Well I have oodles of reasons for wanting AAA usage for the same reason I waited YEARS to get my close to perfect GPS (large color screen SD card waterproof and MOST importantly AA batteries)
First it would not be hard for them to use 2 AAA Nimhs and NO it would not be much bigger than it is now (go put a AAA next to your reader spine)
Here is what is going to happen. in 4-5 years its going to get harder and harder to keep a charge in that reader battery.
What do you do? you can not likely replace it and because of the readers diminutive dimensions its going to be VERY hard to get too and VERY specialized possibly even an oddball shape.
Then good luck finding a compatible replacement. UNLIKE the ipod which sells ZILLIONS so there is a market for battery replacement and more importantly PRODUCTION (more on that in a minute) I just bought a battery for my ipod for $12 shipped. Well unlike the IPOD the sony reader is NOT zillion selling popular. there will be no aftermarket batteries.
EVEN IF you can get OEM original stock (not likely since again its INTEGRATED not user replaceable.
Remember I said more on that later? well Lithium Batteries are "self nuking" ie they have a limited lifespan FROM INCEPTION till they die even if they are left in the shrink wrap and NEVER used.
The smaller the battery the more finicky and SHORTER this lifespan is.
NOW something like this reader with an "open" format support has no "real" lifespan. it will work as good today and still work as good 5 years from now and 20 years from now. Paper is Paper. no bulbs to burn out as long as I care for it the ONLY thing keeping it from lasting 20+ years is that god damned battery.
EVEN REPALCEABLE lithiums are useless to me as Well consider my DVD player. Once this model is "poof" gone they are going to STOP making batteries for it (they are hard enough to get when they ARE making them) eventually all the batteries made will be BAD and no NEW ONES will be made. same problem.
AA and AAA however are pretty much forever. They are NOT going away within our lifespans.
For Super High drain OFTEN REPLACED devices like PDA's and Cell Phones OK fine Lithium makes perfect sense.
Even laptops where other chemistries just will not provide enough juice its livable and again laptops are replaced relatively often.
Something like say a GPS though. It will work JUST FINE 20 even 30 years from now IF I CAN PROVIDE POWER for it. I am still using my original serial puck GPS that I bought well over 12 years ago. It works "just fine" (you think there going to replace billions of dollars in satellites just like that?? hell no :-)
Devices like GPS and Readers like this have NO effective end of life. the Limiting factor is BATTERIES.
I would rather have my reader be 2mm thicker (if that) than have a frelling paper weight in a few years.
My Zodiac (PDA) is only 4 years old and I am already having trouble finding replacement batteries for it. (this pda was an exception ie oddly enough NO ONE has made even a remotely EQUAL PDA since the zodiac. EVERY offer currently available is a decidedly nasty downgrade to the zodiac so I will try to keep mine alive)
My original digital camera. QV-10A (goo look up how old that is) and even my Original Apple Quicktake. Guess what? as useless as they are resolution wise the buggers STILL work cause they use good old AA batteries.
They make 1200mah AAA nimhs now. but with something like the reader I would not bother. AAA alkalines have about 5-6 TIMES the mah capacity of the Lithium in our readers. you MIGHT have the change the batteries ONCE a year especially if someone can hack it to remove the power drain during long term storage. figure 4 AAA's PER YEAR worse case if your like me and ONLY us it for books.
Yeah I think I can live with that. It would not have been "that" hard for sony to design it so it "recharges" nimh batteries so you retain the rechargeability you have now.
I could even see a small solar panel on the back of the "leather case" flush inside the case. so it trickle charges the batteries even with indoor lighting when not in use. These things use so little power you might NEVER have to plug it in at all.
Now some may say wait a minute what do you mean Alkalines have more power than Lithium. Oh yeah. WAY more power. Lithium PALES in comparison to Alkaline in MAH. but it has a problem. it can not handle LOADS. as soon as the amp load goes up the VOLTS go down.
All gadgets have a MINIMUM voltage at which they will run. Lets say the readers is 3.2v (out my butt just a number for discussion sake) if I had a battery brand new fully charged the SIZE OF THIS PLANET it would mean nothing to this reader if it was a 3.1 volt battery :-) see what I mean.
Alkalines loose voltage under load. Lithiums loose VERY LITTLE voltage IE they can maintain there voltage under load (so can nimhs)
SO while Alkalines have amazing capacity they are useless in high load applications They drop below the minimum usable voltage sometimes even with 80+ % of there capacity still in the cells!!. Well the ereader is an extremely LOW load application. it sips power. IDEAL for alkalines.
Thats why you NEVER throw away alkalines from a digital camera. They are usually quite good still they can just no longer maintain the minimum voltage the camera demands under the amp load it uses.
stick them in your remote controls they will go for months or years still :-)
My minidisc was similar. With a Nimh it would go about 18-20 hours of playback (single AA) with an alkaline I was pushing 50+ hours of playback. the Minidisc drew SO little power that it could take advantage of all that extra capacity the alkaline had.
Plus with Today's nimhs. you can buy 15 minute rechargeables. IE I can go from dead to full in under 15 minutes :-) hows that for recharge time :-)
I got a big battery grip for my coolpix 5000 digital cameara. holds 6 AA cells in place of the original 1amp lithium battery. Well nimhs are 2500mah and there is 6 (it only needs 2.3 voltage wise) so thats nearly 7amps of power !!
I can run the ENTIRE DAY without changing batteries where before I had to bring 3 or 4 original lithium packs (now granted in this case it made the camera much bigger but it was also a good thing. Easier to hold and use :-)
It also means my camera's lifespan is NOT limited by the willingness of the manufacturers to produce the special batteries it takes.
TRUST ME on some devices Lithium Ion batteries are definately a DOWNFALL a design FLAW not a design bonus.
Sadly they did not realize this when they went from the libre (AAA power) to the reader (lithium) I was really hoping they were going to keep the AAA power source.
I just KNOW 2 years from now I am going to be RIPPING this reader apart HOPING I do not ruin it and HOPING I can replace the danged battery with something close to what was in there. :-(
I tend to keep my gadgets till they are literally no longer usable.
Chris Taylor
http://www.nerys.com/