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What with the weird freebooting article? This ‘article’ is just a description of Alec’s video with the clickbait cranked up to ten. Gotta love a major corporation using small creators’ work for free ad revenue…
This is how hackaday posts have been… for like a decade. I guess it’s somewhere between articles and link aggregator.
Tbf I hate watching videos, so I found it useful.
Doesn’t mean this is good content I think belongs here. The original video that links to a transcript and a source article do belong here. You want a description cause you don’t want to watch it? go feed the link into chat got. Or ask in the comments. I’m gonna call out corpo freebooting bullshit when I see it and it doesn’t belong on lemmy.
Sorry, I’m pissy rn.
Sure, that’s a fair opinion. I just don’t share it. I wouldn’t have known about this video in the first place. Also I don’t care to use AI summaries.
Coincidentally I was also a fan of the described functionality on batteries and I have used it gladly and without hurting myself. So that clearly makes me different from the vast majority of people here in the comments.
I may have been just as happy with the original article the video is based on, who knows. But since that wasn’t shared here I preferred this one over the video.
Damn! I never even thought about sending it YouTube links. I might try doing that with some of those “retrospective” videos that are hours long.
And Alec’s video is mostly a freeboot off someone’s article.
So this is a full on article and YouTube circle jerk.
You know there’s a difference between using sources and just regurgitating a summary of something with AI right?
Yes. I didn’t misspeak.
ok bud
Alec also clearly says which article he used as a source and credits the author
You clearly haven’t looked at either article. Parasocial relationships are weird.
Video on technology connections: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsA3X40nz9w
Nice try, Alec Watson…
I mean I’d rather Alec get the direct views than this weird hackaday article that’s just a description of his video with a link. Not trying to knock hackaday but this is real close to freebooting.
Ok now I am trying to knock hackaday after learning the ownership chain goes up to Siemens. Frigg off with this corpo garbage.
Yeeaah I drew the line at the printscreens, it was a really interesting video with a lot of effort and research put in, unlike this article.
it was a really interesting video with a lot of effort and research put in
Like all of Alec’s videos :)
Naw, we’re all just his stans.
“Wait, is that a Duracell battery check?”
Oh man that transition. Chef’s kiss. Amazing
But the video purports that normal people don’t really test batteries.
Yeah, it was a novelty that increased the price to manufacture and didn’t actually add anything of value to users.
Either you put batteries in something and they worked or they didn’t, and if they stopped working the next step is try different batteries whether or not the little gauge showed it had charge left.
Now if it was added to rechargeable batteries, it would be pretty useful because tou could do something with the knowledge of a battery being at 50%. But a lot of systems with rechargeable batteries have them built in and some other way to show remaining charge like a percentage on a screen.
Now if it was added to rechargeable batteries, it would be pretty useful
I think the reason we haven’t seen that is that NiMH rechargeables have fairly stable voltage during discharge while alkalines don’t.
I think all of your points were covered in the video, sometimes almost verbatim.
Neat!
I didn’t bother watching the video, so I guess the reasons were pretty obvious.
How dare you ignore Alec’s video? 😤
Select one or more of the following.
- Too lazy.
- I assumed it was a rickroll.
- Figured the video was just another version of the article.
- At work and didn’t headphones handy.
I selected all and it’s still not enough of a reason!
Bow to Alec! Let Alec consume you!
I concur about rechargeables - it doesn’t seem common for devices that take AA or AAA to have a battery gauge and it would be nice to be able to check the level on my rechargeables stock so I can know if I should top them off without needing to put each of them into the charger.
And pairing them correctly for paralel charging too!
It was pretty useful as a kid for feeding my Gameboy and Game Gear with batteries I rescued from the junk drawers of friends and family. If they were low, I knew I had to save more often to avoid losing progress if they went dead while I was playing.
I was a kid then, but I remember that I had to push so hard my fingers hurt… I used a multimeter.
Well the pros and cons of the multimeter are addresses in the video! He uses a meter on a dead battery and it still shows a deceptively reasonable voltage when not under load. The built-in tester draws more current.
My technique is to use the 10a mode on the multimeter and check the battery. A full AA will do nearly 10 amps and dead ones much less. Careful with larger cells or rechargeables since you might blow the fuse in your meter.
That sounds a little like testing matches “Yes, that one works. I mean: worked.”
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Let me introduce You to these spent uranium fuel rods.
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you just had to put one of the other fingers on the battery groumd and not push that hard iirc
It turned out that batteries randomly lying around are always empty. Functioning batteries are still in the device it’s operating or in the box it was sold in.
He draws similar conclusions in his video.
It broke too many thumbs.
This guy is great. He can make anything sound interesting.
He makes everything sound interesting.
Ftfy
He used old batteries, but I actually had new Duracell batteries with this feature very recently, in 2022 or so (Germany).
You could’ve saved him so much movie magic!
Did the power check work or was it snakeoil I remember trying to see it while hurting my hand.
It did, see Technology Connections’ latest video on it, he explains fully how it worked. Quite clever tbh.
Although, he admits in the video to “faking” his footage of it working, by using a off-camera heat source. (His batteries were quite dead.)
But, as someone that lived through this time, they did work, as long as you pressed hard enough in the right places. It was hard to tell if the battery was dead or if you weren’t pressing hard enough
If you watch the whole video he does it more “for real” later on, plugging the casing into a power source to simulate a battery discharging… Plus I’ve had some of these PowerCheck batteries, and they were not old, it was like… 2017? So maybe they rebooted it for a short time at some point?? Anywho, if you pressed really hard it did work I think, but also I think I was doing it wrong for a long time as well lol
The video is in the article.
Oh ok my bad
oh maybe might watch
It was gimmicky as hell. Did it work? Who cares. It was irrelevant for 90% of consumers.
I really miss it honestly. Kids, so, so many batteries in my house.
Dad, my blah blah blah isn’t working right. Then I have to go dig out this monster:
Your kids will inherit that charger, and their kids afterward.
Why does it look so weird? I’m not even sure what shape I’m looking at.
Just an inch thick plastic box with a perspective drawing sticker on top of it, But the box is shaped to fit the perspective drawing.
Haha yeah, it looks like a fake picture or some cartoon.
I just use an old multimeter that I saved from eWaste 😂😇
I have no lack of proper test equipment, this is actually kind of nice because the kids can use it easily without trying to wrangle a battery and two leads.
What in the fuckiest of fucks is this? 😱
Ancient voltmeter for children
i think it did
It never went away. I have a duracell battery with power check sitting next to me on my desk
What sizes are still sold with the on-battery tester? AFAIK it’s now only available on the multipack box.
I think it was a 4-pack
also germany, actually
So the US said later, indicator, while Germany said $punchlineRemainderPls
“Es ist aber smarter mit so einem Indikator!”
😆
Does anyone remember the battery testers that were built into the packaging? I think they were based on the same concept.
They are mentioned in the video.
I do
I have a really distinct memory of finding a bunch of these in a friend’s house when I was a kid and every one was empty. After watching the TC video I think it’s more likely I just wasn’t pressing hard enough and had no way to know that. Anyway, I can see why they stopped making them.
Yea, you have to press till it hurts, lol
I ended up buying a couple testers from Walmart for like $5 and they’ve been super useful! Definitely worth having in every household
I remember those.
Would be nice to have them on my 18650s
The voltage-to-capacity radio for lithium is much less linear compared to alkaline so it wouldn’t really work well :(
This I can get behind.
I don’t need it on all my 18650s, but a few would be nice. Also 21700s.
Someone bring this back.
It failed often enough that it wasn’t all that useful. A cheap battery tester is better. And for 9volts you can also use the tongue test, lol (don’t really though). My grandfather used to do that all the time.
The tongue test works great. Be warned, though, that a full battery will make your tongue go numb. It’ll feel like you have a big hole in the middle. Try it.
Ouch, I never had that problem, but I only barely touch it, lol. It’s a little shock and slightly numb briefly. But fortunately I never had full numbness that lasted more than a second or two. But I haven’t done it in a long time since I have a tester now. 😁
What’s wrong with the tongue test for 9 volts? I know it tickles some but is it actually harmful? I’ve been doing that for over 30 years…
It’s not much power, so it’s not likely to cause major or permanent damage, but it may affect others differently and could cause burns if left on too long like if someone is less sensitive and doesn’t think it’s live.
And if the person is grounded and if they touch the hot side of the battery first there’s a chance the charge could travel through the body rather than just the tongue. It’s not enough to affect a heart, but might disrupt a pacemaker or other embedded device.
And of the battery is leaking, it could cause permanent damage from chemical burns from the alkaline and poisoning from heavy metals which while unlikely to be deadly with just one battery, heavy metal poisoning is cumulative across a lifetime.
So under ideal circumstances it is safe, but there are always risks with electricity and toxic chemicals, though relatively small.
Everytime i test a battery like this, my wife just shakes her head and reminds me that I’m definitely from Kentucky lol
If they are not rechargeable, they don’t make sense, you just use them and throw them in the used up recycle pile. And if they are rechargeable, you already have a charger that does it.
