Longer-Lasting Batteries Are Almost Here | Hacker News Reader

Longer-Lasting Batteries Are Almost Here

wired.com

22 pointsprostoalex19 comments

"The entry-level laptop features a unique battery design that uses “terraced” battery cells to stuff every available centimeter of a device with power. "

Umm, no, it's not unique. It's kind of annoying when techbeat reporters can't even familiarize themselves with recent industry history. Both Motorola and LG were shipping devices with terraced batteries years ago, and they probably weren't the first either.

Comparing battery technology with Moore's Law is just ridiculous.

Every year, there are big claims of revolutionary, new battery technology, but they never seem to reach the market. We're going to have to live with incremental improvements on Li-Ion (which companies like Tesla and Apple seem to be making some strides in) until alternative technologies mature, which I suspect will take years.

50% gains every 18 months is beyond extraordinary, it's miraculous and only to believed because it occurs again and again.

Batteries improve something closer to 8% a year which is merely amazing.

Dude literally wrote an article criticizing sensationalizing journalists just to sensationalize. Seriously?

It's unbelievable. Especially the headline with "(really)" at the end when the entire article has nothing of substance to report.

It seems more likely to me that they will use this technology to create smaller devices with batteries that last the same length.

I think it's more likely that more powerful batteries will allow more power-hungry electronics. This is already happening -- just look at the giant/high resolution screens of modern smartphones that would be unthinkable a few years ago due to inferior battery technology.

Not at all. It was always possible, it just would have meant larger batteries. They size the battery to the phone, not the phone to the battery.

Have you noticed that once smartphones came out they've never really had much more than a day's worth of battery life, yet they get thinner and thinner?

They could easily make the phone 1mm thicker and probably double the battery life, but they don't. They're not trying to make a maximum battery life, they're trying to make the "sexiest" thing possible and still have what someone, somewhere thinks is probably about OK given the average use.

I see you are new here. My first smartphone, a BlackBerry 6210, ran for a week between charges. Its predecessor, a BlackBerry 957, wasn't a smartphone per se, because it didn't contain a phone, but it was a programmable PDA with a 2-way data radio and an i386 CPU and it ran for three weeks before I had to plug it in.

The reason that smartphones now have 1-day battery life is because that's the _minimum_ that the market will tolerate.

Yeah, one of the reasons I just started carrying a tablet is because the battery lasted so much longer, not shorter. It's a bigger device, so it's a bigger battery.

I just want a bigger battery in a physically smaller phone. An iPhone 5 weighs 4 oz. I'd be happy with a slightly thicker and heavier 5 oz phone with much longer battery life.

That's as opposed to an iPhone 6. I now have one because it was "free" with trade in of my old iPhone 5. But I didn't really want the larger size.

I do concede that I'm the minority view. Most people really like the larger screen sizes.

Why not just get a battery case? I've got the Lenmar, ~$30 on Amazon. Couldn't be happier

The problem is that a battery case may be too heavy for where I carry my phone (in front pants pocket). Here's the math:

4 oz "base" phone with bigger (by 1 or 2 oz) battery == happy

4 oz phone + 5.6 oz battery/case == too heavy?

I actually carried my iPhone 5 w/o a case for quite a while, it's doable. The silicone case that Apple sells for the iPhone 6 is really light and really helps the grip.

Still waiting for someone on kickstarter to come out with a belt made of lithium ion batteries. Long as it includes some insurance in case it blows off my lower torso I'm in.

Right in time to make the next Apple Watch not ridiculously thick.

Seems more like a joke article. The batteries aren't going to last longer unless there is physically more battery.

Oook.

Not entirely true. For example, Project Ara is considering shipping batteries that have a higher power density but less cycle count.

Apparently the first smartphone with a graphene-based battery was released a couple of days ago. It claims 10% increase in charge density and 50% increase in battery life. http://www.graphene-info.com/first-graphene-phone-reportedly...

That article is completely made up, from what I can tell. I've seen it posted before.

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