Review: Energizer Flat Panel 4x Induction Charging System

Tonight when I got home, I had a surprise late-Valentine’s day gift from my wonderful wife – the Energizer Flat Panel 4x induction Charging System for the Nintendo Wii. I had seen these when they were originally announced by Energizer last year before Christmas, but they only had the 2x model available up until now and I wanted to hold out for this one. My wife, knowing her geeky husband very well, managed to sneak this order through and we got the first batch shipped out by Amazon. Does it live up to my expectations? Is this the Wii charger that Nikola Tesla could truly be proud of? Read on after the jump.

When we first got the Wii for the kids back in 2006, we used rechargeable AA in the controllers, which worked as well as you could expect. When we got tired of having to change the batteries every time they got low, we got a recharging system by Nyko so we could keep two controllers charged up all the time. Then, when Nintendo released the silicone sleeve (which we were greatly looking forward to, given the kids’ propensity to drop the controllers on the hard tile floors), that made things a little more difficult as now we’d have to take the sleeves off every time we wanted to charge since there were charging contacts on the back of the controllers for the Nyko batteries. This got to be a problem to the point that we simply stopped using the sleeves, which always made me nervous since our kids hate the wrist straps with a passion. So naturally, I was excited to see this inductive charging solution by Energizer since it was said to work through the silicone sleeve.

Upon opening the box, you see the picture to the left here, showing the Wii Remote in various stages of undress. The point being that you can inductively charge the controllers without having to remove the silicone sleeves or MotionPlus adapters if that’s your choice. The other side of the box presents the sexy flat panel induction charging panel and the four battery replacements assemblies. The battery assembly replaces the stock battery cover on the back of the controller with the inductive charge batteries attached to a new cover. The controller is lightly held into place on the charging mat by a small magnet. This works wonderfully on controllers without the sleeves on them, the magnet helps to guide the remote into the best position for the inductive charge. However, on my initial tests it is not as effective at holding the controller in the right position when the sleeve is on. You can feel a very slight pull, but not enough to really hold the controller in place very well.

I also had a difficult time keeping the charging lights steady when trying to charge with the sleeves on the controllers as well. At the top of the charging pad, there are nice bright images of the outline of a controller, which are green if the controller is fully charged and red if it is currently charging. Without the sleeves, I had all of the lights showing steady red, meaning they were charging correctly. With the sleeves, however, only two of the four would consistently stay lit red for charging – the outside two. The middle two would be red, then flash red a few times, then go out altogether and repeat that sequence. I couldn’t be sure they were properly lined up, as the magnets didn’t seem to help position them very well with the sleeves on.

One thing I wasn’t prepared for was how hot these controllers get when charging. The instruction booklet says that it is normal for them to get warm, but they were all certainly hotter than I was expecting – especially when charging with the sleeve on. Not quite hot enough to burn (hello, class-action suit…), but hot enough to give you pause. I’ll have to see if they remain hot by sitting on the pad after the charging cycle is over. They cool off within a minute or two, so most likely it’s not that big of a deal, just a little surprising. What I will have to test over time is the useful play time of the batteries. Energizer claims full charge from a completely drained battery in 4 hours, but I’ll have to see how long the charge lasts with general use. The good thing is that now we’ll always have 4 charged controllers at the ready for those Battle Royal games of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, the new Super Mario Bros. Wii, and Rock Band / Guitar Hero fun. Induction charging has been around for ages, and kits have started hitting the mainstream adding inductive charging to iPhones, Blackberries, PSP and DS systems, basically any electronic device you can think of. The problem is that they all require some kind of dongle that plugs into the charging port of the device or a case that adds bulk to what you’re trying to charge up. To me, this is a very elegant solution that Nikola would be proud of.

4 out of 5 star bits (would give 5 if the charging worked better with the sleeves on – continuing to test that and will report back in a later post)

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