Slashdot Mirror
Huawei Battery Upgrade Means Dramatically Faster Charging For Mobile Devices
Computerworld reports a welcome development for everyone with battery powered portable electronics, which might just have applications further afield, too (like electric cars): Huawei has developed a battery based on conventional lithium-ion chemistry but tweaked with the addition of graphite atoms bonded to the anode. From the article: That change means faster charging but not at the expense of usage life or a sacrifice in the amount of energy that can be stored in each battery, [the company] said.
It was developed by Huawei research and development subsidiary Watt Lab and the company showed off two prototypes in videos posted online.
One of the two batteries has a capacity of 3,000mAh (milliampere hours) -- about equivalent to the batteries in modern smartphones -- and can be charged to 48 percent of capacity in five minutes. The second has a much smaller capacity of 600mAh but reaches 68 percent of capacity in just two minutes.
http://www.oppo.com/en/technol... Faster charging doesn't make it into consumer products? 30 minutes for 75% charge. Though I find it charges faster than that (about twice as fast), but they don't advertise the best case, they advertise the worst case, so they'll always meet it.
The problems with heat were there, but were evidently solved well enough to sell it. And in over a year of use, the battery is holding up much better than my Galaxy S3 did after a year. Though I noticed a drop in standby time after one of the Android updates, but I even reverted to verify it was the update, not age that caused it to drop to standby under 48 hours.
Learn to love Alaska
Have you been asleep? Around 1990, a rechargable AA battery had 500 mAh capacity, took 14 hours to charge and had memory effect issues (NiCd, remember?). These days AA means 2500 mAh NiMH rechargable in under 1 hour. Li-ion is even better but generally not available in AA (cell chemistry means a much higher voltage per cell).
So that's 2 entirely new battery chemistries and a 5-fold increase in capacity.
Also, you may not want to read about early research, but I do. If you want nothing but product announcements, go read manufacturer press releases instead of coming to Slashdot.