy extras and start swapping...

        ...or get a laptop that takes multiple batteries. Mine does - it's a PowerBook G3 Series (a.k.a. wallstreet). With a battery in each of the two bays, I can get a good 7+hrs of console-based emacs/mutt goodness. I don't know what it's like in X11, because I don't use it enough...

    • Re:Newer Laptops (Score:2, Informative)

      by Webdude ( 5964 )
      My IBM x40 gets solid 5-6 hours on its standard battery.

      B
      • Give it some time. My T41 has lost about 15% of its capacity over 55 charge cycles and 6 months.

        Not too bad, but not too great either.

        • Re:Newer Laptops (Score:2, Informative)

          by SupremeTaco ( 844794 )
          Try this laptop battery refresh article [computerhope.com]. I thought I needed a new battery on my T20, did this a couple of times, and now it works great!

          In Win2K/XP, create a new power profile that doesn't ever turn the laptop off or suspend it. Save it as "Battery Refresh" or some other name so you don't inadvertently select it. (Also disable all warning messages). Then just unplug and walk away. Your laptop will run till it drops. Recharge without turning on the laptop. Repeat 2-3x for a REALLY dead battery if

          • Re:Newer Laptops (Score:3, Interesting)

            by forlornhope ( 688722 )
            Yeah apple actually tells people to do this as soon as you get your laptop(mine is an iBook G4). They call it calibrating the battery or some such. They also tell you to do it if your charge isn't lasting as long as it used to. Its a pretty neat trick and it makes sense.
          • My Gateway has a power calibration mode in the BIOS that does this for you, plus measures the battery before and after, and calibrates the charge indicator (the percentage which is revealed to Windows, as apposed to the mAh which the battery meter reveals internally)

            It's a handy feature and saves you from playing games with power management.
      • Wow! Has IBM finally figured out batteries?

        How old is it?

        I've never seen a Thinkpad older than a year that could even get an hour. This T23 gets a good solid 19 minutes from bootup with full battery to "You have 4 minutes power remaining." On a good day. The replacement battery was worse. My old 390 won't even boot from battery. Back when I supported Thinkpads, none of the older ones would hold a charge for any length of time.

        I've looked at the NCharge batteries, and I may consider one. I need som
    • "Newer laptop batteries are making these sort of gadgets not-so-nifty."

      Perhaps, but there's no reason why these batteries couldn't improve right along with them. "5 hours on a Dell? No prob, this battery will give you 20!"

    • Yeah, I get "multi-hour" life too! I get a "multiple" hours out of my Dell's battery... usually... almost... well, I did when I got it. Now (six months later) it's good for just almost two hours at a reasonable load (backlight bright enough to see; processor and HD usage nonzero). At peak load (intentional stress-testing) it draws a good 35W; at 45Wh remaining capacity on the battery (out of an original 53), that comes to 1h20m, or less once you factor in the fact that I'm going to want to auto-hibernate a

    • Re:Newer Laptops (Score:3, Informative)

      by arivanov ( 12034 )
      Ahem. Seconded.

      I get 7+ hours out of an ancient Sony P3 1GHz bog standard desktop replacement class Vaio (3+ years old) under linux after throwing out the horrid puke sony ships for battery and replacing the battery and the CD with 2 x Chinese OEM 4800 mAh and using cpufreqd to keep the CPU frequency as low as possible when idling.

      All I want is that the idiots at KDE HQ stop calling sync after each disk write operation to calendar and settings. I was almost ready to rebuild the entire thing with sync rede
      • do you have any tips on where i can find these batteries? sites and what not, reputable(ish?) manufacturers?

        TIA

        • I buy from these guys: http://www.a1-battery.co.uk [a1-battery.co.uk] They are a front-end for several Chinese and Korean manufacturers. If you are not in the UK get the part number from them and search in your country. For example their Sony equivalents have 25%+ charge for nearly all models. I have not tried IBM and others but I would expect them to be the same. The only problem I have found is that they sometimes switch from trickle charge to full charge mode (actually I see it with all new batteries, my phone does the s
    • Newer laptop batteries are making these sort of gadgets not-so-nifty.

      Well, I didn't read too many reviews on battery life because that wasn't a high priority, but my Dell Inspiron 9100 that is less than a year old has died on me before finishing a 90 minute DVD. It does better if I rip the DVD to the hard drive first, but from what the Slashdotters say, I'm apparently raping a Hollywood carpenter every time I rip a movie I own.
  • 10+ hour battery life? Nice. My aging presario1500us is downt o ~2 hours n a full charge. I wander what the in use life span of one of these would be...

  • charge same? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by BoldAC ( 735721 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @03:51PM (#12093000)
    I always felt that my batteries did better after a couple of charges. Maybe the new one was too new?

    • Re:charge same? (Score:2, Informative)

      by TubeSteak ( 669689 )
      Most batteries absolutely need to be slow charged for an excessively long time before their first use

      This'll condition the cells. Usually its something like regular charge time x 1.5

      After that, its good to cycle the battery another time or three to get max capacity out of it.

    • Not necessarily. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by ultor ( 216766 )
      The only reason you should fully discharge a battery is to calibrate the battery meter. Full discharges have a negative effect on battery life. http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm [batteryuniversity.com]
    • I have a "series I" and I like it when it works. My first battery had to be RMA'd as it was DOA. My second one this weekend started to give me trouble. I have this to say, though, the company's tech service people are great. I was all prepared to have a coronary on the phone and they guy was actually helpful, knowlegeable and mannered that I just kept my mouth shut. Hopefully its working now (won't know until I give it a test tonight.)

      A more indepth review would have been nice.
  • I guess this would make wearable applications for this battery just not happen. Oh, well, back to old AA-size batteries for me!

  • Disgracefull (Score:2, Insightful)

    by FidelCatsro ( 861135 )
    If all you say is true about the product(discounting a shape thign as i can imagine , difrent folks blah) then this is horrifc behaviour by the company .
    Releasing an inferior sequal is bad enough in the entertainment world , in the hardware world though its down right lunacy .
    a new version of a piece of hardware is expected to improve it in a few key areas or perhaps in one drasticaly with a slight loss in another(such as doubling the battery life on an mp3 player but reducing the capacity by 10%) .
    having s

  • why buy? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AmigaAvenger ( 210519 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @03:52PM (#12093016) Journal
    external battery packs are fairly pricy, if you are cheap like myself, check the voltage rating of laptop. My trusty old toshiba 700 mhz cele runs on a nice 18 volts, which works out to 3 6v sealed UPS type cells. They fit in my travel bag nicely and give incredible runtime! the best part is the cost, it was a grand total of $23 for the setup!

    yeah, airport security sometimes look at you when you have a battery pack you soldered together yourself, but no one has stopped me yet.

    • Re:why buy? (Score:3, Informative)

      by 3770 ( 560838 )
      I did this too. I went to radio shack and bought some stuff and soldered it together. Worked a charm with 12 D size batteries.

      Make sure you actually check the voltage though. A 1.5V alkaline battery is usually quite significantly more than 1.5 volts.

      I stopped trying to use it on flights it after 9/11.

    • Re:why buy? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Rorschach1 ( 174480 )
      What do you use to charge this pack?

    • Re:why buy? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Epsillon ( 608775 )
      Yes, but you may find the off-load terminal voltage of that setup is closer to 20.7V at full charge. Most laptops don't like overvoltage and the initial "off state" current will be fairly low, certainly not enough to significantly lower the terminal voltage of a low internal resistance lead-gel battery.

      Be very careful if you're thinking of following this advice and also make sure you fuse the lead at both terminals, as close to the battery as possible and, preferably, between each 6V battery. Lead-gel cell
    • The biggest reason to buy is taking a chance flying internationally is a big deal. You could find yourself explaining to nontechnical people who maybe don't speak english as a primary language what your "device" is used for.

      If you're going to fly, you're pretty much limited to the sealed lead-acid type batteries as you mentioned, UPS ones. You can get lithium cells from a company like digikey but you also need to have a proper charger setup for them.

  • What's the big deal with the form factor? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Leave the battery in the bag and plug in over Wi-Fi!

  • It's 1983, your laptop gets 20 hours off 4 AA's (Score:5, Funny)

    by jhoger ( 519683 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @03:56PM (#12093066) Homepage
    Sometimes you just need the right technology for the job at hand.

    http://www.planetnz.com/palmheads/tandy.php [planetnz.com]

    -- John.
  • Found a link here: http://store.yahoo.com/valencetech-store/ [yahoo.com].

    There doesn't seem to be too much difference between the two products (other that the form). Am I missing something?

  • Compatability guide (Score:3, Insightful)

    by M.C. Hampster ( 541262 ) <{moc.liamg} {ta} {retspmaHehT.C.M}> on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:00PM (#12093118) Journal

    I checked out the compatibility guide for the device (which is in a PDF file for no reason) to see if my laptop was compatible. They have a huge list of devices, and there appears to be some sort of color coding to the whole thing, but they never explain it. It looks like if it is red, it's not compatible, but they never explain what the multitude of other colors mean in the PDF file.

  • Inverters? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Have you looked into the inverters they sell in the airplane's boutique? Most passenger aircraft now have power recepticals under the seats and it would seem to me to be better than lugging an extra battery around. AFAIK these are DC (12V or whatever the plane uses) to AC (110V).

    What I don't know is how much / if these differ from ones you would purchase for your car.
    • Unfortunately, "most passenger aircraft" is a bit of an exaggeration at this point. It is getting more common in First Class cabins, but back in the cattle car seats, they are almost unheard of still.

    • Re:Inverters? (Score:4, Informative)

      by neurojab ( 15737 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:47PM (#12093691)
      Most passenger aircraft now have power recepticals under the seats and it would seem to me to be better than lugging an extra battery around. AFAIK these are DC (12V or whatever the plane uses) to AC (110V).

      First class flying bastard. Most of us geeks that fly for work have to take coach, which almost never has power receptacles.

      BTW, it's silly to go from DC to AC back to DC. Just get a DC/DC converter. Targus sells one that works with most laptops, and can be used in either a plane or a car.
      • BTW, it's silly to go from DC to AC back to DC. Just get a DC/DC converter.

        It's not silly, IMHO. What's silly is nearly every laptop using a different connector, and just slightly different voltage. It's cheaper to buy an inverter once, and use it with your AC adapter, than to buy a DC/DC adapter every few years.

        Wasted electricity, excess heat? Yes. But cheaper all the same.
    • I've tried to use my inverters on a couple of plane flights but they wouldn't work. The DC power port wouldn't provide enough current even for when the inverter was idle. I'd imagine they are pretty current limited as it is so this explains the problem.

      Maybe the airport inverters are deliver less power (and so draw less current) and work better on planes.

      I like the idea of the rechargable battery pack, myself. It'd be nice if I could just leave it in my bag, plug in my laptop while 'traveling', and kno

  • I completely disagree (Score:5, Informative)

    by OblongPlatypus ( 233746 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:07PM (#12093208)
    Of course there's not much else I can do - it's hard to argue with a "review" that's basically just a long rant about why the reviewer doesn't like the form factor. It doesn't even make any sense to complain about it; the form factor is just about the easiest thing to find out about *before* you buy the product - even if you bought it online.

    Here's a second opinion, for what it's worth: I've owned the N-Charge II for several months now, and I'm extremely happy with it. I can't comment on the differences in battery life, since I never owned the first version, but I get ten hours total of productive time from the internal battery of my Vaio X505 plus both parts of the N-Charge II.

    Which brings up what's probably the most important difference in this new version, oddly enough not even mentioned in the "review": The N-Charge II splits in two, letting you carry just half of it around if you only need half the battery life. This is perfect for me, since the total of 6 hours which I get with just one part is enough for most flights I'm on, and the smaller bulk avoids the silly feeling of carrying around a battery that's heavier and bigger than the ultraportable I paid dearly to get so light and tiny.

    As for the form factor, I just slip it into the seatback pocket when on a plane, and otherwise I keep it in my bag. I got the extension cord so I can keep the bag on the floor while working on a desk or on my lap. But of course, if you absolutely must keep your external battery directly under your laptop, by all means get one of the competing products. Maybe next time you should read the specifications before ordering something.
    • I can't comment on the differences in battery life, since I never owned the first version

      If you look at the these pages from a previous post, N-Charge 1 [yahoo.com] came in two versions: 5 hours for $149 and 10 hours for $299. N-charge 2 [yahoo.com] comes in one version - 5 hours for $149. So it's not so much that the battery life is shorter, it's just that they dropped the more expensive model with a longer life.

  • it would be nicer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WormholeFiend ( 674934 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:08PM (#12093225)
    if airlines would put electrical outlets along the aisles for people to plug their laptops in.
    • They do. All business and first class seats I've ever flown in have them, and some newer planes even have them in coach.

      Of course, some airlines have proprietary connections, so you need to go and buy a $150 adapter, which is a real pain in the butt.

    • Re:it would be nicer (Score:3, Informative)

      by babyrat ( 314371 )
      I was on a flight a couple of months, sat in united economy plus and there was electrical outlets in the seat back in front of me - plugged my laptop in and played TotalWar for almost the whol 5 hour flight. Without AC it usually drains my battery in less than 2 hours, so I was a happy camper..errr air traveller.

    • Re:it would be nicer (Score:2, Informative)

      by serbanp ( 139486 )
      What you do not understand is that the aviation regulators become paranoid when thinking about batteries exploding/smoking because of a defective charger.

      This is the main reason why the notebook power outlets built in the seats cannot be used for charging. FAA prohibits this use.

      In the past, there have been cases of smoking batteries because a charger would not stop (one example I know of involved the IC from our competitor, sweet!). LiIon/LiPoly are especially nasty when overheated/ignited.

      Of course, cu

      • on every recent flight I've been, at least one person in every seat row was having a notebook turned on on his lap (even on flights supposedly for pleasure, e.g. flying to Lihue, Kauai).

        You know, they have a Navy test range on the west side of that island, right?

  • External battery? Why? (Score:4, Informative)

    by Stavr0 ( 35032 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:09PM (#12093237) Homepage Journal
    It's not quite universal yet but why not get an empower [continental.com] airline adapter instead?

    Most empower adapters also double as a car charger as well.

  • Rechargeable NIMH Battery Pack (Score:3, Interesting)

    by alue ( 253363 ) <alan.lue@PASCALgmail.com minus language> on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:15PM (#12093309)
    Has anyone tried making a battery pack out of rechargeable NIMH batteries? From what I remember, they're 1.2V, so you could just put a number of them in series to match the proper voltage, and hook up a set of those in parallel to increase capacity. I've been wanting to do this but lack a good way to hold all these batteries together.
    • a good way to hold all these batteries together.

      Duct tape, perhaps?
    • Haven't you ever played with radio controlled cars? Not the Walmart kind but the stuff at hobby stores. Most of those battery packs are shrink wrapped. It's really freaking cheap, Google turns up lots of results if you really want to make your own battery packs.
    • These guys [batteryspace.com] sell what seems to be pretty much what you're describing.

      I see that the Dell one weighs 3.4 lbs, which is about as much as my laptop, and gets "up to 3 hours" run time. I guess that's not too shabby, considering I get about 2 hours now. Combined with the built-in battery, that could make it usable for a cross-country flight, say, where I didn't have a power source.

      For a more DIY solution, they also list Li-ion 3.6v cells putting out as much as 2400 mAh. But I have a much older laptop I'd exp

  • Series II data sheet is lame (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Chmarr ( 18662 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:16PM (#12093312)
    I was looking at the data sheets for the two versions of the N-Charge.

    They're both pretty light on details. But... at least the Series I data sheet gives you dimensions and capacity (in watthours)

    The Series II datasheet only has the dimensions listed with the optional expansion pack, as a footnote on the bottom of the 2nd page, and no charge capacities at all. It's almost as if they're embarrassed to state anything. It's not a 'data sheet' at all.

  • Sounds like... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by TLLOTS ( 827806 )
    ...the newer battery wasn't quite so 'new'. It would explain the seemingly quick loss of power (going from half full to empty in an hour). Makes one wonder if the parts used were taken from old stock.

  • Buying old Series I won't help (Score:4, Informative)

    by Rashkae ( 59673 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:18PM (#12093344) Homepage

    Unfortunately, Li-Ion Batteries degenerate with time, from the date of manufacture, regardless if they are used or not. A Li-Ion battery will only perform well for a 2-3 years.

    See: www.batteryuniversity.com [batteryuniversity.com] for more information. There is also great advice for dealing with "Battery Gauges" (They calibrate on a full discharge)

  • Who says Slashdot isn't timely or Stuff That Matters.. by coincidence I was considering buying one of these, and checking into compatibility (which is surprisingly hard).

    If the external pack is as awkward as described, I'm probably better off going with two or three OEM batteries and swapping them out while hibernating. At least they're not going to make the laptop lopsided.

  • I have a series I ncharge (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I like it a lot. I got it cheap with a rebate a few years ago (far cheaper than a replacement laptop battery) and it extended my refurb laptop to 6+ hrs of life. I believe you can put it under your laptop but the heat supposedly degrades battery performance.

    Take performance numbers with a teaspoon of salt. What processor speed, backlight full or down, hard disk parked or used, watching DVD (ie. spinning DVD drive) or not, etc.

    I had a really old laptop that I took the hard disk out of and replaced with a c
  • Tried this? [igo.com] Looks like it'll power everything from your plane seat without the battery to carry around.
  • I also loved my N-charge I which bit the dust recently and picked up the N-charge II. The size changes really don't make a lot of sense from a usability standpoint. Not only that but I have gone through two of the N-charge II's already. They are no where near as robust as the previous version.

  • Reviewer step #1, get facts straight (Score:4, Insightful)

    by geekboxjockey ( 745169 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @04:38PM (#12093585)
    The store link posted earlier contains CLEAR descriptions of each of the units, the first generation unit is available in BOTH 5 hour or 10 hour versions. The second generation unit provides 5 hours or a total of 10 WITH EXPANSION UNIT. I'm assuming the author had the old 10 hour version, about 300$, and purchased the new second generation base unit (rated to run for 5 hours), which is about $150. To get the same duration as the $300 (10hr) first generation unit, you would have to buy the $150 second generation unit, and add on to it the expander which is another $150. Store with info: http://store.yahoo.com/valencetech-store/ [yahoo.com]

  • Old system used wrong (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jeneral ( 22829 ) * on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @05:00PM (#12093892)
    We have a user here that has one of the originals. If I remember reading the materials on the original, you were NOT supposed to use a laptop resting on the unit. The heat coming out of the bottom of a laptop could damage the unit. That's probably when they changed the form factor was to prevent people from using it exactly the way you've described. The original was designed with that form factor to easily slide into a laptop bag, not sit under the laptop while in use.
  • Great, maybe I can finally get some sleep while I use one of these to power my girlfriend's... erm, nevermind.
  • I can do maybe 1 movie on the plane and then I'm waaaayyy to fidgety to sit in some plane seat for a zillion hours. MSP to SNA makes me edgy when a 2 hour movie is done. LAX to Fiji (pre-Ambien) about drove me around the bend -- 10 freaking hours in the dark at 45000 feet.

    That's why I prefer Ambien to extra PC batteries. Nothing quite like waking at your destination airport on the other side of the world completely refreshed, and all those boring hours completely behind you.

    Ativan works OK in a pinch,
  • For some reason the FAA and TSA wouldn't let my wife take a lead-acid battery on the plane to power her CPAP machine for a 16 hour overnight flight. The NCharge-II battery pack was more than enough to run the device.

    All those damn tips came in handy after all because sooner or later you can find one with the right shape and a close enough voltage.

    The TSA wont let you take wet cell batteries on at all. FAA will let you take "non spillable" batteries, but you're not allowed to actually use them during the

  • Progress? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by haggar ( 72771 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @07:42PM (#12095666) Homepage Journal
    Interestingly enough, my Olivetti M10 has always been capable of 20 hours work from 4 AA zinc-carbon batteries.

    And while you might think I am justkidding, I say to hell with increased CPU performance, when they are not capable of making laptops that would last longer from a single recharge. They should be called lap-burners, with all that heat they dissipate. You'd think that, with increased performance per CPU cycle, some laptop manufacturer would havedivided the CPU frequency, to save energy at the expense of performance - often NOT the main property of a laptop.
  • A buncha "D" cells. Yes, a buncha "D" cells. What do you think are in some of those nifty sealed battery packs, anyway, these days?

    http://www.thomas-distributing.com/cta-d-rechargea ble-batteries.php [thomas-distributing.com]

    has rechargables, Ni-MH "D" cells rated at 12 amp-hours; yes, 12,000 milliamp-hours each, if you hafta be Green. However, the Real Deal, eTanium(TM) is rated at 21.5 AH each:

    http://data.energizer.com/PDFs/x95.pdf [energizer.com]

    and even your buy-them-at-three-AM-from-7-11 variety alkalines develop 20.5 AH

    http://da [energizer.com]

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