Video Game Deals

Best rechargeable batteries for the Wii

If you’ve been using your Wii for exercise, one of the things you find is that you go through a lot of batteries. Just a few workouts swinging the Wii remote or stepping on the Balance Board will run your batteries dry very quickly.

Not only is it bad for the environment to be tossing all those Duracells and Energizers away every couple of weeks, it’s not all that great for your wallet either.

Personally, I haven’t bought an alkaline battery in the store for years. Instead, I got these Eneloops by Sanyo. If you’ve been disappointed by rechargeable batteries in the past, whether because they don’t last long or because they completely die very quickly, it’s time to give rechargeables a second look.

These batteries are different for a couple reasons. First, when you buy them they already come fully charged, just like regular batteries. Just pop them into your Wii and you’re good to go for as many hours as you could expect with regular batteries.

The magic happens when they run out. You just pop them into a recharger, and in a few hours you’ve got a brand new set. For me, I’ve charged and recharged my Eneloops so many times I’ve lost count, and yet they still keep a full charge. I actually keep two sets for each Wiimote, one to use in the Wiimote, and the other fully charged so I can swap them out. They say you can charge them up to 1500 times (3 years) before they start losing a charge–multiply that by the price you pay for batteries and you’ll realize how much money you’ll save. They even use arrays of solar panels to charge the batteries to full capacity at the factory before they ship–talk about being green!

The performance is actually superior to alkaline batteries and standard NiMH batteries.

Amazon sells the eneloop 4 Pack AA NiMH Pre-Charged Rechargeable Batteries as a set of four batteries.

You’ll need to purchase a charger as well, which you can get if you buy the Eneloop Power Pack with Battery Charger and batteries from Amazon (also available at your local CostCo). If you really want to go high-tech with the charger, consider a charger like the La Crosse Technology BC-9009 AlphaPower Battery Charger. (Although while this charger comes with batteries, I still prefer the eneloops).

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