Does Changing Batteries Have To Be So Complicated?

So I have this Zoom H2 recorder here. One of the little things that annoy me about it is that the batteries are upside down.

The leftmost battery has the positive terminal pointing downward. To me, this just ain't natural. I tend to think of the positive terminal as "up" and, as my language reads from left to right, I tend to thing of the battery on the left being the first one I insert. I want to put it in right side up and that's wrong. Since batteries only last about 3 hours in this thing, I can envision some time when I'm changing them in the near dark, don't remember how I took the dead ones out, and put fresh batteries in upside down. It probably won't do any damage (haven't checked that out yet - don't want to blow it up so soon) but it sure won't work that way.

Take a look at the gadgets that you have around and let me know how many you have that are "backwards" in this manner. Four infra-red remote controllers I found quickly, and my Minilyzer, have the leftmost battery oriented with the positive terminal "up."

so what's natural BTW the other battery is 'natural' by your definition. 1 out of 2 ain't bad these days IMO

Stand on your head while changing the batteries!!

This is one of those things that I pay absolutely no attention to, 'cause I have myriad other things to worry about.

I probably wouldn't have noticed.

I've been putting two-ended batteries in devices for over a half century and I never, ever, once thought there as a standard for which battery goes up or down.

Anyhow, that's flippin' nothing.

A coffee house friend brought a nice little Kodak 6 Mp camera in to have me look at (why me, Lord?) because the batteries died with the lens extended and then when she put new batteries in, it wouldn't work. (I suggested using alkalines rather than the cheapo carbon battery she had but I wasn't sure.)

Anyhow, I pull the batteries out to see if she's got the polarity right and I look at the flip top connector where it has polarity marking and then I look into the battery tubes and they're marked for polarity, too -- unfortunately, neither one agrees with the other!

There's no way the flip top door could go on the other way around. The polarity markings are stamped into metal on the door and molded into plastic in the tubes -- so it's not like someone put a sticker on backwards.

HOW ON EARTH does a company like Kodak sell a moderately expensive camera and let it get out the factory with something like that???

I found it just really hard to get over... I mean. Damn, that's bad. And I don't mean sick.

at least you dont have an ipod or iphone...

If you cant read the little picture stamped into the plastic, you need to give up all electronics and go back to a hand-cranked Edison wax cylinder recorder....

;-)

Not to bust your balls, but the springs are usually the first clue. I could change those batteries in the dark. The negative end always goes on the spring side.

Perhaps I'm missing something?

So ... you think the right hand battery should be the "upside down" one?

Why? And what has the way you're language reads got to do with it?

Something strange is happening to you Mike.

1st it was Aux sends in DAWs.

Now it's battery alignment in hand-held recorders.

Where has this new found reactionary stance to

electronics and software come from?

Yes, it's universal that the negative (or flat) end of the battery goes toward the cell, but the part that you're missing the intuition part. I just naturally grab a batter with the positive end pointing up or away from me when I'm putting it in at least the leftmost well of this sort of battery holder. Call it a habit, but it's what I do all the time.

So, in the dark, sure, I could think "Where's the spring? Oh, there. Gotta turn the battery over. Now where's the other spring?" But it's quicker if the battery is already in my hand in the proper orientation. Installing the second one with the opposite orientation is fairly common so that one isn't a problem for me.

In this particular recorder, the positive contact is recessed. While it's possible to insert a battery backwards, because of the way the positive end of the battery holder is constructed, the positive end won't make contact, so you won't damage the recorder, but neither will it work.

Now contemplate this: On a button cell, the bigger surface is the positive terminal. How are we ever supposed to remember all those things? I guess that's why battery holders nearly always have diagrams.

Battery holders have diagrams because we're a nation of lawsuits waiting to happen.

Speaking of lawsuits, this might amuse you. Here's a picture of the bottom of the H2:

The hole in the middle is a tripod socket. The symbol to the right of it with the X is, I believe, a trash can. I think they're trying to tell you not to throw trash in the tripod socket hole.

Or maybe they're telling you not to throw the H2 in the trash?

Yes they are telling you not to throw the H2 in the trash.

What you are looking at there is the WEEE symbol.

It has nothing to do with the screw hole for the Tripod stand.

On further investigation it looks like WEEE is an EU only initiative.

Probably doesn't apply in the U.S.A.

Clever deductive work there, Sherlock. I never thought of that, but I'll bet it (the concept if not the symbol) will become more common as the effort to keep haszrdous materials out of our landfills and waters. I wonder if a portion of the price of the H2 goes toward proper disposal.

Jeez... I thought you were gonna be addressing active-electronics basses that have 12 screws on the rear battery cover or something.

You've gotta be kidding. You're complaining about THAT??? Get a life.

I have no life. That's why I'm here.

Thanks...give me a PC and access to Google

and I can deduce just about anything.

Yes you did... you wrote:

"Or maybe they're telling you not to throw the H2 in the trash?"

1. Producers will be expected to pay an annual registration fee to the appropriate Agency.

2. Producers, or WEEE compliance schemes acting on their behalf, will be required to report

data on the amount of WEEE which they put onto the market.

3. Producers will be required to report this data annually to the Agencies. It will be an

offence not to do so.