The scorpians are the easiest choice but like Metal Man said, they don't currently have much upgrade capability.

If money is not an issue, I would go with FMA. You will be able to balance and charge your packs in 20 minutes. I don't know of any other systems out there that can boast that feature. I would recommend two chargers and two 12.5 amp power supplies for the fastest charging capability possible.

As far as proprietary concerns, the FMA Skyvolt packs have an adapter to charge with any other chargers. In my opinion, the scorpians are limiting due to the 2s only config. I would rather go with the BalancePro HV's and 6s chargers or cell pro pack's/6s adapter and 6s chargers. The FMA scorpians and chargers are the most proprietary equipment they sell but who knows, they may come out with adapters for those as well.

Personally, I will not use nihm cells again, unless I have no other choice :028:

Thunder Power is working on their charger software so that it will support 3C charging, when used with the balancer and cable between the charger and balancer. If one can afford the Thunder Power charging setup ($200 for TP1010 charger and $100 for 10 cell balancer), then it would be THE BEST to get.

I guess the question is, do you want to wait for TP to get thier software together for 3c...
I'm also curious if anyone has used the Li-saver with the 9920 esc? The other issue is increasing your pack weight, by going with the 3700mah packs, will degrade your trucks performance.

MetalMan, what upgrades are you refering to exactly? If its an upgrade in mah config's, you'll be increasing your weight which isn't ideal for racing. The reason I suggest FMA is they have every feature, I see, needed for racing available right now.

For upgrades down the road, I mean future purchases. I say upgrade because Lipo technology is always improving, and unless something went wrong there might be a better pack that is a direct replacement (size and weight), but would be more powerful and have higher capacity. With the Scorpion system, if they don't come out with new cells, then you'd be using old technology (possibly obsolete). But, if you get a charger like a Duratrax ICE and a balancer, you could have a setup that would work with a battery in several years.
Since the Scorpions are proprietary, you have to buy 2 batteries to replace the original set (if they started fading), and that would cost $220. If you were to replace these Hyperion packs, the price would be only $170. Another thing I forgot to mention with the Scorpion setup is that you can only charge one battery at a time. I know that you can charge a battery to 90% in 20mins, but that decreases the number of life cycles that the battery will provide. By how much, I'm not sure.

As for the weight comparison, two Hyperion 2s 3700mah packs would only weigh 384g (together), whereas 2 Scorpion 3200mah packs would weigh 456g, for a difference of 70g. You might want to factor in the LVC weight, but that's only going to be 10g maximum. So, the truck's performance would increase from the higher availability of amps (you know what I mean), and the fact that it won't pull as many amps because it is lighter.

You have good points MetalMan. I've, however, already made my decision so I'm a bit biased since I like what I experienced so far. I'm going to contact FMA to see if they would be able to provide an charger adapter to balance other battery packs.
I guess its gonna take a major change for me to make an upgrade such as M1. Have you heard about M1? It sounds like a major break through... can you say 5 minute charge times :017:
here's a snipit:
http://home.earthlink.net/~j1138/evo/m1.jpg

A 5 minute charge would be awesome. The would almost be a gas go feature of a nitro some time. I wonder if this technology will hit the rc mraket before long.

so now slyvcester there is a delema if you want nimh or lipo

Hey guys, sorry i havent been on the forums for a while. Its cause my comp crashed, and has a virus, so im just using Mike.l's comp:p Now, for the time being, ill have to go with ib3800 8 cell packs, and good chargers out there, i was thinking the duratrax ICE but i want 2 chargers and that dont run on a power supply. Thanks .

untill my e-maxx ships in get those batterys
IM SO ANXIOUS!
lol

ooooowwww that kills my eyes trying to read that :019:

stampy, if that hurts your eye's... why'd you post it again ;)
You're right though, it was a bit ackward so i dimmed it down for ya :027:

wow thats very interesting to say the least. i thought manipulating nano sized particles was at least 10 years off wow :eek:

I think i told this before, a friend of mine, who lives in china, works for a tool manufacturer. He keeps bragging about the superiour cells sony makes, they are much more powerfull and durable than the normal 'baggy lipoly's' they take more charges, and keep their capacity for much longer.charging them in 5 minutes would be nice!

though you might be needing another powersupply..

5S 6000mah would take 72A to charge.. 1332 watts of charging power.. and i didn't calculated the losts of the batts etc.

I like it.. Bring on those cells..