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Nokia: the Sun Can't Charge Your Phone
itwbennett writes "Nokia's research into solar-powered cell phones ended with a (barely audible) thud. Under the best of conditions researchers were able 'to harvest enough energy to keep the phone on standby mode but with a very restricted amount of talk time,' Nokia wrote in a blog post on Tuesday. Not surprisingly, the prototype phone, which had a solar panel on the back cover, performed better in Kenya than in other testing locations, like southern Sweden and the Arctic Circle."
No need. Have you used a Nokia low-end phone lately? They can go two weeks without a charge. Seriously. I just lent a friend a 2320 for use while in the USA and it lasted a full 15 days. And yes, they made calls on it! Amazing.
Mechanical energy -motion and/or sound waves- seems a more likely source of power for a phone.
They don't have the power density of a solar cell and the mechanical energy approach would add considerable mass.
Looks to me like they'll just have to figure out how to make a much lower power cellphone. That process will be limited by the need of the phone to produce sound that one can hear.
...or, you know, sell a separate battery and a stationary solar powered battery charger. That would avoid the size constraints on the solar panel and the exposure problem.
The only problem with that obvious approach is that such a charger couldn't be used to sell expensive phones under the pretext of Nokia being environmentally-friendly and all the associated fraudulent propaganda. ...and so the project is scrapped.
Slashdot, fix your code or at least hire someone who is competent at it to do it for you.