I don't think that Ikea Ladda batteries are Eneloops

I've got the white Ikea Ladda AAA NIMH batteries. Pack of four. Bought some five years ago.

One pair has lived as a swap in to my single AAA MP3 player, so each battery gets used in my player for the day, then gets swapped with a fresh battery the next day for a solid 10 hours of playing time.

The other pair has lived in my remote control and has been charged at most 10 times in the past 5 years.

I've used the Ladda USB charger the entire time. My LaCrosse charger died long ago, and the Ladda charger has proven adequate, although in this case, I do wish for some of the info from the LaCrosse.

Recently the MP3 AAA's have been lacking in playing time, so being many years into it's role, a fitting retirement into the remote control was in order with those batteries being called up to front line duty seemed in order.

Surprisingly the remote batteries has the same 'capacity' as the batteries they replaced even though they've seen 1/20th the number of cycles. Both sets might be able power on for a couple of hours, but if I fast forward a track, which may have an increased current requirement, causes a voltage drop and power off the player. This can happen within a half hour, or after a couple of hours. This may depend on each individual battery, or possibly the imperfect charger I'm using, although I've read that each compartment has a seperate charging circuit.

Interestingly enough, both sets from the same pack seem perfectly fine in all other devices, especially my high demand 2xaaa headlamp, and surprisingly, I think that my one pair of 1st gen chrome/green Laddas have enough capacity to last me an entire day and will be pressed back into service with the MP3 player.

So capacity may be the same, but the useable mah above a certain voltage/current seems to have disappeared.

Eneloops are famed for their longevity, not sure about how they fare with having that same nature of 'full' voltage/current.

Still happy with the performance with the Laddas. They will eventually be retired into headlamp and remote use and all the thermometers I have in the house that run on AAA batteries where those rechargeables are barely useable.

It doesn't seem like the OP was asking a question but merely making a statement based on experience. To be sure, it didn't seem to be a rant 🙂. Also they was no request for comments but perhaps the OP knew that there would be some 😉.
RE: the root statement "I don't think that Ladda batteries are Eneloops", without an "off the record" statement from the manufacturer (unlikely) that will be difficult to confirm. I've done a few Google searches and while there aren't any unequivocal confirmations, the common thread was that ALL batteries labeled "Made in Japan" are made in the same factory! Like other products that come from the same plant, the production lines can be set up differently for separate runs and while a product make look similar they may be different internally. I do suspect however, is that when the specifications of one product are identical (or nearly so) to another product AND they each were made in the same factory, the label is the major (and perhaps only) difference! Draw your own conclusions.
As to the performance issues that the OP reported, I can't comment with any level of expertise. I will say that I believe the OP has clearly gotten his money's worth out of the pair of Laddas used in his MP3 player! If his everyday use/recharge routine was, in fact, everyday, those batteries would have each been recharged over 900 times 😳! I believe the Ladda packaging states 500 recharge cycles. I can't answer why the pair used in his TV remote (recharged twice a year) suffered the same decrement in performance. Perhaps there is a time factor unrelated to recharge cycles?
I don't fully understand the final statement in the OP's post. I get using the "past their prime" Laddas in the LED headlamps and remotes. My experience with household thermometers however, is that they function poorly (if at all) with 1.2V rechargeables and require new i.e. fully charged (1.5V) alkalines to function properly.
My take on the whole "Ladda vs Eneloop" issue is if batteries with nearly identical specifications can be had for less than half the cost, I'm not going to be a battery snob 😉. The closest IKEA is about 160 miles from where I live but I do visit the area at least once a year. On general principles, I'll pick up a pack of AAs or AAAs and retire the crappy Chinese Ni-MH ones that I bought before I became "aware" 😎.
Sovende

Regardless of brand, AAAs don't generally last as long as AAs, IME.

How's that for a non sequitur?

Chris

Quite the nonest sequitur that I've seen this week.
P

ChrisGarrett said:

Regardless of brand, AAAs don't generally last as long as AAs, IME.

How's that for a non sequitur?

Chris

Click to expand...

So, why did you waste the keystrokes?

Sovende said:

So, why did you waste the keystrokes?

Click to expand...

I'm in Los Angeles right now, taking care of pops and he sleeps a lot, so I had nothing better to do.

Chris

Now I'm shopping for replacements.

I used to get laddas for $5/pack from ikea, now they're $9/pack. Ouch. Ikea closed (thanks coronavirus).

DX.com? Dead. Nothing. No Soshines, or Enitimes or anything really. Used to have tens of choices with thousands of reviews. All gone. Just one crappy 1350mah (lol) brand.

Amazon seems to be flooded with dodgy counterfeits and/or very iffy quality controls, based on reviews.

I guess I'll walk into the botique druge stores I'm stuck with and see what the options are although they're usually filled with overpriced energizers or duracells for the posh crowd, although I would think that they would be genuine. In my head though, I have this sneaking suspicion that they make their rechargeables kinda crappy to encourage people to continue to pay for disposable one time use batteries.

The white Ladda's match the rated Eneloop Pro capacity. Those aren't known for their longevity, either.

My Ikea Laddas have been amazing consistent and reliable. I would expect that they are very similar to the FDK made Eneloop Pros.

I've long had the belief that they are made in the same factories, but not up to the same standards as eneloops. Unless the company buys eneloops and puts their label on it, then yeah. But I believe that a lot of these, like Amazon's, just use them as their supplier and manufacture, but don't pay for the quality that eneloops cost. I won't buy any re-wraps anymore, I only buy straight eneloop or fujitsu. I've done tests on fujitsu alkalines. Straight fujitsu, and the others I've caught that use fujitsu to re-wrap as their own. Like energizer, eveready, Amazon basic, Walgreens, etc. And both in use tests and with a c9000 tests. For example, the ones that they sell energizer at energizers price worked the full rated life in an incan mini mag, but the ones that eveready sells dies around 2 hours and 15 minutes. The eveready ones are around 3 dollars cheaper.