The OP asked about life span, and he likes passthroughs.
The li-ion cell in the Rivas and the eGo models have a comparable lifespan. Unless you run into a defective one, or kill it yourself, they should last at least a few months. While some have lasted 6 months to a year, banking on that would be foolish. Most passthroughs are limited by the quality of the cord. While convenient, construction quality is usually lacking.
Rocketman, I have to respectfully disagree with the statement you posted which I highlighted in red. It really depends on how well the end user takes proper care of their device. Most of my passthroughs are at the 6 month mark or beyond with the exception of those I did not take proper care of due to my highly
newbish state at the given time hehe
Sorry ahead of time for this rather verbose response…
Aside from simply poor internal wiring, etc. that should have little impact on overall battery life and performance; though bad soldering and poor connections are not so uncommon with China made products unfortunately. Not to sound like a “know it all”, but I have owned several passthrough batteries (not all eGo's) and I have used many of the same cords on all the devices and that seemed to have little or no impact on the device. You run into problems (in this case user error) when you try charging the passthrough on USB wall adapters that do not have proper output voltage/amperage, failing to ensure you are plugging your USB cable into a
POWERED USB 2.0/3.0 slot on a computer no USB 1.0 or 1.1 port powered or not can produce enough power to properly charge Li-ion batteries, or if the battery is constantly being over-charged (many if not most eGo style batteries do not include battery overcharge protection). This means leaving the battery plugged in all the time or for extended periods of time can and will drastically reduce the lifespan of that particular battery. On the opposite end of the spectrum leaving the battery almost fully discharged has a similar effect and can reduce overall battery life as well. So you might ask, the how do I prevent from overcharging and leaving the battery completely discharged? That is a good question and unless you are willing to go out and buy a 510 threaded battery voltage meter you won’t get the prefect answer. I will say that I have found if you know the battery is close to fully discharged, simply put it on whatever charging method you opt to use for between 15 to 20 minutes prior to shutting it down for the day and letting it sit like that overnight or while not in use for any extended period of time. The unfortunate nature of Li-ion batteries whether it be in your laptop, cell phone, e-cig battery, blah blah blah they were not meant to be fully discharge regularly. As for the overcharging you will notice that most Li-ion batteries again laptops, cell phones, e-cig batteries, etc. are starting to have overcharge and short-circuit protection so you don't have to worry about these things on your own... the devices basically does it for you. All of that don’t discharge/overcharge crap I just mention is for someone who REALLY wants to maximize battery longevity and is not quite as important or dramatic as it may have sounded, but still good information to know because it does apply to Li-ion batteries in just about ANY device not just e-cigs.
Personal opinion of mine is to stay away from USB wall adapters unless you know specifically what the adapter is dishing out to your battery. I started out with an INFERNO 1000 mAh passthrough as my introduction into passthrough batteries and though I rarely use it now that I have my eGo-C passthrough it still does give me a solid 4 to 5 hours of battery life (depending on how much I vape during that particular time frame) BUT my second INFERNO was charged using a third-party USB all adapter (I think was meant for my iPhone 4S and within a month it was putting out maybe 2 hours worth of battery life as compared to the other one which was only charged in my car using the INFERNO car charger or on my computer which uses a powered USB 3.0 port. On average, as stated before, with my Joye eGo-C 1000 mAh passthrough I can go roughly 7 to 8 hours between charging unless I am using it and the "unregulated mode" which does drain the battery faster. My 1st Riva is down to an average battery life or 2 to 2 1/2 hours under what I consider normal vaping. My 2nd Riva still lasts me around 4 hours and I vape it pretty hard the few times I dust it off and use it on long trips etc. Again, I'm not saying necessarily one brand is better than the other I'm simply pointing out my personal experiences between the 2 brand differences. Manufacturing wise I do not have insider information to confirm the following statement but I'm fairly certain that a lot of the components on both the Riva and Joye eGo's are identical with minor cosmetic differences and now with the Joye eGo-C voltage toggle that would be my choice; however, keep in mind that added functionality will likely cost more than a Riva passthrough and even the Joye passthroughs without that feature. Once more, in the end it all really depends both on your budget and what your personal preferences are... BOTH are among the more trusted eGo battery brands and I'm sure in the long run you would probably be happy with either or.
Now I could go on and on about the formal semantics of what I have previously stated and I could even go into more detail about Li-ion batteries and how they work and how to properly take care of them but in all honesty I think I have already gone well beyond what I intended to in the first place (lol I’m also starting to pass out at my keyboard)
So I’m going to shut-up now and leave it to you to decide for yourself what you think will suit your needs the best and I wish you the best of luck with whatever you decide moving forward.
