MP4 got a dead battery???

MP4s from China can’t turn on, is the battery dead? It’s a waste of money!
Most of the time if the MP4 cannot be turned on, it is due to a faulty USB cable, or plug. Sometimes the buyer didn’t charge enough time before using it, so we need to charge it right in order to have it works properly.

Q.1 How can I charge the MP4?
1. Connecting it to your PC/laptop/Mac
2. Through the wall plug

Q.2 How to make sure the MP4 is charged successfully?
Once your USB cable is connected to the MP4 and the power source, you need to make sure the battery charging logo appears on the screen. Eventhough it may later goes away, as soon as you press the MENU button, you will see the same screen again. This make sure the power source is supplying power efficiently.

Q.3 How long do I need to charge it for?
To ensure faster charging, using the wall plug is recommended over the PC since the power source is higher.
For wall plug, please charge it for 3 hours, if you charge by the PC, please charge it for 5 hours. This ensure about one hour of play time.
We do carry batteries of longer lives, which can play for 2-3 hours after fully charged at a different price. This need to be specially ordered, please contact us if you are interested.

Q.4 How do I know the unit is on?
Please refer to the picture above. The switch should be in either the right or left position. You may noticed that it will turn to sleep mode automatically. This help saves some energy to keep it up longer. To adjust this time, please refer to the next question. To wake up the unit from sleep mode, please hold the round button (3-4 seconds) in the center.

Q5. I try both the wall plug and the computer, I can’t see the battery icon, what’s next?
In such case, the USB cable or plug may be dead. Please try with your own USB cable, if you know that the cable is dead, please contact us for a FREE replacement.

Q.6 How do we know your new MP4 carries a good battery?
We asked our supplier to FULLY CHARGE each MP4 before delivering to us. In such case, we can ensure they carry a good battery which can be charged up fully.

Touch Screen MP4′s and their usage

2.8″ TFT touch screen + Build-In Stylus MP4

Q1. They are good companion to school or work, fun and convenient to use

It comes with a stylus installed inside, very easy and convenient to use. Software on this unit is easy and simple in operation.

 

Q2. How to turn on the unit?

1. Step 1. Turn the button to the on position
2. Step 2. Hold down the button on the other side of the unit.

Q3. What kind of video format does it support?
It supports 240×360 avi format. To convert video to this format, please download AVIConverter, you should get this software from the world wide web. Many individual companies have this software for download.
Please note: there are newer version of MP4 (known as MP5) they can play rmvb formats directly. I think they are much more convenient to use, since no conversion is required. However, this one is not bad … after the conversion, even subtitle is very clear from the small screen

Q7. How do you use this MP4? I can’t understand the menu that comes with it…
Let me use the following example to illustrate the usage.

1. In the first screen, pick the SETTINGS icon by the styllus.
2. You will see the second screen, pick PERSONAL SETUP from the second screen.
3. In the third screen, pick the time in seconds.

**Please note, during this process, if you want to return to the previous menu, press the white arrow.(please refer to the third picture)

Q4. What should I do when data corruption occurs?
You can fix this problem by reformating the unit. To do this, plug it into the PC/laptop. It will appears as a default drive in the operating system (Windows, Linux or Mac), right click on your mouse and select FORMAT.

Q5. How to avoid data corruption from occurring?
Use the SAFETY REMOVE HARDWARE before removing the MP4 from the computer / laptop.

Q6. Do we have some example of our MP4 showing videos

coral reef 1

coral reef 2

coral reef 3

Beware of MP4 fake memory? You bought a 4G/8G it became 512?

Fake memory MP4 selling on some website /at eBay, watch out!!

Someone out there want to make more money without thinking twice!   I know that selling fake memory makes more money, however WE WILL NEVER DO THIS, I rather choose not be selling anymore if I have to sell fakes to cheat.

The cost of 1G/2G is about two thirds of 4G chip. As for 8G’s chip they are even more expensive than 4G. Everytime we asked for the price quote in China, we will emphasis the fact that we DO NOT WANT UPGRADES, well in Chinese that means fake memory.

Q1. How do we know the MP4 contains fake memory? It will be showing the real memory capacity once you format the MP4. My supplier in China told me some online companies uses 1G’s to upgrade to 4G’s or even 8G’s. Some uses 512 to upgrade to 2G’s. or 4G’s

Q2. How to format the MP4? You can fix this problem by reformating the unit. To do this, plug it into the PC/laptop. It will appears as a default drive in the operating system (Windows, Linux or Mac), right click on your mouse and select FORMAT.

Don’t be surprise if you discovered the MP4 contains less memory than you expected it to be. You can buy from seller with better reputation in order to avoid this from happening.

What makes a long lasting battery in MP4?

Comparing our batteries with other batteries

A different kind of battery in our MP4 – with Polymer Lithium battery.

Left - Li-polymer battery (MP4 from Hobby Unlimited Int’l)
Right - Regular Li-ion battery (provided by other companies)

All our MP4 comes with a high quality,  full size Li-Polymer battery, which ensures longer fun time and less hassle.

So what is a Lithium-ion polymer battery?

Lithium-ion polymer (Li-Polymer) batteries use lithium as an active ingredient. The lithium in these batteries isn’t packed into cells as it is in lithium ion batteries. Instead, it is contained in a polymer solid composite gel. They utilize this gelled electrolyte to increase conductance.
What is the advantage of using Li-poly batteries over Lithium ion batteries (Li-Ion)?

1. Lower cost manufacturing and being more robust to physical damage. In addition, they utilize a dry polymer which enables them to be manufactured in a greater variety of shapes and sizes than Li-Ion batteries.

 

2. Unlike Li-ion, having a rigid metal case, polymer cells have a flexible, foil-type (polymer laminate) case, but they still contain organic solvent. The main difference between commercial Li-Poly and Li-Ion cells is that in the latter the rigid case presses the electrodes and the separator onto each other, whereas in polymer cells this external pressure is not required because the electrode sheets and the separator sheets are laminated onto each other. Since no metal battery cell casing is needed, the battery can be lighter and it can be specifically shaped to fit the device it will power. Because of the denser packaging without intercell spacing between cylindrical cells and the lack of metal casing, the energy density of Li-poly batteries is over 20% higher than that of a classical Li-ion battery and they store more energy than nickel-cadmium (NiCd) and nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries of the same volume.

 

3. Li-polymer battery has a greater life cycle degradation rate. However, in recent years, manufacturers have been declaring upwards of 500 charge-discharge cycles before the capacity drops to 80% (see Sanyo).

 

4. They have excellent Charge/discharge cycle characteristics, plus no memory effect after repetitive cycles, with self-discharge less than 10% per month.

 

5. They process a wide discharging temperature range of -20 °C to +60 °C, can maintain comparatively high performance no matter where our customers locate.

 

6. With all the above great profiles, they can still be the size of a regular credit card, due to the gelled electrolytes, which enables simplified packaging by eliminating the metal shell.

 

7. With all the above excellent safety characteristics, more resistant to overcharge, and less chance of electroyte leakage.

 

To recharge the cell, please keep it charge for at least 3 hours, up to 8 hours at a maximum, you should be able to enjoy 2 hours of music.  

I bring it to work on my way to work, every day the commute takes about an hour to my office and an hour back.  I can watch predownloaded videos while I am waiting in the subway… this is especially good when there are too many people in the train and I have to just stand up in a corner… whenever reading newspaper became impossible.  This little gadget just fits in my palm, became my companion to work  

Links showing available adapters for HP Laptops

Due to the huge size of the list (if I add HP and Compaq together) it is quite too big and difficult to handle… I put the HP AC Laptop Adapters in one link, then the available Compaq laptop AC adapter in another link.

… only black is available, comes with 2 years warranty and a 5.5 feet cable

CE Certify AC Adapter, durable, plus 2 years warranty, strong interior and steady flow of electricity

AC adapter makes from one piece of metal

As the usage of PCs / notebooks / laptops increase in popularity, more and more of us has one or more laptops or netbooks at home. As a consequence, everyone has the opportunity to own AC adapters, no matter white or black in color, connected by long or short cables, they differ in their quality, however, just looking at the outside is quite difficult to tell… so what contributes a better adapter?

Please click on the image or a description to a better ac adpter to find out more…

You may want to get an extra one to be used at home, or at the office. The beauty and convenience of having laptop or netbook is the light weight, if we always need to bring the adapter with us, that kinda defeats the purpose of having a light unit …

How to choose the right ac adapter? You are welcome to send us email to customerservice@bobcatpower.com or use the search function found on our front page.
http://www.bobcatpower.com/

Go to http://www.bobcatpower.com

Go to >>> www.bobcatpower.com

HP Mini 1000? Acer Aspire One? IBM thinkpad?

New updates on April 14, 2009

I recently spend sometime updating the links, showing the available AC Adapters for Acer Aspire One

and Laptop Adapters for EEE PC Mini Notebook

I also have the available AC Adapters for Dell Mini Notebooks

Both colors are available. They are CE Cerify, from a pretty reliable third party company we have been buying from for years.

Buying a laptop/netbook?

As the popularity of netbook surges, more and more users are switching to netbook (HP Mini 1000/Acer Aspire One) compared to traditional notebook (IBM T60/ Acer Aspire 4520/ dell inspiron 6000).   As a long time notebook user, I always want my notebook to be a multipurpose platform, having everything a PC have is a “basic” requirement.   However, looks like my requirement is kinda out dated, I know this is not other people thinks…

When we go pick up our favorite coffee in Starbuck’s, I ‘ve seen many small netbooks(ASUS EEE PC, Acer Aspire One), accompanying their owners to the coffee shop to browse the web.  As we sell adapters, we also see a growth in the needs of ac adapters for netbooks.   When I check the specifications of different netbooks, including Acer Aspire One, HP Mini 1000, and etc.

So what is a netbook?  The main difference of a netbook and a traditional laptop is, the physical size (I this this is rather obvious… A netbook is about 2.5lbs but a notebook is about 5-10lbs) but in fact when we look inside, there is another difference, which is the CPU (or the brain of the unit) make the big difference.

Netbooks generally uses Intel® Atom™ processor(1.60 GHz), this basically means it is not a fast processor.  Let me put it this way, the reason why we call it slow is because it is actually an older technology that was used a few years back.  The cycle of computation is comparatively slower.  However, it does satisfy the usage if used in a netbook, when all it does is going online, IM, listening to music, watching video or playing causal games (as stated in HP’s website).   Due to the fact that it is rather slow in nature, it couldn’t support an additional graphic card inside this unit, as a result, the unit relys on the shared grahpics supplied from the chipset.

However, due to the beautiful cover and colors, using a netbook has became trendy and fashionable which attracts young web surfers.   The convenience to share photos and music anywhere has made a gathering fun and unforgettable.  So if we have a few hundred dollars to spend, what would you choose?

Netbooks…
1.  Light weight (portable)
2.  Color (fashionable factor)
3.  Keyboard size (remember that deal to the small screen, the keyboard is smaller than a regular labtop)
4.  Cannot play mainstream games  (esp. 3D Games)
5.  Can use windows office.
6.  Can only use simple photo editing tool (photoshop or fireworks CS2/CS3/CS4) is for sure out of reach.
7.  Send and receive emails.

So if you are thinking of using a few hundred dollars (US$) to buy something, I suggest you can decide on whether you wish the unit
to fit in your backpack, or your handbag (for ladies) or the jeans pocket (for guys) depends on the usability.  If a bigger screen is  important, then you should get a laptop instead.  After deciding which one to choose, if you end up spending less money then you expect, then you may load up in the memory or hard disc size so that you can fit more nice pictures or your favorite videos in that netbook.

According to the website of these two units, both HP Mini 1000 XP Edition and Acer Aspire One can support up to 2GB, as for the hard drive, Acer Aspire One comes with a 250GB hard drive but the HP mini 1000 only has 60 GB hard drive.

Here are some interesting calculations…

1G = 1024MB

One song is about 5000-10000KB, let’s take 8000KB(8MB)
Acer Aspire One  can hold up to 128 songs* 250 = 32000 songs
HP mini 1000 holds up to 128 songs * 60 =7680 songs

My dogs and their puppie’s times…

It's getting late...

When are we going home?

We have 3 pomeranians.  One of them is the mother of the other 2.   The father of the puppies belongs to a breeder.  It was a great experience to feed and bring up 2 puppies from birth, it feels like they are babies of our family.  Everyday when we go to work, we will bring them with us in the office. 

Be Be

Dicky

Dicky (2008)

Fay (mother dog) + cables

Be Be (2008)

Since they were allowed to run around in our office which is about 2000 sq feet, they grown up to be quite large poms, much larger than regular sizes. 

Since they like to bark at strangers, whenever people deliver goods to our company, they bark so much that it is actually quite annoying!!!  Since we are animal lovers, I guess this is why our website also starts with animal name!

Greetings from Dicky and Bebe (www.bobcatpower.com)

Need a new laptop adapter, replace old or extra item on the trip?

When do you need before buying a new laptop adapter?   For frequent travelers, extra adapters may be an important assets, information given in this article may be useful.

One day when the laptop stop charging, may be you think it’s time to get a new adapter.   However, it may not be the case.  If you have more than one adapter, please try both adapters before ordering a new one.   Chances are, if you have an aged laptop, the mother board may be at fault after being in service for a long time, if the problem is due to a bad mother board, you will need to fix that instead of getting a new adapter.

Battery is another issue, generally, the life span of a laptop battery is about 2 years.  If the battery is dead, instead of getting an adapter, you will need to get a battery instead.  Laptop batteries are expensive, it’s one of our assets especially for those whose laptop is an equipment at work, as a result, it’s important to protect it properly so that it can well live pass 2 years.

Money saving tips for laptop owners

My IBM T43 is now 3 and a half years old, fortunately my battery is still in good shape.  I have include my battery information as in the attached picture below.  Ever since I start using this laptop, the charge threshold of the battery was adjusted according to the suggested level.

To increase battery lifespan, you have set your battery
to start charging when below 60% and to stop charging at 90%.

Battery Maintenance

I think this plays an important role in helping the battery stays in good shape after 3 and a half years.  I heard another customer talked
about his battery was dead after using the laptop for 2 years at Lenovo’s office when I was waiting to get back my laptop for repair service.  However, my battery stays in good condition after 3 and a half year.

I have heard a lot of suggestion regarding battery maintainance, the most frequent suggestion I have heard is – to discharge  and recharge it constantly.  As for me, I think the most important thing is to avoid the battery from fully charge 100% and  stays here all the time.  I believe the easiest way to kill a battery is to overcharge it always and consistantly.  As long  as the battery stays good, it helps us save money on other things we might need to spend instead.  This is quite important,  especially with limited resource, it’s wise to take good care of our assets and spend only when necessary.

Battery Maintenance