ZTS Inc. MBT-1 Multi-Battery Tester for More Than 30 Different Battery Types

This device is awesome! I found myself throwing away good batteries due to the fact I could not tell which one's were good and bad when installing multiple batteries into a product - sometimes even thinking the item itself was defective. This device has been right on the money when testing batteries and automatically turns on and off when using - just start testing your batteries. We put up massive amounts of holiday decorations at our home so we needed one that tests all sorts of batteries, even our vehicle remotes, and this device has been a life saver. I highly recommend.

Works as advertised: Accurately measures battery voltage under load in order to derive capacity...no-load voltage measurements cannot do that.Both measurements can tell you if your battery is "Good". Only one, however, can tell you what your battery is "Good" for.Big difference.Capacity matters!More expensive than a cheap voltmeter but well worth the investment as far as I'm concerned.

Works great. Tested 178 lithium AA and AAA and 22 alkaline AA batteries. Tested each battery 3 times and the results were consistent with a few exceptions. Im an engineer and I would recommend this product if your testing a large amount of batteries especially lithium batteries due to there high cost.

That’s how much I love it. This is expensive for a “battery checker” but if you have several battery-operated devices in your home/work it becomes indispensable. This creates a load on the battery so it can truly be tested. The amazing part is I’ve never had a battery I couldn’t test. I have four different button batteries. It tests them all. I’m a geek so I have many strange contraptions with weird batteries. I’ve been able to check them all. It has eight ‘states.’ Dead, 10%, 10%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80% and 100%. As long as you identify the battery correctly, place it on the interface…positive down…and place the probe on the negative pole, you will receive an accurate reading. I even used it as a diagnostic tool for a device I built. I felt I was pulling more current than I should be because I was running through batteries. I found a piece of solder that, while the device was still working, it was draining the batteries. I also discovered some name brand batteries purchased over a few weeks were arriving almost dead but a multimeter (VOM) did not indicate an issue.I’ve used their customer service. Suddenly many of my batteries were failing the tests after a year of using the MBT-1. Turns out the meter was failing. I contacted them and had a new one before I could even box up the old one. So they stand behind their products. So, yes, it’s expensive but so are batteries…especially the Lithium ones. So for me this was very much worth the cost. It’s been especially handy at Christmas when some of the battery-powered lights still had last year’s batteries in them. I was able to make a solid determination whether the batteries I tested could last the four weeks our decorations were up. And finally I dropped a certain brand of rechargeable batteries because I discovered they were draining much faster in disparate devices. So this has saved me both time and money.I’m about to replace my second one. It’s not the fault of the tester. I have a weird nerve disease that assists gravity often. ;-) But definitely treat it gently or maybe leave it in a case.

This is the best cell tester I know of on the market. This package does not include the separate fitted soft neoprene case that I recommend to all purchasers to protect their investment in the instrument, which can be found at ZTS SC-MBT1 - Protective Soft Case for MBT-1 Battery Tester. This MBT-1 tester bundled with the soft case is The ZTS Multi-Battery Tester With Case - MBT-1.I've had an MBT-1 tester for four years and use it quite frequently. Although a knowledgeable technician can replicate this pulse battery test with appropriate resistors and an inexpensive digital multimeter (DMM), the ease of use, speed of use, and unambiguous results make the MBT-1 worthwhile to anyone who works with cells ('batteries') or keeps cells on hand in various states of charge. I use four Energizer lithium cells to power mine, mostly because this type of cell has a reduced change of leaking and damaging the expensive MBT-1.To test, each cell is held by hand with the positive or button end down against the appropriate contact point on the tester, while the attached probe is pressed to the negative end. The scanning LED sweeps visibly back and forth across the face during the scanning, which lasts three seconds, and then clearly stops at the indicated charge level. You can hear the relay clicking inside the unit as it gives your readout, and again afterward as you break the circuit.Testing questionable cells will definitely prevent those with life from heading to the garbage bin. It's not surprising that I've used the MBT-1 to test cells from the battery recycle bin and found new and nearly-new matched sets discarded by others. The ZTS MBT-1 is also extremely useful for verifying that matched sets of cells all retain the same level of charge -- having a weak nonrechargeable cell get charged by other cells in a series frequently leads to alkaline battery leaks. (This is also why single-cell devices like flashlights are useful to use up the remaining life from unmatched single cells.)I've tested AA, AAA, C, D, and 9-volt alkaline cells, AA and AAA 1.5V lithium cells, CR123, CR2032, CR2016, and CR2 3.0V lithium cells in the nonrechargeable (primary) category. In rechargeable (so-called secondary cells) I've tested 3.7V nominal conventional lithium-ion cells, mostly in size 18650. The MBT-1 doesn't test LiFePO4 chemistry, but despite the best efforts of several firms that chemistry remains rare in both cells and chargersThe MBT-1 is labeled 'Made in U.S.A.' and serial numbered on the rear. The outer perimeter is a bumper made of stiff rubber-like synthetic, and has a form-fitting groove to hold the probe at the end of its attached wire. It's very solidly constructed and seems like it would last decades with proper care.Now to the downsides. Besides being a fairly large and weighty device for an electronic instrument, there is only one disadvantage: price. Used appropriately, this tester could save its purchase price in a year or two of frequent use. What's unexpected, though, is that the price of this tester seems to rise steadily every year, like vintage champage.It seems unlikely any patent protection remains on basic pulse load-testing of cells, but even so it doesn't seem like anyone has produced a comparable alternative as yet. If ZTS follows the pattern set by other firms, the price will stay high until a competitor appears, then they'll quickly lower the price to match the competitor. Even so, ZTS might want to think about increasing their products' value before they get disrupted by a nimble offshore competitor. For example, ZTS can bundle the optional soft neoprene case without decreasing the price point of the product.

Bought this for those hard to test lithium batteries and it paid for itself quickly. Used to throw out lithium batteries from trail cams and bought this to test if they were all bad. Came to find that a good portion of the batteries still had a reasonable charge and could be reused in other devices. Works well, consistent results and easy to use. Light weight and durable