Rechargeable batteries

I needed to replace some old 1450 maH Nickel Metal Hydride AA batteries I was using in my Apple Bluetooth Keyboard and Mighty Mouse and went out comparison shopping.

What a surprise to find an incredible variance in prices and capacities, without any relationship to price. For example, Costco had Sanyo pre-charged Eneloop kits at 2000 mAH. The Source had 4 packs of Energizers at 1800 MaH for $17.95 and Wal-Mart had 4 packs of Duracell AA at 2650 mAH for only $10.95 (which where cheaper than lower capacity Energizers and other off-brand batteries). But if you bought a kit with a charger you could not get the higher capacity batteries. Weird.

The lesson here is that not all rechargeable batteries are the same, and it is often not clear by the packaging what you are buying.