DeWalt’s batteries only play nice in one direction, and beginners pay for the mistake

Power tool battery adapters make the wall between cordless platforms look thin. Twenty dollars of molded plastic, and a DeWalt drill runs on Ryobi packs, or a Ryobi tool runs on DeWalt packs. The fit feels identical in both directions, which is exactly what fools people. Underneath, the two systems disagree about a basic question: which half of the pairing is responsible for shutting everything down before the cells drain too far. Ryobi answers with the battery. DeWalt answers with the tool. Line those answers up one way and you get two independent safeguards on the same job. Line them up the other way and you get none at all. I've already covered the adapters themselves and what they cost. This is the part the product listings leave out.

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