Battery extender-- a good idea?

[vovka1965]

I have heard from some Radio Shack salesmen that using a commercial alkali battery extender to recharge your palm's internal Li ion battery is NOT a good idea as it can adversely affect the internal battery. Nothing to do with damaging the charging circuit, but, perhaps, with the fact that the external battery pack cannot provide the right charging current?
They only recommended charging from AC.
Any comments on that?

[The New No. Two]

Most Palms also recharge (slowly) through the cable/cradle connector itself, so I don't imagine this could be a problem.

[Gregte]

No truth in what the R.S. guy told you. I do it al the time.

[raspabalsa]

Most salesmen know very little about what they sell, and the ones from Radio Shack are no exception. While it may be true that some batteries can fail to yield the required current for a standard fast charge of a Li-Ion battery, this will only mean that the battery will charge at a slower rate. No harm in this.

I too have used several battery extenders built by myself to work with AAA (low current) or AA (higher current) batteries. Never had any problem with any of my palm devices.

[vovka1965]

Most salesmen know very little about what they sell, and the ones from Radio Shack are no exception. While it may be true that some batteries can fail to yield the required current for a standard fast charge of a Li-Ion battery, this will only mean that the battery will charge at a slower rate. No harm in this.

I too have used several battery extenders built by myself to work with AAA (low current) or AA (higher current) batteries. Never had any problem with any of my palm devices.

That is good news.. Now, what is the most compact power battery extender I can get? Another external rechargeable battery?

[raspabalsa]

Well, all battery extenders are "external rechargeable batteries". I haven't used the commercially available extenders, but I've seen pictures of some that use 4 AA cells and they seem quite small and handy. One of my extenders runs on 8 AAA cells, has the advantage of being very flat, fitting in the front flap of a leather case. Trouble is that it's good for only one charge of TX's battery or 1.5 charges of T3's battery. My other extender uses 4 AA cells, good for almost two charges of TX's battery or almost three of T3's battery.

[Gregte]

DigiKey.com, and I would assume others, have a 2700 mAh NiMH AA cell now. I use four of them for powering and charging my TX. I think 2700 mAh is nearly as much capacity as a good quality non-rechargeable alkaline cell. This makes them far cheaper.