On 1/24/03 at 3:06 PM -0800, Sean Cross wrote :
>Third, I may need to replace/repair the battery. I've been reading on the
>list about AA battery compartments. Is this the best solution? Or is an
>actual battery pack preferable? Which lasts longer? Which is cheaper?
OK, I just got a Newton 2100 after using a Newton 100 for many years
and have been contemplating the question you are asking for several
weeks now, so here are my thoughts FWIW.
The seller said the battery pack with my Newton wasn't running long
so I went looking for a battery tray and got one for $40 on eBay, the
NiMH batteries cost $14 for a package of 4 NiMH 1850 mAH. With the
battery tray you have to recharge in a separate charger for 8 hours.
There is a mod to the battery tray to allow it to charge in the 2100
but I don't particularly like it so I won't be doing it (if I had a
free supply of battery trays to hack I might feel differently). The
page is only on the Internet Archive now
<http://web.archive.org/web/20000410002621/http://www.logictools.de/newton/akku_mod/akku2k.html>
The advantage of the battery pack is a really fast charge, a little
over an hour since the 9 watt Newton adapter charges at 1.2 Amps. It
turns out the battery pack I got with my Newton is only down to 90%,
if that. I intend using the battery pack only when travelling to
minimize recharging hassle or during battery tray recharging. I'll
use the tray otherwise to keep the pack's life up as I really don't
look forward to a rebuild of the pack with its close tolerances...
<http://www.pda-soft.de/body_mp2k_battery_pack.html>. I think I would
attempt to buy a pack rather than doing a rebuild if they were
available for sale (eBay has some with fairly good/specified
capacities right now IIRC, completed sales typically run $25 - $45).
Recommendation? If you are in it for the long haul get a battery
tray, then you can go to your Home Depot and get replacement NiMHs
simply and inexpensively.
Cheers,
Darrell
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