[tmann]

I bought new Sanyo gumsticks for my newly aquired D-777 PDCP about a year ago and now suddenly I am getting a lot less battery life (really got screwed on a bus trip from DC to NYC last weekend - I95 was closed because of a crash and the trip took over 6 hours and my freshly charged D777 lasted less than 2 hours!).

Is this normal, or should these batteries last more than a year? I probably use the player an average of 4 times a week for a 1/2 hour (home from work), with some extended bus/plane trips once in a while.

On that last bus trip the player dropped off the seat to the floor and landed on the thin edge pretty hard, which was when it died early for the first time- is there any way this could have affected the battery life?

 

[Sazabi2001]

A good Ni-MH rechargeable-batteries, like SONY MW-14, can charger alomst 500 times for their all life. But in fact , including some other reason such like wherter, humidity, tempicture ... They may just have 150-250 time charges of their owm life. But even just 200 times is long enough to use nearly 2 yeas ~I think

When the batteries become short , it can use a way to re-affect them. When used up all the power of the battery, use a quick-charger (like SONY BC9HS or BC7HT~~means the charge-current is more than 500ma~) to charge the battery . than the battery may last long again~~

After all this way just effect 1-2 times, Still it can't help the batterys going shorter and shorter in its life~

 

[Duncan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmann On that last bus trip the player dropped off the seat to the floor and landed on the thin edge pretty hard, which was when it died early for the first time- is there any way this could have affected the battery life?

I don't think so to be honest... if it had damaged the charging circuit, it then just wouldn't work at all?!

Following on from what Sazabi2001 said, if you don't have a fast charger... take a look at the light on the D777, especially if you're using NH-14WM cells (which are out of spec for this player technically, as its only designed for charging 1000ma batteries and judges by what power it sees coming out of the batteries, which - technically could well be in spec for the NH-9WMs that it was designed for) and when it stops charging, charge them again (just once every ten charges maybe, rather than every charge)... if the light goes out very quickly, then - maybe they are fully charged, and then you have a problem - if not, then just let them charge up some more...

Sometimes you have problems when you leave the batteries to run too low, and then leave them in storage for a while, that there just isn't enough juice in them to show the unit there are batteries inside, but it doesn't sound like that is your problem..

 

[Lisa]

Like Duncan said. The charging circuit would probably not work at all if it were broken. But batteries can be damaged too if you drop them. The damage can appear straight away or even after a you've used it for a while. I dropped a cell phone with a NiMH battery several times and at some point it would not stop charging and when I unplugged it the battery lasted only for a very short time.
If it's true that the D777 stops charging after 1000mah you won't have the problem that the batteries won't stop charging and get too hot. But one of them might be broken.
But then again, my cellphone only lasted for 10 min. not two hours. So I'm not sure.

 

[tmann]

Thaks guys (and girl)!

I should have mentioned that they are Sanyo Nickel Metal Hydride 1400, model HF-A1U 1.2V (from I-river - the cheapest compatible batteries I could find).

I'll try re-charging them after the light goes off as Duncan mentioned and see if that helps. It seems like this would have affected them from the start though (is this wrong?), or would it become more noticeable as they get older, which in that case may explain them lasting less longer now?

Just to clarify, on the bus ride the unit did not die right after it dropped from the seat - it lasted a while after that.

 

[Lisa]

I've read several times in those batteries faqs online that not completely charging the batteries makes them lazy. But I've got no clue how that would translate in actual use.

(I feel like I'm giving you advise that is not much help in practice...maybe someone else can step in and say something sensible about this.)

 

[Sazabi2001]

In fact , all the gumsticks-batteries , like SONY NH-14-WM , Panasonic HHF-AZ01 , was also produce by SANYO.

SANYO may be the biggest batteries manufacturer Japan. And including SONY AIWA & Panasonic has already stopped produce such batteries~~They just ODM~

Not only Ni-MH batteries . The Cell-phone batteries , like NOKIA , their batteries is also manufcture by SANYO . By a subsidiary company of SANYO call "ShenZhen-HuaQiang" in China~