Power hungry bluetooth?

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macx

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Recently acquired hp Compac nc8230
XP Pro sp2, obviously with Bluetooth

Bought a new Dell keyboard and Kensington
mouse to go with it.

I'm only getting somewhat less than 30 hrs use
out of a pair of coppertop AA's in either device

Is this normal?

Seems maybe I better invest in some good quality
rechargeables at this rate - I use the machine up to
8 hrs or so daily.

What ARE some good quality rechargeables that
hold power well? I know some don't retain "memory"
and therefore lose charge capacity over repeated charges

I've forgotten which are the good type, i.e. NiMh or whatever?

Also what brand / model hold the longest lasting charge?

Thanks!!!
 
i happen to have logitech wireless mouse and keyboard and use rechargeables for both of them as well as other non-computer items around the house. Don't know how all the brands and types compare but can tell you i have Radio Shack Nickel-Metal Hyrdide batteries and recharger and have been pleased in all their uses.

I'd add no matter what you decide to get, advise you buy only by a recharger that can handle ALL different type batteries (e.g. AAA, AA, C, D, etc) as it really makes it easier as you decide to add batteries for use around the house. And make sure the recharger allows you to drain all the batteries before recharging (one reason battery life is short is recharge before drained)
 
That certainly makes sense.

I was pretty sure I'd read that one of the battery types, maybe even it was the NiMH ? that didn't take a memory set and wouldn't lose capacity even if not
fully discharged.

I'd tried rechargeables before and got such short charge times out of them
that they kind of fell by the wayside.

On other / previous keyboards and mice, just plain wireless as opposed to bluetooth, it sure seems I used to get quite a number of weeks of fairly
constant use versus just 3 or 4 days like I'm getting with this bluetooth stuff.

Might have to go back to "old fashioned" plain old wireless if that's the case.

Besides, my bluetooth stuff esp the mouse disconnects frequently esp if it
sits inactive for more than a few minutes and I often am unable to reconnect in any way other than restarting the computer. NOT convenient! The "old"
regular wireless stuff never seemed to give problems like that.
 
macx said:
I was pretty sure I'd read that one of the battery types, maybe even it was the NiMH ? that didn't take a memory set and wouldn't lose capacity even if not fully discharged.

What's a memory set? I always do the drain first as whenever i see recharageables i always read is best that the batteries are drained before charging.

Just pulled out the Radio Shack charger and see it handles both Ni-MH and Ni-Cd batteries. It also handles/charges 9v rectangular type batteries. The one i have is their Cat. # 23-428

I also have a BT add-on to computer for connecting to my phone. But decided to go with RF wireless for keyboard/mouse as i was having some BT connectivity problems then (far less so now). The BT driver makes a big difference in establishing/keeping good connections (not that there aren;t other issues involved). i'm now using Widcomm (i.e. Broadcom) v5.1.0.1100

fyi i still keep a PS/2 wired mouse connected and sitting behind my monitor 'cause when something hangs my cpu at 100% it can hang the RF mouse response times as well (which is connected via RF usb adapter in my case)
 
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