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[–] 28 points 3 months ago (11 children)

We really need to standardized battery sizes again...

I bought a flashlight the other day that came with a lithium ion rechargeable the size of 2 AA stuck together. If it ever dies or won't hold a charge, I can just use two normal AA batteries.

It's a really simple compromise to have a "state of the art" battery, yet not be tied to a weird size I won't be able to find. In 30 years I should still be able to buy rechargeable AA batteries.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 months ago (4 children)

    Or at least standard connectors to make modding easy. I get using a weird shaped battery in a handheld to maximize battery life in a compact device, but would be nice if it was an easy to find connector so you could just glue a battery pack to the back of it (or 3d print a new shell), so you can easily keep it going if/when that battery becomes unavailable.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (3 children)

    Most of the ones I've opened up have one positive wire and one negative. What's more standard than that?

    The big difference is in battery voltages.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    The steam deck uses whatever the hell that is. And the laptops I’ve torn into in the last 10+ years use all kinds of connectors.

    I’m assuming it’s because they’re doing all the battery management on the motherboard, not a separate bms in the battery pack. But some standardization would be great.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (3 children)

    Not all AA cases fit the same, but that’s why god gave us the imagination to invent the dremel tool.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    Not sure it is wise to take a dremmel to a lithium ion battery.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    Step one, force all battery manufacturers to switch to rechargeable cells. Keep all the existing sizes for now, but no more disposable batteries. What Panasonic did with Eneloop was make rechargeable AAA and AA batteries. If you want C or D, there’s a cheap plastic adapter for the AAs that turn them into C and D-sized batteries. So an aggressive approach would be to force C and D to discontinue and use AAs in adapters from now on. Continue making disposable 9-volt until they’re no longer needed, and alert manufacturers to stop making products that require 9-volt.

    Step two, reduce “coin” batteries down to a single size (for simplicity, the same width as the smallest existing coin battery and the same thickness as the thinnest existing coin battery), force all new devices that need coin batteries to adopt that size. Keep making disposable coin batteries in all sizes until they’re no longer needed, and alert manufacturers to switch to the new universal size.

    Then draft a bunch of different flat rectangle size standards that manufacturers can build products around.

    In all cases, there will be exceptions that need custom-sized batteries. But for now this will keep the industry and standards bodies busy and make things easier for consumers as quickly as possible.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago

    by the time I buy a battery its going to cost as much as when I bought the steamdeck.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    Maybe there is ram on the batteries? /S

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (5 children)

    Does anyone know the risks of using non-OEM batteries?

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (3 children)

    The DRM engages and instantly incinerates your Steam library. Not just the downloaded games.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    I think you're thinking of the Switch lol

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  • [–] 6 points 3 months ago

    The risk is it going "spicy pillow" rapidly.

    I recently had a lipo go nuclear on me (full spontaneous fireball), so I'm currently a bit risk adverse on rechargable lithium batteries right now.

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