Quote:
Originally Posted by davidfor
You might want to check your definition of "trickle charging". Trickle charging is exactly what the words imply. A trickle of electricity is sent constantly. It doesn't turn off, it is applied all the time. For some battery chemistries this is good. For Li-Ion it is a very bad idea.
Li-Ion is charged to a point and the charger turned off. When the voltage drops to a certain point, either by use or self-discharge, the charging turns on again to top up the charge level. In the past, my laptops would drop to a 95% charge before recharging. Current laptops seem to stick closer to 100%. Or maybe the self-discharge is so low I never notice it between times I use the laptop on battery.
But, overall, there should be no issues with leaving any device with a Li-Ion battery in it on charge. Assuming the charging and protection circuits are properly designed. Keeping the battery full isn't the best, but, it is a tradeoff between runtime and overall life. An issue could be temperature. It is likely that a plugged in device is running hotter than the same device on battery (less likely to go to sleep or use any power saving modes). Li-Ion batteries age faster with higher temperatures. But, I would not really expect this to be an issue for ereader.
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Yeah, that's roughly what I wanted to say. Maybe I didn't explain it too well. Yours is better!
And I agree, for an eReader it shouldn't be too much of an issue, but I can tell from personal experience, after using my Glo HD for about 4 years, putting it in charge normally, and then unplugging it, the battery stayed at a fine level. When I got my Libra, I started to use the Glo HD for more of a development platform, leaving it plugged in pretty much all the time, and now battery life is like 1h30. I couldn't unplug the battery because it would cause the screen not to display anything (I don't know why, maybe the power provided by USB was not enough).