Which is the most efficient battery for Arduino Uno?

Other Hardware General Electronics
21

dc42:

kurtselva:
So comes another qn: is a 9V battery better or a 3 AA battery connected directly to the 5V pin of arduino better?

3 x AA will last a lot longer. But check that your LCD works OK on 4.5V.

Sounds good. So for a current drawing abt 50mah from the arduino and the LCD, how long more would the 3 x AA battery power last as compared to the 9V battery?

How much mAh rating does 1 AA alkaline battery usually have? Tried searching online but the values are ranging from abt 700mAh to as much as 2000mAh..

And would it be better to use rechargeable batteries or normal ones?

22

http://data.energizer.com/ will give you typical capacities for alkaline batteries and the lithium versions of standard batteries. If you use rechargables, bear in mind that NiMH cells are about 1.2V not 1.5V, so you probably want to use 4 of them instead of 3.

23

dc42:
http://data.energizer.com/ will give you typical capacities for alkaline batteries and the lithium versions of standard batteries. If you use rechargables, bear in mind that NiMH cells are about 1.2V not 1.5V, so you probably want to use 4 of them instead of 3.

So am I right to say this:

Say I am using 4 x 1.2 V AA NiMH battery (2000mAh each). So total is 8000mAh and hence the battery would last for 8000/50 = 160 hrs which is slightly more than 6 days?

24

No, the batteries are in series, so the capacity will be 2000mAh.

25

dc42:
No, the batteries are in series, so the capacity will be 2000mAh.

Oh darn. But normal alkaline AA batteries has abt 2500mah, compared to 9V batteries that has only abt 600mah..

So I'll just go with 3 AA alkaline batteries, as it would at least be able to work for 2 days..

Just another doubt to clarify: the 4.5V supply wire has to go to the 5V pin or the Vin Pin of the arduino?

26

Oh no! Just checked the datasheet for my LCD display and it needs 5V supply.

So can I use 4 AA battery and connect it to the power socket in the arduino? WIll it loss too much power due to the 5V regulator heat dissipated?