A strange request

[Tombolian]

My fellow skeptics (and the rest of you)!

I guess it's time for this lurker to quit lurking and finally become a part of this thing.

In the last SWIFT, Randi asked for volunteers to test the Batmax Battery Life Extender. I was quick to request this (honor?) and received the stickers and instructions in the mail yesterday. I would like to bounce some ideas off of y'all in regards to the test, but that'll be in another post (gotta get 15 so I can have an avatar).

I just wanted to introduce myself and give a bit of my background. I'm 39, live in California, and was raised Protestant but 'protested' the whole time. I never really bought into the brainwashing that was delivered 2 days (about 5 hours) a week, for the first 18 years of my life.
Fast-forward to last year. I attended Tam4 and met my hero, Randi, and have since been looking for a way to contribute to the skeptic community. I believe this test was my calling.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to some opinions and feedback about my ideas for the test.

More soon...and 'Hi!'

[Terry]

Welcome, Tombolian

[petra10]

Welcome to the forum Tombolian.Looking forward to hearing about your test results.

[LibraryLady]

It is an important rite of passage in this forum to answer two vital questions:

Have you returned your library books?

How do you feel about budgies?

Oh, and

[Tombolian]

Quote:

Have you returned your library books?

Unfortunately, no.

Quote:

How do you feel about budgies?

I'm neutral. I know for a fact that my Boa Constrictor and 9 cats are big fans of them though. Yes, I'm the crazy cat man at the end of the block...

[TTLer]

Preamble: I'm a total skeptic and I won't believe these battery-extending stickers actually work until I see proper scientific evidence.

Originally Posted by Tombolian

I would like to bounce some ideas off of y'all in regards to the test, but that'll be in another post (gotta get 15 so I can have an avatar).

Your ambition to get an avatar is duly noted, Tom, but I'm more interested in the substance of your posts.

Originally Posted by Tombolian

Anyway, I'm looking forward to some opinions and feedback about my ideas for the test.

Junk Science Warning, Tom!: Randi's suggested "cell-phone standby time" is a poor way to test for comparative battery life (sorry Randi but it's true). Wireless technology is subject to sporadic interference and variances in network efficiency which affect battery life. A valid test of the product should use some type of closed-system battery-powered device that runs independently until the battery dies.

In order to be taken seriously, you must complete several trials using duplicate devices. In order for us to take your work seriously Tom, you must provide charts, photographs - these days, video is also expected - detailing the way you carried out your experiments, and how you came to your results.

Anyways, just a primer to help you get going on a proper experiment protocol... congratulations on your "new calling" and all the work it brings!

[Slimething]

Originally Posted by Tombolian

...(gotta get 15 so I can have an avatar).

Welcome, Tombolian! True skeptics don't need no stinkin' avatars. You'll notice that the best here don't lower themselves to these attention-getting devices.

Originally Posted by TTLer

Preamble: I'm a total skeptic and I won't believe these battery-extending stickers actually work until I see proper scientific evidence.

Welcome to you, too, TTLer!

Quote:

Your ambition to get an avatar is duly noted, Tom, but I'm more interested in the substance of your posts.

You tell 'im!

Quote:

Junk Science Warning, Tom!: Randi's suggested "cell-phone standby time" is a poor way to test for comparative battery life (sorry Randi but it's true). Wireless technology is subject to sporadic interference and variances in network efficiency which affect battery life.

Aye, I can attest to that. My office is in the basement of an old building (channeling Milton Waddams) and I have to turn my cell phone off because the battery wears down looking for a signal. When I forget, the low battery beep starts after about two hours. Above ground, the battery will go for days with short phone calls.

[TTLer]

Indeed, Slimething. Based on my experience, even 2 identical phones (with the same service provider) placed together on a windowsill will draw power at different rates. It's a complex system, etc. etc. - in any case, not a simple enough way to scientifically test the simple claim of these stickers.

[TTLer]

Oh, and one last thing tonight, Tombolian - regarding your profile here, which is brand new and empty so far - If you're seriously conducting an experiment for JREF, we would really appreciate knowing who you are and your education and background etc...

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by TTLer

Preamble: I'm a total skeptic and I won't believe these battery-extending stickers actually work until I see proper scientific evidence.

Glad we're on the same page. I have little 'faith' that this thing will do anything at all, but somebody has to put it to the test.

Originally Posted by TTLer

Your ambition to get an avatar is duly noted, Tom, but I'm more interested in the substance of your posts.

Aw, shucks...

Originally Posted by TTLer

Junk Science Warning, Tom!: Randi's suggested "cell-phone standby time" is a poor way to test for comparative battery life (sorry Randi but it's true). Wireless technology is subject to sporadic interference and variances in network efficiency which affect battery life. A valid test of the product should use some type of closed-system battery-powered device that runs independently until the battery dies.

In order to be taken seriously, you must complete several trials using duplicate devices. In order for us to take your work seriously Tom, you must provide charts, photographs - these days, video is also expected - detailing the way you carried out your experiments, and how you came to your results.

Anyways, just a primer to help you get going on a proper experiment protocol... congratulations on your "new calling" and all the work it brings!

Thank you TTLer, this is exactly what I was talking about when I said I wanted feedback. I don't like the 2 phone standby test either (no offense Randi, if you're peeking). My idea was something much simpler like connecting a lightbulb to the battery. Unless I misunderstand the claim, it has nothing to do with cell phone technology, and everything to do with batteries. Period.
To that end, I have aquired a Nokia 6200 cell phone whose battery should do just fine. I have access to several other cell phone batteries too.
I had already planned on doing Excel charts, and pictures are doable, but I don't have a camcorder, and don't see the value in videotaping the process anyway. I'm open to suggestions though...
If I demonstrate that it doesn't work with a single battery, I can do it with multiple, although multiple tests with the same battery (with the device, without the device, with the device, without the device etc...) should prove the same point no?

Originally Posted by Slimething

Welcome, Tombolian! True skeptics don't need no stinkin' avatars. You'll notice that the best here don't lower themselves to these attention-getting devices.

What do you expect from a n00b!

Originally Posted by Slimething

Aye, I can attest to that. My office is in the basement of an old building (channeling Milton Waddams) and I have to turn my cell phone off because the battery wears down looking for a signal. When I forget, the low battery beep starts after about two hours. Above ground, the battery will go for days with short phone calls.

Indeed, Slimething. Based on my experience, even 2 identical phones (with the same service provider) placed together on a windowsill will draw power at different rates. It's a complex system, etc. etc. - in any case, not a simple enough way to scientifically test the simple claim of these stickers.

Precisely why I don't like the cell phone standby test!

Originally Posted by TTLer

Oh, and one last thing tonight, Tombolian - regarding your profile here, which is brand new and empty so far - If you're seriously conducting an experiment for JREF, we would really appreciate knowing who you are and your education and background etc...

Done, and speak for yourself!

Seriously, thanks you two. Comments welcome (duh).

[LibraryLady]

Originally Posted by Tombolian

I'm neutral. I know for a fact that my Boa Constrictor and 9 cats are big fans of them though. Yes, I'm the crazy cat man at the end of the block...

[BillyJoe]

<- A self-deprecating avatar is okay though.

[T'ai Chi]

Congratulations on your conversion?

[BillyJoe]

Why, thank you.

[Tombolian]

Whew! what a weekend! I'm just touching base to say that although I haven't made much progress on this yet, I did fully charge a cell phone with no carrier and began running it down (by letting it idle) on the 18th. It had 7 bars to begin with, and now it's down to 4 bars. Suffice it to say if I do the test as indended by the device's manufacturer, it will be months before it is complete... I intend on contacting the manufacturer today to request using a lightbulb test instead. Any bets he says 'no'?

[Tombolian]

ahem... that was supposed to be 'intended' not 'indended'... you get it...

[slyjoe]

Tombolian:
Welcome to the forum. Just a couple suggestions.

Charging the battery - not a real tight control unless you somehow measure how good the charge was. There is variability in charging.

Bars on cellphones - also, quite variable. A fixed load (resistor, light bulb, etc) while measuring the voltage and current would be more accurate to see how fast the battery discharges.

Just a few suggestions

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by slyjoe

Charging the battery - not a real tight control unless you somehow measure how good the charge was. There is variability in charging.

Agreed, but the cellphone will stop charging on it's own when it thinks the battery is fully charged. If I do many tests (5-7 as suggested) If I get similar run-down results, can I assume the charges were about equal?

Originally Posted by slyjoe

Bars on cellphones - also, quite variable. A fixed load (resistor, light bulb, etc) while measuring the voltage and current would be more accurate to see how fast the battery discharges.

Agreed again. I'm just running the battery down in idle mode to demonstrate how silly the proposed test is.

Thanks!

[slyjoe]

It really all depends on the size of the effect you are trying to measure. What is the claim on the Battery Life Extenders? If it is large, your test may be ok. If it is small, you would want to minimize variability in anything not related to the extenders.

Also, what did you mean by charging a cell phone with no carrier? Is this to minimize the effect of the network and communication with the cell phone? Sorry, I work in the industry and "carrier" can mean multiple things.

[Antiquehunter]

Does the phone you're using have an 'aircraft' mode or similar? This would effectively turn off the 'seek a signal' function, leaving the phone functional as a PDA/camera only...

Just a thought.

Also - any issue with testing the same battery over and over? Don't some batteries develop a 'memory' or at least, stop holding as strong/long a charge the more they are charged, drained and recharged?

Perhaps one approach could be:

- Two batteries, each bought brand new as replacement parts.
- Each battery placed in the same model phone, phone has radio turned 'off' or in 'airplane mode' or similar.
- Phones is unplugged after a complete charge, and sticker applied to battery or not by a second party (blind to the tester)
- Notes taken
- Repeat.

You may want to check the sticker to see if it affects the charge in the battery if left on all the time vs applied only in use vs applied during the charging stage on its own.

For the record - I too would be flabbergasted if these things worked - but in the spirit of skepticism they should be tested fairly.

-AH.

[Jon.]

Just a thought - do all batteries of the same type have the same amount of charge to start with, or is there some variability?

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by slyjoe

What is the claim on the Battery Life Extenders?

From the website batmax.com (numbers added by me for later reference.)

1 - Extends the battery life
2 - Accelerates charging time
3 - Prolongs the battery life span
4 - Restores the original performance
5 - Protects the battery
6 - Saves money

Originally Posted by slyjoe

Also, what did you mean by charging a cell phone with no carrier? Is this to minimize the effect of the network and communication with the cell phone?

By 'no carrier', I mean the phone isn't activated, no calls in and no calls out. No phone number and there's no signal reception indicated by the signal strength bars. I acquired it from the "cell-phone person" at my work from the pile of phones that are destined for recycling after they are no longer useful. Yes, it is to minimize the communication that occurs even on standby (I think it's not communicating, but could you confirm this for me?)

Originally Posted by Antiquehunter

Does the phone you're using have an 'aircraft' mode or similar? This would effectively turn off the 'seek a signal' function, leaving the phone functional as a PDA/camera only...

Nope, it's a Nokia 6200. No PDA or camera.

Originally Posted by Antiquehunter

Also - any issue with testing the same battery over and over? Don't some batteries develop a 'memory' or at least, stop holding as strong/long a charge the more they are charged, drained and recharged?

According to claims #3 and #4, the device overcomes these problems, even corrects for them.

I'm leary about using the phone to run the battery down because of how long the test would take. The full charge I started a week ago still has 3 bars out of 7. I assume the phone will die in another day or two, but 8-10 days per test seems like a waste of time.

Originally Posted by Antiquehunter

You may want to check the sticker to see if it affects the charge in the battery if left on all the time vs applied only in use vs applied during the charging stage on its own.

Part of the company's suggested test is to check for differences with the sticker on during charging vs. not on when charging. Now, we're up to about 10-14 tests...

Originally Posted by Jon.

Just a thought - do all batteries of the same type have the same amount of charge to start with, or is there some variability?

I can only assume they have the same amount to start with (give or take a couple of percentage points), but for this claim, I am to use a 'used' battery.

Did I cover everything? I think I did. Seriously folks, I appreciate the feedback as I view this as a collaborative effort. I'm sure there are experts out there (slyjoe) and if anything I say sounds fishy, please tell me...

[Tombolian]

I will be speaking with Alain Aisenberg, CEO of Batmax, on the phone tomorrow re: possible modifications to the test protocol. Stay tuned!

[slyjoe]

Antiquehunter: The batteries you are thinking of are NiCds; they develop a memory. Lithium Ions and NimH don't. I seem to remember something from the Batmax site that seemed to indicate Lithium Ion batteries were used in their tests.

Tombolian: I work more on the network side than the phone side. That said, it depends on whether or not the phones are really deactivated. If they just haven't been used for a while, they still might perform periodic registrations, depending on the type of network. For example, if a subscriber hasn't paid their bill they can't make calls and are "deactivated". Pick up that phone and you can still make 911 calls though. However, I think you have done about as much as you can to minimize VARIABILITY in usage, which is what is important.

As mentioned, I briefly looked at their website. I tried to understand the technical parts, but it sounded like a bunch of junk. It mentioned magnetic fields inducing a current - only a wire moving through a magnetic field (or a moving magnetic field) generates a current.

I'll keep an eye on this thread as time permits. Good luck!

[Tombolian]

Well, I don't know if I got what I wanted out of that phone call, he agrees to letting me use a light (more specifically an LED) to help drain the battery, but the battery MUST remain in the phone while doing so... no problem...
The problem began when he left himself this giant escape hatch implying that the product works best when used in real-world situations, like having your phone on standby...hmm...
I'll post the entire conversation I had with him asap... Bottom line is I'm going to write up my proposed test protocol and send it to him for approval before beginning the actual test.

Status update on my cell phone: It's been over a week since I started running it down, and it still has 1 bar left. I think it will switch itself off in the next day or so... That'll be about 8 days to drain my battery the 'real-world' way...

An interesting note: Alain kept repeating that he works in the cell phone industry, but hasn't ever heard of a cell phone that can last for a week on standby. Does that sound strange to you?

[Antiquehunter]

Seems like great performance to me - my Motorola RAZR USED to go 4 / 5 days before needing a charge when I first bought it, now I have to plug it in every night - hence my comments about deteriorating batteries.

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by Antiquehunter

Seems like great performance to me - my Motorola RAZR USED to go 4 / 5 days before needing a charge when I first bought it, now I have to plug it in every night - hence my comments about deteriorating batteries.

It's not a NiCad battery, is it? I've never had Motorola, the company I work for provides Nokia to all us grunts, almost exclusively. I've had 7-10 (ok, 10 may be streching it) days of standby time for years. The one I'm using for this test is Li-ion.

[Antiquehunter]

I just checked - its a Lithium battery. I think its important to note that the power situation here in Kabul is not comparable to anywhere in the US. The power from the city (which we use overnight) fluctuates / browns-out and cuts out frequently throughout the evening. So its possible that my phone doesn't get a 'Western standard' of charge, or that because of the weird power situation the battery's storage capacity is compromised in some way.

[Geek Goddess]

Originally Posted by LibraryLady

It is an important rite of passage in this forum to answer two vital questions:


How do you feel about budgies?

What, we're not standing on budgies anymore? I didn't get the memo.


I know that my Blackberry battery runs down fast in areas with strong signals, because I have it set to check for emails every few minutes. Even my Razr, which didn't have anything fancy on it, would cause some buzzing on my wireless devices (such as my router) every few minutes, which made me think it was checking for a tower. I'm not up on cell technology, however, I'm just a user.

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by Antiquehunter

I think its important to note that the power situation here in Kabul is not comparable to anywhere in the US. The power from the city (which we use overnight) fluctuates / browns-out and cuts out frequently throughout the evening. So its possible that my phone doesn't get a 'Western standard' of charge, or that because of the weird power situation the battery's storage capacity is compromised in some way.

I'm no expert, but I'd blame the faster discharge on distance from cell phone towers/analog vs digital signals... maybe even the cell phone towers are subject to those brown-outs/black-outs causing your phone to have to search for more distant towers??? I would expect the AC Adaptor to regulate the charge regardless of what's coming from the wall, but, again, I'm no expert...

[slyjoe]

A RAZR can have different technologies - CMDA or TDMA, basically. Without knowing whose network you are on GG, it's hard to predict behavior. Hearing noise (even on computer speakers) is generally a sign it is a TDMA system.

Operators can set how often the phone tries to register - it is not fixed, even in a single operator's network. It is generally the same in a market (city) though.

CDMA technology adjusts the power of the phone 800 times a second for an active call, message or registration; CDMA is very power-concious, and the battery generally lasts longer than a TDMA phone.

The amount of standby time you are currently getting seems very high, Tombolian. Also, how do you plan to measure the actual time the battery goes out? Not sure what Batmax is claiming, but if you can't measure accurately any difference may not be detectable.

When I hear things like "it works best in real world situations", alarm bells go off.

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by slyjoe

The amount of standby time you are currently getting seems very high, Tombolian.

For the record, my test phone just ran out of power sometime last night. That was 7.5 days on a battery that is at least 1.5 years old. Granted, it's not registered on a network and I did nothing but let it sit the whole time. I wouldn't, therefore, call it real 'standby' time.
However, when I did use the Nokias issued by my employer, I would only really charge on weekends. I probably spoke on the phone about 10 total minutes per day. I dunno, I'm only human and willing to accept that my memory is flawed but that's what I remember...

Originally Posted by slyjoe

Also, how do you plan to measure the actual time the battery goes out? Not sure what Batmax is claiming, but if you can't measure accurately any difference may not be detectable.

My plan is to shorten the time it takes to run it out, hopefully, to around 12 hours or so and I hope to rely on the phone's automatic shut-off feature to alert me when it finally dies. Once I know approximately how long to expect, let's say it's somewhere between 11-12 hours, I can run the test again and actually be watching (listening to) the phone at the exact moment it dies.
Batmax claims that the device will add around 30% more time, so that amounts to hours' more standby time.

Originally Posted by slyjoe

When I hear things like "it works best in real world situations", alarm bells go off.

You mean the ringing isn't in my ears?

Thanks again Slyjoe.

[Winterfrost]

Originally Posted by Tombolian

... he left himself this giant escape hatch implying that the product works best when used in real-world situations, like having your phone on standby...

I think this is why it's important to test using a mutually-agreed protocol. If they claim that the sticker extends the life of a cell phone under "regular operating conditions" and you hook up a light bulb to drain a cell phone battery faster, it's sort of like asking a pet psychic to read a person's mind. The results will be dismissed because the test wasn't testing the original claim. (Sure it's all electricity, but it's not the same kind of electricity.)

If you want to have a test which BatMax can't immediately refute, I think you have to play on their court. If Aisenberg agreed to allow you to connect an LED to drain the battery faster, that's great... but you can expect that will also be the first thing they will jump on.

It may not be perfectly normal "operating conditions," but could you potentially drain the battery faster by placing a call to yourself from a specific physical location and leaving it connected for hours? At least then you would be using the phone as intended.

[Tombolian]

Originally Posted by Winterfrost

I think this is why it's important to test using a mutually-agreed protocol. If they claim that the sticker extends the life of a cell phone under "regular operating conditions" and you hook up a light bulb to drain a cell phone battery faster, it's sort of like asking a pet psychic to read a person's mind. The results will be dismissed because the test wasn't testing the original claim. (Sure it's all electricity, but it's not the same kind of electricity.)

If you want to have a test which BatMax can't immediately refute, I think you have to play on their court. If Aisenberg agreed to allow you to connect an LED to drain the battery faster, that's great... but you can expect that will also be the first thing they will jump on.

It may not be perfectly normal "operating conditions," but could you potentially drain the battery faster by placing a call to yourself from a specific physical location and leaving it connected for hours? At least then you would be using the phone as intended.

That might be a problem, testing in his court, because of the variables. I just aquired a hands-free earpiece for the phone allowing me to use the radio feature. If that works, I can abandon the LED plan and keep the test within the phone. Does anybody know if a radio will draw varying current depending on received signal strength (another potential variable)?

Before I go any further, let me present more of his variables in this, the first 16 minutes of my 30-minute phone call to CEO of Batmax, Alain Aisenberg, in regards to changing the test protocol. It’s not a perfect transcript as I’ve removed mutual stuttering, unnecessary words, etc…
He has an extremely thick French accent and was generally pleasant to talk to, but it’s sometimes difficult to make out exactly what he’s saying.

Warning: This may be pretty boring, but I thought it a good idea to get it documented… Feel free to skip...
-------------------------------------------------------------
AA = Alain Aisenberg
CB = Charles Bangwiner (just an alt name I use sometimes)[/b]
-------------------------------------------------------------
AA Hello?

CB Hello, Alain?

AA Yes?

CB How are you doing? This is Charles again.

AA Well, thank you and you?

CB I'm doing fine, Are you free?

AA Yes.

CB I'm not sure if you've been checking the forums on the James Randi website or not, but I've started a thread and I'm getting some help from some of the other members there and one of the common things we are running into is that a cell phone, by itself, an active cell phone will try to communicate with the cell phone towers even when it's in idle (standby) mode when you're not actually talking on it or anything. I read in one of your test procedures here the fact that you were taking the SIM card out so no network service was available?

AA Yes, this is to clarify a little bit the way to be sure that the phone is not affected by any external influence from network or, you know, many things can change the battery life on any devices and, as you know very well, depending how you are going to set up your cell phone, you're going to draw the battery more or less rapidly.

CB Correct, if it is an active phone. So what I would like to do, first of all, is to change the protocol a little bit but before I do that, I want to clarify the cell phone part. If I were to use the cell phone to actually discharge the battery, it would have to be a cell phone that is not on a network, and...

AA Yes, to be sure that there is no (mumbles something), in fact you can change the procedure, but, yes it's better to be sure that the cell phone is not connected to the network because a cell phone can change a lot depending on the receiving signal.

CB Sure, it can change based on temperature, based on weather patterns, based on how far you are from the cell phone towers...

AA Yes there's a lot of uh...

CB Lot of variables.

AA Right, mm-hmm

CB So, I think we've come up with the best way to remove all of the variables. Is it possible that, instead of using the cell phone to discharge the battery, what if I wired up a light bulb to the cell phone's battery to do the discharge test?

AA If you accelerate the discharge, in fact as we know, because we are not inside the battery itself, the faster you are going to withdraw the electricity from the battery, the less you're going to have the difference in improvement between without and with. This is the reason why we... there is two things in fact that are not good to do. The first one, and this is for sure something very important, is to test the battery outside the cell phone. If you take the battery and you take some equipment measurement devices for batteries, you just look at how the battery discharges outside the cell phone, for, I don't know why, but for several reasons there are very big differences when you test the battery inside and when you test the battery outside alone.

CB I could do this test leaving the battery entirely inside the cell phone. I can wire the cell phone with wires that come outside to an external light bulb and the battery itself would remain in the phone, even connected to the phone, even with the phone on.

AA About the procedure, we have different procedures because people want to make comparative tests between two cell phones and other just want to look at if there is or if there is not any improvement. A very simple way that we can suggest is that you just take your own cell phone until it's fully charged, then remove your power adapter, leave your cell phone on without the network connection, it's better, for a day. After a day, you remove your battery and you measure the remaining voltage inside the battery. And then do that, the next time, with the foil Batmax, and then you wait about 5-7 cycles and measure at the same time the time reference, let's say 12 hours, and you have a voltage reference so you know that if nobody touches the cell phone if there is any difference above the remaining voltage there is something happening inside.

CB Ok, so I don't need to run the cell phone battery down all the way, your test would be sufficient if I were to only run it down for 12 hours and then measure it?

AA Standby time is one of the most important things in a cell phone. You know that there are many people who use their cell phone a lot and they withdraw (I think he means drain) the battery within a couple of hours or a day, and there are others like me, for example, I don't often use my cell phone. I have a standby time of 2 or 3 days. This is the reason why I think it depends on that factor for each person.

CB Right, with running the battery all the way down, that's where I have a problem. My cell phone that I have here has a standby time, when it's not on a network, is actually about 10 days.

AA Wow!

CB Yeah. So to run this test 5-7 times would take 50-70 days if I did nothing else. That's a very long time so I'm just trying to figure out...

AA What is your cell phone?

CB It's a Nokia 6200 that's been used for about a year-and-a-half.

AA That's good. It's good but it's also very strange because that's a very long standby time. Anyway, you can put a load on the battery, as explained in one of the procedures that if you want to speed up the test you can put a load within the cell phone using, in the same two cell phones, the camera for example...

CB I don't have a camera.

AA Not the network because the network can be variable, but for example a camera is a very simple...

CB The phones I have do not have the camera feature.

AA Ok, so if you have just one cell phone and you want to see exactly what happened you can have a visual test just by looking at where the battery life is at after a couple of days. Let's say if your very longest standby time is ten days, you can wait 2 or 3 days more. You take your own reference of time and your own reference of voltage. So starting from this point of reference, you are just applying the product inside and waiting a couple of cycles and you do the exact same test, #1 visual by seeing the remaining battery, and #2 scientifically measuring the remaining voltage which is, in fact, the most important thing inside the battery. So the problem with the product for THIS test is that when you look at the curve of the discharge of the battery itself, the real gain is in the last couple of hours. It means that, let's say if you have for example 100 hours of standby time, with the product you can gain about 30% so you will have 130 hours of standby time, but you see that about the curve of the discharge, you will be pretty close, one-to-the-other, at the end, during the last 10-15 hours, you will see that there is a difference which is exactly where we gain. The battery stands longer because of these last hours, the last little amount of energy inside the battery is still here enough to activate your cell phone, because as you know, and I know perhaps you know but it's not because the cell phone tells you 'Ok, my battery is down. The battery doesn't have any remaining voltage inside.' There is 1.3 or whatever amount of voltage inside the cell phone where it cannot....

CB Sure, it's not enough for the cell phone to turn on, so it turns itself off.

AA Yes! there is a level where the phone will turn off...

CB Yes, a threshold where it will turn off.

AA Ok, this little amount of 1.3-1.5 volts where the cell phone normally tells you 'Finished - Done'. We've a product to keep this minimum voltage longer.

CB Ok.

AA Where there is a difference, the difference is exactly at this time, during the last potentially 20-30% of the time where the remaining voltage is so low that one goes off and one stays on...

CB Ok, I understand. The only problem I would have with the test is how long it would take to perform. I still need a better way to draw more energy out of the battery than letting it idle. If I can't hook a light bulb up, would you agree that the a cell phone has LED's in the display?

AA Yeah yeah, you know you can do what you want in fact.

CB But I can't leave the LED on, on this phone. That's the problem, the LED on this phone only stays on for about 20 seconds at a time and then I have to push a button to make it come on again. To run the battery down, I tried a couple of nights ago to keep the light on for about two hours, and it didn't drain very significantly. I'm wondering if it would be ok if I hook up an external LED that would stay on all the time. Again, the battery would remain in the cell phone. I would just connect 2 wires to the battery terminals on the inside, and have them come outside the phone to hook up to the LED. I estimate that I would be able to run the battery down within one day that way.

AA You can do that, but the problem with this test is that there are many parameters that can affect the battery life.

CB And using an external device to draw the energy out reduces those parameters to almost nothing because all the energy is going to the light bulb or LED. At this point I'm thinking more of an LED. I'd like to run a test with an LED to see how fast I can run the battery out.

AA You can do that. You can do what you want. If there is a difference you're going to see the difference. This is the most important thing that you want to see, I think.

CB Exactly. I want to run this through all the way start-to-finish. I'll do it 5-7-10 times, however many times are necessary but I just want to make sure that it's not something inside the cell phone that's making the difference. I want to make sure that the product is doing what is advertised, which is, to 'extend the battery life'.

AA Yes, but you must understand something else that's related to the technology itself. The battery is affected by the product. The more time the battery stays in standby mode the product reacts with the battery, the more you will have the visible effect. This is why we suggest 1) to follow our procedure instead of other procedures and 2) to use very old batteries because they are not able to keep their charge for a long time, so you can really see the difference. I have very interesting feedback from people, clients and other people that I know, I gave them samples and I remember I have a friend who is in PR for a very big company she spends about $5000 a month, she receives calls every minute and she has to charge her cell phone twice a day. She had a Motorola clamshell, I don't know the model, and she put the product in and she said 'you know what? I'm gonna tell you something. I haven't charged for 2 days. It's amazing! I don't know how it works, but this is my proof and this is what I see and there's no doubt about that because time is not something that you, you know...'
I read on James' website all the things about Uri Geller and all these people (chuckles)... This is magic for sure and you feel that it's a trick but it's not a trick. Time is time. You can't compress time. One hour is one hour. One hour and a half is one hour and a half. There is something happening inside the cell phone, whatever it is. We know very well several things. We don’t know everything because we don’t do tests in every direction, with a lot of different parameters. What we know is that the effect is more visible on old batteries, the older it is the better it is because you are going to ‘reactivate’ the battery so if it’s close to dying, you are going to have a fresh, brand new battery, and this is a very visible effect.

CB These batteries that I have, have been in use in the industry for at least a year-and-a-half if not longer.

AA Quite good, it’s good. You just told me that you have very long standby time, it’s very impressive. I’m very impressed about that.
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That's enough for now... hope to get the rest up asap. Very tired... gnite.

[Tombolian]

Well, it looks like the radio feature of the cell phone will take between 1-2 days to deplete the battery. I think I can scratch the silly LED test and go with the radio instead. I'm still wondering if the radio will draw current from the battery differently when tuned to a radio station with a strong signal versus tuned to static. Unless somebody out here knows, I'll have to run a couple of tests to figure this out. I suspect that I will want to keep it tuned to static. Does anybody know for certain?

[slyjoe]

Which radio are you talking about that you can tune to "static"?

[Tombolian]

I mean tune the radio in the phone to a station that has either a very weak, or possibly 'no' signal (no such thing as 'no' signal, right?)

[slyjoe]

OK - I see what you mean. You can't tune the phone, and there really isn't RF static as almost all cell phones are digital.

Before starting with the Batmax, I think you need to do the test several times without the Batmax device to get a variance on discharge times. I don't think the particular usage pattern in and of itself is all that important. Althought I'm sure the Batmax guys would say it is. Which is why the alarm bells are still going off after reading the transcript of your phone call.

[Tombolian]

I'm sorry, I think I've confused you... I have an FM radio on the phone. I can tune to anything on the FM dial from 88-108 MHz and I get static when I tune to frequencies that don't have a radio station on that frequency within range. Just like any FM radio.

[slyjoe]

Yep - I was confused.

FM receiver - doesn't much matter. In fact, any receiver's power consumption isn't really affected by the signal it receives. On the cell phone, again, the receiver power doesn't affect the time the battery lasts very much compared to the transmitter.

Again, reducing the variability is more important than absolute power consumption.