Another battery tool: scam or proper product?

[thexeno]

Hi,

I was some time ago to the MakerFaire Vienna, and I step into a product claiming to increase the lifespan of a phone battery.
https://chargie.org/

Can it be analyzed, maybe on a eevBlog video?
Or, what do you think?

Cheers,

[Rerouter]

This is not batteriser, but more like over-provisioning an SSD, always preventing the phone from completing a charge cycle and trying to keep the amount of charge on the battery consistant,

However its rarely the full charge cycles that are hurting modern batteries, instead it is the fast charging, and the number of cycles

[Daixiwen]

The things that degrade a LiIon battery life are high charging currents, as you said, as well as usage in high temperatures, charge at very low temperatures, and the amount of time spent at low state of charge (~< 15%) and high state of charge (~> 80%).
You can have a lot more cycles if you keep your battery constantly between 20 and 80% and avoid the fully charged or fully discharged states.

So this device makes sense to preserve your battery life. There are more and more systems (phones, laptops, electric vehicles) that use different strategies to keep the battery in that zone.
If your Android phone is rooted you can also use this free app that does the same thing: Battery Charge Limit [ROOT]

[tooki]

I think it's less a scam and more just possibly uninformed.

Yes, it seems to be true that charging to less than 100% can extend battery lifespan. But if it were THAT big a problem, gadget manufacturers would simply do it that way by default, and have an "extended battery charge" checkbox in the settings to let you override it. But they don't, which makes me think it's not as big an improvement as we'd hope.

As for misinformed... the first reference cited is battery university, which seems to be roundly debunked as one guy's own pulled-out-of-thin-air "data".

[NiHaoMike]

Yes, it seems to be true that charging to less than 100% can extend battery lifespan. But if it were THAT big a problem, gadget manufacturers would simply do it that way by default, and have an "extended battery charge" checkbox in the settings to let you override it. But they don't, which makes me think it's not as big an improvement as we'd hope.

Some Lenovos actually have that. But in general, manufacturers just want the battery to last what the average customer would call a reasonable lifetime. Why add a feature that reduces future sales?

[Daixiwen]

I think it's less a scam and more just possibly uninformed.

Yes, it seems to be true that charging to less than 100% can extend battery lifespan. But if it were THAT big a problem, gadget manufacturers would simply do it that way by default, and have an "extended battery charge" checkbox in the settings to let you override it. But they don't, which makes me think it's not as big an improvement as we'd hope.

As for misinformed... the first reference cited is battery university, which seems to be roundly debunked as one guy's own pulled-out-of-thin-air "data".

Yes Battery university is usually not a very good source of information, but for that particular matter it does make a difference. I have seen actual measurement data made by my previous employer (a battery manufacturer) during a campaign over several years with cells used in different conditions. I guess that mass market manufacturers (except Lenovo) are not doing anything about it because Average Joe is more interested in how long he will be able to use his phone between two recharges than the battery health after 3 years. AFAIK that strategy is more widespread in electric vehicles.

[jbb]

Unfortunately a lot of consumer products are sold on specs. Even if they’re the wrong specs.

If I told my hypothetical boss “if we change the maximum talk time from 10 hours to 7 hours the battery will last 6 years instead of 2.”
I would expect the reply “but the customer will buy the competitor phone which says it lasts 9 hours.”

[tooki]

Unfortunately a lot of consumer products are sold on specs. Even if they’re the wrong specs.

So true.

Reminds me of the Pentium 4, where Intel pushed clock speed above all else (since that’s all consumers looked at), but by reducing the work per clock cycle. So despite having double the clock or something, they didn’t perform any better than the P3.

If I told my hypothetical boss “if we change the maximum talk time from 10 hours to 7 hours the battery will last 6 years instead of 2.”
I would expect the reply “but the customer will buy the competitor phone which says it lasts 9 hours.”

Yep, definitely.

I’ve thought for a while that many gadgets should have a setting to keep them at a storage charge level (rather than full), e.g. for laptops that are only used plugged in. But perhaps a more generalized slider (with “maximum runtime” on one end and “lowest battery wear” on the other) would make sense.

[ovisoftblue]

This thread is old. Of course this is an actual issue since most people won't be keeping their phone for only a year, since they're capable of so much after two or three years. But everyone should enjoy the best battery capacity they can get. And it's not because they're cheap, or because they can always buy a new phone or replace the battery in a service, but because it degrades the user experience. People don't necessarily need 100% of 4000mAh nowadays, but if they use it heavily during the day, it will eventually lose capacity after a year and the experience will degrade slowly and painfully.

Proof that manufacturers are aware of the issue: Apple has introduced a similar "AI" function that learns the user's sleep habits and charges to the phone to 80% until just before he wakes up. Then tops up to 100%. But it doesn't necessarily work, since people's schedules are diverse. And that's why iPhone users still ask for a Chargie app for their phones, in spite of iOS's native functionality.

Disclosure: I am Ovidiu Sandru, the creator of Chargie. I'm not making a fortune off this device, but rather get a lot of gratitude and a small boost for my other high-tech projects. I'm doing it for the right purposes, it's not a scam, if anyone still fears that. We do ship our product.

And I'm working on the app every day to make it compatible with every phone out there. You can get Chargie at https://chargie.org. After the app is mature enough, I will ship it to Dave for a review.

[thexeno]

I'm doing it for the right purposes, it's not a scam, if anyone still fears that. We do ship our product.

And I'm working on the app every day to make it compatible with every phone out there. You can get Chargie at https://chargie.org. After the app is mature enough, I will ship it to Dave for a review.

Hi! Yeah I see that more in perspective now, I believe is not a scam because it makes sense.
But I can't wait to see the review!