By Alice Hill
RealTechNews
For years the battery has held us back from true wireless happiness. What’s the point of being able to sit on your deck or anywhere more freeing with your laptop when the &^%& thing runs out of battery power every three hours or so, or barely gets you through a DVD on an airplane? You may as well throw in an Ethernet connection and call it a day. But there is hope on the horizon – fuel cell batteries are expected to last 8 hours (untested so let’s not get all excited yet folks –Alice) and a real live prototye from and AVC Corp. will be shown next week at the CeBit trade show.
Antig Technology and AVC Corp. will demonstrate a production-ready fuel-cell insert for notebook PCs at the CeBIT trade show next week. According to the two companies, the CD-ROM size fuel cell will fit within the media bay of a notebook PC, replacing the drive with additional battery power. AVC said it has contracts in place with unnamed Taiwan ODMs — the companies that actually produce the notebooks that later carry a top OEM brand such as HP or Dell — for production in the second half of 2006. Soucre:
We Say: Oh the humanity. The batteries weigh almost 4 pounds, are filled with methanol, and there is no word on how you refill them again when they deplete. Worst yet: Try taking one of these babies through airport security. You can’t even get a Zippo lighter on a plane. Bottom Line: Sounds great, but the devil is in the details, and don’t ever believe they will hit the market in second half 2006. Snort!
Yeah, it’s too bad they weigh so much and probably wouldn’t pass a security checkpoint… They also have to take the place of a drive which means you couldn’t watch a DVD while using this anyway
Sounds like this is geared towards the user in extreme computer unfriendly environments… Places where there are regularly scheduled extended power outages or no power available at all. Y’know, exotic far off places like California…
Alice, come on now… sure it’s a piece of crap. It’s the first one to come out… ever! Did anyone expect them to release a first product of it’s kind to reviews of 4 out of 5 stars?
Getting the battery through the airport security is an issue, but I’m positive there is a huge market for an 8 hr. batter that will not go on an airplane. Yea, I know, the ‘8 hrs.’ is a big IF too.
It’s just that I’ve read so much commentary in the last two years wondering why ‘they’ do not deliver alternate battery technologies to market. Well now ‘they’ have.
The first laptop computers were pieces of crap too, but it has to start somewhere even if the idea ultimately fails.
Charles – I totally agree. But I didn’t want to write a big puff piece saying “hooray – problems have been solved at last.” Most new tech products are crap when they start out, but I agree that you have to start somewhere. I remember the first Compaq “luggable” which they compared to a sewing machine. Who even sews anymore? And I still have the first Logitech digital camera that was black and white and deleted its entire contents if the battery level dropped. And now look at digital cameras today.
But this fuel cell is a breakthrough and someday may be what we all need, because to me, the battery is the bottleneck. I hate charging a cell phone every two or three days, and a notebook that gets 4 hours is great, but I want at least 8 if not 16 hours so I can truly be portable.
The day someone gets this right and we have batteries that last weeks, imagine what that would be like? But I still have to wave the red flag and remind our readers that that day is not here and there is no way these are going on sale by this spring. That’s my job – to point out breakthoughs but then give you a more realistic picture on when you can actually buy something and not get burned.
Just an FYI, you CAN get a Zippo on a plane. TSA and DOT actually lifted the ban a year ago and now Zippo lighters are allowed in checked luggage.
Actually, the recharging of the Cell HAS been worked out – Refillable cartridges. The rules about getting the methanol through security have already been addressed, too – Changes to be implemented in 2007, which about how long setting this up for commercial sales will take.
The real value isn’t to air travelers (who CAN find an outlet, if they look), but to rural workers – Modern farmers who plant to database and satelite imaging, researchers in remote locations, teachers and doctors in undeveloped countries, and suchlike. For those of us posting or reading HERE, the cells are just another (very nifty) luxury.