Buying a replacement laptop battery?

[andyoxon]

Do you tend to go Genuine product, or 3rd party anonymous, and where do you buy from?  42whr battery for this 17" Dell has a 100%>0% life of about 5 mins now, after ~3 years, so I need to source a new one.

[grams]

On this MacBook Air, the first third-party replacement had a lower capacity than the original knackered one.

The second one (different brand, good reviews) was fine on day 1 but less than a year later it's saying "Service battery" and is down 30% on capacity according to the stats utility.

So yeah, get a genuine one if possible.

[andyoxon]

Thanks.  Dell battery is £75 on Amazon, but £50 on ebay for same seems reasonable value.

[Polar Bear]

The question is, is the ebay one really a genuine oem battery or not?

My position here would be to expect a non-genuine battery and hope to be pleasantly surprised.

[DaveJ]

I will usually try to get a genuine one.  Sometimes lots more money, but my experience with the cheap ones was that quite a lot of them are junk.  For Dell batteries I always look at BlackCat first.

[andyoxon]

The question is, is the ebay one really a genuine oem battery or not?

My position here would be to expect a non-genuine battery and hope to be pleasantly surprised.

Good question.  I guess looking identical to Dell battery is no guarantee of authenticity.  How does one actually check if it's genuine anyway?  Or is the only sure way buying via Dell/authorised store?   Amazon is awash with 3rd party variants on Prime; "Amazon Choice" is 3rd party too.  Tho' batteries marked Dell, seem to only be from Dell store on amazon...

[andyoxon]

I will usually try to get a genuine one.  Sometimes lots more money, but my experience with the cheap ones was that quite a lot of them are junk.  For Dell batteries I always look at BlackCat first.

Thanks.  OOS unfortunately - £10 cheaper than Dell store.

[Polar Bear]

It is the big question.  As I say, I either shop knowing that I am not buying genuine or if the price is too good in spite of the apparent claims, I expect the worst and hope to be pleasantly surprised.  The latter has happened more than once but very infrequently.

The third option is to shop for known reliable brands albeit not the original manufacturer.

[SoreTween]

I've replaced the batteries in my company Acer laptops twice, they are 12 years old.  Both times the replacements came from PSA Parts.  The first time genuine were available and they were indeed genuine or such a good copy I don't care, they lasted just as well.  By the time they began to tire the company was down to just me so I only got one more, it's a pattern part and it claims slightly higher capacity than the originals.  It would be impossible now to say for sure it lasts any better but it's certainly in the right ball park.

Tip: Keep the tired battery and have that plugged in whenever you're using it on mains.

[andyoxon]

...
Tip: Keep the tired battery and have that plugged in whenever you're using it on mains.

Thanks.  Unfortunately to replace the battery the whole of the base of this 17" Dell needs to be unscrewed, & the optical drive popped out, then process reversed.   Anyway I've previously swapped out the HD for a SSD, so it's easy enough to get the back off and replace stuff, but when it's in, it's in...  This time the battery's going in + another 8Gb of RAM, to 16GB.

PSA battery = ~ same as Amazon Dell store.

[SoreTween]

[Unfortunately to replace the battery the whole of the base of this 17" Dell needs to be unscrewed, & the optical drive popped out, then process reversed.   

Bummer.  This and the not 16fucking9 screens are the reasons I still use 12 year old laptops.

[andyoxon]

So I bought a "Genuine Dell" battery off ebay, for about £25 less than Amazon price.  Side by side it has all the right markings, and the Dell Power Manager says it's manufactured by Samsung.  So hopefully OK.  On the battery I took out,  one of the three cells was rounded and probably getting on for x2 thickness as the rest of the battery. So perhaps it should have lasted longer but one of the cells failed for some reason.

I set the power manager for primarily AC use - which apparently 'lowers the charge threshold'.    Any thoughts on best practice for battery life if mainly plugged in?

[Cudzoziemiec]

My experience is that by the time you're on to the second battery, the laptop's about to die anyway. Mine now lasts maybe 20 minutes but as I use it as in effect a mobile desktop, ie it can always be plugged in, it's not a big problem.

[pcolbeck]

Dont know about that. My work Lenovo W540 Thinkpad needs a new battery. That will be its third and it's still going strong.

[ian]

I put a new battery in my 2011 Macbook Air (turned out it was the power supply that was dead, but that said, the battery had been flashing up a health warning for a year and ran to about fifteen minutes). It was a third-party but I paid modest premium for a known brand* (as an ancient computer I don't especially need, I wasn't bothered about a proper Apple battery though if it was a mission-critical computer I'd go for genuine).

Works fine, gives it about 2.5 hours of charge time (which I think is all it ever got, things have come along since 2011).

I think a some laptops require a battery (even a sickly one) to be present before they'll boot even on a/c.

*not sure I'd trust any 'genuine' battery from eBay.

[drossall]

We've bought 3rd-party replacements for a couple of HP laptops, and they have been fine.