The pack then notifies you when it's time to recharge, when it needs repairs or even when it's time for a replacement. Information is stored on the battery itself, so that even if you change your phone, you can still view your pack's previously recorded data.

NTT DoCoMo says that keeping close track of deterioration in the battery pack is a great way to prevent the Li-ions from catching fire or exploding—a problem that has only increased as the need for more portable power continues to swell. The new brand of intelligent batteries will be found on phone models coming out next year. [Techon]

There are some hedges that need to be made here that almost no one is making. Because of 3G, you'll kill batteries faster, but you're also downloading much faster, so can get more browsing done in a set amount of time. What's the math on the total number of web page refreshes vs. the old one? Secondly, no one yet is checking on the battery life while playing a high-end 3D-game like Monkey Ball or Motionx-poker; these games are not only running the GPU and CPU full bore, but the screen too. Gaming is probably the most intense activity you can do. Just wait for the multiplayer gaming to start and see what happens. Thirdly, because the apps give new functionality to the iPhone, you're going to be using it a lot more often than before. Especially in the first few days.

But back to the scores. As you can see, they're kind of all over the place.

One takeaway seems to be that as far as straight-up 3G talk time goes, the iPhone 3G is near the top of the range—Wirelessinfo and PC World both found it to be among the best 3G handsets they've tested for voice talk time. For mixed use and browsing numbers, the range is pretty wide, since the variables at play are nearly infinite.

Ars Technica: 3:00-4:30 (mixed use); under 4:00 (video playback)
"Using the iPhone constantly for various tasks like reading e-mail, surfing the web, sending updates to Twitter, and using other apps that make use of the network connection, we managed to get anywhere from 3 to 4.5 hours of Internet use out of the device. As for video playback, we watched several TV shows purchased from iTunes back to back until the battery died completely. Doing this, the battery went from full to empty in just a hair under 4 hours."

Wirelessinfo: 5:50 (3G talk time)
"The iPhone 3G lasted five hours fifty minutes in our test of call time. This is significantly above average and is the best time amongst our comparison phones. The web browsing test on the iPhone 3G has been one of the most vexing. So far our results have been 162 minutes, 168 minutes, 253 minutes and 409 minutes. One possible factor is that we leave the backlight to set itself automatically as our standard is to leave settings in default except for a few like making sure the screen stays on."

PC World: 5:38 (3G talk time)
"The battery life on Apple's new 3G iPhone isn't great, but it beats that of other 3G smart phones we've seen. PC World's Test Center ran it through our standard talk-time battery life test, and found that on average it ran 5 hours, 38 minutes, a running time that we consider earns a Fair rating...Of other handsets that support AT&T's HSDPA/UMTS network, only the HTC Touch Dual came close, with an average talk time of 5 hours, 18 minutes."

Engadget: 5:24 (video playback)
"We managed just 5 hours and 24 minutes of continuous playback of our 320 x 176, H.264 video encoded at 127kbps. (Our tests were conducted with the screen at half brightness, half volume, with Apple's stock headphones, WiFi on, but not connected, Bluetooth off, 3G and cellular radios on, and location services on — pretty much all the defaults.)"

PC Magazine: 5:43 (3G talk time)
"On our 3G talk time test, the iPhone lasted 5 hours, 43 minutes." [Spare words, eh guys?]

CNET: 5:00 (3G talk time); 9:00 (EDGE talk time)
"On EDGE the iPhone 3G fell about an hour short of its rated time of 10 hours, while 3G calls matched the promised time of 5 hours. Those times aren't bad, but we'll run another round just to be sure."

Anandtech: 3:17 (3G web browsing)
"At 197 minutes, the iPhone 3G can keep you browsing for a little over 3 hours before completing dying. That's with no additional phone calls or anything else going on in the background, just constant surfing. The problem is that this is a very realistic scenario for many users."

DVICE: 2:54 (3G web browsing /mixed use)
"This is a real-world test, too. Just as Apple tested its iPhone 3G, I had Wi-Fi running but not associated with any network, call forwarding on, and “Ask to Join Networks” and Auto-Brightness were turned off. Then I just browsed from site to site as I would normally do, checking email and downloading a few apps from time to time. It was all 3G, all the time."

Walt Mossberg/WSJ: 4:27 (3G talk time); 5:49 (3G web surfing)
"In my test of [3G] voice calling, I got 4 hours and 27 minutes, short of Apple’s maximum claim and nearly three hours less than what I recorded in the same test last year on the original iPhone. In my test of Internet use over 3G, I got 5 hours and 49 minutes, better than Apple’s claim, but far short of the nine hours I got using Wi-Fi in last year’s tests."

1. Turn down the LCD. The new iPhone's screen is brighter, but you shouldn't be running this thing at full heat if you want to save battery power. I keep mine at 10% brightness. Change this under Settings -> Brightness.

2. Wi-Fi new network scanning off or Wi-Fi off. While you're not checking data for more than a few seconds at a time, I'd turn off Wi-Fi and in general, I'd turn off Wi-Fi scanning. It uses less power than EDGE or 3G but when you're not using your network connection, you might as well shut it down. Change this under Settings -> Wi-Fi. Same goes for Bluetooth.

3. Toggle off 3G till ready. Here's something I wish Apple had automatically managed. I use 3G for browsing, YouTube, app store purchases when not around a computer, or during important calls. For all other uses, including email, weather checking and Twitter, etc, I use EDGE. This setting is under Settings -> General -> Network.

4. Turn off Vibrate in Games. Playing a game with vibrate happening frequently is an unnecessary battery suck. If you can turn it off, turn it off.

5. Limit use of A-GPS tracking. GPS tracking is still pretty useless after you've gained your bearings, since there isn't a turn by turn navigation mode for driving. I exit out of maps once I've got the directions in my mind, and if I lose myself again, I just start maps up once more.

6. Buy Apps and Songs in iTunes. You can buy songs over Wi-Fi or Apps over 3G, but that doesn't mean you should. I'd recommend buying Apps at your computer if you can help it, and syncing them to your iPhone instead. As an added bonus, you'll be picking up a charge while you're tethered to your computer.

7. Set the Autolock to 1-minute. The iPhone's autolock is good at shutting off the screen if you forget to when placing it in a pocket, purse or just tossing it on a table after a call. I set mine to the most aggressive, 1-minute, but there are times where I set it to 2-minutes. This setting is under Settings -> General -> Autolock.

8. Use programs with 3D less often. Not surprisingly, I've noticed that when I play games rendering 3D, battery life drops. Using the graphics chips more intensely will crank up power usage, but maybe the drain is also because of the nature of gaming: Unlike email or browsing, gaming is a full-time, full attention endeavor that also keeps the CPU, GPU and LCD going full-time. (I'd like to think this is a more useful tip than "don't use your iPhone" but maybe it's not something you can avoid if you're a gaming addict.)

9. Set Push to Off, and Set Fetch Time. Push email isn't that useful for me because I know I'm getting emails all day long and that I have to be checking all the time. Push does use more juice than the fetch mode, which checks for calendar, contact and email syncing at set intervals of 15 minutes to an hour. I set mine to 1 hour unless I'm out of the office. If you seldom update your contacts and calendars, you might even be better off syncing by cable to iTunes, while you pick up a charge.

10. Stay Juiced. If you're at computer or in a car, you should try to use a cigarette adapter or USB cable to pick up a few minutes of charge. Every bit helps!

These tips also apply to a first generation iPhone running OS 2.0.

PC World says that the result is remarkable knowing that AT&T's HSDPA/UMTS network is very power-hungry because voice calls use the more battery-demanding 3G band. Apple's own tests give the new iPhone a 5 hour talk time over 3G, so that's 38 minutes more. By contrast, the Samsung Instinct—which runs on EVDO—switches to CDMA for voice, which they say it uses less power. In theory—as the results show.

They also claim that the iPhone 3G's battery performance is lower than the iPhone over 2G, which is true. But that's like comparing apples to oranges (no pun intended). They didn't test the latest iPhone's battery life over 2G networks, which Apple rates at 10 hours (the same as the iPhone classic). Also, these tests don't compare the iPhone to some options available elsewhere in the world—like Nokia's—but it gives a good idea of where the iPhone 3G stands against the competition. [PC World]

They took a Gateway T-6828 with Vista Home Premium SP1 and tried it with its native Western Digital Scorpio WD2500BEVS and two SSDs: a Samsung SATA II 64GB, and a SanDisk SATA 5000 32GB.

And guess what? Both SSD's resulted in an extra 10 minutes of battery life, versus the native hard drive. That's not a huge difference, sure, but it's a completely different story to the Tom's Hardware study which showed worse battery performance.

Laptopmag admits that the absolute hardware choices both studies make may have a large impact, but they conclude "in real-world use, SSDs offer a small improvement in battery life." And, of course, there's the potentially faster loading times you get from SSD's, meaning your laptop's uptime may be more productive. [Laptopmag]

Actually, the external battery pack pictured above probably wouldn't do — I don't need this to a full rating to also charge the laptop — it just needs to be enough to keep it running for a minute. I know there are laptops that have slots for second cells, and extended battery packs, but I don't need anything so drastic or heavy or large. Just keep me up as I switch cells. First manufacturer to make this gets a cookie. PS Hibernate would work, but I'd like to keep network connections and uploads and downloads still going at the same time.

Why would we need this? Because we go through multiple batteries in a day of liveblogging, and this is the perfect thing to charge up more than one battery at night without having to wake up multiple times in the middle of the night to swap them out from your laptop. At $69, it's fantastic, and even better than the NewerTech chargers since it charges pretty much every recent Apple laptop. [Fastmac]

FULLY CHARGE YOUR WII WORKOUT WITH NYKO'S ENERGY PAK - COMING SOON

Rechargeable Battery Solution for Wii Balance Board Eliminates the Need for Wasteful Batteries

LOS ANGELES, California - May 8, 2008 - Nyko Technologies®, the premier game console peripherals manufacturer, today announced that it will soon release the Energy Pak for the Wii Balance Board™, a peripheral packaged with the forthcoming title Wii Fit™. The rechargeable battery solution is expected to hit stores on May 19th.

The Energy Pak installs conveniently on the underside of the Balance Board and features a unique AC Port Relocator that allows users to easily play with the board and charge the battery simultaneously, without ever having to remove the Pak or turn the Balance Board over. An easy-to-read LED charge light indicates the charge status of the battery, letting the user know when it is time to recharge, and when the charging cycle is complete. The Energy Pak can be quickly charged with the included, detachable AC adaptor, and provides up to 20 hours of playtime per charge.

"It is difficult enough trying to keep up with a regular fitness program without the hassle of swapping out alkaline or other rechargeable batteries," said Chris Arbogast, Director of Marketing at Nyko Technologies. "Like all of our charging solutions, the Energy Pak is as easy to use as it is functional. Users will be able to recharge the Wii Balance Board while in use or in between gaming sessions, all without ever needing to flip the board over to switch out battery packs."

Nyko's Energy Pak for the Wii Balance Board is expected in stores on May 19th for the suggested retail price of $19.99. Please visit www.nyko.com for more information.

The battery prototype was made by the R&D team at Sony Material Laboratory, which told spectators at the Small Fuel Cells 2008 expo that it was in talks with Sony's operation division to push the tech out soon. Looks like the day when our gadgets can stay unplugged and awake longer than we can might finally have arrived. [Tech On]

One, it'll be like 3-5 years before you can curl up next to your notebook in bed and pass out without worrying it'll take your gnads off with an exciting display of shrapnel and fire in the middle of the night. (That's not what keeps me up at night, I swear.) The other is that it looks like they don't pack in quite as much juice as the combustible kind (hence the 3-5 year development time). I don't know, I think almost rather risk silicon and limb to get a 30 hour charge for my notebook. [Fraunhofer Institute via Gadget Lab]

Previously (and depreciated):
I just spoke with Apple and found out why the new test numbers are lower when in fact, the actual absolute battery life in these models are higher. It has to do with their testing methodology. Instead of reporting the battery life as the longest of three tests (one test being DVD playback, one test being standard Wi-Fi usage and web browsing, and one test being absolute power saving mode doing just Text Editing), Apple's just reporting the middle test, which approximates average usage much better than the other two. Previously, they reported numbers for the unlikely scenario that you'd just be editing a text document while not connected to the internet. If you ran the same tests in the three models, the newest laptops would actually rate higher than before, says Apple. – Jason Chen

Before that (and depreciated):
The battery life of the new MacBooks and the MacBook Pro 17" has dropped dramatically in the new revision. From being the top battery performer with 5.75 hours, the 2.6GHz MacBook Pro 17" has fallen to 4.5 hours. There are some explanations, but none of them can explain the change because the number don't add up:

First is Apple's new "Wireless Productivity" battery life. According to Apple, this measures the battery life under typical Wi-Fi use, browsing web pages, working with mail and other internet-related applications. It seems like if Apple is now being a lot more conservative and strict in their battery performance tests. But while this may explain the drop, it doesn't seem that simple.

The MacBook Pro 15 battery life, for example, remains unchanged across all CPU speeds even with the new battery test method. Apple sources point out that the use of LED screen backlighting saves about 30 minutes of battery life. But is that enough to compensate against the drop in battery life of the MacBook Pro 17?
[MacBook and MacBook Pro]

Before you go and ridicule these people with emails they'll probably never read (because they're insane mountain people), the charger doesn't charge your standard AA batteries. It charges a 48V battery bank. You know, to power their house. It's the same battery bank that they use solar arrays and wind turbines to charge when not using that steam engine. Because they're crazy hippies that none of us can relate to. [Other Power via Boing Boing]

Inside that plastic jaw are a pair of adjustable arms with contact teeth on the end, so it can adapt to different battery configurations and sizes. While it certainly seems convenient, and might save you carrying around loads of chargers when you travel, how does it cope with varying battery voltages and currents, eh? Answer me that, Thanko. The universal charger is available in Japan for around $18. [Newlaunches]

We won't list the lot here, but the best of the bunch include the:

• Antikythera Computer 
c. 1st Century B.C. Discovered in 1900, amongst relics of an ancient shipwreck, the mechanism contained in the device was uncovered in 2006. Though it is unclear how it worked exactly, the navigational tool was thought to be used onboard ships as an early pre-compass type tool.

• The Baghdad Battery 
c. 250 AD. Where would we be without portable power? Not in ancient Baghdad for sure. The galvanic cells were discovered in the 1930s, but their use remains a mystery. The terracotta urns had small copper and iron fixtures, and they were filled with an acidic agent that propagated a chemical reaction. The reaction caused a small amount of electricity to flow. It was theorized that they may have been used to electroplate dull metals.

• The Turk 1770. The Turk may well have been the first gadget prank in history, which means it should be contender for first joke post in ancientmodo's archive. Essentially, the device concealed a chess player within it. When an unsuspecting player tried it out, the pieces would appear to move autonomously, but were in fact being moved by a series of cogs controlled by the hidden chess master. Those ancient pranksters sure were crazy.

To get the full low-down on other great age-old gadgets, including the first true compass, planetarium, watch and GPS (kinda), as well as a few others, hit up Wired's excellent feature. It is awesome. [Wired]

As soon as we got our MacBook Air, we couldn't help but want to tear it down to its innards. We wanted to see what made up this beautiful machine, so we grabbed our #00 phillips screwdriver and had at it. Want to know what we found? The sexiest and simplest notebook has the sexiest and simplest construction (you'll be surprised at how easy the battery comes out). Not only was this thin thing amazingly easy to disassemble, it was even gorgeous on the inside. Here are the details and, more importantly, pictures.

Aside from the innards being well designed, the disassembly of the MacBook Air was surprisingly easy. Hands-down the easiest Apple notebook we have ever taken apart. There's basically only one step to get inside the machine, just unscrew the bottom casing.

The bottom casing has 10 screws, all #00 Phillips, but there are 3 different screw lengths, so remembering where each screw belongs is crucial. Once all the screws were out, we expected to hassle with Apple's typical tabbed locking system, like the iPod and iBook. But to our surprise there were no tricky tabs to unhook, just lift up the back of the casing and it's off. There were very small metal tabs at the front of the casing, but they were easily and unknowingly undone by just raising the back first and pulling up.

Once the casing was off, we set our sights on the battery. Since the battery takes up almost 3/4 of the inside, it was hard to miss. Nine screws hold the battery in, which are again #00 phillips. Once the battery screws were out, we disconnected the battery cable, which again was surprisingly easy, just using our fingers.

So, getting inside the MacBook Air and taking out the battery was very easy. Easy enough to allow most users to do a battery replacement on their own. We must state that replacing the Macbook Air's battery is far more complicated than say a MacBook or MacBook Pro. But considering that the MacBook Air's battery is actually enclosed in the machine and Apple charges for the replacement service, it is nice to know if needed to, it can be replaced by the user.

Other Thoughts
•The screws that hold the bottom casing, go in at a slight angle. Since the sides of the MacBook Air are curved, the screws have to go in a certain angle to sit level in the holes. This could be a pain when screwing back in, since the little screws have to be at an exact angle.
•On the inside of the bottom casing, there is a convenient two image reassembling instructions.
•Hard drive appears to be easy to replace.
•Ram appears to be soldered on, not so easy to replace.
•The inside construction seems very solid.
•As with all Apple books, taking out screws and opening up the casing voids warranty, so we would imagine the same goes for the Macbook Air.

According to their findings, EVOLTAs have a 10-year shelf-life—which is nearly double the duration of other products on the market. Panasonic's EVOLTA batteries will also keep gadgets running up to 20% longer than offerings from Duracell and Energizer—as well as their own Oxyride brand. Unfortunately, US residents are going to have to wait until sometime later this year to get their hands on the product—but Japanese customers can power up starting on April 28th for about $5.40 for a pack of four. [Canadian Press via Inventor Spot]

The charging times are said to be exactly the same as that from a standard AC outlet, as the Splashpower bay and dongle utilizes the inbuilt charging circuitry to power your low-juiced appliance by conduction. With pricing aimed at $100 for the base station, and $20 for each additional dongle, competition with the folks at WildCharge ($59.99 base / $34.99 adapters), is going to be fierce. Nevertheless, Splashpower's in with a chance. For one, the dongles look a little more workable than WildCharge's adapters, even if the bases are not as cool. Expect the Splashpower to drop in Q3 '08. [Splashpower]