Alkaline rechargeables are not a really good idea on
the Newt...no, they won't injure the Newt in anyway,
it's just that the Newt is not a good appliance for
those types of rechargeables. To understand why, you
need to look at the battery. Alkaline rechargeables
need to be cared for in exactly the oposite manner
from NiCADs and NiMH rechargeables. What I mean by
this is that the alkaline rechargeables first only
give a useable recharge cycle of between 25-40
charge/discharge cycles. But this is very touchy! The
reason being is that alkaline rechargeables should NOT
BE FULLY DISCHARGED! The alkaline rechargeables should
only be 1/2 - 3/4ths discharged before they are
charged again for optimum life. If you drain them
fully, then you will loose 2-3 charge cycles thereby
reducing their usefulness! Since the Newton is a low
drain device (I run a set of Duracells on my Newt for
2-3 weeks with 30 minutes of backlight per day!) The
Newt will bring the batteries down to zero before the
Newt shuts down. In contrast is a digital camera. Most
digital camera need a minumum of 5volts to operate
(with 4 "AA" batteries, that gives you 6 volts. Each
battery can discharge 1/6th of their capacity before
they no longer work inthe camera) If the battery
voltage drops below 5 volts, the camera will cease to
function...this doesn't mean that the batteries are
dead...no, they are perfectly usefull for other
things! (in my case, I dump a new set of duracells in
my digital camera, then when the camera can no longer
use the batteries, they go into my Newt for an
additional 2 weeks of use!)
Having so many gadgets that use "AA" batteries, I have
learned to care for the batteries and the most optimal
use of the batteries! At any given moment, I have over
90 "AA"s in use with about another 25 in the fridge! I
don't use rechargeables becuase they are fully
unreliable. I only use Duracell Copper Top because
they seem to work the best in all of my devices (my
MP3 Player instructions say that the Duracell
batteries are a slight bit longer than most other
"AA"s and as such give a more solid connection in the
battery compartment. It's true, I didn't believe it
either. My MP3 takes a single AA battery and with all
the other brands, the player would "skip" if jostled.
If I put in Duracells, the MP3 player runs fine)
btw, devices I use daily that have AA batteries:
CD Player-2AAs
Pocket microscope-2AAs
Newt-4AAs
Digital camera-4AAs
3 Nikon SLRs-12AAs (4 each)
2 flash units-8AAS (4 each)
Special effects for Yahama Synth-6AAs
4 clocks-4AAs (1 each)
HP 200LX-2AAs
Digital Multimeter-4AAs
MP3 player-1AA
Micro Cassette recorder-2AAs
Lego MindStorm-4AAs
Lost In Space (original series) robot-4AAs
2 Newt 120s-8AAs (4 each)
Lighted slide viewer-2AAs
Mini computer vacuum cleaner-2AAs
3 Brinkman flashlights-6AAs (2 each)
Portable battery pack for my Zip Drive-4AAs
sheesh! After listing this out and counting...I now
know where my paychecks are going!!
Ed
Web/gadget guru (and they all run on AA batteries)
--- Alexandre Enkerli <aenkerli_at_indiana.edu> wrote:
>
> Hello to all!
> I've been using alkaline rechargeables (Pure Energy)
> for the past few
> weeks. I need to use a separate charger but they
> give, IMHO, a fair
> amount of power. Anyone else has experience with
> these?
=====
note: This does not constitute a sig file...
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