The real hidden cost of the Wii

Chatting with my brother this evening, he was griping that the Wii's remote strap is not the problem, as has been reported elsewhere, but rather the battery life. He's been using normal Duracell alkaline batteries and getting 15 hours of play out of them. For reference, Nintendo says you can get as much as 35 hours.

So let's do some calculation. Let's assume you play 10 to 25 hours a week, every week, for a year. You buy 20-packs of AA batteries from Wal-mart for $9.76 plus some tax, which we'll just call $10 for the sake of round numbers. You run your single Wii remote down until it's dead each time before replacing the batteries. The following table tells you how much you can expect to spend per year for batteries based on your usage (per week) and the lifespan of your batteries.

So if you're only getting 15 hours of use before you change the batteries, as apparently is happening with my brother, then you could spend $35 per year just on batteries by playing as little as 10 hours per week. If you play 20 hours a week, you're up near $70. And if you have two Wii remotes, the cost will go even higher.

Apparently the manual discourages the use of rechargeables, although the page linked above says use Nickel Metal Hydride (NiMH) if you insist on doing so. I don't know how long those will last, but my experience has been that regular batteries will last longer than rechargeables will between charges.

These are not huge costs, but they are costs you won't see with a PlayStation 3 or an Xbox 360 controller. Naturally, Nintendo will no doubt offer a new rechargeable Wii remote very soon, giving you the chance to upgrade. I bet it won't be cheap either.

Update: Brother sent me this scan from his manual, just to point out the bit that says you should use alkaline batteries...to avoid BATTERY LEAKAGE. Of course, who reads the manual (besides my brother)?

Labels: nintendo, wii

--jvm at 21:03

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