I used to let my cellphone batteries drain completely before charging them. I was told the last time I bought a cellphone that that is not necessary anymore, but I continued to do it anyway, just to be safe. I figured it couldn’t hurt.

Well, apparently, it CAN hurt!

This source says that lithium-ion batteries should *not* be discharged fully on a regular basis.

Avoid frequent full discharges because this puts additional strain on the battery. Several partial discharges with frequent recharges are better for lithium-ion than one deep one. Recharging a partially charged lithium-ion does not cause harm because there is no memory. (In this respect, lithium-ion differs from nickel-based batteries.) Short battery life in a laptop is mainly cause by heat rather than charge/discharge patterns.

Source: http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm

So, it seems that I probably contributed to the short life of my last two batteries (not including the defective one) by following the same rules as for nickel-based batteries. From now on, I will not let the battery run out completely before charging it. Also, I will try not to leave my cellphone in a place where it will get too hot. Let’s hope that leads to a more reasonable lifespan for my cellphone
batteries from now on!

What you need to do to accomplish this goal is to head down to Akihabara and find yourself an old IBM Thinkpad laptop with no operating system. I was able to find one the other day for about 22,000 yen. Mine is an X31 and it has 512MB of RAM and a 40GB hard drive. Since I am using it as a second computer, not my main beast, I don’t mind slightly low specs. I also had to pony up 8000 yen for the base so I could have a DVD drive. Other kinds of computers may work, but I have been told that IBM Thinkpads interface well with the kind of operating system we are going to use here (Ubuntu, based on Debian GNU/Linux, a popular Linux distribution), so if you aren’t sure what kind of computer to buy, go with the Thinkpad.

(Linux is a free Unix-type operating system originally created by Linus Torvalds. There are many different flavours of Linux, but if you are not already familiar with Linux/Unix, you should probably stick with Ubuntu for now. You can always try other distributions later.)

Once you have your new-used computer, go to the Ubuntu website, download the latest stable version of Ubuntu and follow the instructions for burning an ISO image onto the disk.

You can also get a free Ubuntu disk sent to you, but that will take quite a few weeks, so if you have a decently fast connection to the internet and you are able to burn a CD, it will be faster just to make one yourself.

At this stage, if you have not done an Ubuntu installation before, I would recommend that you order some pizza and invite your geekiest friend over to walk you through the installation and basic setup. It is quite an easy process, but you will appreciate having a helping hand to walk you through some of the options if you don’t know your bits from your bytes. That said, since you are dealing with a computer with no operating system installed, if you want to give it a try by yourself, you can’t really do much harm. Then you can resort to the pizza bait trick if you find yourself in trouble. Just stick the installation disk in and start answering the questions. The whole installation will probably take less than half an hour.

Once you have your operating system up and running, and you have hopefully managed to connect your new-used computer to the internet without any problems (and have downloaded and installed all the updates), you can go online to find out how to make your DVD player spin disks from any region or how to input Japanese characters, amongst a myriad of other things. You will probably find free open-source software that will allow you to do everything on your Ubuntu machine that you are about to do on your main machine. Just remember to install the Linux version of the software on your Ubuntu system, not the Windows or Mac version!

This solution works well if you already have one computer that has a Windows or Mac operating system and you just need another computer for odd jobs (like watching DVDs from other regions or checking email in the morning before work). You can use proprietary software like MS Office on your main computer and then put Open Office on your secondary computer for when you just need a quick and dirty word processor to get the job done.

If and when you find yourself in trouble, just do a search for whatever ails you and you will be sure to find that someone else has dealt with the problem and was kind enough to write up instructions for how to fix it. I have found that sometimes the first few hits in the search engines show me really complicated ways to fix the problem, but that if I dig a bit deeper, I can usually find a simpler answer. Don’t despair if you find some answer that doesn’t even seem like English because of all the computer jargon. Go back to your search results and see if someone else was kind enough to give it to you in language you can understand.

(If you have never worked with Unix/Linux/Ubuntu or anything similar before, you may find the
Ubuntu Pocket Guide useful.)

This has happened to me a few times now so I generally just put up with it. However, I found out today that I probably shouldn’t have been quite so stoic this time. I brought my cellphone to the au shop to find out whether it would be cheaper to change the battery or change phones, but when I showed my cellphone (41SA) to the clerk, she told me that it might be possible to have my battery replaced for free. She gave me a number to call, and lo and behold, a new battery will be sent to me next week for free.

This probably won’t work for everyone, but I just thought I would write about it in case anyone else is being unnecessarily stoic with a defective battery. It seems that the battery in my cellphone was recalled at some point. I received my current phone from a friend who was leaving Japan, so it is possible that she got a notice about the recall but didn’t bother doing anything about it because she wasn’t staying for very long.

So, if your cellphone battery seems not to be able to hold a charge even though the phone/battery is quite new, it might be worth asking your cellphone provider if you qualify for a new battery. It’s a long-shot, but you might just luck out.

The website is http://www.toner.jp.

Recommended by SY on the Frugal Japan mailing list.

For used books, the mother of all shops is, of course, Book Off. This mega-chain has over 900 stores (500 franchises), and sells the bulk of Japan’s used books. They will buy your used books (sorry, Japanese books only!) and pick them up from your house if necessary. Their stores are also a great place to browse (what better place to pick up cheap cookbooks, magazines, maps, or even novels to study Japanese?), and they even offer CDs and DVDs at some locations now. For foreign used books, in addition to the old favorite Good Day Books in Ebisu (), an online option is available in the form of http://www.infinitybooksjapan.com (formerly Caravan Books). They also offer book purchase and credit services.

Used clothing in gaijin adult sizes can be rather hard to find at the average Japanese “recycle shop” (and do you really want what the have to offer), but used children’s clothes *are* usually a good bargain. A good time to shop is “moving season” (usually March in Japan, right before corporate transfers and the new school year starts), and also “koromogae” season (koromoeage means – usually around April/May or October/November when the seasons change and people empty out their closets. Many towns and cities have one or two used children’s clothing stores, sometimes in a larger mall or complex. You can search online (enter the Japanese “kodomo fuku risaikuru” in Google, along with your city name) for the location, or choose one of the many online retailers. Man will also accept clothes for sale.

Finally, electronics! In particular, PCs. Although new PCs are getting cheaper and cheaper these days, there is still a vibrant market for used PCs in Japan. The largest retailer of used PCs in Japan is Sofmap, which sells more used PCs than new. Most of its PCs are less than two years old, including some very new models even released just a season go. Looking for a simple laptop to do email, word processing, Internet surfing, and a few other basic applicatons? Sofmap offers a Japanese brand 800Mh, 256MB, 15GB hard drivewith a CD-ROM drive and Windows already installed for Y47,800. A 2.93GHz, 512MB, 300G hard drive Valuestar with a huge 17″ monitor and DVD multi-drive and TV tuner (i.e. a “multimedia PC you can use as a TV and DVD player as well) is only Y143,800. You can add a 3-year warranty for used PCs as well for Y7500. Check out http://www.sofmap.com for more information!

When you shop smart, “recycled” goods can be quite a bargain sometimes!

© 2006 Wendy J. Imura.

Unfortunately, I can’t recommend any of the major camera shops for electronics purchases. Even taking the points into account, you’re going to pay ten to twenty percent more than you’d pay in Akihabara. To figure out where to go to buy this stuff, use www.kakaku.com (Japanese only, unfortunately, but heck, for this stuff you really need only katakana to get by). They’ll show you who’s got the lowest prices, and who’s got what in stock. And the site works on a keitai, too, with maps even, so that you can do your research whilst wandering around in the area.

One area where the big camera shops are ok, however, is film. It’s as cheap there as it’s ever going to get. And developing is not too bad, either, if you go for the “original brand” (in-house) version. For 800 yen you can get a 36-exposure roll of color film developed and get two sets of prints. Black and white is more expensive, but if you’re using black-and-white film, you should be developing it yourself and saving yourself piles of money. (Not to mention buying bulk film and loading it yourself–that will almost halve your film costs.)

But the cameras themselves: again, too expensive. See www.kakaku.com. But wait, what are you doing buying a new camera in the first place? There are tons of used camera shops in Tokyo (see this site), and if you avoid the cameras that collectors want, you can get a pretty good deal. Your best bargains are going to be for used digital cameras; now that the market has matured, you can get quite good 3-4 megapixel cameras for well under 20,000 yen. And most people probably don’t want a seven megapixel camera anyway, for two reasons. First, most people just don’t make prints that are all that big, so the extra pixels are just wasting storage space on your hard drive. Second, there’s no point in having all those pixels if you’ve got a crappy lens that’s ruining the image anyway.

© 2006 Wendy J. Imura.

Well, resident foreigners are apparently not the only persons facing these issues. Many Japanese, such as students, salarymen living and working alone, or other professionals on assignment, also find themselves faced with setting up residence in a place where they only plan to live for a year or two. A few companies recognized that there was a unique niche market need to be filled, and thus the home electronics rental package business was born.

The major player in this market is Toshiba Techno Network’s “Kaden Rentaru Pakku Saabisu” (Home Electronics Rental Package Service). Their basic two year contract offers four appliances (a TV, freezer/refrigerator, microwave, and automatic washing machine) for 4,725 yen a month, with the latest up-to-date appliances. After the two-year contract is complete, you have the option of continuing rental for 3,150 yen a month, or having them take away your appliances at no charge. A cancellation charge is applied unused portions of the contract. Options for renting a slightly better TV (with DVD and video options), as well as vacuum cleaners, rice cookers, hot water pots, and AC/heater units are also available for an extra charge. A clear, concise description of the service can be found at: http://www.toshiba.co.jp/tcn/pack/kaden/index_j.htm (Choose Single or Family Pack.)

Note that a “Family Pack” service, with larger and better appliances, is available for 8,400 yen a month for the same four items. The service is also offered through a variety of other distributors, including Seven Eleven Japan’s “Seven Dream” website. Since this service only advertises in Japanese, I suggest you enlist the help of a Japanese friend or coworker (perhaps your boss or the person in charge of seeing that you are settled) to help navigate their websites or make a telephone call. Note that recent law changes requiring a hefty recycling fee for the pick-up of used electronics for disposal makes renting electronics even more of a bargain.

A few other options for assembling the required items are to buy used from other foreigners, at sayonara sales and the like, or to take advantage of competitively-priced packages at volume electronics retailers like Yodobashi Camera or Bic Camera. These discount packages are usually called “shin-seikatsu kaden” (new start) fairs, and can be recognized by a large group of appliances displayed together with a common color or design theme. They are usually held from February through late March.

You can sometimes get 10 to 12 items for between 80,000 and 120,000 yen. While not cheap, you will have purchased every possible item you will need, and they will all match!

© 2004 Wendy J. Imura.