Bought Chinese Battery on Ebay

[graywolf]

I bought a new battery for my X24 like this one (ebay item 260263342250). Supposedly a 4800mah replacement.

It took almost a month to get it. It only lasts as long as the 4000mah factory battery used to. In communicating with them they told me to download batterymon.exe from the web and send them screen shots of the battery info. What that is going to do I have no idea. But....

I found with that software that the battery is cutting off just below 15%, and charging is cutting off just above 90% That gives about 75% of its supposed capacity or 3600mah, no wonder it is not lasting longer than the original. In addition while the capacity came up some after the first calibration cycle, subsequent ones actually seem to be reducing it (remember it thinks it only has 90% of the previous power because of the early shut off). By setting hibernation to 3% I was able to chart the discharge cut off point , it looks like it drops from 12% to nothing in about 10 seconds.

Conclusion, even if they make it right, it is not worth the hassle! NOT RECOMMENDED.

[gator]

Graywolf, please add location info (city/state) to your profile.

Overstock.com has new, original X2* batteries on sale for $39 + $2.95 shipping, I guess that is a decent deal. I always use original batteries if I can, the knockoff ones are good in price but usually bad in performance (ie they dont last as long as the OEM ones, not to mention safety issues).

[graywolf]

I don't know, how old would that battery be?

I have posted a review on my blog "Subject To Change". http://graywolfphoto.com/journal/
It is the July 23, 2008 entry.

Edit (Aug 6, 2008): My webhost seems to have gone belly up. So the link above is currently no good. Sorry.

[gator]

ABout 3 years old ... but it will charge up and run fine. I have bought new-old-stock OEM T23 batteries that were 6 years old and they run really well

[qviri]

graywolf, I sympathise. I bought a 'replacement battery' for my X21 on ebay in 2006. Capacity seems good (though my factory battery is 3.6 Ah, and the replacement is 4.4 Ah), the battery life is pretty much as expected, but the electronics are not at their greatest. The notebook will report that the power draw is half of what it actually is, then power off due to low battery when the charge reaches 50%.

gator, by "run really well", do you mean full charge capacity is close to the design capacity?

[gator]

gator, by "run really well", do you mean full charge capacity is close to the design capacity?

full charge capcity actually is above the design capacity for 2 of the batteries.

[aceo07]

graywolf, I sympathise. I bought a 'replacement battery' for my X21 on ebay in 2006. Capacity seems good (though my factory battery is 3.6 Ah, and the replacement is 4.4 Ah), the battery life is pretty much as expected, but the electronics are not at their greatest. The notebook will report that the power draw is half of what it actually is, then power off due to low battery when the charge reaches 50%.

gator, by "run really well", do you mean full charge capacity is close to the design capacity?

My X22 battery seems like that. I also got it from ebay. The original battery is still in great shape, but I just use the ebay one. The ebay battery thinks it's gone to 0% after 2-2.5 hours, but it'll still go on for another 1 to 1.25 hours. I use the system low battery beep warning to let me know when it's critically low. The only bad part is that once the laptop thinks that it's at '0%', it won't boot up, even though there's at least 1 hour left. If I plug it in and bootup, and then unplug, it'll work fine.

[mikeh]

I noticed the Chinese 4-cell batteries for X40 claim a capacity of 4.8AHrs!
(quite impossible for a 4-cell)
They obviously just copied this number from the IBM/lenovo specs, but got the wrong model. I had some decent no-name Chinese cells before, but its
a bit of a lottery.

Please, if anyone buys them, let us know the capacity after a few cycles.

[graywolf]

Well, for folks not wanting to check out my review. The battery is now at 3645mah. That will give about 2.5 hours of use, but it seems to still be going down with each cycle. And, the charge light is still blinking when the battery is showing 100% charge.

As for the battery lasting longer than the battery monitor showing, in this case it does not. The X24 shuts down at 10-12% indicated. Hopefully in a few more cycles it will show the actual capacity and not some fantasy they programmed in. It would be nice if at that point the charge light would quite blinking so I will know when to unplug the power brick.

For what it is worth current battery technology is 2.2, 2.4, and 2.6 amp/hour cells. The ones in this fake 4.8ah battery are no more than 1.8ah, more likely 1.7 or 1.6. So take any claims for more with a shaker full of salt.

[no_man]

yes, count me in, i bought one.
at 3 recharge cycles, it is down to 1.5 hours max run time, with max performance settings on my X41.

The original IBM battery with 149 cycle count provides me with 3.5 hours run time with max performance settings.

[mikeh]

Well, for folks not wanting to check out my review. ... And, the charge light is still blinking when the battery is showing 100% charge.

Sorry, missed that link somehow. Great review. From your conclusions, it looks like it might be safer to replace the cells in an old IBM-endorsed battery, than buy a non-name one. Do the IBM batteries allow this?
You can get a set of 6 18650 cells from dealextreme.com for about $25 delivered. (get the unprotected ones)
It hadn't occurred to me that the problem might be the battery firmware, rather than the cells.

Unfortunately it is "normal" for Chinese to overstate battery capacity. (like US companies exaggerate CRT screen size & HDD capacity)

There is something odd in those BatteryMon info screenshots.
The watt/amp numbers in the first one are based on 11V, but the other two shots use 12V, hence the different design capacity numbers. The reported Energy capacity did not change.
Under linux, the numbers I see are based on the "design voltage" reported by the battery, which is 10.8V.

[graywolf]

There is something odd in those BatteryMon info screenshots.
The watt/amp numbers in the first one are based on 11V, but the other two shots use 12V, hence the different design capacity numbers. The reported Energy capacity did not change.
Under linux, the numbers I see are based on the "design voltage" reported by the battery, which is 10.8V.

Nope, nothing wrong with the voltage. The first chart shows the battery only 2/3's charged. If anything it should show a lower watt rating. It was taken during the second discharge cycle. I did not have batterymon.exe to check the first cycle. Fully charge the battery pack shows 12.48-12.49 volts.

Unfortunately IBM's battery monitor is not compatible with XP Pro SP3, or at least you get a popup from XP Pro telling you that when you try to load it. However batterymon shows just what you would expect when using it with the Sanyo made IBM battery.

[DPHMIN]

Graywolf, please add location info (city/state) to your profile.

Overstock.com has new, original X2* batteries on sale for $39 + $2.95 shipping, I guess that is a decent deal. I always use original batteries if I can, the knockoff ones are good in price but usually bad in performance (ie they dont last as long as the OEM ones, not to mention safety issues).

Thanks for the tip. I checked out Overstock.com, and the batteries were priced $32.00 and free shipping. I bought one, seems to have been the last one. I hope it will be a good replacement for the battery in my X23, which doesn't hold a charge very long anymore.