Wireless keyboards and Mice and Batteries

"Heavy Duty" = "Advertising Hype".

I use alkalines. They need changing maybe every other month.

Mark L. Fergerson

Yeah the only reliable guide would be the capacity in mAH and I've never seen that marked on an Alkaline battery. Personally I wish consumer laws were introduced to make capacity marking mandatory. I mean can you imagine what would happen if a gas station tried to sell gas without telling you how much you were getting

Best switch to NiMH rechargables for your keyboard & mouse.

You should be using a good quality Alkaline battery, or investing in a few sets of chargeable batteries, and the proper charger.

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Jerry G. ======

Generally alkaline batteries have few times more capacity than "Heavy Duty" batteries. Calling zinc chloride batteries heavy duty became misleading once alkaline batteries (with 300% more capacity than zinc chloride batteries) became available.

The actual capacity depends on how the battery is used. Alkaline bateries do not give their best when very havily loaded. Alkalines do not have a fixed capacity rating because where the discharge rate of rechargeable batteries is a straight line, the discharge rate for alkalines slopes depending on the current drain. The higher the current drain, the faster the battery discharges. In alkaline batteries, the sloping discharge curve makes it impossible to accurately provide a mAh rating; the rating would vary depending on discharge rate and temperature.

Here are some general battery figures collected from various sources:

As you can see above, givign exact mAH rating for alkalines is hard. If soembody wants to make capacity marking mandatory, then there needs to be also some standardized means to define it from power source that varies in capacity when discharged differently!

That will definately save money on long run...

never

laws

imagine

you how

Might work, and then it might not work. Depends on whether or not the mouse or keyboard was made to accept the lower 2.4V of NiMHs instead of the normal 3V alkaline voltage. Don't assume that it will. Check the instruction manual to see.

I have had the same problem with the cheap heavy duty batteries in my MP3 player. I felt like I was changing my battery every hour. I guess you get what you pay for. Alkaline is my first choice now. I dont like rechargeable since I am always on the go and it would be a pain for me to remember to charge them.

I agree crazy.... Ive also switched to alkalines in my mp3 player for the gym!!! Nice to get a workout in without my batteries dying haha

I bought a Rayovac 2 hour charger, it works good but it's heavier than usual and uses a wall wart. I save a _lot_ of money by using rechargeable cells. Once I got used to putting chargers in different places, such as home, work, and in the car, it wasn't too much hassle keeping them charged. It's about $15 a charger with a set of four Ni-MH cells.

If you're going to keep using alkalines, you should go to

BTW, by locally, I mean I can get them at Fry's electronics.

totally use alkaline batteries. anything else is a waste of money. i am not a fan of anything else myself really. be smart. go alkaline. have a happy new year

jolly george

apsman wrote:

came

batteries

was

Alkaline

than

totally use alkaline batteries. anything else is a waste of money. i am not a fan of anything else myself really. be smart. go alkaline. have a happy new year

jolly george

apsman wrote:

came

batteries

was

Alkaline

than

Heavy Duty are the cheapest you can find for a reason. And that's because they suck. Alkalines last about 4 times longer. Heavy duty are terrible because they lose there charge over time while alkalines keep the same charge the whole time. So with heavy duty your keyboard and mouse will become less and less responcive over time until the cheap heavy dutys die while with alkaline it will be the same as the first day you put the battery in until it finally goes out. I'll never buy a heavy duty battery again.