Sennheiser BA2015 - Functional alternatives?

[Solstace]

Hi everyone!

 

We're just finding our first batch of BA2015's coming to the end of their lives, after something like 2 years I think. For what seems to be a pair of AA Ni-Cads in a frame with some management contacts, £60-70 per mic seems something of a large expense for the convenience of cradle charging...

 

Don't get me wrong, we LOVE the cradle charging and likely won't be moving away from it anytime soon after the nightmares we had with the loose AA's we were previously managing with a rack-charger, and the numerous ways we found of making that simple setup go hilariously wrong.

 

BUT, I wonder whether things have moved on in the Sennheiser world, such that we can now spend that kind of money on something a little more erm... "current"?

 

I'm also wondering if anyone's tried out some of these generics:

Battery Trader or BigUpGadgets

 

I know we get what we pay for, but on a pocket-lint and half-chewed toffee budget, it's getting harder to justify "pro" pricing to those who think they know better... I can keep up the fight, but would love some real-world evidence and anecdotes to back up the case, or even tell me "it's okay".

[sam.spoons]

How often do they get used? £60 represents 120 pairs of Procells. Is this a school? if so term time is around 40 weeks in the year so that's 1.5 uses per week always using box fresh batteries. They'll probably do two typical sessions on one set of batteries so that equates to three sessions a week.

[Solstace]

It's a church/conference/events setting, and all 8 mics get used several times a week. I'm therefore looking at the equivalent of around 1500 pairs of Procells per year, if we assume we need fresh for every event. So even if we replace all 8 packs in a year, we still basically break even, and get to save on wear-and-tear on the mics themselves (it's amazing how rough people can get even just changing batteries...)

[timsabre]

Have not seen one of these up close, but couldn't you just replace the Nimh cells in it? If they are tagged cells, CPC sell them.

[sam.spoons]

It's a church/conference/events setting, and all 8 mics get used several times a week. I'm therefore looking at the equivalent of around 1500 pairs of Procells per year, if we assume we need fresh for every event. So even if we replace all 8 packs in a year, we still basically break even, and get to save on wear-and-tear on the mics themselves (it's amazing how rough people can get even just changing batteries...)

 

Fair enough, t'was just a thought.

[Solstace]

And a very good one at that - made me double-check the maths! :)