I am a HUGE fan of Streamlight's. All together I own somewhere along the lines of 25 of them. Yes, I'm a flashlight *****. I own at least 1 of every Streamlight model out there, from Stingers to SL20's, Survivors, Vulcan's, Lightbox's, even an old SL-35 and some Ultra and Super Stingers.
What Stinger did you have? There are multiple Stinger's made. Poly, XT, Ultra, HP, LED, LED DS, LED DS HP, etc etc.. Even the "base" Stinger is rather bright, should have been brighter than any Maglite. It sounds like you may have had a bad battery pack to begin with, I'm guessing you probably had a bad cell so when the lamp wanted 3.6v, it was only getting 2.4v. New battery packs can be had at numerous places online. There is a franchise called "Batteries Plus" that is pretty big on the east coast, every one that I have ever walked into stocks the Stinger packs.
Alternately, you can do the NiMH route. NiMH Stinger packs are all over ebay, usually cheaper (shipped) than what an OE Streamlight NiCd pack will run you. The NiMH pack's are usually 3000mAh, where the stock NiCd packs are 1500mAh. You get twice the burn time out of them (of course, twice the recharge time as well).
If you're looking for a new light, *definitely* check out the new Stinger LED DS HP. OMG, it's a WICKED light, 200(!!!) lumens @ 2 hours! It has 4 modes, high, medium, low and strobe. Battery life ranges from 2 hours on high to a little over 7 on low and even low is still pretty freaking bright. I have been daily carrying mine since November and it's absolutely awesome (I repo houses, power is off 95% of the time), I carried the non-DS model prior to that.
If you want a slightly smaller profile and are used to the size of the Stinger, take a look at the Stinger LED or Stinger LED DS (the DS indicates it's a dual switch model, having both a tail clicker as well as a head clicker, the non DS models are head clicker only). The non-HP stinger isn't as bright, but it also has a smaller head on it as well
There are other great lights out there, Surefire certainly comes to mind. There isn't anything wrong with a Surefire, but it gets costly to use. Most of them use CR123's and unless you're buying in bulk (think, 100+) they're expensive little cells. Even buying in 100+, they're still expensive. I enjoy the Surefire's I have, they make a great tacticle light. I absolutely love the model I have on the front of my XD .40 4", but they are, IMO just that, a tacticle light or maybe a light you keep in your glove box or take camping (the lithium cells carry a 10 year shelf life, so the CR123's are a great emergency light power source, Streamlight makes a number of lights that use CR123's as well).
IMO, Streamlight makes the finest, daily carry lights out there. Most of their models are rechargable so if you use it often like I do, it pays for itself in no time. They offer AC and DC chargers and the entire Stinger line uses the same charger, no matter if you have a brand new LED DS HP or a 10 year old original Stinger. Police, Fire and EMS nationwide use the Stinger and SL20 variants. Every fire department around here that I know of uses Streamlight Vulcan's and Lightbox's. They ARE dependable lights, it just sounds like you got a bad cell in yours unfortunately.
Also, I'm not sure how old your Stinger is, but do keep in mind like any other rechargable battery, be it in your cell phone, home phone, car, laptop, etc they will go bad, no matter the technology. If you want your light to perform optimally at all times, figure on replacing the stick once a year. $20 bucks a year for a quality flashlight is nothing compared to the money spent on D-cells for a Mag or worse, CR123's in a tacticle light, 2 battery changes in a 2 battery unit and you're at $20.
