Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Charging and care of your cell phone battery

From my local cell phone provider: Recharge the battery every night whether it needs it or not. Batteries only have so many "lives" to live before they die. One life means running a battery nearly out before recharging it. It only takes a few times before the life of the battery ends and you then turn over $35 or $40 for a new battery.

Extend the life of your battery by charging it nightly and if you are going to be on your cell for an extended period of time, plug it in if possible. He also told me that unlike batteries of years past charging them nightly does not wear them down but now prevents that from happening.

He also reminded me to use my car charger as little as possible if at all. Car chargers are hard on batteries and wear them down quickly.

Also stay away from the converters that convert a car charger to an outlet charger. That is the fastest way to give your poor cell phone battery a heart attack and insure its immediate death.

Yes this information is brought to you by personal experience. I was in a small town for a show and left my outlet charger at home. Not wanting to spend 2 hours in the car to charge the phone, I headed to the nearest nationally known electronic store since I thought they would carry high grade products. Well those thoughts blew away right along with all the tumbleweed in town when the wind stirred. This particluar converter allows you to plug a car charger into the base and then into an outlet. Only the directions don't warn you about sudden death caused by electrical shock. Stay away from those converters. Purchasing a new battery is how I learned about the charging tips!

Happy New Year!