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Portables Hardware Technology

Batteries Continue To Suck 605

Posted by timothy from the newsflash dept.
pvt_medic writes "As technology continues to grow, and we see more and more of a shift to portable electronic devices in our daily life, we are still constricted by one simple thing: Batteries. Newsweek has an interesting article about the lack of development in battery technology. 'Ironically, in our headlong rush to create sophisticated untethered computing, the most problematic technology turns out also to be the oldest: those nondescript metal cylinders that never seemed to be included with our Christmas toys.' And for those of you who would like an extensive overview about batteries, ExtremeTech.com has a nice overview."
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Batteries Continue To Suck More

Batteries Continue To Suck

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  • so then (Score:4, Funny)

    by rootofevil ( 188401 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:51PM (#7450018) Homepage Journal
    lets make with the cold fusion already.
    • What, you don't have Cold Fusion [macromedia.com] on your laptop. Damn Luddites.

    • Re:so then (Score:3, Funny)

      by CorkieVII ( 587036 )
      Fuel cells are the dream power source for portable computers. Engineers imagine you might run your notebook computer for 20 hours from a single fuel cell...The wonderful side of this dream is that some engineers expect it to be reality by the end of 2001. The same technology will free your cell phone from its charger for a week at a time. Really, that's interesting.
  • Seriously, what about all those great Slashdot battery articles we've seen over the past few years? The amazing advances that were supposed to revolutionize our portable electronics? I've been wondering about them recently. Was manufacturing these theoretical advances just too difficult?
    • Two areas of society drive technology inovations - porn and the military. The military guys are too busy dropping lithium batteries in water and anything else would drive the fun factor out of batteries. Porn? Well... D cells rock the vibrators, and there's no need in decreasing the size of those clam shuckers. The only step up from there is an A/C adaptor and discount pricing with your local power company.
      -B

    • Re:What about all the advances? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by mrbuttle ( 587604 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:11PM (#7450171)
      Here's [fuelcellsworks.com] a recent press release about an alternative to chemical batteries. It's a storage capacitor made of porous carbon. Supposedly can store twice the charge of lead acid batteries, recharge in 1 minute and last indefinitely. Sounds relatively simple.

      • Re:What about all the advances? (Score:4, Informative)

        by michael_cain ( 66650 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @12:20AM (#7451101) Journal
        Supposedly can store twice the charge of lead acid batteries, recharge in 1 minute

        Maybe I've just grown overly cautious in my old age, but if it can be charged quickly, it must capable of discharging quickly, no? Energy-storage devices of reasonable density that can discharge very quickly make me nervous about bad things happening. Maybe not on the order of your gas tank "discharging" suddenly, but certainly the possibility of heating conductors enough to start a fire.

      • carbon nanothings (Score:3, Informative)

        by js7a ( 579872 ) *
        The problem with nanoporous carbon capacitors is that they can't hold their charge over time as well as electrolytics. Of course the little press release linked to in the parent comment doesn't say, but I'd be suprised if they get more than a few hours half-life. Another thing is that medium amounts of physical trauma to such capacitors can cause plasma arcs (i.e., fire.)

        However, carbon nanostructures are perhaps the most promising areas of energy storage research. When someone finds out how to do with n

    • Re:What about all the advances? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by kfg ( 145172 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:30PM (#7450271)
      The amazing advances in batteries that were supposed to revolutionize everything have been a constant prediction since the early 70's at least.

      In the late 70's I was involved in the design of electric cars. We're all driving them now, right?

      Throughout the 90's I was involved in the design and development of electric cars on a smaller scale (of the cars themselves. The work was actually more extensive).

      End result was a complete lack of revolution.

      I canna change the laws of physics Cap'n.

      Over the years batteries have gotten a bit better due primarily to better manufacturing methods of existing technologies, not to any real breakthrough.

      Some day we just might have to deal with the fact that batteries are WYSIWYG. I'd love to have a simple wind up toy that could fly me to China in an hour, but, as my mother used to say, wishing won't make it so and just because we wish for a "technology" ( applied science ) does not imply that such a technology ever will, or even can, exist.

      KFG

    • Re:What about all the advances? (Score:5, Informative)

      by swordboy ( 472941 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @10:43PM (#7450652) Journal
      The advances are there but people aren't willing to pay for them. Err, rather, the manufacturers don't offer the advanced batteries because they don't believe that people will pay for them.

      Most laptops use Li-Ion - a technology that brings the term "suck" to the title of this article. Li-Ion sucks. Not the other technologies out there. They aren't offfered.

      NiMH is a decidedly better technology. Matsushita (who, BTW, is currently in arbitration with Ovonic Battery over a patent dispute) has brought the new Toyota Prius battery up to some astounding levels of power and energy density. And the batteries are proven to last for the vehicles lifetime - not this puny 500 cycles like Li-Ion that we get with laptop batteries. Didja ever wonder why your laptop's 2-year warranty didn't include the battery?

      Because margins are already too thin. They can't afford real battery technology. We'll have true wireless only when the electronics downsize their power requirements.
    • The real issue is voltages. Every type of chemical cell has a particular voltage it produces. It's easy to get a multiple of that voltage, but very hard to get any other voltage. Most of the new technologies produce voltages that don't match standard batteries, which means that, unless you have a custom device or a device designed for a range of voltages, you can't use anything new.

      Actually, there is one place where battery technology has seen incredible advanced, and that is power tools. Ten years ago, a

  • Not my "Nondescript metal cylinders" (Score:4, Funny)

    by Hi_2k ( 567317 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:52PM (#7450025) Journal
    "nondescript metal cylinders that never seemed to be included with our Christmas toys"

    Why is he talking about Nukes? I mean, yeah, you never seem to get them (Top of the list, five years running! But do my parents see fit to get one? NEVER!), but what place do they have in an article about batteries?

  • Fuel Cells... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by c_oflynn ( 649487 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:53PM (#7450033)
    There is actually a real use of these, see http://www.ballard.com/tD.asp?pgid=700&dbid=0

    Its pretty cool, because you always hear about fuel cells, but almost never see a commercial application.

    Hopefully once they make it smaller...

  • Time to dig out an old favorite quote (Score:5, Interesting)

    by RalphBNumbers ( 655475 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:55PM (#7450040)
    "Had batteries advanced at the pace of the computer processor, a double-A cell would contain more energy than a tactical nuke." - Paul Saffo

    I suppose that would be somewhat hazardous wouldn't it.
    At least a current day leaking battery will leave a nasty burn mark on my table, not burn thru the table and into the concrete floor underneath.

    • I think the key is.. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Epistax ( 544591 ) <epistax@gmail. c o m> on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @10:22PM (#7450534) Journal
      A battery that knows whether or not it is in use. Perhaps it would be possible for another voltage to trigger the chemical compounds in the first place, that is, when there is no voltage across it, the chemicals are relatively inert. A while ago I read (possibly on slashdot?) of a substance which is a liquid when any current is going through it, and a jelly-solid when it isn't.
      Now the downside to this avenue is that each battery would have a battery (likely internal). However this wouldn't have to be nearly as big-- by design, make a very low current required to start/stop the chemical process in the larger battery, which is now free to be much more caustic in nature. Now the battery may still explode from mal-use, then again a passive fuse element could also be added which makes sure the battery permanently becomes in it's inactive state.

      I'm not saying we know how to do half of this, it's just one option we can persue. Another option is fundamentally chance the amount of electricity anything handheld uses. This would be happening right now, but every time we make something more efficient, we make it faster so that it's consumption is more or less equal (usually more).

  • The Adult Industry (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:55PM (#7450043)
    The adult industy is the answer! They just need to make less efficent vibrators, than something will be done.
  • They had this battery recharger that could recharge batteries in 15 minutes. Sure beats the overnighter rechargers I have been using...

  • what I want to know is... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    why the generic alkalines only last for 5 seconds in my digital camera. I mean, maH is maH right? voltage is voltage? what the hell.

  • Thump ThumP Thump (Score:3, Funny)

    by AbbyNormal ( 216235 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:58PM (#7450062) Homepage
    Thump Thump Thump. Keeps Sucking. Nothing outlasts the...
  • Batteries will continue to suck for a variety of reasons. Numero Uno: if you have a lot of energy packed into a small space it has a tendency to want to explode. Duece: Batteries are a chemical conversion of electricity to a chemical reaction and back. Every conversion takes energy. Trece: Even if you get away from chemical batteries, and somehow find a way to store that much potential energy safely, nature abhors a vacuum. That energy is going to leak out any which way it can.

    Quit bitching or open-source the laws of physics.

    • Warning: your Spanish really sucks.

    • Then why did you? (Score:5, Informative)

      by rmm4pi8 ( 680224 ) < ... > <ta> <rellimr>> on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:35PM (#7450300) Homepage
      1) Energy in a given space has nothing to do with exploding. TNT doesnt explode without a detonator, Plutonium needs a critical mass and a neutron source, etc etc.

      2) Since the original electricity is a trivial cost of batteries, the question is how much energy we can keep in the battery, not how much we use to get it there, so this is utterly irrelevant.

      3) Vacuums apply to pressures, not energies. Have you seen the sun exploding lately because it's more energetic than the surrounding vacuum? (No, sorry, flares dont count.)

      Real problem with batteries: inorganic chemistry hasn't made any huge progress lately.

      Solution: capacitors. GM is planning to use them instead of car batteries in the relatively near future.

  • batteries smatteries (Score:5, Funny)

    by larry bagina ( 561269 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @08:58PM (#7450068) Journal
    Seiko has a watch that runs based on your arm motions. Think Geek also sells a flashlight that recharges itself by jacking it off. [thinkgeek.com]
    • its a kinetic watch [seiko-kine...atches.com] and unfortunately unless you're willing to strap your laptop, boombox, phones, pda's, dildos (for the goatsex pricks), then it won't work.

      I'm sure battery vendors can find something to do more or less the same but why should they when they could continue charging you? Salesman: Ok I'm gonna give you this product and dont worry you will never have to see me again! Dream on. Its not in the vendors best interests to do something like that so don't expect anything to come out of their labs

    • Re:batteries smatteries (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Brandybuck ( 704397 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @02:46AM (#7451554) Homepage Journal
      Seiko has a watch that runs based on your arm motions.

      Whatever will they think of next? Now excuse me while I put on my grandfather's watch, which is still ticking away after seventy five years, despite the fact that there is no way to wind it.

  • Radioactive decay batteries (Score:4, Interesting)

    by nurb432 ( 527695 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:02PM (#7450096) Homepage Journal
    They could be built now, from radioactive waste, using the same really simple technology used aboard space missions..

    Such a small amount of material per battery would make it safe, but would last years... ( not forever, but with teh way things are designed these days, at least long enough for the device to fall apart...)

  • If only (Score:5, Insightful)

    by nate nice ( 672391 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:02PM (#7450097) Journal
    If only we could harness all of our wasted energy. Like those watches that gain power by your movement. Devices should be looking to get energy from as many sources as possible. Solar, moving etc. Do I have the answer on how to do this? Hell no, I'm just some punk on Slashdot with crazy ideas that are technically impossible. When *they* create wireless power, I'm definitely investing in their business.
    • Well, you could actually power very low power devices with an antenna and a rectifier. The radio waves carry a reasonably useful amount of power if you aren't picky about the frequencies.

      Not enough to run a laptop, but certainly enough for a potato clock.

    • Movement power! (Score:3, Funny)

      by Gldm ( 600518 )
      But that would require us to move around to power our electronic devices, and I don't think too many slashdotters do all that much moving around.

      How about one of those blood sugar powered [smh.com.au] setups. Then your laptop could help you lose weight without all that inconvenient moving around. I can see it now. "I need to finish this paper by midnight, bring me more Krispy Kremes NOW!"

    • The greatest inventor in western history (Score:4, Informative)

      by cassady_ ( 101893 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:33PM (#7450289)
      Actually, the greatest (and most under rated) inventor in western history, Nikola Tesla, has already created it. [mind-course.com] For some unknown reason, J.P. Morgan refused to back it.

  • the standard tradeoff (Score:4, Insightful)

    by EngMedic ( 604629 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:05PM (#7450116) Homepage
    power, size, and longetivity: choose any two
  • Since desktop computers can suck hundreds of Watts from the outlet to drive powerful CPUs that can execute bloated applications at a reasonable speed, programmers have become very sloppy. In a portable device that is no longer possible. Maybe this will expand a job market for people who know how to run efficient code.

  • Hmm... VERY dated ExtremeTech article! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Johnno74 ( 252399 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:09PM (#7450152)
    "Fuel Cells:

    The wonderful side of this dream is that some engineers expect it to be reality by the end of 2001"

    Err... whats the hold up? Are they finishing duke nukem first?
  • Best Christmas present ever:

    Pack of batteries with label: Toy not included.

    -Adam

  • What about toxicity? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by stefanlasiewski ( 63134 ) * <slashdot@stef a n c o .com> on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:10PM (#7450154) Homepage Journal
    I commute by bicycle. Now that it is getting dark early, and I bike through heavy traffic, I have several bike lights:

    - One 10-Watt halogen light with a lead-acid battery. It's lasted me for several years, but is starting to loose it's charge.
    - 2-3 blinking lights which take any old AA & AAA batteries.

    I'm getting sick of having to toss the discharged alkaline batteries all the time, and am looking for a replacement.

    Since I'm comparing the prices of the different kinds of batteries and chargers, I'd also like to compare the different toxicity levels.

    Are NiMH's safer then NiCADs or Alkalines?

    Ironically, my lead-acid battery gets the most frowns, but it seems like it's actually one of the least toxic options. There are several places near me which recycle lead-acid batteries (They strip the batteries, neutralize the acid, and take the lead; all in-house).

    • Re:What about toxicity? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by CaptBubba ( 696284 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:41PM (#7450331)
      NiMH's are better than NiCd's because they don't have large amounts of toxic Cadmium. They are also better than Alkalines because they can be reused so many times.

      A good set of name brand batteries with an overnight charger will quickly pay for itself. The only problem with them is that they will run down on their own if you don't use them often, which is why I use alkalines for remote controls. So if you remember to swap the batteries every week or so, to make sure you have a fresh set in there you should be in good shape.

      Whatever happened to those bike lights that would pull power from the rotating wheels? With the low current that LEDs require I would think such a system would work well.

    • Generator Hub (Score:3, Informative)

      by spreer ( 15939 )
      You want safe and clean? Try a generator hub.

      This one [sheldonbrown.com] is the Shimano NX-30, and it will power a 6 watt front headlight.

      Maybe not as bright as your old 10-Watt, and sure, there is a little drag, but it's not bad, and you get to stop charging your bike lights for good. And $60 for the functionality of a battery *and* a front hub is a good deal.

      spreer

  • batteries (Score:2, Insightful)

    by cranched ( 707812 )
    All I know is when I got my first mercury alkaline batteries in 1966 to power my Ross 3 inch reel-to-reel tape recorder, they lasted over 2 years with daily use! the second set lasted about 6 weeks. I think batteries are like light bulbs, there's no profit in making them well
  • If battery technology isn't going to progress, how about some changes to the building codes to add more public power outlets? Perhaps improvements in power supplies to make them smaller would help as well.

    It seems simple, but even with recent inovations in other energy storage (fuel cell, etc), we won't see anything small (battery-wise) coming to market for some time. KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)
  • Don't worry, we can always use human batteries [blogspot.com]!

  • I don't suppose... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MoneyT ( 548795 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:11PM (#7450170) Journal
    It's possible that batteries have indeed gotten better and more efficient but that the technology that we've been using them in has gotten more and more power hungry?
  • They have the perfect gig! Disposable product, vendor lock in, endless demand.

    It's like asking why hookers are popular.

    Sure, release a 'better' battery every couple of years, and sit on the pile of money. Better battery?

    I can sooner see MS making Office for linux.

  • I don't think that there is such a battery pitfall. My iPAQ Pocket PC uses it's own built-in lithium battery and that could easily last me a week a regular usesage, with a few games here and there. Furthermore, my Nomad Zen MP3 player gets over 12 hours of life on it's built-in lithium battery, as well. That's well more than I need considering this: It is extremely easy to hook up these built-in battery units to the wall/computer to recharge. When I get home after the day I just plug my pocket pc into

  • Batteries are not the constriction... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by heyitsme ( 472683 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:15PM (#7450188) Homepage
    It's not batteries that are the constriction, it is slow IO hardware.

    Imagine what you could do if your hard disk could read data as fast as your processor could handle it (think RAM-like or cache-like speed)

  • Actually, there IS a lot of R&D (Score:5, Informative)

    by mercuryresearch ( 680293 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:26PM (#7450246) Journal
    A few years ago I got to meet with some folks from Eveready and a number of charge controller companies, and trust me, there's quite a bit of R&D that goes on.

    For disposables, consider that we've gone from carbon-zinc to alkaline to lithium chemistries. In the case of Eveready, they have the L91 lithium AA, and it's pretty amazing in terms of power density and battery life (about 3X alkaline.) It's now about 10 years old.

    Rechargables have gone from lead-acid to Nickel-Cadmium to Nickel Metal Hydride and also Lithium-Ion.

    Keep in mind we're talking about a chemical device here that's storing larger and larger amounts of energy as times goes on. More energy = more potential for bad things to happen. Since it's chemical we're dealing with chemistry, materials science, and environmental factors (heat/cold, issues of outgassing, etc.) There's a lot more going on than a simple metal tube here.

    A lot of the work that goes on is hidden -- it's hidden in the fact that the battery works for more than a few cycles. Many battery chemistries are very touchy when it comes to repeated cycling, for example, while others if not formulated (or charged) correctly would outgas or swell and explode. If any of you remember the good old days of carbon-zinc, it was routine to have things destroyed by leaking cells. That's one of the reasons the battery manufacturers actually offer warranties on the devices using them. (Think about that: It's like Exxon giving you a warranty on your engine if the gas harms it.)

    While the future is probably fuel cells (I'd bet on methanol cells in particular, perhaps like Neah Power is working on) it'd be wrong to think that batteries aren't improving -- or that they won't be around for a long, long time.

  • no battery advances? huh? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:26PM (#7450251) Homepage
    Obviousally the writer is so young as to not remember the evil that is the NiCad battery.

    Today's batteries are unbelieveably nice and great compared to the utter crap we had to use just 7 years ago.. NiCad batteries would get a memory effect, last very short times and have abyssimal storage capacity.

    batteries have came a long way, and they will continue to improve... how about making processors and displays that dont suck down amps of power?

    the problem isn't the batteries, the problem is the horrible inefficency of today's tech!

    • Re:no battery advances? huh? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Dun Malg ( 230075 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @11:30PM (#7450897) Homepage
      NiCad batteries would get a memory effect, last very short times and have abyssimal storage capacity.

      Actually, the "memory effect" thing is a myth. What really happens with multi-cell nicad packs is one or more of the cells runs down to 0 volts before the rest do and subsequently gets "anti-charged" by the other batteries in the pack. The reverse voltage damages that particular cell, reducing its capacity. A multi-cell pack only gives full voltage for as long as the weakest cell in the pack can. The weird thing about the "battery memory" thing is that the recommended means of avoiding problems (full discharge before recharging) is more likely to result in cell damage. Then again, the difference between that and the opposite (recharge frequently without discharging) is practically nil: nicads are just crap.

  • Fuels will be the new print cartridges (Score:5, Funny)

    by bluegreenone ( 526698 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:29PM (#7450266) Homepage
    All the big gadget people out there (including me) are all waiting anxiously for fuel cells to come along and give us super long usage times for our devices. But what I suspect will happen is that fuel for fuel cells will become the next ink jet print cartridge, with manufacturers charging insane prices for refills. The price you pay for plugging in your laptop will be a fraction of what a single fuel cell refill will cost. And of course you can expect the same manufacturer technical lock-ins as ink, except now with even more warnings like "Use of non-approved refills will result in EXPLOSIONS AND DEATH, buy only certified refills UNLESS YOU ARE INTERESTED IN BLOWING YOUR HEAD OFF. You've BEEN WARNED, JACKASS!"

  • Battery lmitations (Score:3, Informative)

    by Artifakt ( 700173 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:30PM (#7450267)
    1. If there was a chemical reaction that could produce energy on the nuclear level, it would disrupt nuclear processes - So whatever elements it happened between would transmute each other on contact. Look around. Do you see any natural element below the radioactive ones on the periodic table that is undergoing alchemical style (i.e. lead to gold style) transmutation to another element? No? Then there is a peak limit for how much power you can get out of any chemical battery, and it's lower than the weakest natural nuclear reactions observed. 2. The most electromotive elements are the reactive metals, like Potassium, Calcium, and Sodium at one end, and Florine and Clorine at the other. The reactive metals burn on contact with cold water, and the problems with handling the reactive gasses are legion. Batteries generally work with an anode and a cathode of two different mentals or metal compounds. Electrodes are generally made from metals in the middle of the electromotive range, like Pb, Cd, Cu, Ni, and even Hg, and their compounds. To get better energy storage per weight than zinc, nickel or cadmium just about always means working with something more reactive for at least one electrode. So "better" batteries are generally more environmentally damageing, or pose bigger health risks to humans working with them. 3. There is a metal with electromotility better than oxygen or clorine gas. It's called Gold. Unfortunately it is hard to get gold to react with chemicals, it's heavy, and it's just a touch expensive.

  • why would they get better? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by deus_X_machina ( 413485 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:31PM (#7450275)
    The public accepts the idea that batteries die and need to be replaced, so therefore, battery companies make money. What would be their incentive to create better batteries? So that the public would have to purchase them less frequently? Then we'd probably just end up paying the difference for the better battery. I doesn't sound like a good business model to take a cut in profits to make everyone's life a little bit easier. I don't really think there's much of a public demand to reform the battery industry, so therefore there's no need to do so for the industry. Just keep up with the technology.

    I guess on a side note, my rechargable batteries are a godsend. While you can debate the economics of it all (40$ for a charger and 4 batteries), I just like not having to worry about having batteries for my MP3 player [Nike PSA64]. I use it primarily for working out, I go through a battery every week or two, throw it in the charger, and then replace it. They've lasted all summer and still give me numerous days of life. Prior to purchasing them, I was going through batteries like a mad man, buying a pack every two weeks to keep up with my working out. I think its the best solution for anyone who goes through a lot of batteries...

  • The King is dead. Long live the King. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Graymalkin ( 13732 ) * on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:31PM (#7450278)
    How is it that "batteries don't last as long as I'd like" turns into "there's no development put into batteries" in some people's minds? There's lots of time and money put into developing better batteries because if someone creates the better battery they will make lots of money.

    The lack of headway is the chemistry, not the funding or effort. There's a finite limit on the amount of energy you can safely store and retrieve chemically from a given volume. A lot of development is focused on getting higher energy/volume ratios, lithium polymer and methanol fuel cells are good examples of this branch of development.

    Looking for better battery chemistries is much more difficult. Between environmental concerns and ridiculous patents trying to market new chemistries isn't a cake walk for any company. There's a lot of materials that can be used in batteries. Not all of them are things you want ending up in land fills or in the hands of complete and utter morons.

  • Batteries suck for a reason (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ljavelin ( 41345 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:38PM (#7450315)
    Fuel cells suck ONLY because no one ever commercialized fuel cells 30 years ago.

    Fuel cell technology should have been the next leap forward. But it's taken a long time because most investments in fuel cell has been centered around space applications... where light weight, high-performance electrical power is a requirement.

    An incredible amount of fuel cell technology was developed in the 1960s and 1970s for space programs - and when you make money on space programs, the bean counters know that there is no reason (financially) to look at other potential markets. That was simply a sign of the times.

    Unfortuantely, now most fuel cell expertise has been lost to the retirement of industry experts. Much of the "innovation" in recent years is merely a rehash of research done 30 or 40 years ago, but forgotten because no one back then had a vision for using fuel cells to replace (terrestrial) batteries.

    I contend that many modern fuel cell related ideas and patents are really old ideas that have been rediscovered by a new set of researchers unfamiliar with the developments of the past.

    It's like we just lost 30 years of ful cell development... too bad, because if the corporations that originally developed this technology had their shareholders in mind, they'd have a slightly longer vision and would be leaders in a new industry.

  • What I wanna see is... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ScottBob ( 244972 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @09:40PM (#7450324)
    A rechargeable battery that puts out 1.5 volts instead of 1.2 like current NiCds and NiMH batteries. That way you can use them in devices that were designed for alkalines, e.g. boom boxes and portable TVs. Using currently available rechargeables sucks, because you have less useable time with the device because the voltage was low to begin with.

    And like what was mentioned in another post, faster charge times. I would drive an electric vehicle everywhere if I could go 200 miles (with no slowing down towards the end) per charge, and a completely full charge only took 10 minutes.

  • Batteries *have* gotten better ... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dougmc ( 70836 ) <dougmc+slashdot@frenzied.us> on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @10:50PM (#7450690) Homepage
    Batteries may not have kept up with Moore's law (and it's not like we'd expect them to) but they have definately gotten better over the last few decades.

    The non-rechargable batteries gotten much better, going from the Zinc cells to the modern alkalines -- the capacity has gone up greatly (a factor of 10 or so?) And then there's the non rechargable lithium cells that can hold MUCH more (and costs more too, of course.)

    Also, and perhaps even more importantly, the rechargable cells have gotten much better recently. Maybe fifteen years ago, you'd buy 500 mAh AA NiCd cells ... now most people buy 1800 mAh NiMH cells, and for a few dollars more, you can get 2100 mAh AA NiMH cells.

    (Quick aside, NiCd vs. NiMH: NiMH have more capacity, but usually cannot deliver as much current in a very short period. NiMH cells do not suffer from voltage depression (often mistakenly called `memory'). NiMH cells are not as environmentally unfreindly as NiCd. NiMH cells usually don't last quite as long as NiCd cells. But for the most part, for most applications, NiMH and NiCd cells can be used interchangably.)

    And more recently, Li-Ion and Li-Poly cells have really come of age. These cells often have energy densities and power densities several times greater than what NiCd and NiMH cells have. Li-Ion cells were extremely fragile and could not handle abuse at all, but the new Li-Poly cells are overcoming many of these shortcomings.

    Ten years, electric R/C planes were very rare. Now, thanks mostly due to the improvements in batteries, they're found all over the place, and they can perform just as well as the glow and gas powered planes in many cases. All three types of batteries (NiCd, NiMH and Li-Ion/Li-Poly) have improved greatly recently, and all three are quite popular with pilots today.

    (Li-Poly especially looks incredibly promising for the future -- today, some planes with motors powered by them can often fly a full hour on a single charge, and things are getting better all the time.)

    In short, I don't agree with Michael Rogers at all -- there's all kind of developments being made in batteries. It's just that they're not happening fast enough for him :)

    (Semi-relevant aside: I have a TRS-80 Model 100 laptop computer. It's powered by 4 AA batteries, and it lasts a very long time. Perhaps the problem isn't the batteries -- maybe it's the laptop makers who use CPUs that use so much power!)

  • Batteries aren't the problem. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SetupWeasel ( 54062 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @12:30AM (#7451139) Homepage
    Listen up all y'all. It is time to testify.

    Maybe the problem isn't the batteries, maybe the problem is what we expect them to do. Sure a laptop that runs Unreal Tournament 2003 at 100 fps is nice, but when was the last time you saw anyone playing it off their battery.

    Portable eletronics will always need to be more rugged and less power hungry then their stationary brethern, without exception, no matter how good batteries get. So here is a bright idea.(let me know if this gets too deep for you) How about we stop expecting portable electronics to be as powerful as non-portable electronics?

    Sure try to make better batteries, work as hard as you can at it, but keep in mind what Lone Star said to the Druish Princess Vespa: "Take only what you need to survive"

    No, and by that I mean zero, laptops need a DVD-R. Almost no laptops need any 3D accelerator. Why, on god's green earth, do cell phones need a camera? Why does a PDA need enough hardware to play videogames? Do you buy a cellphone for a camera? Did you go shopping for a portable video game system and say to yourself, "Hey this GBA is pretty cheap and has really good games, but I am looking for something that is 4 times as much and is hard as hell to play games on?"

    Opmization is what must prevail. Making one machine that does everything, will not work. Give the people what they need. No one is buying a phone for its camera. They buy a camera for that. Power saved. No one needs to burn a DVD while flying from New York to LA. Power saved.

    I mean look at the Game Boy. The first took 4 AAs and lasted 4-6 hours. The Game Boy Color took 2 AAs and lasted 10 hours. The Game Boy Advance takes 2 AA and lasts 15 hours. Batteries have not gotten that much better, but today's Game Boy users are spending 1/8th as much on them.

    Programmers need to care about memory and processor usage again; engineers need to care about power consumption again. Do you really think that an mp3 player really needs to take 20MB of space? Power saved.

    Batteries aren't the problem. People are.

    SW
    • ...How about we stop expecting portable electronics to be as powerful as non-portable electronics?...No, and by that I mean zero, laptops need a DVD-R. Almost no laptops need any 3D accelerator.

      OK, even if I agreed that all of those things are not necessary in portable electronics, there's one thing that's totally critical in portable electronics and also a huge power drain: wireless communications. Trust me, it's not the camera in the cell phone that's wasting your battery, it's the transmitting.

      The "k

  • Of course there's been limited/no development (Score:3, Insightful)

    by iceT ( 68610 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @09:13AM (#7452700)
    There is an entire class of industry that revolves around the fact that their products are disposable.

    Batteries, Light Bulbs are two of the oldest members. Neither set of manufacturers have any kind of incentive to make their products last SIGNIFICANTLY longer. Their revenue streams are BASED on the fact that you have to replace them.

    The faster you go through them, the cheaper they are.. (carbon batteries are cheap compared to Alkaline, which are cheap compared to NiMH), becase they can make up the different in volume. But they still have to make money.

    So, what incentive do they have to make a battery that lasts substantially longer? I shy away from replacing my laptop batteries until the absolute last moment, because they run about $120 each, and most people that have one will tell you that a used laptop battery (charge/discharge, lather rinse repeat) will only last about a year, maybe 2 before your runtime is in fractions of an hour..

    It's simple economics.

  • The article repeated some misconceptions... (Score:5, Informative)

    by AB3A ( 192265 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @09:55AM (#7453026) Homepage Journal
    That bit about NiCd batteries having "memory" but not NiMH? Not true. Yeah, they got the crystalization part right, but they ignored the usual cause. Too many people (manufacturers and users) used dumb chargers and overcharged the batteries causing them to release hydrogen and oxygen. The resulting charge/discharge curve led people to think this was the memory effect, when it really wasn't.

    Battery chargers today are much more sensitive to the charge state of a battery and as a result they're much less likely to overcharge a battery.

    According to the GE manual on NiCd batteries, there really is a "memory effect" on NiCd batteries, but it relates to their use on board spacecraft in orbit where charge and discharge cycles are very regular. This effect is slightly different from that which results from overcharging the pack. Most people don't charge and discharge their battery packs so regularly.

    In the case of the batteries in orbit, the full capacity can be restored by one or two irregular charge/discharge cycles. However in the case where you overcharge the batteries, you actually lose capacity in the battery.

    By the way, overcharging a NiCd battery is less damaging than overcharing a NiMH battery. The former can recover some of it's capacity by exposure to air to recover the hydrogen and oxygen gasses it released, but the latter generally doesn't.

  • Suck ? I thought they were beginning to BLOW (Score:3, Informative)

    by ozzee ( 612196 ) on Wednesday November 12, 2003 @12:06PM (#7454170)

    I've seen reports lately of batteries blowing up.
    Nokia: Other Batteries Explode [unstrung.com]
    Google [google.com]

    While you make a good point that battery technology has failed to make the leaps that other technologies (like disk drive technology, for example) have, the issue remains, increasing energy density may cause explosions (batteries blow - literally), other technologies in comparison don't have similar failure modes (few, if any, disk drives cause serious injuries).

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