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Portables Handhelds Hardware Technology

Hitachi Shows Off A Fuel-Cell PDA 149

Posted by timothy from the wouldn't-you dept.
prostoalex writes "Hitachi made a PDA, powered by a fuel cell. The device runs for 5 hours, and they plan to expand the battery power to 40 hours. It weighs 700 grams, which makes it heavier than most of the models out there. The commercial production will start next year, a picture is available from MobileMag." (This earlier mention of Hitachi's work talks about how such fuel cells could be used to charge or power other things, from cellphones to laptops.)
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Hitachi Shows Off A Fuel-Cell PDA More

Hitachi Shows Off A Fuel-Cell PDA

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  • precent (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:18AM (#8712646)
    Although it has a greater cost then that of traditional power sources, it is completely 100 precent pollution-free.

    \Pre"cent\, n. [L. praeceptum, from praecipere to take beforehand, to instruct, teach; prae before + capere to take: cf. F. pr['e]cepte. See Pre-, and Capacious.] 1. Any commandment, instruction, or order intended as an authoritative rule of action; esp., a command respecting moral conduct; an injunction; a rule.

    Yes folks, that's right! This device follows all of the 100 rules of anti-morality pollution.

    • Re:precent (Score:2, Funny)

      by Gabrill ( 556503 )
      Well, I, for one, don't want that highly toxic dihydrogen monoxide byproduct polluting my atmosphere.

      Its highly adictive. Once you get some of it, you can never go without it.

      I can kill you if you breath it in high concentrations

      It's the primary ingredient in most CEO's of monopolistic companies and diet sodas

      It causes severe erosion

  • war driving (Score:2, Insightful)

    by sndtech ( 738958 )
    may we can finally get more usage out of PDA's for war driving instead of killing the battery so quickly

  • Water as waste product (Score:5, Funny)

    by Ratface ( 21117 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:21AM (#8712656) Homepage Journal
    "Is that a fuel-cell PDA in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me??"

  • duh uh (Score:2, Insightful)

    by manavendra ( 688020 )
    Looks more like a stereo! How is one supposed to carry it again? Stuck against a ear, pretending to listen to music?

    • Re:duh uh (Score:3, Interesting)

      by mirko ( 198274 )
      Parent's right, it's too heavy for a PDA.
      Let's call this a CDA (Carriable Digital Assistant).

      I personally use a Samsung Digimax Battery [ephotozine.com] to achieve around 11 hours uptime with my Zaurus which is definitely more portable than this.

    • Re:duh uh (Score:2, Funny)

      by krets ( 645685 )
      You've got to remember, those japanese trade-show girls are really teeny. They make lots of stuff look big. :) -k watashi wa baka na deutsujin

  • Methanol (Score:3, Interesting)

    by carm$y$ ( 532675 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:22AM (#8712660) Homepage
    I'm not sure I'd like to walk with methanol in my pocket. Hell, one whiff and you're blind... not sure even if it's allowed in a plane.

    • Re:Methanol (Score:5, Insightful)

      by millwall ( 622730 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:35AM (#8712710)
      I'm not sure I'd like to walk with methanol in my pocket.

      People walk around with methanol lighters. Never really heard of anyone being so chicken that they can't even carry a lighter.
      • The lighter is disposable, your PDA shouldn't be. :)
        I mean, you have to _refill_ it.
      • People walk around with methanol lighters. Never really heard of anyone being so chicken that they can't even carry a lighter.

        Not to nick pick... if you mean zippo style wick lighters, typicaly they use naphtha based products. While I like using methanol, ethanol, or cheep generic denatured alcohol due to it being far less smelly, it evaperates far too quickly.

    • Re:Methanol (Score:4, Informative)

      by JanneM ( 7445 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:36AM (#8712714) Homepage
      No, "one whiff" and you're certainly not blind. Methanol is only dangerous if ingested, and even then, small amounts will not cause any permanent damage. And while flammable, it is no more so than ethanol, which is allowed in airplanes by the bottle.

      • Re:Methanol (Score:3, Interesting)

        by carm$y$ ( 532675 )
        Please check the "Acute effects" here:
        http://www.epa.gov/ttn/atw/hlthef/methanol. html
        Lists "inhalation" as well as "ingestion", and I personally know a guy who almost got blind when a 200 gallon container fell on the floor and spilled the methanol inside (dangerous workplace...).

        • Re:Methanol (Score:2, Insightful)

          by DigitumDei ( 578031 )
          Almost got blind when a 200 gallon container spilled? Damn that'd keep this pda running for so long. ;)

          I'd assume you'd be able to buy small cannisters to refil the fuel cell, that would be quite safe and even if they did rupture and empty their contents into the air, would be unlikely to provide enough methanol to blind you. Assuming of course you're not in an cramped airtight box.
      • Methanol is only dangerous if ingested
        ...or absorbed through the skin. Check out the MSDS [bu.edu]

    • Re:Methanol (Score:2, Informative)

      by RedShoeRider ( 658314 )
      One whiff?

      We're not talking about Oprah's perfume here. We're talking about methanol. If you DRINK it it can blind you. Getting a good lung-full of it just makes you cough like hell.

    • Re:Methanol (Score:5, Informative)

      by tantalus ( 466821 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:42AM (#8712738) Homepage
      I'm not sure I'd like to walk with methanol in my pocket. Hell, one whiff and you're blind... not sure even if it's allowed in a plane.


      Though it can be dangerous including causing retinal toxicity, ethanol comes far from blinding you with one whiff. You can read the World Health Organization's health and safety info for methanol here [inchem.org].

    • Re:Methanol (Score:5, Funny)

      by ch-chuck ( 9622 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:49AM (#8712767) Homepage
      one whiff and you're blind

      Almost as bad is dihydrogen-monoxide, one 'whiff' of that stuff causes severe breathing problems. Did you know that many commercial foods are processed with dihydrogen-monoxide? We should boycott those as well.

  • ...But some self-proclaimed doc stole the plutonium and left me a bunch of pinball machine parts.

  • It's BIG (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The prototype weighs about 700g, twice the weight of conventional PDAs

    Whoa... barely luggable, surely not pocketable.

    • Re:It's BIG (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Wuukie ( 47391 )
      That's why it is a prototype, not a product. I don't think the actual product will be anything like that brick in the picture.
    • Can you imagine the limp you would have in your walk with that thing in your pocket at all?
      I think its endorsed by the Chiropractors Union,
      they'd make some major money getting that limp back out of your body.

  • Nice idea for the road-warrior.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dealsites ( 746817 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:25AM (#8712671) Homepage
    I think it's a bit too heavy for most people. I know a lot of people that don't use it enought durin gthe day to really worry about battery life. Usually they are back home and can recharge, if they remember.

    However, I'm sure there are some people who would sacrifive weight and portability for the extra battery life. Campers, explorers, hikers, skiiers, etc... Anytime you slap a GPS unit on it and head off the beaten track, you will probably appreciate the extra battery life.

    --
    Live deal updates from Slickdeals, Techbargains, Bens Bargains, Able Shoppers and more! [dealsites.net]
    • Why not just slap a GPS unit in your pack and leave this brick at home. I've never heard of a GPS unit using batteries in 5 hours.

      (And yes I do know what a GPS system is *ducks*)

      --
      this is not my sig
      • Because... if you go out for a 2 week hike away from civilization it might be harder to find a wall outlet than just grabbing the bottle of methanol in your backpack and giving it some more juice in a few minutes.

        • Re:Nice idea for the road-warrior.... (Score:1, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Carrying spare batteries generally works.

          Leaving a gps switched on all the time is stupid anyway. Learning basic navigational skills and reserving satellite navigation for emergencies is a better bet.
    • So don't you think this is "early-adopter" style stuff? Of course it's heavy. So were the first cell phones. This is a new tech they're showing off.

      Don't worry about the weight with this version. And tell all the /.ers who are jumping to the same silly conclusion...

  • How much? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by stecoop ( 759508 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:27AM (#8712675) Journal
    Cool but how much does it save me over than using rechargeable Double-A batteries? I just hope the fuel cells aren't something like $400 for a $300 PDA.
    • Given current gas prices, it will probably only cost about 5,000 dollars a month to keep it topped off and running. You will look stupid holding a gas nossle up to it though. No way around that.

  • Shouldn't they just concentrate on laptops (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mustrum_ridcully ( 311862 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:27AM (#8712677)
    Wouldn't it be a better idea if they concentrated on fuel-cell powered laptops instead of PDAs? I would kill to have a laptop whose battery lasted 40hours, and was topped-up using cigarette lighter gas (butane)!

    I don't see the battery manufactures jumping for about this one, if fuel cells do get sufficiently small and cheap then there'll be a few very worried companies out there.
    • If they get sufficiently small and cheap the battery companies will adapt. They make rechargables, yet disposables are still more popular.

    • Re:Shouldn't they just concentrate on laptops (Score:4, Interesting)

      by no longer myself ( 741142 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:14AM (#8712863)
      Fuel cells won't make any corporations worry one bit. First of all, the typical corporation has "Covenants Not To Compete", so the only way they will displace existing technology is if the biggest corporate powers deem it to be in their best interests.

      That being said, the cost of using these devices will undoubtedly be familiar to purchasing printer ink. 40 hours my seem like a long time, but that can be used up in less than 2 days. There's also the "depending on the device load" clause that will no doubt be bundled into the EULA. Oh... You forgot to mention that you had to agree to terms and conditions just to use a new-fangled battery.

      But wait! They've got this stuff all laid out! If you thought the price of conventional batteries would drop... BZZZZZZZT! Nope. They've got a dual edged blade on this one. "Well the demand for conventional batteries has decreased, so we can't make them in the volumes like we used to, so the price has to increase." Oh yeah, so the fuel cell cost will drop? BZZZZZZT! "Due to the increasing demands and the difficulty in producing the PIM material we have no choice but to raise consumer prices." I hate to break it to you, but it's not a carrot on a stick. It's an orange turd!

      Will it leak? Will it explode? Can I take it on a plane? Will the exhaust (steam) burn you?

      These are all questions that will work to artificially keep the price high. The manufactuers will whine ad nauseum that the FUD is holding them back, and they need to be subsidized and then de-demonized by the evil-libral-media-machine.

      Legislatures will have endless uses for this technology as well... in the red herring department. "Oh look! Someone just effed up the rights of millions of people! Quick! Let's stir up some controversy over fuel cell technology so people won't notice!"

      Of course you've go the whole chicken vs. egg hydrogen economy issue as well. Since hydrogen is derived from less clean energies, then it's already tainted. Nya-nya-nya-nya-nya-nya!

      I used to be waaaaaaaaay optimistic about the whole fuelcell revolution, but now that it's future has already been carefully laid out by corporations, it hardly thrills me as anything more than one more piece of technology that will somehow eventually be used against me or perhaps even you when you most depend upon it, and least expect it.

      Sorry so long, and I know it's not very optimistic, but thanks for listening... Try to have a nice day. :-)

      • Fuel cells won't make any corporations worry one bit. First of all, the typical corporation has "Covenants Not To Compete", so the only way they will displace existing technology is if the biggest corporate powers deem it to be in their best interests.

        Uh huh. And I guess every government in the world is in on this conspiracy?

        That being said, the cost of using these devices will undoubtedly be familiar to purchasing printer ink. 40 hours my seem like a long time, but that can be used up in less than 2 d

    • Re:Shouldn't they just concentrate on laptops (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:20AM (#8712916) Homepage
      That is the funny part, most people dont realize how much power generating capacity they have around them every day. I do long range biking and camping. My cellphone, zaurus, GPS, digital camera, and toshiba Liberetto all get recharged with either the solar panel I have, the Motorola hand crank charger they made 2 years ago for cellphones, or from the generator I have on the bike. I have never had to want for power on long camping/biking trips away from a car or electrical grid. Now some of you nature freaks will lose their mind at the amount of gear I carry with me but I prefer to document my travels and take gobs and gobs of photos (uploading to the liberetto at night is nice to clean out the CF cards and gives me a chance to look at the shots) I can recharge all my gear sitting and connected in the left rear pannier bag from the bike mounted generator that runs on a tire, within the 7 hours I am riding that day and is trickle charged by the Smallish solar panel on top of the pannier bags.

      this fuel cell devie is cool, but still nowhere near as clean and renewable as human power/solar... and their first products needs to be a pocket power source instead of a laptop or PDA.
      • this fuel cell devie is cool, but still nowhere near as clean and renewable as human power/solar...

        Human power is renewable, but it's hardly clean. Or haven't you noticed the waste products? Not to mention the damaging effects of the clumsy infrastructure that's currently in place to support those ineffecient generation units. Ugh.

      • Sweet... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by interactive_civilian ( 205158 )
        Dude! That is pretty kick-ass! Just out of curiosity, about how much did all of that gear set you back? I would definitely be interested in throwing stuff like that together for my gear.

        Right now, most of the gear I carry around consists of my PDA (an old 8MB Handspring Visor, which routinely gets up to a month of use on a single pair of AAAs...) a couple of film cameras (a small "Lomo" point and shoot and a Nikon FA SLR) and when the backlight was working on my iBook, I used to carry it around all the tim

        • Re:Sweet... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @10:54AM (#8713744) Homepage
          I built most of it because of the huge hole there is in portable power generation. The most expensive item was the military surplus Solar panel kit, an aluminum book that when unfolded exposes 2 high efficency "purple" solar cells that generate 12 volts at 200ma in bright sun.. I can get almost 250ma out of them if I point it directly at the sun instead of laying flat. closed it's the size of a textbook and 1/2 inch thick. The motorola hand generator was bought at gander mountian on clearance. it's for motorola cellphones and was limited to 3 volts until you remove the NICAD batteries inside and re-solder the winding points. I now get 12V @100ma out of that also. finally I modified 2 of the cheapie bicycle light kits that have the generator for creating the electricity. they each generate ~7VAC 250ma(ok so they are altenators) so I simply recitify the voltage and use one backwards to generate about 13 volts DC. total money spent WITHOUT the Military solar panels is less than $50.00US the solar panels cost me $150.00US but were worth it due to the high output and efficency. I charge NiMh AAA and AA cells during the day off the whole thing as well as the cellphone and laptop. One of the key's though is that my battery packs are all fresh and I leave fully charged. you dont usually drain everything dry and try to recharge but I generate enough electricity during the day to replace what I use.

          I could generate more if I modified a kiddie trailer to hold bigger solar panels and gear driven generator off the wheels.... but you don't want to get too ambitious to generate power... or you will end up reducing your ability to bike very far and reduce the gear load you can carry. (generating 1.2 amps at 110V will get you about 30 minutes before being wiped out.. you also want to disengage all your power generators when you are looking at a hill.. it is suprising how that extra resistance can make a difference when you are going uphill!

          finally, I use a libretto because of the low power consumption with a self modified battery. the older 50C had nicad batteries which are complete crap. you must hand rebuild with li-ion or Nimh and learn to love a P-I 45Mhz processor... (Yes, Linux + blackbox + abiword + other apps are very useable on this slow of a laptop.

        • You should write a FAQ and make a webpage on this. It sounds fascinating -- since you've done the research already, why not share? (P.S.: Do you have an Xtracycle [xtracycle.com] for carrying all that gear around in?
      • this fuel cell devie is cool, but still nowhere near as clean and renewable as human power/solar... and their first products needs to be a pocket power source instead of a laptop or PDA.
        I was going to post: Sorry, false. Alcohol is 100% renewable (what do you think beer is made of, petroleum?).
        But, for one (I must be new here), I checked the facts before posting. The article says that they are going to use methanol, which according to wikipedia [wikipedia.org] is usually got from the methane ("the most economical and wide
      • I wish I had the money to spend on a srtup like that, nevermind the camera, and laptop and GPS, how much did that solar panel cost, and how heavy is the battery for riding (bet you could compete downhills!!!
        • Battery? well 2 sets of batteries for the digital camera weight about 12 ounces, the laptop is 5 pounds, the zaurus is 1 pound, the GPS weighs almost nothing and is attached to the handlebars... probably 8 ounces, cellphone is the same. generators are probably 4 pounds total and the military solar panel pack is about 6 pounds. all of which weighs less than my tent. most of the weight I carry is in Water. the gear is almost nothing.

          I'm betting that you can spend less than $400.00 to outfit yourself the

    • They should concentrate on laptop battery replacement plugins. These don't require anyone to buy into your "platform". It's especially relevant since people end up replacing laptop batteries every year or two anyways. Why not offer a long-life alternative.

      Two other good near term applications (things with HUGE batteries)
      * Portable power tools
      * Radio controlled toys.
      * Small electric vehicles (golf carts, pickers)
      * Mobile printers
      * Mobile speakers
      * Headlamps (caving lamps, like Petzl makes)

      Future Militar
    • if this ban on smoking in public places continues to ripple around the world, you may find that your butane gas will cost more than a replacement battery! ;)
    • Wouldn't it be a better idea if they concentrated on fuel-cell powered laptops instead of PDAs? I would kill to have a laptop whose battery lasted 40hours, and was topped-up using cigarette lighter gas (butane)!

      If you RTFA, you'll notice that the 40 hour thing was for the laptop, not the PDA (Slashdot's summary is messed up as usual).

  • Bob's an avid smoker.

    Bob lights a cigarette while doing work on his new Hitachi PDA.

    Bob...

    *poof*

    Bob! Dear Lord, Bob's... Bob's dead!
  • Didn't Medis [medistechnologies.com] do this a while ago?

    Moderate this comment
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  • Hydrogen environmentally friendly? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:31AM (#8712693)
    qoute from the article:

    Although it has a greater cost then that of traditional power sources, it is completely 100 precent pollution-free.

    At the moment hydrogen is not environmentally friendly at all. It has te be chemically extracted from fossil fuels or electrically extracted from water. When the times comes that hydrogen is produced with truly clean energy (be it renewables or fusion) THEN is will be truly environmentally clean.

    • Re:Hydrogen environmentally friendly? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SlashDread ( 38969 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:25AM (#8712949)
      You have a point. But only a half baked point.

      You read the article, you quote the article. But you misquote. Nowhere does it say hydrogen is 100% pollution free. And nowhere do they misspell "precent" Here is the real text:

      "A fuel cell is a pollution-free and highly efficient power source and it is expected to be used for automobiles and in households, although its greater cost than that of traditional power sources limits its applications at present."

      BTW, It IS possible (and it is already happening NOW) to produce clean hydrogen.

      Already, Iceland, "harvests" hydrogen by using hot water springs. Also, hydrogen created from Solar energy, or really any clean energy source, is also truely clean.

      Remember, hydrogen is no energy -source- per se. It is a handy energy -carrier-. So is oil. (And we misuse it as a source) We still need clean sources to -make- hydrogen.

      But in USING oil ALONE lies enviromental consequences. Not so with hydrogen. It is the -usage- which is 100% clean. So the article claims "The fuelcell is clean" and the article is right.

      "/Dread"

  • Rename? (Score:4, Funny)

    by CleverNickedName ( 644160 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:31AM (#8712695) Journal
    Not so much a "Palm Pilot" as a "Pocket Bomb".
    • Or maybe rename "Palm" to "Na-Palm" ?

      Hydrogen and methan burns very well.
      And can make nice fireworks.
      DO NOT SMOKE NEAR YOUR FUEL-CELL PDA.
    • Remember lithium-ion batteries used in most laptops are also extremely flammable. In fact, they're so flammable that manufacturers won't sell you raw cells to experiment with, unless you're a bona fide engineer.

  • Slashdot Summary Wrong -- Article More Surprising (Score:5, Informative)

    by InnovativeCX ( 538638 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:37AM (#8712715)

    Hitachi made a PDA, powered by a fuel cell...they plan to expand the battery power to 40 hours.

    This is incorrect. If the submitter were to take the time to read the actual article...or the editors...they would have noticed this more surprising tidbit:

    NEC Corp. has developed a notebook personal computer (PC) powered by a fuel cell that runs for five hours and plans to extend the operating time to 40 hours for commercial sale in 2005.

    Toshiba Corp. has developed a fuel cell-based notebook PC that runs for five hours and a handheld-device fuel cell that weighs 130 grams. Toshiba plans to commercialize them in 2005.

    While a PDA that runs for a paltry five hours and weighs over a pound isn't exactly impressive (quite the opposite, in fact), a laptop with a forty-hour battery [fuel cell] would be incredible. Not only would that solve the problem of waiting for endless charging cycles to complete, it would also resolve the issue of batteries losing their life over time (I type this on a PIII-900 Gateway that scarcely lasts an hour and half with a second battery installed).
    The only issue now seems to be rechargability, as I don't believe that this is possible with a fuel cell.

    In any case, this is a tremendous step forward.



    -Scott

  • Extra feature... (Score:3, Funny)

    by OwlWhacker ( 758974 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:37AM (#8712722) Journal
    A fuel cell generates electricity when hydrogen from fuel such as hydrogen and methanol combines with oxygen leaving pure water as a by-product.

    Awesome, you can also use it as a flask.
  • ...and if they could make more stuff run on just methane, his grocery bill would pay his fuel bill.

    "Dude! Was that you?"

    "Nah, man, that's just my PDA..."

    Seriously, though, you'd think they'd have applied this power source to cell-phones first, due to their overwhelming ubiquity and constant need for power (although they don't typically drain down as fast as a PDA with a fast processor). Ah, it's probably in the works as well, but it's more forgivable to make a PDA of the requisite size for fuel-cell tec
    • I don't know maybe the PDA is a better middle market device to test this concept out first. A bad run with cell phones and they might just get a nasty taste of the public's anger. Not everyone is so willing to forgive and forget as the /. crowd with a next gen improvment.

  • H20 (Score:4, Funny)

    by PRES_00 ( 657776 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:38AM (#8712724)
    [i] the only waste will be pure water.[/i] Yeah, a stain will go well with that big bulge in your pant's pocket!

  • Wired Article (Score:4, Informative)

    by drskrud ( 684409 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:38AM (#8712725) Homepage
    And interestingly enough, in April's issue of Wired there's an article [wired.com] about how battery capacity and power consumption need to be focuses in the future for American companies. I didn't expect to read about some attempts the very next on Slashdot... although granted, Hitachi is Japanese.

  • A little uncertain about a few things (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Phekko ( 619272 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:41AM (#8712734)
    • A fuel cell is a pollution-free and highly efficient power source and it is expected to be used for automobiles and in households, although its greater cost than that of traditional power sources limits its applications at present.
    This refers to using the cell, not getting the power in it I'm sure. I think making alcohol takes more power than you get burning it, does the same apply to burning in a fuel cell? Or did I accidentally smoke the wrong stuff again?

    Another thing I didn't get is the expected lifetime of the cell. IOW how many times can you expect to charge the sucker before the same happens to it as did to all of my cellphone batteries. If you are expected to get as much as 40 hours from a cell (which, stripping the marketing hype and suchlike, translates to roughly 20 hours, maybe) does it mean you get 95% of that after the second charge? Or after the 100th charge? Or what? Sorry for being ignorant. If you know, please enlighten me.

    I sure hope they get PDAs to the point, where your battery lasts a week again (as it did in my original Palm Pilot) and hopefully it can be done in a somewhat environmentally friendly way, too. Is this the way? You tell me, please (pretty please)
    • No no no, you're missing the gayest part about fuel cells! You can't convienently recharge them! You have to run to a store and buy a new one everytime they run down!

      GOOOOOOOOO PROGRESS!!!!!!!!

  • Not entirerly true (Score:3, Informative)

    by Underholdning ( 758194 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @08:53AM (#8712780) Homepage Journal
    From the article " it is completely 100 precent pollution-free."". This is not completely true. It's correct that the application of hydrogen as a fuel doesn't pollute, but the creation of hydrogen does indeed require traditional energy. Besides, the degree of efficiency is not 100%. In other words - if you use 100 kj of energy to create hydrogen, you don't get 100 kj back from spending the hydrogen. So, you could say that this is actually more polluting than conventional energy sources.
    • But eventually one could envision the use of solar powered electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen and oxygen.

      Of course it will have taken polutting energy to make the produce the solar cells as well as the PDA.

      In the end the biggest pollution sources will be the heavy metals/nonbiodegradable materials in the PDA

      • It's my dream to see wind farms on the great lakes chugging out zero maintenance power for the midwest. The coasts would put theirs in the ocean (of course).

        Of course, EVERY house would be equipped with grid inter-tie and solar panels that would help power the air conditioner during peak energy usage (when it's brightest and hottest).

    • Re:Not entirerly true (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ljavelin ( 41345 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:17AM (#8712889)
      you could say that this is actually more polluting than conventional energy sources

      More than a NiCD, Li-ion, or NiMH battery? Those systems also require that you put energy into them, and they are extremely far away from being 100% efficient.

      It should be obvious to the casual observer that plugging a device directly into the wall is more energy efficient than using a portable energy storage system with a device. There is simply no such thing as 100% efficiency in any energy storage products.

      The big question is how much energy you can store in the smallest space with the smallest amount of nasty chemicals. Charging efficiency is only a small part of the picture - heck, I'm confident that driving your SUV for a mile uses more energy than all the batteries I have ever used in my entire life... and then some.

      In addition, the chemicals involved in traditional "batteries" are known to be very toxic. If you want to talk about polutants, look at all the cell phone batteries that are thrown away year after year.

      Energy efficiency isn't the only piece of the pie when it comes to polutants. Especially when you consider the toxicity of traditional batteries.

    • Not only that (Score:4, Informative)

      by Walkiry ( 698192 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:25AM (#8712954) Homepage
      The full quote I want to address is this: A fuel cell generates electricity when hydrogen from fuel such as hydrogen and methanol combines with oxygen leaving pure water as a by-product.

      Excuse me, but if you're using methanol there's a Carbon atom that has to go somewhere, usually goes as CO or CO2. Although there's some struggle about CO2 being a pollutant, the fact is that you don't only produce water.

  • Finally (Score:4, Funny)

    by okmijnuhb ( 575581 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:10AM (#8712841)
    Finally someone has solved the huge air pollution problem posed by PDA usage.
  • They need to make this thing chug and hiss like some old coal fired boiler.

    "Sounds like Bob is back from Cincinnati."
  • How does this work? Is the actual fuel cell integrated into the laptop, and you just pop a new fuel container into it? And if you have to keep buying fuel for it, is it going to be any less expensive than recharging a battery?
  • Will these be allowed on airplanes I wonder? In a day and age when you can take exactly 2 lithium batteries on a plane but not 3 (because you *know* if someone took 3 they would just blow the entire plane right out of the sky), who knows what the government will allow. The corporate types will probably complain bitterly, (10 hours laptop battery life? Woohoo!) but ultimately it comes down to pushing the terrorist agenda, real or imagined.

  • wind-ups (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @09:38AM (#8713039)
    I think wind up technology is more impressive and practical. I own two baygen windup radios that store the energy in a coiled spring, then drive a mini generator to power the radios. They work, the concept works. I also have a small tri-power radio that is very interesting. Shirt pocket size, multiband. It has a built in solar cell which will charge internal fixed batteries (ni cads I guess, never looked at them). There's also a battery bay that holds conventional AA batteries. That's a redundant power supply. In addition, there's a small fold out crank on the side that runs a mini generator to add-to any of the solar input, a couple minutes of very easy cranking gives a long radio play time. That particular thing doesn't involve a spring like the baygens, but it could. either way it works as advertised, it's spiffy.

    I think a PDA could be constructed along those lines somehow. The chemistry involved with using normal human muscles is very efficient, much more than other other fuel/power source. A similar PDA could also have an external jack for charging from a normal AC to DC wall wart or another DC source such as from your car while driving or an even larger solar panel/whatever, making it quad power.

    zogger
  • "Hitachi made a PDA, powered by a fuel cell."

    No they didn't. They developed a fuel cell capable of powering a PDA. Then they stuck it on a PDA assembled from components from many companies.

  • Certainly not.

    The PDA may proeduce no pollution during use, but then neither does My LiIon powered laptop.

    There are plenty of Biomass sources for methanol, that is not the problem. Think of all of the energy and pollution used to make the damn thing, and the pollution problem of the fuel cell's platinum catlyst on disposal.
  • I'm not sure I want too look like I've wet my pants every time I want to look up an address.
  • Hitachi is not the only company in this field. Have a look on FCT Image Gallery [fuelcelltoday.com] for more pictures on this topic.
  • Maybe it's just me, but it seems like news reporting on fuel cell technology is consistently

    effusive

    overblown

    and incorrect.
    I mean this:

    A fuel cell is a pollution-free and highly efficient power source and it is expected to be used for automobiles and in households, although its greater cost than that of traditional power sources limits its applications at present.

    Plenty of posters have already poked appropriate holes in the incorrect "pollution-free" claim, but what about the overblown "highly efficien

  • I'm waiting for the gas powered PDA's to arrive.

  • Do fuel cells really work better than batteries? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It weighs more than a battery and, like ALL OTHER prototype fuel cells, only lasts a fraction of the time expected of it - less than a comparable battery. It is still uncertain whether this touted efficiency will come through further refinement, that's a total crap shoot.

    Fuel cells currently run hotter than batteries, which sucks.

    Also, every fuel cell design I've seen produces water vapor. Some of the cells capture and use it internally, but in case of malfunction it could really be disastrous. Especia
  • It weighs 6 times as much as an iPod and has half the battery life... I suppose this is just first gen tech so it shouldn't be a problem that it underperforms the market right now.

    In a year, let's hope it can reach 20 hours and weigh as much as an iPod ^^

    Or... maybe we can see it in a PowerBook! Still, it does seem rather counterintuitive to bundle it with a PDA, rather than a notebook... And that's one big PDA, it looks more like a small football!

  • Not pollution free (Score:2, Interesting)

    by jludwig ( 691215 ) *
    Two things... first, pollution free must be an outright lie, they are using a carbon based fuel therefore it must generate carbon based waste. I have no idea how they can make claims like this...

    Secondly, fuel cells are nothing more than batteries. None of the proposed "fuels" are available in ample enough quantities in nature to make them attractive as fuels. The likely scenario is a standard power plant generates electricity/energy which is then used to make H2, methanol, ethanol, etc, etc. Its poll

  • Methanol cartridges are the new disposable battery (Score:3, Insightful)

    by aquarian ( 134728 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2004 @01:20PM (#8715599)
    Wouldn't it be great to have a fuel cell powered laptop, where all you have to do is pour in more methanol to get 40 hours' more runtime? Wouldn't it be great if this technology would trickle down to flashlight cells? No more noxious disposable batteries going into landfills, and no more pollution from the process of making them. Methanol is a byproduct of oil refining and other industrial processes. Using it in fuel cells would be practically pollution free, and eliminate other pollution from battery manufacture and disposal.

    But wait!

    This is not what's happening. In fact, you won't be able to top off your fuel cell with a bottle from the drugstore. What Toshiba, Hitachi, and others are planning, is to capitalize on the lucrative disposable battery/razorblade business model -- with disposable methanol cartridges, like the CO2 cartridges for seltzer water makers, bicycle tire inflators and BB guns. The cartridge concept for fuel cells was supposedly to get around airline regulations about open containers of flammable liquids, but the lucrative disposable battery/razorblade business model is the real reason.
  • So how about putting a fuel cell in a little black brick with a power-brick cord on it, for the rest of us?

    Plug it into your ORDINARY laptop and compute until you run out of gas (or vodka or whatever).

    Or plug it into anything else that needs a few watts.

    Yes it's not as convenient as having it IN the laptop. But it also puts a bunch of the heat and all the exhaust water somwehere other than my lap. And it doesn't limit my between-fill sessions to the size of the tank I can fit into the laptop.

    And like
  • Jeeze, I guess the Japanese are jealous that the X-Box controller is so huge, because this PDA dwarfs even that. They should have just slapped a keyboard onto it and marketed it as a subnotebook.

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