Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I don't have much confidence in Tenergy products in general. But the Tenergy Centura AAA Low Self-Discharge (LSD) NiMH Rechargeable Batteries are presently available at ~50% the cost of Sanyo Eneloop AAA. So I took a chance and was pleasantly surprised. Here are my test results, using my old La Crosse BC-900 Battery Charger: - Right out of the package, the average remaining charge measured was only 237mAh, or 30% of the rated capacity of '800mAh'. - After the first recharge, the average capacity jumped up to 898mAh! - After another two discharge/recharge cycles, the average peaked at 900mAh. The spread is quite small, with minimum=880mAh and maximum=922mAh. In comparison, Sanyo eneloop AAA typically arrives with ~75% of rated capacity, and the average capacity after 2 cycles is 830-840mAh. So the Tenergy Centura, while marketed as an eneloop clone, actually delivered ~7% higher capacity than eneloop. The measured capacity of Tenergy Centura is higher than all other LSD AAA cells I have tested - except for PowerEx Imedion AAA. The Imedion AAA is rated for '950mAh', and delivers 975mAh average capacity under the same test conditions. But of course the price for Imedion is much higher. I still have one concern: the performance charts provided by Tenergy claim that the capacity of Centura AAA is within 1% variation from that of eneloop, but why did I measure ~7% higher capacity instead? It is possible that Centura cells have actually improved in capacity, or maybe they are made by two different suppliers, one with higher capacity than the other. In any case, the present low price of Centura makes it an irresistible deal. You got to start picking while the picking is good. [Aside] Make sure you shop around for the best unit-price. As of this writing, the Tenergy Centura 12xAAA package is actually more expensive than three 4-pack, after you factor in shipping cost. [Update on Oct 9, 2011] Long term self-discharge data: After 92 days in storage, a pair of Tenergy Centura AAA cells retained 83.3% of the original charge. This proves that they are indeed LSD type, although the charge retention rate is slightly worse than advertised ("85% after 12 months"). [Update on Dec 5, 2011] Tested a second pair of Centura AAA cells after 5 months. The average remaining charge is 739mAh, or 81.2% of original measured capacity of 910mAh. Another way of look at it: those cells have retained 92% of rated capacity of 800mAh. This is probably where the marketing claim of "85% after 12 months" came from.