Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
So, no; I don't think planned obsolescence is prevalent in the dedicated reader business. Though I do think we should start to see a wave of dead battery-driven upgrades at some point. But with a typical rechargeable battery being good for 300 recharge cycles and 30 honest hours of use it takes a long time to rack up the 7000 hours of use where batteries become an issue.
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There's two factors which affect the capacity of lithium battery: number of charge cycles is one, but simple ageing is a more significant one. When a lithium battery is first charged, the clock starts ticking; a 3-year-old battery will typically have lost a third of its original capacity; after 5 years it'll probably be completely dead. Many people with older readers like the Sony PRS-505 or the original Kindle have certainly run into battery issues already.