PowerEx MH-C9000 WizardOne Charger-Analyzer
by Maha Energy Corporation
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of PowerEx MH-C9000 WizardOne Charger-Analyzer
Customer Review: A fairer look of two excellent charger/conditioners
Summary: 5 Stars
There are quite a number of good reviews and comments already, why another one? There are important points that require clarification especially when compared to La Crosse Technology BC-9009 AlphaPower Battery Charger. Leaving them unchallenged would be unfair. Its a bit long as this is one of the most complex chargers I've encountered.
FEATURES
Key points: charging or conditioning batteries must be based on each individual battery's need. Each battery not only ages differently, it may differ in subtle construction variations between or in brands, and rated mAH. If one charges a mix of different brands, sizes, and mAH you shouldn't be hamstrung by one setting limiting others.
The BC9009 design has some dependencies, if you program charge current into slot 1, it can't be exceeded for all 4 slots. BC9009 provides 1800mA if cells are placed only on Slots 1 and 4, otherwise its 1000mA. The Powerex, aka Maha, slots are fully independent to a maximum of 2000mA per slot.
BC9009 provides a total of 4000mA; the Maha 8000mA. The 1000mA charge makes Maha default as a quick charger, while the BC9009 is default a slow charger, requiring keystrokes to set up as a quick charger.
There are no keystrokes to use the Maha as a basic charger. If you just insert batteries and leave, select no function, Maha begins a charge at 1000mA.
The multi-day long Maha Break-in mode is as long as the BC9009 Refresh Mode, except the BC9009 auto detects when to stop the mode. BC9009 Refresh is better version of the Maha Refresh/Analyze mode: it will repeat a charge/discharge cycle until the reported battery mAH is stable, whereas the Maha does its specific cycle x 2.
Maha Break-in mode is an international standard, IEC 61951-2, charge/discharge cycle specification that manufacturers must do to rate a battery's mAH and label the battery as such. The BC9009 Test Mode is its equivalent, but since it does not provide the exact sequence, is not comparable. It determines how far from 'virgin' your battery is, or if your battery has 'short changed' you by giving you less mAH than the label says you should have.
CHARGING
The charging mode is similar on both units, they pulse width modulate charge cycles.
The most important question is does Refresh, Cycle or Breakin modes actually work? Since the BC9009 has a Maha like Refresh mode but is programmed to stop once the stable mAH capacity is reached, this mode can be emulated by the Maha manually, to reflect both such charge modes.
I have 19 NiMH cells from 4-10 years old. 4 were in active use, 6 occasionally used and 9 were dead, forgotten in a box.
Of 4 2006 Digicells, Refresh x 2 and Cycle x 3 did not change the mAH, returning 1800mAH but the final reported mAH was lower on Breakin mode x 2, 1500mAH; pure discharge mode confirmed Breakin mode; when new in 2006 these cells rated 2300 mAH. 2 cells initially reported much lower mAH, but after 3 cycle modes, came up to par with its brothers.
2003 x 4 Energizers occasionally used cells could only be used after a fresh charge. The Maha Refresh x1 or Cycle x 3 did nothing to improve their 1600 mAH, rated new at 2000mAH, but Breakin mode reported 1200mAH. 2 cells initially rated with lower mAH were slowly increased to its peers. The discharge mode confirmed a fast self discharge rate, over 30% per day. 2 Digicell AA rated 2300mAH returned HIGH and could not be charged or discharged through the Maha. These Digicells could be charged on a C204F charger, but got very hot to touch. The cells that passed the Maha impedance mode did not get hot when charged on the Maha at much higher charge currents than the C204F, nor did they get as hot as the Digicells when on the 204F.
The 8 dead cells consisted 4x 1999 Radio Shack branded 850mAH and 4 AAA 2004, 2001 x 1 Nexell 600mAH. All were initially rejected by the Maha until a 1 minute top up charge made by the 204F charger. The 1999 cells were subjected to Cycle x 3, with mAH reported at 900mAH; adding Cycle to x 2, and Refresh/Analyze x1 did not improve the mAH rating. Breakin confirmed mAH rating about 800mAH. However, these Radio Shacks had extremely high discharge rates, they were empty in 6 hours. The AAA would Cycle X 3 charge, but not hold any charge as confirmed by discharge mode.
CONCLUSION:
Its clear the at least Cycles x 3 revitalize cells. Resurrecting old Radio Shack batteries was interesting, but not practical. Whether more cycles are needed, I continue to experiment. Its unclear whether Refresh/Analyze is any better than Cycle x 3; Cycle x 3 is faster time-wise. Breakin is good only to establish the IEC battery capacity, rather than as a conditioning method.
In summary, I would act on the Maha functions as follows:
Refresh Analyze: if cells unused for > 2 weeks, this mode saves you keystrokes from setting Cycle mode
Breakin mode: determines how cells differ from a brand new, calculate its true virgin mAH
Discharge mode: confirm any condition and charging effects in terms of true battery capacity
Cycle Mode: the preferred conditioning mode. Start with 3 cycles, up to 5. Check if mAH improve with each.
So which is better? Technically, IMHO its the Maha. Its charge slots are fully independent, provide higher mAH, rates a battery's mAH according to international standards, and albeit physically larger than the BC9009, was built to fast charge and run the battery's cooler. Today's NiMH are over 2000mA, and the default BC9009 settings at 200mA is an unnecessary long charge time, added extra keywork needs be done to match the Maha default.
The BC9009 excels at being smaller, a better presentation of battery data, and a better Refresh mode, if it works properly. How it determines that the mAH are stable is unknown to users so it should be described in full. Its discharge mode is not helpful: it charges after discharge and is like a single Maha cycle mode. The BC9009 discharge mode will not allow a user to create a fully discharged cell to use a different charge mode on or to estimate remaining mAH after use. The test mode is similar to Maha's Refresh/Analyze, without the rest period, but it is NOT the IEC test so its equivalent to an automatic Maha cycle mode.
The charging mAH and voltage, regardless of mode, is unhelpful data for either charger except for monitoring charge is progressing. The pure discharge mAH and end voltage are what's needed to rate the battery, and only the Maha provides a discharge cycle without recharging. Users can compare this result to the IEC mode.
The downside of the Maha is that extra keystrokes are needed to use the advance functions, but it needn't be as tedious as a review here suggests. You can quickly select items as keys are very sensitive to touch. The LCD toggling of each slot's setting is time consuming and is better frozen until a keyed input, but since the readouts really don't mean much until the end of the cycle, its inconsequential.
The BC9009 has a complete but poorly organized manual. The Maha manual is simpler and easy to understand, but fails to mention all of what the WizardOne can do or why it does; its still unclear if combinations of Maha functions can improve battery mAH more, but enough options exist for technical battery nuts to explore finding out. For example, how many cycle modes are truly optimal? What current? The manual and FAQ mention 3-5, but the Maha can do up to 12; As 1000mA charge is typical for 2000mAH batteries, will 1400mA work better with 2700mAH batteries?
After 1 month of constant use, my power meter P3 International P4400 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor reports that it cost ~$3 in electricity to run these tests.
Customer Review: Showdown: Maha MH-C9000 vs. La Crosse BC-900
Summary: 4 Stars
I have a La Crosse Technology BC-900 AlphaPower Battery Charger since nearly two years ago, and I'm very happy with it. When the Maha Powerex MH-C9000 WizardOne Charger-Analyzer was announced, its looked even better on paper than the BC-900. So I also bought the C9000 one month ago. Here is my assessment for those two chargers:
First, let's get the similarities out of the way. Both the BC-900 and the C9000 are powerful battery analyzers/conditioners which can also be used as your everyday battery chargers. Both chargers accept one to four AA or AAA cells with independent charging currents. Both come with universal (100-240V AC) adapter.
Next, the differences:
1. SIZE:
First thing you'll notice is that the Maha C9000 is HUGE for a 4-AA-cell charger. It is about twice as large as the BC-900 (see my Customer Image for size comparison).
Larger size makes the C9000 less suitable as a travel charger. However, as a home charger this is actually an advantage. Extra spacing between cells allows better cooling, and also makes it easier to remove individual cell.
2. CHARGING CURRENT:
The BC-900 can provide charging current from 200 to 1000mA for 4 cells, or up to 1800mA for two cells. The C9000 can charge from 200 to 2000mA for all four cells. So if you routinely need to charge cells in a hurry, the C9000 is better.
However, due to the complicated key sequences involved (for example, to charge 4 cells at 2000mA, you need to punch in 48 key strokes!), most sane people will probably leave the C9000 at its default current of 1000mA.
3. DISPLAY:
The BC-900 has a 4-column LCD panel that shows the status (capacity, voltage, current, or time) of all four cells either simultaneously, or individually. The C9000 sports a LCD display with back-light. It is BIG, it is BRIGHT, and it works really well - as a NIGHT LIGHT!
The biggest problem with the C9000's display is that it can only show one status for one cell at any one time. It constantly toggles from one status to another, then from one cell to the next. If you have 4 cells in the charger, it takes 48 seconds or more (depending on the current activity) for the display to cycle through all 4 cells. There is also no way to pause the display. So if you missed one reading, you have to wait for it to cycle through again.
4. ANALYZING / CONDITIONING FUNCTIONS:
The BC-900 has an easy-to-use 'DISCHARGE/REFRESH' function that can be used to recondition old cells. The C9000 has a similar function called 'CYCLE', but it is very tedious to use (see the USER INTERFACE section for details).
In addition, the C9000 also has a 'BREAK-IN' mode which supposedly should be applied to new cells before first use, or to really old cells that have not been charged for years. Beware that this operation takes at least 39 hours to complete, so I doubt many people would actually use it.
5. DEAD CELL DETECTION:
If a cell is completely drained (battery terminal voltage drops below 0.5V), the BC-900 thinks it is shorted and therefore refuses to charge it. This has caused a lot of frustrations among users, but there is a way to work around it (see my BC-900 Customer Image for details). The C9000 is smarter in this aspect. If the battery terminal voltage is too low, it automatically starts charging at 125mA until the voltage rises above 1V, then it continues with the programmed charging current.
The C9000 also measures battery internal resistance when a cell is first inserted. If the user inserts an alkaline cell (which has much higher internal resistance), the C9000 displays 'HIGH' and refuses to charge it. This is a good safety feature, except that it also incorrectly rejected most of my NiMH cells bought four or five years ago. So I cannot use the C9000 to charge or recondition those old cells, even though the BC-900 reports that they still have around 1000mAh of capacity left.
6. USER INTERFACE:
With the BC-900, you can select the operation and current for all cells simultaneously, or you can change them indivdually by using the cell-selection buttons. The only limitation is that once the charging current is fixed, you cannot subsequently select a larger current without removing all cells.
The C9000 has four completely independent charging circuits that can be programmed to different currents. This may sound great at first, but in practice it soon becomes a burden, because you often need to press dozens of key stokes to program all four cells.
For example: If you want to recondition four cells on the BC-900, you'll go through the following sequence:
- insert in all 4 cells at once
- press MODE to select DISCHARGE/REFRESH (2 keystrokes*)
- press CURRENT to select charging current (2-3 keystrokes)
* Note: need to press and hold MODE for ~3 seconds for the first keystroke
On the C9000, you can insert in all 4 cells at once, but you have to program them one at a time. Which means:
- press UP/DOWN to select 'CYCLE', then 'ENTER' (2-5 key strokes)
- press UP/DOWN to select charging current, ENTER (1-11 key strokes)
- press UP/DOWN to select discharging current, ENTER (1-6 key strokes)
- press UP/DOWN to select number of cycles, ENTER (1-13 key strokes)
Congratulations! You just finished programming the first cell. Now repeat that for the other three cells.
BOTTOM LINE:
The Maha MH-C9000 is, without a doubt, the most powerful NiMH AA battery analyzer/charger in the consumer market. However, certain design issues (such as a single-status LCD panel and ridiculously long programming sequences) make it difficult to use for multiple cells. For most of my routine charging and maintenance of NiMH cells, I'll continue to use my old La Crosse BC-900.
Nevertheless, I don't regret buying the C9000, because it was a lot of fun for me to try out all its functions. Plus I now have a really cool (but expensive) night light.
Customer Review: What's with the car analogies? The HUMMER of chargers.
Summary: 5 Stars
Ok everyone seems to want to comapre this to a vehicle - it's a high end BATTERY CHARGER. The field is VERY narrow here - 2 to be exact if you don't want a charger with idiot lights on the dashboard.
There were some important considerations in the C9000 vs the competition.
1 - Only the C9000 can charge 4x2000 ma (the competition can only do 2000 ma on the outer two most cells due to heating and power limits.
2 - Backlit display. When 3 cells go along normally and one does something wierd being able to read it is important. If your flashlight batteries are IN the charger you won't be using it, right? At this pricepoint an LCD LED is expected. They are cheap 5 cent parts and should be used in a $60 pricerange product.
3 - If you are a control freak, this is the charger for you. 200 - 2000 ma charge rates stepped by 100 ma are possible. If you want to charge at 0.1 C it's no big deal - enter 2700 mAh cells and it will charge at 270 mA, not 300. There is a ton of flexibility in the design, but you must use the other modes.
4 - "breakin" of a new cell is easy, but as others noted it's a 39 hour process with automatic rest periods, so you use this mode cautiously.
5 - Most importantly - being able to select a charge rate from 200 to 2000 mA across all 4 cells with precision voltage readout is great. It may take some keypresses but I can put 4 cells on charge in under a minute at any setting because of the responsiveness on the keyboard to quick tapping. Charging at low currents (e.g. 200-300 mA or 0.1 C) until shutoff is a low stress way to maximize the available capacity in the cell. I prefer this if I have the time. If not, I may double it to 0.2C but seldom go to 0.5C due to heating and the inefficiencies that come out. For example, charging at 0.5C only gets about 90% of the rated capacity. You can charge another 0.1C @ the 0.1C rate for 1 hour the next day to top off hot charged cells.
Because it runs off 12V, car operation is a no brainer (I bought mine with the MAHA Li-Ion charger for my motorola 9505 iridium batteries which came with a fine quality 12V adapter and have used the C9000 with that adapter frequently)
Nobody is ever going to take these chargers out to the drag strip, and they won't be reviewed in car and driver, so I'd look towards the well designed feature rich unit without limits. There are too many features here, but look for me to post a photo of the display which really does justice to the product and justifies its pricepoint for the BIG custom LCD. The competition's tiny unlit displays don't support the competition's pricepoint.
Either charger will do an excellent job of charging your batteries at a slow rate, but the C9000 can really cook em when you need charged batteries NOW, in your car, and on the run. Maha's separate product for lithium cells or NIMH cells up to 20V is very impressive as the (separate) product has positionable gold points you can adjust to fit the battery pack, auto voltage detection, and a strong magnet to hold the pack in place, along with two guides. It was cheaper than replacing my broken sat phone li-ion charger from motorola, more flexible, and can evaluate all my camera packs that just have tabs on the end as well. I use it to confirm suspect packs that are going bad. When all you have is a sealed pack with tabs, it's an ideal match to MAHA's LiIion charger.
As for MAHA brand 2700 mah cells, they gave me 4 free, but they don't store 2700 mAh's as claimed by about 100 shy. I also discovered alot about the REAL capacity of battery packs I've been using for years as they aged using this unit. Looking at the accuracy of the C9000, I compared it by forcing current through a $25,000 Agilent data acquisition unit I used to use to check power supplies and batteries. They matched to less than 1% error, which makes the C9000 a great deal. It time modulates the charging current allowing for voltage measurements in between charging currents, which allows it to give you a very accurate cell voltage. It's well engineered top to bottom and well worth the money. It's not a BMW, Mercedes, Bentley, Rolls, Miata, or Humvee, but it does its job well with a great user interface and that's what counts.
Charge on!
Customer Review: The Mercedes of chargers
Summary: 4 Stars
Your iPod and cell phone have their own better- technology batteries, but for some devices (like flashlights, or SLR camera flashes) AAs are the gold standard; and with the recent advent of Sanyos Eneloop or Rayovac's Hybrid batteries which don't self- discharge that fast, you might use rechargeables even for your smoke detectors and remote controls. In that light, I was looking for a top-shelf charger that would give me a little more info about my batteries than saying "they're charged". You may think it's a geeky thing to care about the exact properties of your batteries, and maybe to a degree it is, but when you have your SLR flash die on you with "they're charged" batteries, or you're lost in the woods and your GPS receiver gives out, you'll wish you'd have been a little more concerned. It just takes one bad or badly charged battery in a batch to create those scenarios.
This unit takes excellent care of your rechargeable batteries, and yet it's simple to use: insert a cell into a free slot and wait until it says "done" below the slot. What is nice, even with this basic scenario, is that the slots are independent, so you can put in and take out batteries regardless of the others. In case you don't take them out, the Maha will keep them topped off with a small, safe trickle charge. Speaking about safe: unlike other units, this device measures temperature along with current and voltage. On a more "geeky" level, you can select special treatment for your batteries when you insert them. The menu is very simple to navigate, you use the "up", "down" and "enter" buttons to select one of the modes which are:
- CHARGE: default, top off the batteries
- REFRESH/ANALYZE: discharge/charge the batteries, and display the capacity (so you can pair batteries with similar capacities)
- BREAK IN: run a few cycles for new batteries to maximize their capacity
- DISCHARGE: empty out the battery, then display the charge it had (good when you want to test the self- discharge rate)
- CYCLE: run many cycles to bring old batteries back to life.
In addition to the modes, you typically can select charge/discharge current if you're adventurous enough (but the defaults are fine). Again, the unit, unlike others, can handle it. You want to deliver 2 amps to every battery, no problem. Other devices boast high charging current, but they can't do all slots at that rate.
A special section about this "other units" I've mentioned: if you're interested in a sleek charger, you probably have come across the LaCrosse bc-900. It's much cheaper, comes with a bag of extras, and may even have a nicer-looking LCD! However, if you carefully read the forums, there have been some incidents of melting. That's right, in the hands of some users, the thing actually melted down and the support center didn't acknowledge the problem. It may be that this affected only a subset of the delivered units, but for me, such a serious issue coupled with poor response disqualified the product entirely. Not that Maha makes any "tested on the moon" claims, but they do give 3 years warranty. You make your own decision; to me this was a no- brainer.
Back to the Powerex. One thing that disappointed me a little (hence, -1 star) it that there is a slight hissy noise coming from the charger. Not enough to be a nuisance, but audible enough to disqualify it for the bedroom. Of course, since the lcd is backlit when a battery is in, you wouldn't put it in the bedroom to start with. The noise comes from the pulse charging method used by this device. It must be a a good thing overall though, because when I charge my batteries with the C9000 at 2 amps, they barely become lukewarm; but when I use my el-cheapo Sony travel charger (forgive me, but it's really small!), they become very warm at not even 1/4th the current.
Bottom line: you need a good charger for home and don't mind to pay a little extra in exchange for a solid unit and peace of mind? Get this.
Customer Review: amazing!
Summary: 5 Stars
This is just wonderful piece of technique. It does exactly what the manual says and you will love it. It will analyze your batteries, discharge, recharge, break-in (repeat cycle n-times). It helped me a lot to solve problems with my batteries. And now I am using only Powerex precharged batteries which works wonderfully. I use it for my DLSR. Best batteries for me are IMEDION AA 2100mAh NiMH Rechargeable Batteries w/Holder- 4 Batteries Per Pack
Now I am able to analyze batteries to my friends and they really appreciate that.
So once again, wonderful item. If you need batteries often or you need to rely on them, you need some "intelligent" and smart charger and this in one of best.
Enjoy!
P.S.: Try in combination with MAHA MH-C401FS 100 min AA / AAA Battery Charger and Wall AC/ Car DC adapter with Scratch-Guard Protector Bag and X4 2700 Mah Nimh Batteries ***Includes Accessory Bag***
It is good idea to combine both chargers with car adapter. Especially for small one.
P.S.S.:
Below, you can find speficiation from web page of manufacturer - MAHA. Sorry for long story, but it is just best way how you can see benefits of this charger.
- Four independent slots
It's like having four charger-analyzers for AA and AAA NiMH / NiCD batteries.
- Large backlit LCD display
Digitally displays capacity, voltage, time and current.
- Endless programming possibilities - over 10,000 ways!
29 selectable charging and discharging rate. Charging current from 0.2A to 2.0A and discharging current from 0.1A to 1.0A in 0.1A increments.
- Five modes of operation
Charge: Recharges the battery at the selected rate.
Suitable for batteries used frequently.
Refresh & Analyze: Charges the battery, rest for one hour, discharge, rest again, then recharges it. Selectable charging and discharging rate.
Suitable for batteries stored for more than two weeks but less than 3 month or those showing poor performance.
Break-In: Also known as IEC capacity measurement and "Battery Forming". Charges battery at 0.1C for 16 hours, rest for one hour, discharges battery at 0.2C, then recharges again at 0.1C for 16 hours.
Suitable for new batteries and those stored for more than 3 month.
Discharge: Discharges the battery at the selected rate.
Cycle: Performs charge-discharge cycle for up to 12 times with discharge capacity stored in memory. Recharges battery after final cycle.
- New ways to take care of your batteries and maximize runtime!
Battery Matching
In most devices, usually two or more batteries are used together. When batteries are used in a series, the performance is limited by the worst one. In other words, one poorly performing battery can significantly reduce the device runtime.
Battery matching refers to grouping batteries with similar "actual" capacity. To perform this, use the Refresh & Analyze mode to determine the battery capacity. Group batteries with capacity within about +/- 5% of the rated capacity.
Battery Forming
New batteries and those stored for extended period become chemically deactivated. Battery forming is a charge-discharge-charge cycle which forces a full charge into the battery at a very slow rate. This process activates the battery. In certain cases, it needs to be repeated two or three times.
Battery forming can be performed using the Break-In mode.
- Delivers just the right charge
Independent negative delta V, temperature and timer protection eliminates over and undercharging.
- Super light travel worldwide power supply and 12V compatible