Fuel Cell Laptop announced by Toshiba

Steve writes "Following on from the Fuel Cells approved for airline cabins story a week or so back, it would seem there will soon be a need for that approval: Toshiba has announced a fuelcell powered laptop for 2004,and possibly a PDA."

Comments

Finally

[jeffasselin]

It's time the batteries finally caught up to the way we want to use our laptops.

With the popularity of wireless networks, it has become a pain to have to plug in the laptop to the electric outlet while you spent that money to set up a wireless entwork so that you could stay on the net without any wires.

Although network technology is much newer, it seems it has managed to progress faster than battery technology sofar.

Apple is one company who has done all they could to extend battery life (the G3 processor uses so little juice it helps a lot), but every company is still at the mercy of the limits of the battery companies.

Re:Just like printer cartridges

[ackthpt]

I'm concerned that you're right. Low Methonal solution souldn't be a problem, as you can pick it up for a few dimes a bottle, however, it seems likely they'll hold you to the warrantee with some certified/proprietary mixture (then get someone to add reverse-engineering fuel mixtures to the DMCA) which you can only buy with their quality name on it, or from licensed moonshiners.

Probably missing the point

[DougJohnson]

The idea isn't to "upgrade" your old equipment to use feul cells. The entire tech industry desperately needs something to sell some new products. How many walkman's do you need? (or should that be walkmen?)

The point is to not have to have batteries at all so you just pump it up with some butane/methane whatever every now and again. This is a HUGE upgrade, not having to replace/recharge PDA batteries every couple hours of use could improve screens and processor power. And to top it all off, means that the manufacturers will make more money selling NEW things.

You can bet that this is only the first of a coming shift in consumer electronics.

Re:Fuel cells?

[GooberToo]

He violated federal law that was in place prior to 9/11. Deserved what he got.

Translation: He's a moron.

Consumable costs will be the killer

[Billy the Mountain]

One manufacturer is proposing to supply a 120 ml cartridge that last 10 hours on a laptop. The price is going to be an estimated $3 - $5 per.

Although wholesale costs for methanol are $0.33 per gallon. I'd be hesitant to pay five bucks to "recharge" my laptop once, OTOH I'd be willing to pay $2.50 for a gallon of methanol that's probably good for forty charges even though it might involve a bit of a hassle to transfer the liquid into "refill" containers.