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Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

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Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#111
post #101

My laptop has swapable battery. I can also swap HDD bay from my desktop when I am traveling. It is really funny to see Mac fans excited about simple external battery. This stuff is around for decades!

What laptop do you have? Macbook Pro's are so thin now even a RJ45 hole is too tall. I can forgive them for not having a replaceable battery for size/weight and noise reduction having everything so tightly integrated.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#112

They claim that their 50 Whr battery can power a MacBook Pro for 6 hours, a MacBook Air for 12 hrs. By my math, that would mean that the MacBook Pro would only be consuming an average of around 8.3 watts an hour, the air only around 4.2 watts an hour. That seems absurd to me, considering the power supplies that ship with the MacBook Pro and the MacBook Air are 85-watt and 45-watt respectively. They are assuming that…

"watts an hour"

FYI, the unit you're looking for is "watts", not "watts per hour".

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#113
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the linked article? > Batteries are typically charged and discharged through a constant stream of power, which causes problems like SEI layer formation that causes the battery to degrade over time. The BatteryOS system, by contrast, takes an active role in managing what’s happening inside a Li-ion battery, which not only lengthens the life of the battery, but also gives it the ability to store 10 percent…

Active power management is nothing new to lithium ion batteries.

You're right, see for example http://www.qnovocorp.com/

Guess execution is king ;)

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#114

This has almost nothing at all to do with Apple. I'm a little sad that folks can't get past the proof-of-concept product. The game-changer is BatteryOS, not BatteryBox. Who cares about BatteryBox itself? Think bigger, people, come on.

There's not much to discuss about BatteryOS until it's been verified by third parties. Every 4 months or so we get a news article about some amazing breakthrough in battery technology, and they never ever seem to pan out.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#115
post #61

Mentioned in passing in child comments below, but worth highlighting - the HyperJuice Battery range of products (eg http://amzn.to/1mqK9ap ) already does this, at a similar price point, and is available for purchase today. In fact they're already onto the second generation of the product, with minor bugs and issues with the first gen already ironed out. I get this GBattery has a new "BatteryOS" management feature but…

We bought a HyperJuice 2 for use on trips. It's terrible. It'll charge a 15" rMBP about 10-15% before it's completely dead.

It's not designed to charge MacBook Pros, just Airs due to the wattage required. I don't believe that's any difference for the GBattery either.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#116
Their battery technology sounds great but, honestly, I am a consumer so my point of view is "do I want to buy this for $139?"

Yes, I do want it, mostly so that I can set it next to my Macbook Air (mid-2012) for a full day's worth of power, as is the use case shown so prominently on the web site.

Take away the MagSafe 2 and I don't want it.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#117
post #64

Nice though would not a A4 (laptop sized) slab instead of a box be better as could then sit under the laptop and also easily fit inside the laptop case. Just a thought.

It's a lot more expensive to make custom-shaped cells than to pop a couple of standard cylindrical cells into a square box.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#118
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you read the article, you'd see they're working on OEM deals to get the tech into batteries across the board. The Box is just a nice consumer demo so people can get their hands on it now. Actually a pretty smart PR move. Also, the patent: https://www.google.com/patents/WO2013142964A1

You said >if you read the article, you'd see they're working on OEM deals I did read the article and didn't recall that, so I re-read. This is what I saw: >It’ll take some time for Gbatteries to get its technology embedded with third-party OEMs

Good point - I came away with the inference that they are seeking to embed the tech. But as you've highlighted, they don't explicitly say that.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#119
post #101

My laptop has swapable battery. I can also swap HDD bay from my desktop when I am traveling. It is really funny to see Mac fans excited about simple external battery. This stuff is around for decades!

What laptop do you have? Macbook Pro's are so thin now even a RJ45 hole is too tall. I can forgive them for not having a replaceable battery for size/weight and noise reduction having everything so tightly integrated.

The ThinkPad x240 is thinner and lighter than a MacBook Pro and still manages to find space for an external battery, an RJ45 jack, and a VGA connector.

Re: Gbatteries (YC W14) Launches BatteryBox, A 50Whr Backup Battery For MacBooks

#120
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It turns out that even the most amazing technologies don't just automatically get you huge checks overnight. You have to build a business, starting with a first product, and grow from there.

Actually no, if this worked it would be a 30-minute meeting. Our patented technology extends the charge-cycle life of standard lithium-ion batteries by at least 200%, and we can prove it. Great, we will license that. Here's a check for five billion dollars.

Panasonic would NOT pay additional money in licensing to make less money by having their batteries last longer.

Large companies like this make sure the batteries they use aren't interchangable or standardized. They certainly don't want to make batteries that you wouldn't want to replace.

If you look at profit analysis of almost any product (like a panasonic camera), the profit margins are all in the accessories, like batteries.

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