yeah bizarre, no adapter connected, and the polarity was good, it worked for 20 minutes.
i tought first, 4 nicads can only deliver 4.8 volts instead of 6, but on the other hand, old alkalines don't
deliver 6 v either... i guess i will never know what happened
but sometimes small machines have an explicit warning not to use them with rechargable batteries,
maybe thats what happens then
anyway, the dr55 uses extremely little power( as long as you take out the jack when not in use)
so it run long long time on 4 penlites