I have been enjoying the iCharger X8 for a couple of weeks. As someone who works a lot with rechargeable batteries (for my DIY home solar storage system), I find that this tool is definitely worth its price.
The function of a battery charger is conceptually simple, but there are simpler chargers and there is this charger. This one has the versatility of being programmable to handle currents up to 30A and voltages up to 49V. That's power in the kilowatt. It will do cell balancing for up to an 8S battery (8 cells in series), with the individual cell balancing currents of up to 2A. It will log data into a microSD memory card, for download to a PC later for analysis.
The iCharger X8 uses the "buck-boost" circuit topology, hence it can transfer energy from a low-voltage cell to a higher-voltage battery, or vice versa. This means you can use a 12V supply source to charge a 24V battery, for example.
What I particularly like is the discharging function with regeneration. The only way of measuring a battery capacity is to draw power from it. However, many chargers simply dissipate this energy as heat, and doing that with power level up to a kW takes a big heater with a fan for cooling. With this charger buck-boost circuit, I can draw down the energy from the cell under test and transfer it to a larger battery of a high voltage, which is of course of a much larger capacity in order to be able accept the charge. When the "small" cell under test is already kWh size, that's a lot of energy wasted as heat if you do not have this regeneration feature.
I am impressed by the small size (fits in your palm), perhaps even more than its versatility. And I initially thought that this is an American product, but it appears to be a product designed and produced by a Chinese company. The user interface via a single thumbwheel is fairly good, and does not take long to get used to.
Not earthshaking, but it is a well-designed product, both electronically as well as mechanically. If the Chinese can design and build products like this, Western electronic companies have a lot of competition to be concerned about.
