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: Easy to use
Summary: 5 Stars
If you read the spotlight review by NLee, you will think that only an insane person would want to face the daunting task of entering a charging cycle for a battery. He is being very dramatic and frankly unfair. If you have an Eneloop AA battery that you want to charge, you don't have to press any buttons at all. Just stick the battery in there and walk away. It will then charge at the default setting of 1000 ma and be done in a couple of hours (that's not a bad rate, but I usually do 800).
If you want to use other than the defaults, you select the charge rate you want using the up and down buttons (down twice to get to 800, for instance) and then press ENTER. You are prompted for each setting, it is very easy, and takes only a few seconds for each battery. The display is very good. Once the batteries are charging you press the SLOT button to check the status of each battery at your choosing. This isn't a charger for dummies though: If you want to charge at the correct rate, you do need to do some reading. So this isn't for just anyone.
I had about 50 batteries varying in age from brand new to 10 years old. The C9000 was able to deal with all but about 3 of them and then I threw away a few more because their capacities were so poor. That's a good thing: I needed to cull the collection down and the C9000 will help you with that. I also had some brand new "2900 mah" Zeikos batteries that I worked on over and over again and couldn't get past 800 mah, so I knew those were defective and was able to return them. I found out that Eneloop batteries, while not the highest capacity out there, are remarkably consistent: a year old set of 4 2000 mah batteries analyzed at 2008, 2047, 1998, and 2008. No wonder people swear by these!
So far I think the break-in cycle seems overrated. I tried it on two batteries in a set and simply did a refresh/analyze cycle on the other two batteries in the set and got similar capacities. Powerex only recommends it for batteries that have sat around for a long time and I didn't have any that fit that bill, though.
Negatives:
* You can't change the cutoff voltage when you are discharging a battery. It cuts off when it cuts off. This isn't so bad because when a NiMH battery starts losing power, it does so pretty quickly. So there isn't much left and if you drain a battery too low, it can damage it.
* When charging, you pick a current, but it charges at slightly less than that current (e.g. 581 ma instead of the 600 I input).
* It has a tendency to miss a charging cutoff with some batteries, especially if charging at 500 ma or below. Then it will just charge and charge and charge. I have only experienced this once and with a marginal battery that I wound up throwing away anyway.
* It will reject a battery for having HIGH impedance, but if you put that battery in another charger for a little while and then put it back in the C9000, it will be okay. It seems like the C9000 is rushing to judgment. Like the missed cutoff, the HIGH thing generally applies to very marginal batteries that probably should be tossed in the recycle bin anyway.
* On a Refresh and Analyze cycle, it charges the battery, waits, discharges it, waits, and charges it again. At the end of the discharge phase it will show you the discharge capacity (this is what you want to know), but once it starts the final charge, it won't show you that number again until it is done. If you are patient, it isn't a problem.
I can't compare this to the LaCrosse, but that charger seems to do most of the same things, costs less, and comes with 8 batteries. I'm happy with my purchase and many people at Candlepower Forums who have both machines swear by the Maha, so I feel like I made a good decision. Plus I didn't need more batteries.
Customer Review: FAILS TO PERFORM
Summary: 1 Stars
Although this charger has a gorgeous LCD display and is powered from 12 volts, it fails to perform the function for which I purchased it - charging NiMH AA batteries. Perhaps I am unable to operate it as intended because of the minimal instruction sheet provided. Or perhaps it fails because the firmware which operates the device is not as smart as it needs to be. Or perhaps I just got a lemon?
I have many radios which use AA batteries in sets of 4. The radios all have the ability to recharge batteries, but they are not very friendly to the batteries. I purchased this charger to: a) recharge the batteries separately; b) analyze battery capacity (and age); c) keep from overcharging them in the radios. I have 42 AA batteries of various brands from brand new to about 2 years old that I used for this test & review. These are batteries I've been using and have not been stored.
After carefully reading the entire instruction sheet and readying the charger, I put in a single AA battery. After selecting "Refresh/Analyze", 500 mah charge and 500 mah discharge, the charger returned to the original prompt as if it had not accepted anything I entered. I knew that if I did not make any entries within 10 seconds it would select "charge" mode with 1000 mah values. After several attempts I set that battery aside and used the next one from the set of 4. The same thing happened for all 4 batteries! The charger needs a more intelligent response in this situation, it is VERY CONFUSING to a first time user.
After going through my entire library of batteries, it turned out that the charger would only "accept" 10 of them. In other words, it was telling me that 32 out of 42 batteries were "high" and could not be charged. The instruction sheet mentioned such batteries and suggested either discarding them or using discharge mode first. It didn't matter if I started out with charged, discharged or average batteries, they failed in every mode. But the fact remains that these same batteries charge fine in the radios, get quite warm (meaning they don't have that high of an impedance), and operate the radios for several hours. So much for a so-called "refresh" mode.
This charger can be set to charge batteries from 200ma to 2000ma in 100ma steps and to discharge them from 100ma to 1000ma in 100ma steps. I note that this charger only accepts AA & AAA size batteries, so I wonder why the large amounts of current? One set of my batteries states to rapid charge them at 340ma and slow charge them at 150ma with others recommending charging currents of 270ma, 220ma & 205ma. The charge current of my radios is typically 150ma, so it seems the use of this charger will only "fry" these batteries more, not less. The high currents might explain why some people experienced melting/etc when using this charger.
Below is a list of batteries used for this test.
BRAND CAPACITY MODEL COLOR CONDITION
Chicago Electric 2000 mah 1.2v Green & Black GOOD
DuraCell 2050 mah 1.2v White & Green FAIL - "high"
DuraCell 2650 mah DC1500 Green & Black FAIL - "high"
Energizer 2500 mah NH-15 Silver & Green FAIL - "high"
Panasonic 2300 mah HHR-35PA Silver GOOD
I can NOT recommend this charger. However, I do not know if there is a charger out there which can do what this one preports to do. I sincerely hope this design is upgraded so that so many batteries are not reported as "high" and the user interface is made more friendly.
Customer Review: Excellent charger - could almost be the only charger you need
Summary: 5 Stars
I've owned the Powerex MH-C9000 and La Crosse BC-900 chargers for over 3 years now. Most of the time the only thing that determines which one I use is which one has available battery slots.
Similarities: Both are excellent smart chargers that are better than pretty much anything else out on the market. Both require reading the instruction manual in order to get the most of each charger, but it's worth taking the time. Both require an AC-DC wall adapter which makes them bulky for travel. Both have 4 independent battery slots. Both have selectable charging currents so you can choose between slower/faster charging times. Both charge only AA and AAA batteries.
Differences: The La Crosse charger is a little smaller than the Powerex, and (unlike the Powerex) it's display is not backlit (to some that's a plus [doesn't illuminate the room at night] and to others it's a minus [not as easy to read]). The La Crosse does not have a break-in function like the Powerex does - this function is meant to be used on brand new batteries or older batteries that have gone unused for a while. I haven't used the Break-In function too much so all I can really say about it is that it's a long procedure but does seem to result in a battery with a pretty good amount of charge. One of the biggest functional differences between the 2 chargers is how they handle suboptimal batteries. The La Crosse charger occasionally has problems recognizing a battery that has been drained too much - in these situations you have to stick the battery in a dumb charger for a short while (30 seconds is enough) before it will recognize the battery and start charging it. On the other hand, the Maha charger is much more picky when detecting a battery with a high internal resistance and refusing to charge the battery - in these situations, I have to charge the battery in the La Crosse charger. This has only happened to me with really old rechargeables; the batteries are still usable once the La Crosse charges them up so I don't totally agree with the Powerex charger not wanting to charge them. Both chargers have their own unique operating interface. I don't particularly care for one interface over the other - they're just different.
Summary: You can't go wrong with either the Powerex MH-C9000 or La Crosse BC-900 chargers. The best thing I did was to pair these chargers with low self discharge (LSD) NiMH's. I've transitioned away from standard (non-LSD) rechargeables because I'd always be worrying about having batteries with mismatched charge levels due to self-discharge. Now I always have charged batteries around, and many of the items that I use batteries for (wireless mice, remotes, etc) operate much longer with LSD's. If it were an option I'd rate both the La Crosse and Powerex chargers with 4.5 stars out of 5 since neither is perfect. The La Crosse has issues recognizing over-drained batteries and the Powerex has issues charging really old batteries that may have a higher internal resistance. Still, these two are far better than almost every other battery charger out there.
Customer Review: Does what it says on the tin, makes it actually worth it to use rechargeables
Summary: 5 Stars
I got this charger a few weeks ago on Amazon, and it's worked great so far.
I was irritated because all the chargers I bought in the past have been really slow (trickle charge) 16-hour chargers. I was wary of buying a charger that could charge quickly (15-minute chargers etc.) because they can harm the battery and I've heard reports of them exploding, even. So I was looking for one where I could adjust the charge rate so it's not ridiculously slow (16 hours at ~.1C), and not so fast that it's bad for the battery (Over 1.0C or probably anything faster than an hour or so). The C here stands for the battery capacity, so .1C for a 2000mAh battery is 200 mA. I usually charge where it takes maybe three or so hours.
Anyway, I love this device because of the flexibility and power it gives you. The average person might look at this and think "this charger seems a bit excessive, the one I have works fine". However, I've found this unit to be extremely easy to use. If you only insert the batteries and wait a few seconds, it will begin charging them at 1000mA, which is usually fine for most batteries. Of course, you can change this rate from 200-2000 mA and it offers functions that can restore some of the lost capacity of your older batteries (unless their capacitance is too high, in which case it will say "HIGH" and will not charge [you can attempt to do a discharge and try again, though]). My old batteries weren't low self-discharge and were only lasting about an hour. I ended up getting new ones that don't lose charge so quickly once you stop using them, but I've found this unit has greatly helped their battery life. The display is very bright and easy to read (I usually have to cover it at night if I'm charging batteries because it's so bright and right on my desk), and with it you can track your batteries over time by looking at the "capacity" it tells you (really just the amount of mAs it put in, I'm assuming this INCLUDES those lost as heat, but it is still useful).
The device isn't hard to use, but sometimes I find that if I insert all the batteries at once, it begins charging the first cell I inserted because it has individualized circuits for each slot (which is a good thing, since you can control the charging of each slot), so usually I insert one at a time and program them. It only takes a few seconds to program a cell. I used the "break-in" mode for my new batteries and they seem to be doing quite well, but this takes over 36 hours usually as it charges, then discharges, then charges at .1C.
Overall, I think this charger is good for any consumer. I think people need to stop using fast chargers which ruin their batteries. This charger is a bit expensive, at around 60 dollars with shipping, but it will save you a LOT of money by lengthening the life of your batteries, and it's a one-time investment that makes sense if you use batteries at all. I am extremely satisfied with this product, and believe it is one of the best, if not the best charger on the market.
Customer Review: The best... so far
Summary: 5 Stars
I have only had this charger for a few days and I believe you should only give a product review after having it for awhile, but I will do an update here if necessary.
I am by no means an expert of any kind when it comes to batteries/chargers. In fact, I never even knew about different charge rates, etc until a week ago.
My old digital camera kept telling me that the batteries were depleted even though I just charged them. I blamed the camera and found out (after buying a new camera) that it was the batteries not being charged properly (too fast).
I started reading about proper charge rates and capacity's and how fast charging (what I was doing on a cheap charger) is harmful, etc., etc.
I had a hard time deciding which charger to get: BC-700/900 or the C9000.
I finally decided on the C9000 since it had a couple more features I liked over the others. I was concerned about the LCD read-out only showing 1 slot at a time. People were complaining about having to wait about a minute for it to cycle around to the slot you want to read. I liked the features of this so much that I felt I could wait 1 miunte.
THIS IS NOT TRUE. You do not have to wait for the slots to cycle. You can press the slot key to go directly to the slot you want. It will then give you that slot's information immediately. No waiting at all!
If you have all 4 slots going and you want to know about slot #4 and it is on slot #1, just press the slot key (3x) and it goes to that slot.
Others have said that it takes awhile to learn the features and how to use the C9000. Again, I am no expert but this unit is almost self explanatory on how to use it. The only thing you would have to read the manual for is how to choose which cycle you want to use. Once you pick the cycle (i.e. analyze & refresh) the rest is simple.
Another thing I don't know why people complain about is that it takes too long to program 4 batteries. They say it is too many buttons to push.
The first time I used this, I had all 4 batteries programmed in 30 seconds; and I am brand new at this. I like the control it gives me over EVERY slot so of course you are going to have to push a few buttons for each slot. That's the great control you have for your batteries. But if thirty seconds to program 4 batteries is too long.....
The LCD is bright and large and the unit has a "prop-up" bar on the back which makes reading even easier.
As mentioned in the beginning, my first impressions of this charger is 5 stars for quality, ease of use, features and versatility. I will do an update in a few months to see if things have changed.
I am very glad I bought this over the LaCrosse since the one feature I was concerned about (the waiting for the info.on the cycling of the slots) was quickly eliminated.
Great product and I would highly recommend it.