I bought a BD Cosmo light, which may also work with Spot and Astro models. It operated perfectly up until the battery was around 50% full. It began to automatically reduce the LED to unusable levels, making it completely useless for my purpose; I had to reset the brightness to 100% every ten to fifteen minutes because anything less would prevent me from accurately assessing the ground conditions. Why is this crazy? Does BD have contracts with battery producers to subtly pressure consumers into replacing their batteries too soon out of sheer frustration? What were the engineers thinking when they designed such a ridiculous function?
When I need the most brightness, I don’t need the power-saving economy mode until the juice runs out and I swap out the cells. To extend operating time, I don’t need a sophisticated auto-management feature; I just need the best performance possible right up until the finish! These days, it seems that every gadget needs its own life, much like the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence.