Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Samsung and Sanyo are just a few of the notebook makers that are prototyping next generation Laptop battery solutions.

Instead of Lithium Ion batteries, these companies are hoping that Methanol is going to be powering laptops in 2010 and beyond.

Benefits of Fuel Cell Powered Laptops:

• Longer battery life - Toshiba is claiming that their fuel cell model can crank out 10 hours of uninterupted use!
• Environmentally friendly - Breaking down lithium ion hurts the environment. Methanol cartridges on the other hand can be refilled and don’t have to be thrown out

Drawbacks of Fuel Cell batteries:

• *click*, *whirrr*, *bubble* - These new batteries make sounds when starting up that might remind you of a 10th grade science experiment.
• High costs - The cells aren’t commercially ready for the average consumer to be able to afford. Lithium Ion is still cheaper.
• Bulky - These batteries are bulky and oddly shaped. Needless to say, Scientists don’t have ‘aesthetics’ at the top of their priority list right now.

It’ll be a while before you can custom order a new Dell laptop with the fuel cell option. But that isn’t stopping the competition from finding cheaper and better ways to power notebooks.

BBC News Report: Fuel cells in Laptops

A new Survey put out by the Mobile PC Extended Battery Life Working Group (which also likes extending industry working group names) says that laptop users would pay up to 20% more for longer battery life.

Over 1,200 notebook users were polled in the US, Japan, Germany, and China.

According to the study, users said the average laptop runs only on batteries about 25 percent of the time. The study also found that 60 percent of standard users—and 75 percent of heavy users—say they recharge their notebooks every chance they get.

Via: [RedHerring]