you always have to manage a million different cables for each one, and they all suck. why can’t we just use AAA batteries instead of these shitty lithium ones? it’s so fucking frustrating. where can I find gadgets that work while plugged in, or at least don’t need to be recharged every two fucking days?
I think rechargeable is overall better than needing a thousand batteries that you just throw away to sit in a landfill, but agree they desperately need to 1) Normalize and standardize batteries and 2) Not use shitty ones that need charging every 2 day. We have standardized rechargeable AA and AAA batteries, if anything just encourage using those.
All the batteries in my house are double A and Triple A rechargeable. Use them for the Xbox and the remotes.
But I agree with OP sick of batteries that last one to two days. And cables today suck. Back in the old days the charger got with my phone lasted for years. Now it seems the cables lucky they last 6 months.
WTH do people do with their cables? I haven’t had one fray/fail on me… ever, and I pay zero attention to them.
This is how I do it too, we just got a second charger so we could keep more than 4 charged, mostly for remotes and controllers. Agree with cables, I’ve had shit luck with anything from Amazon, it’s about a 50/50 shot if the cable will last more than a month, I’d be happy to hear where people buy quality cables.
Problem with rechargeable AA and AAA batteries is that they need complicated chargers. Putting a charger for those into a device will make it unnecessarily big. There’s also the issue with the charge cycles they can take. I believe they have a maximum of around 100 charge cycles while lithium ion batteries are more around 1000 cycles.
Xbox360 managed both. You either plugged in the pack with two AAA’s or you could use the one with a rechargeable battery that fit the exact same slot.
Seems a good compromise to me.
Meanwhile, Sony went with an internal battery but had a standard USB connector.
Nowadays, you can get an Xbone controller and still choose a replaceable battery pack or a rechargeable one, and it has a USB-C connector. Standard connector, choose of battery feels like a good way to go for me.
What are you talking about? I literally just bought a charger today for AA and AAA batteries for $15 today so I’d have 2 chargers at home. I’m still using my original AA rechargeable batteries after 6 years now. Are you saying that’s somehow worse than single use batteries? My rechargeables last just as long as alkaline ones and I haven’t had to buy batteries in years.
Check your misinformation.
Man chill, he’s right, single use batteries have a higher energy density than rechargable ones. And somehow everybody is misreading that OP was talking about built-in chargers.
Not an argument not to use rechargable ones though
Buying shit tier stuff is gonna give your a shit tier experience. Have more discretion in your shopping, which could mean holding out for quite awhile, and you’ll eventually find a USB-C option.
It has been my experience that electronics are the only thing where “you get what you pay for” actually applies. If you’re getting tired of your cheap shit falling apart, spend more money to get not cheap shit.
I think single-use batteries should be banned. Whenever I go to the weed store and I see them selling/advertising disposable vapes I can’t help but feel a hint of rage. All my AA and AAA batteries are rechargeable now. Hopefully soon everything will use USB-C and graphene batteries and supercapacitors will be common.
I’ll infuriate you further. Most of those disposable vape products actually have rechargeable lithium ion batteries inside, but they’re just designed so you can’t recharge them. Why? Well, the same form factor reasons as why other gadgets use lithium ion batteries, and due to economy of scale they’ve decided that’s the cheapest way to do it.
If you’re a hardware hacker type you can grab discarded disposable vapes and dismantle them to get the batteries out, then use them for other projects.
I think single-use batteries should be banned.
Unfortunately, some devices simply don’t work unless you have the voltage curve of an alkaline/lithium battery, or they’ll show a “low battery” even with a relatively fresh NiMh rechargeable batteries.
If devices could all accept lithium rechargeable batteries, or something else better than NiMh, then there’d be very little reason why you’d need to use single-use batteries.
I’d love to take advantage of super capacitors if they became more readily available. Many dashcams use them instead of internal batteries, and they make a HUGE difference when using them in the cold, and they are safer than using lithium batteries in the summer heat, too.
I go camping and have some lights that have rechargeable batteries but you can swap disposable batteries in if needed which is really nice to have as a backup when any sort of charging isint available
I’m of much the same opinion, and I refuse to buy certain categories of gadget if the battery is not replaceable with a commodity type. This is becoming increasingly difficult.
Note that this doesn’t have to be AAA/AA batteries, either. The reason so many little gizmos use lithium-whatever rechargeable batteries is because the energy density of lithium is way better than consumer alkaline batteries (with some exceptions that I’ll get to; keep your shirt on) and because they’re available in a lot of form factors – particularly flat ones – that are easy to jam into the product.
For instance, I have quite a few flashlights that take rechargeable lithium chemistry 18650 cells. Some of these allow for charging the battery in the light with a USB cable or whatever, but the important point is if the battery takes a shit I can just take it out and replace it with another one easily and cheaply. I cringe every time I see the backpacking dudebros recommending “slim” USB-rechargeable-only lights to each other like they’re all the best thing ever, but which will inevitably be landfill in a year or two when their little nonreplaceable batteries give up the ghost. Hikers look at me like I have a fish for a head when I mention I use an 18650 light. “But it’s so heavy!” Sure, and it gets 4 times the battery life of your little stupid light, and it will last forever. I also still have a digital camera that runs off of AA’s, and several other oldschool odds and ends of that ilk.
If you are using a gadget that takes consumer AA or AAA cells, by the way, you can now get lithium rechargeable versions of these which are in most cases superior to both disposable alkalines and rechargeable NiMH cells. Whatever you do, don’t run everything you own off of disposable alkalines. That’s just stupid.
I’ve got a black diamond headlamp that I’ve been using for 20 years. Cost me less than $40, runs in triples, has seen some serious shit, been banged, stomped, and submerged. It’s still going strong (I assume. It’s been in a box for a year, but the last time I left it in a box for two years, it just needed new batteries).
I used to. I had a Black Diamond ReVolt that mysteriously took a shit one day after almost precisely 1 year of ownership. I replaced it with another one, the new “updated” model, and it did the same thing. So I gave up, and now I have a Shenzen Express no-brand 18650 headlamp that’s been serving me well for about three years. It also cost like a quarter as much. I give up on Black Diamond lights. (I also hope my Black Diamond ATC doesn’t have a hidden built in expiration date, either…)
My 18650 light has just under 4 times the available battery capacity as my old ReVolt. I run a 3600 mAh cell in it, versus the 950 mAh or so AAA’s I could put in the old Black Diamond. And if push comes to shove I can always just pop the cell out of it and swap in another while the first one is charging.
I will point out for any existing ReVolt owners, as well, that the batteries Black Diamond include with the thing are absolute trash. Mine came with 750 mAh cells in it which were far behind state of the art even back when I bought my first one. If you want to put higher capacity cells in it, note that Black Diamond saved a nickel by not including any chemistry sensing hardware in the headlamp; it “detects” their NiMH cells by way of a set of contacts in the battery compartment that touch an unwrapped section of their cells. If contact is made it assumes you have rechargeables in there and if it isn’t it assumes you loaded disposable cells and won’t charge them. If you want to use aftermarket batteries with it and allow them to charge in the headlamp, you’ll have to either peel some of the wrapping off of your cells or apply some foil tape or something. (This is surely to prevent imbeciles from putting alkalines in there and plugging it in, causing them to go off bang.)
Interesting. I hate AAA batteries and only buy things that I can charge with USB cables. I hate having to replace and throw away batteries all the time.
I assume op was talking about rechargeable AAA batteries. At least then they’re hot swappable.
Even better would be if more devices used the lithium ion cylindrical cells. Higher power and energy density, while also being a standardized form factor that can be switched out as needed.
Key is standardisation, we should all move to li-ion but not at the cost of random shapes and non-swappable. Everything should have similar 3-4 form factor batteries and easily replaceable. Also the charging connector, everything should have USB c, barrel connector should be banned or be forced to just use one single size
Maybe in buying the wrong AAA batteries but I’m struggling to make them last longer than a few cycles
That sounds like you need better brand. when the inventor got 500 cycles on their patented design 60 years ago… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickel–metal_hydride_battery
