Consumer Reports: You Get What You Pay For in Batteries
People convinced that a battery is a battery, regardless of the brand name or variety listed on the packaging, are probably lacking experience with long-term relationships.
Consumer Reports, a source for objective consumer product information, recently took 17 brands of store-bought AA batteries for a road test, and its staff concluded that, if consumers could afford them, the higher-priced, single-use lithiums have the best staying power.
Consumer Reports is one of the highest circulated magazines in the U.S. It is published by Consumers Union, a nonprofit organized in 1936 to separate fact from hype in advertising.
Testers there measured the endurance of a variety of AAs. The equipment used in the lab was a digital camera. Researchers simply loaded identical cameras with fresh batteries and counted clicks, until the flash was no longer able to fire.
Taking into account the full spectrum of batteries tested, the winning brand-name lithiums  performed more than seven times better  (678 images) than their weakest competitor,  a disposable, alkaline generic (92 images).
Earning a respectable finish were the greener choice, alkaline rechargeables. They landed about in the middle of the field, with an average of 350 shots on a full charge.
Another lesson consumer’s might learn from the magazine study: If you’re picking out an economical generic battery, try a variety over time and then stick with what works best for the application. In the Consumer Reports study, a set of AAs that bear the name of a pharmacy chain were far inferior to a set that came out of a multi-pack from a warehouse club.
The magazine recommended that battery choice should vary depending on intended use. Reserve disposable alkaline batteries for household objects that have low electrical output (television remote) or are seldom used (flashlight). For high-demand equipment that sucks energy, spend the extra money for lithium batteries or rechargeable alkalines.
Remember also that the shelf life of lithium batteries is about twice that of garden-variety alkalines  (15 years versus  7 years).
This study backs field tests performed on vehicle tracking systems by leading manufacturer LandAirSea Systems. Two of the company’s biggest sellers are the GPS Tracking Key and the GPS Tracking Key Pro®. Both are passive GPS tracking systems, meaning they log location data that can be downloaded and reviewed once the unit is retrieved from the vehicle.
The GPS Tracking Key takes two AAA batteries. The GPS Tracking Key Pro requires two AA batteries to operate.
The GPS Tracking Key will operate about 20 hours on a cycle of alkaline batteries and up to 36 hours on lithiums. Lithium also adds length to the GPS Tracking Key Pro® battery cycle. They will yield about 80 hours of tracking versus 60 to 65 with alkaline.
Motion sensors in both the tracking units help to conserve battery life. If the vehicle is idle for more than two or three minutes, the GPS tracking system will power down.
LandAirSea has long proclaimed lithium batteries superior to regular alkalines in tracking systems. The new Consumer Reports experiment seems to back that up. For many GPS system users, consistent performance justifies the higher battery price.
Source: Consumer Reports , Yahoo Finance
Tags: batteries, consumer reports, Fleet Management, GPS Tracking, Vehicle Tracking, yahoo finance
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