Touch Replacement battery for a Touch?

[TonyToews]

I've ignored my Touch, and my WiFi, forgotten to recharge them on a regular basis and now the battery life on the Touch is measured in about 20 page turns. <sigh>

Anyone know of a replacement battery? I'm a little surprised. I looked on eBay and couldn't find any. With my Palms that were years older there were lots available. Maybe the Touch is still too new.

[ottdmk]

Battery replacement is not a supported option on any Kobo device. That being said, if you hunt around here on the forum you may be able to discover what type of battery the Touch uses (I seem to remember it coming up once.)

[TonyToews]

Never mind. I put it back on charge which only took a few minutes until it read full again. Then I was able to read 150 pages or so and the battery indicator only dropped slightly and as expected. Thus I suspect it just needed some recalibration.

[JSWolf]

To calibrate the battery, charge it until the Kobo says it is done. Then disconnect the charge cable. Plug it back in and wait until it is charged again. Keep doing this until it takes less then one minute to charge to full and it should be OK from there.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

To calibrate the battery, charge it until the Kobo says it is done. Then disconnect the charge cable. Plug it back in and wait until it is charged again. Keep doing this until it takes less then one minute to charge to full and it should be OK from there.

Where did you get those instructions?

Li-Ion battery calibration needs to have the battery go from one extreme to the other. The usual instructions are to charge it completely and then run it out completely and then recharge. Then repeat two or three times. You might need to do this again after some usage if the charge levels seem to be off.

The other thing to remember with Li-Ion batteries is that they age. This results in loss of overall capacity. A year old battery will probably be 20% down on a new battery. Using the battery does speed this up, but not by that much. I don't have any stats, but I suspect that the battery in a low power device like an ereader is going to age because of time rather than actual usage.

Originally Posted by davidfor

Where did you get those instructions?

Regardless of where the instructions came from, I would like to learn of the results. Since buying an Aura, my Touch has gone unused. It would be helpful to know the charging situation to decide whether to keep it as a backup or sell it off.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Regardless of where the instructions came from, I would like to learn of the results. Since buying an Aura, my Touch has gone unused. It would be helpful to know the charging situation to decide whether to keep it as a backup or sell it off.

The recommendation for storing Li-Ion batteries is to discharge to about 40% and store in a cool, dry place. Every few months, take it out and run it through a charge/recharge cycle.

The danger is if the charge level drops to low due to self-discharge. If the charge level drops below zero, then the battery can be damaged and the protection circuit should kick in and prevent it from being recharged.

Personally, I've never stored my batteries. They stay in the device, and get used. But, for something like a "spare" Touch, I would charge it, power it off and put it away and try to remember to check the battery level in a month. But assuming there wasn't a problem, it should still hold a good charge in six months.

[TechniSol]

It may just exploit a minimum initial delay in the charging cutoff mechanism... It might even be a neat way to realign the top end of the battery percentage display routine with a hardware charging cutoff mechanism if the software logs what the highest voltage reached is and uses it to set the upper limit for the range over which the battery percentage is interpolated.

Say that five times fast with a bag of marbles in your mouth! I nearly broke a finger just typing it.

[robko]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Regardless of where the instructions came from, I would like to learn of the results. Since buying an Aura, my Touch has gone unused. It would be helpful to know the charging situation to decide whether to keep it as a backup or sell it off.

My old Kobo Wifi (and Original for that matter) sit on a shelf unused for the most part. When powered down they seem to be holding battery charge quite well over the long term (still charged when I do occasionally power them back up for some reason).