alt Hacker NewsWas just checking out the Index 01 [1]:
> Why can't it be recharged?
> We considered this but decided not to for several reasons:
> You'd probably lose the charger before the battery runs out!
> Adding charge circuitry and including a charger would make the product larger and more expensive.
> You send it back to us to recycle.
I don't think this is true. The charging circuit could have been in the charger itself. To provide access to the battery, one of the terminals could be behind a transistor enabled by the micro. The charger could then send a signal to the ring to unlock the battery terminal. Then all you needed to do was expose two/three pads externally.
Replies
Yeah, that's really not great at all! From their website:
> Wait, it's single use? Yes. We know this sounds a bit odd, but in this particular circumstance we believe it's the best solution to the given set of constraints
I don't want to be too harsh, since it seems like the pebble team are working hard at producing some exciting tech. But intentionally making a single use device is phenomenally irresponsible in today's climate.
I know they say they'll recycle them, but it'd be naive to expect anything other than a tonne of these becoming e-waste.
Yeah I agree if it was 10 yrs then I would say no need to charge, but apparently it's 2 yrs? In that time frame you could totally recharge it.
I agree losing the charger is actually pretty likely but THAT'S ON ME. For a $75 product, I don't want to consider it a consumable.
So 100% agreed, +$10 add terminals and a special charger.
Cool, let me know when I can order your ring.
A piezo button would be neat, might be able to generate enough electricity for each use without having to rely on a battery at all. Not sure about the form factor here though.
I’m also baffled that they didn’t do this. If I am buying something that becomes so precious to my workflow then I don’t want a hardware subscription. I also want peace of mind that the company will not be gone, or the product discontinued in a few years.
Hopefully version two is rechargeable.
This is version one, I'm not particularly worried as I will probably upgrade to version two by the time the battery runs out.
> To provide access to the battery, one of the terminals could be behind a transistor enabled by the micro
So it’s a brick as soon as the battery goes flat?
IIRC EU markets now mandate the USB-C charger for devices (which is not a bad thing, too many throwaway custom chargers....). Adding the port, the USB-C PD circuitry may take up too much room. I think this approach would require some kind of custom charging cradle (probably usb-c connected..). Is having a custom usb-c adapter to charge a device allowed under the rules?
I think it uses a silver oxide battery which is not rechargeable.
Exposed terminals would need a lot more than a single transistor. It would need ESD protection and it would change the outer case from being a complete sealed over mold into something that had to seal against two exposed terminals. That’s a big change.
They would also need to ship a separate charger device to go with it, which approaches the complexity of the simple ring product.
These are solvable problems, but it would increase the cost, decrease their margins, or both.
For a niche, low volume product with an unknown market demand I think making the simplest possible version of the product is a good idea to start, but at $99 it’s getting into the range where buyers don’t want to think of it as a disposable item.
The bigger problem is that the 2 year battery life depends on the device being used for only short notes like “Add milk to the grocery list”. The people who expect to use this for taking notes or thinking out loud could exhaust the battery in a couple months.