- Joined
- Jan 27, 2007
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- 5,658
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- Your Mac's Specs
- 17 inch 2 GHz C2D imac (5,1) with 3GB DDR2 RAM, X1600 (128MB memory) GPU - OSX 10.6.3
Hi all,
As you know I have recently purchased an Apple Battery Charger. And it has arrived to me today. About 2 weeks from when I first ordered it. And here is a photo of what you get in the little box.
The plug adapter might be different for different countries though. Cause everyone has their own different wall power points. And now for a few points I have mentioned about the product so far.
1. The white charger itself is tiny. Very tiny. Hardly bigger than the batteries themselves ad you can see in the above picture. And neither the batteries or the Apple charger/wall adaptor have any Apple logo on them. Yes the main charger has the whole "designed in California and made in China" but no little Apple logo.
2. You might have to take out and put in the batteries a few times to get it to work properly. I know I had to. The batteries slide in and out of the charger very easily. But getting to charge and not just flash amber (error) is a little tricky. But not impossible. I had it done in say 4-5 mins of fiddling with it.
3. The charger itself does not get warm at all when in use. I haven't fully charged any batteries in it yet but I can't see that being an issue.
4. The initial batteries took say 1 hour 15 to charge from whatever levels they shipped with to a full charge. Which is pretty slow. But they are designed for a long shelf life with many recharge cycles and not a fast recharge. And if you're just using the batteries for Apple products and other similar things then this will not be an issue.
5. When the charger said the batteries were full I took them out and put them in my Magic Mouse. And my imac said the Magic Mouse was at 89% charge. Not 100%. and . . .
*NOTE WELL this point*
I've been reading up no the batteries and the Apple system. And the Apple computers rate 100% as a fully new unused non-rechargable battery. And they have a higher mA I think it is then the rechargeables. So in in short:
For the first charge the non-rechargeable batteries will get 11% more use then the Apple batteries. But for the 2nd charge you recharge the Apple batteries or have to waste money on more non-rechargeable batteries. So even if the batteries last for 5 years of use (half of what Apple claims) then it's still a very good deal for my liking.
That's as far as I know. Someone can correct me if I am wrong.
6. I think the batteries themselves are just re-branded eneloop AA's. The batteries have printed on them "Made in Japan" and only for use with Apple products/charger. So it is very hard to find out which manufacturer actually made the batteries. And I'm sure Apple would not tell us.
7. In Conclusion.
It's hard to say from one day of use if this product actually lives up to the specifications Apple set for it. And I can say though pretty this product really has no wow factor like some of the other Apple products do. But in my opinion is something you don't really think about. And not having to think "oh where will me next set of rechargeable batteries come from?" is a very good thing. If you use this product charge the batteries and think nothing more of it then Apple has done their job well.
8. A Score.
I'd give this product a 9 out of 10.
Simply because I plugged in the charger and had to spend 5 mins getting the charger to work. But apart from that it's a small sleek product. With very small vampire draw (which is good cause no one takes the batteries out the instant they are charged) and the time between fully charged and battery removal (from the charger) will not be as much wasted power thanks to Apple and this very nifty little product.
As you know I have recently purchased an Apple Battery Charger. And it has arrived to me today. About 2 weeks from when I first ordered it. And here is a photo of what you get in the little box.
The plug adapter might be different for different countries though. Cause everyone has their own different wall power points. And now for a few points I have mentioned about the product so far.
1. The white charger itself is tiny. Very tiny. Hardly bigger than the batteries themselves ad you can see in the above picture. And neither the batteries or the Apple charger/wall adaptor have any Apple logo on them. Yes the main charger has the whole "designed in California and made in China" but no little Apple logo.
2. You might have to take out and put in the batteries a few times to get it to work properly. I know I had to. The batteries slide in and out of the charger very easily. But getting to charge and not just flash amber (error) is a little tricky. But not impossible. I had it done in say 4-5 mins of fiddling with it.
3. The charger itself does not get warm at all when in use. I haven't fully charged any batteries in it yet but I can't see that being an issue.
4. The initial batteries took say 1 hour 15 to charge from whatever levels they shipped with to a full charge. Which is pretty slow. But they are designed for a long shelf life with many recharge cycles and not a fast recharge. And if you're just using the batteries for Apple products and other similar things then this will not be an issue.
5. When the charger said the batteries were full I took them out and put them in my Magic Mouse. And my imac said the Magic Mouse was at 89% charge. Not 100%. and . . .
*NOTE WELL this point*
I've been reading up no the batteries and the Apple system. And the Apple computers rate 100% as a fully new unused non-rechargable battery. And they have a higher mA I think it is then the rechargeables. So in in short:
For the first charge the non-rechargeable batteries will get 11% more use then the Apple batteries. But for the 2nd charge you recharge the Apple batteries or have to waste money on more non-rechargeable batteries. So even if the batteries last for 5 years of use (half of what Apple claims) then it's still a very good deal for my liking.
That's as far as I know. Someone can correct me if I am wrong.
6. I think the batteries themselves are just re-branded eneloop AA's. The batteries have printed on them "Made in Japan" and only for use with Apple products/charger. So it is very hard to find out which manufacturer actually made the batteries. And I'm sure Apple would not tell us.
7. In Conclusion.
It's hard to say from one day of use if this product actually lives up to the specifications Apple set for it. And I can say though pretty this product really has no wow factor like some of the other Apple products do. But in my opinion is something you don't really think about. And not having to think "oh where will me next set of rechargeable batteries come from?" is a very good thing. If you use this product charge the batteries and think nothing more of it then Apple has done their job well.
8. A Score.
I'd give this product a 9 out of 10.
Simply because I plugged in the charger and had to spend 5 mins getting the charger to work. But apart from that it's a small sleek product. With very small vampire draw (which is good cause no one takes the batteries out the instant they are charged) and the time between fully charged and battery removal (from the charger) will not be as much wasted power thanks to Apple and this very nifty little product.