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[The Shadow]

I recently went wireless crazy and replaced some of my stuff with wireless parts. My keyboard and mouse are wireless, my PS2 and Xbox controllers are wireless. Knowing that I'd be going through batteries, I bought a pack of rechargeable AA and AAA as well as a recharger.

This is the problem though. These batteries seem to die pretty unpredictably. They don't seem to die slowly like a store bought alkaline. They just die, right out of the blue. My keyboard for example would exhibit "possessed" behavior before it died when I had regular Alkalies in it. With the rechargeables, it could work one hour and then BAM, it's dead the next.

Just now, I wanted to get started on some homework and I noticed that my TI-89 is dead. Usually it has a little "batt" indicator that shows up when the battery charge is getting low. With the rechargeables, it just up and died. I don't know how long it's been dead but I tested the four batteries and 3 of them are completely drained while the fourth seems to have a full charge. WTF?

Is this typical or should I be looking for a different brand of rechargeable battery?

 

[Chony]

Happens to me. Also the batteries sometimes will just not work anymore It sucks cause they cost more.

 

[NetMapel]

That doesn't sound normal to me though. My rechargable batteries always last for a very long time, even longer than the normal alkaline batteries. Something is wrong with your rechargable battery set.

 

[Pimpwerx]

1. Rechargeable NiCD and NiMH batteries self-discharge over time. IOW, they'll be dead even if you don't use them after fully-charging them. They'll drain on their own after varying amounts of time. I've seen it happen over anywhere from 2 weeks to a month. So you invariably have to charge them regularly. Not a big deal IMO.

2. Rechargeables are not meant to run as long as alkalines necessarily. Alkalines keep a voltage at a certain level even when they are near death. Rechargeables don't. Voltage drops off awful quick when they get low. Any device that is voltage-regulated will get squirrely before quitting, and will probably stop working before the batteries are completely dead. You don't want to run rechargeables past a certain voltage level (1.1V per cell or something like that) b/c you stand a chance of killing the cell (battery) when you do that.

For RC guys like myself, we keep tabs on the voltage when discharging a battery to make sure the total charge of a pack doesn't drop too low b/c you could overdischarge a battery and kill a cell or two in the process. All minor things that shouldn't kill the benefits of recharbeables IMO. I have the same 2200mAh batts that have lasted me 18 months now. I run them in my wireless mouse until they start freaking out on me, then recharge them again. Way better than buying alkalines. PEACE.

 

[The Shadow]

Recharging them isn't a problem. As a matter of fact, the 4 that died on me are already recharged and back in my ti-89.

It's just that they seem to die so suddenly. I was just wondering if that was typical. Usually there's some warning with store bought alkaline that they're going out. These just kind of go *poof* and they're gone.