New battery technology.

[NQ6U]

[...] Yaesu and Kenwood (and probably Icom) [...]

That's Yaecomwood.

[KA5PIU]

Related to this is, Why can't Yaesu and Kenwood (and probably Icom) make ham gear with quick charging? My 'F6A is s...l...o....w, and so is my '817. OTOH, every piece of consumer gear I have comes automatically with quick-charging...cell phone...laptop...PS3 controllers...PSP, etc...etc...etc.

Get outta here....the technology is mature and the NRE costs have long been amortized, so what's up with this?

Hello.

The trouble is the cost of the battery pack.
A laptop pack can easily run the cost of a radio, $200 and up.
The VX-3r can do fast charge in an external charger as it can use smart batteries intended for a camera.
Note that the battery supplied with the VX-3R is NOT a smart cell unit! ONLY a smart cell battery can be fast charged.
Batteries that fit this radio come in 4 flavors, normal and high capacity and regular and smart cell.
I use the non-smart cell batteries, such as the Kodak KLIC-5000 or Fujifilm NP-60 and an external regular rate charger as the radio can not fast charge so there is nothing to be gained, I can leave a pack on the charger and 2 hours later it is charged, swap out in seconds and be on my way.
Both of the chargers I bought can do 110 AC and 12VDC and came with the batteries.
10 hours operating time is not uncommon with the larger capacity cells.