Any experience with the 9cells from ebay?

[b0yd07]

I'm looking at this in particular. Every one of the reviews show positive things about him and the batteries he sells. And there are a lot.

Do the non-oem batteries not hold a charge as long or what (Single-charge/Lifetime)? I realize this topic comes up a bit, but I don't think anyone's answered it directly. Everyone just says it would be ideal to buy the Lenovo battery. Why is that?

One more question: Running third party batteries can't possibly put my computer at risk could it? From the looks of it, a lot of people do so and are happy with their decision. (Judging from the feedback.)

Thanks guys.

[b0yd07]

I think I'll be buying this one later today:
http://cgi.ebay.com/9-Cell-Battery-for- ... 1|294%3A50

Two things I think everyone should read:

One thing you should always check is the battery capacity (expressed in mAh - like 6600mAh). The bigger the number the better. Battery technology is always improving and there may well be batteries with higher capacity than the original had. But often the Manufacturer's battery replacement is the same capacity as the original, even though higher capacity generic's are available. Several years ago I bought a replacement battery for a Toshiba on eBAy. It was much cheaper than a genuine Toshiba battery and had nearly twice the capacity (meaning the laptop would run nearly twice as long on it). I would not hesitate to buy again from one of the big sellers on eBay.

An earlier post gives several reasons to only buy the original manufacturer's battery. I disagree with much of what it says and still believe you can be perfectly safe with a MAJOR seller on eBay (I'm not talking about individuals selling one or a few items). Here's why:

1) Look at the picture of the battery in the ad. Usually you can see the CE mark on the battery. This means the product has been tested and meets all directives of the European Common Market, which are usually even stricter than U.S. standards. The battery you buy should look exactly like the picture, including the CE mark. If not, send it back. If in doubt whether the battery carries the CE mark you can always email the seller and ask. My experience is these sellers always respond quickly to product questions.

2) The seller I looked at on eBay stated the battery cells were manufactured in Japan, same as Toshiba.

3) These large eBay dealers sell a huge volume, and like any business they are very sensitive to word-of-mouth reports affecting their business. If they were selling shoddy goods it would show up quickly in their eBay feedback. It doesn't. They are buying and selling in large quantity from reputable battery manufacturers (possibly the same ones who make Toshiba's batteries!). They are able to sell at a much lower price because they don't have Toshiba's marketing costs, there are fewer middle-men in the sales stream, and they are not supporting any brick-and-mortar sales fronts.

4) The previous poster said you might get a recalled product. I can't imagine how. In anyone has a battery under recall, they're going to turn it in and get a new one, not try to sell it on at a discount. And certainly you can't think that Toshiba is going to recall defective batteries and then resell them elsewhere? That would be commercial suicide.

5) And finally, every article I have ever read about a laptop battery fire has been about an original manufacturer's battery, not a generic. So why should you feel safer with the original?

Heck, I realize you might still feel better with the manufacturer's brand name battery, and, if so, then do buy it by all means. I just want to be sure you have all the points of view before making a decision.

^ http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7587_102-0. ... dID=315996
-> http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/a ... risky.html

If anyone knows for fact I'm making a BAD decision, please tell me! But I don't think it's ever more than speculation that these are terrible and dangerous.

I emailed the seller about the warranty as well. If anything is wrong with it up through the end of the 12 month warranty, he'll send me another one for free. Seems like a winner to me.

[RRHODY]

FWIW, I got a nine cell for my S10e off eBay for $55.00 including shipping. The vendor was listed as Hong Kong, but the item came USPS Priority from New Orleans, LA. It has been working just fine and the build quality looks about like the one that came with the S10e from Lenovo. I can look up the transaction if you're interested.

[wakka2u]

i'm also thinking of getting a 9 cell battery too. the 4cell i currently have is holding about 1.5 hours... any other reviews on an off market battery? thanks in adavance.

[eosme]

i'm in the market for one as well. i have a 6 cell and the battery life just not long enough. i'm only able to get 3.5-4hrs tops out of it when i drop CPU all the way down to the lowest speed and LCD dimmed out.

let us know how it goes for you.

[wakka2u]

i'm in the market for one as well. i have a 6 cell and the battery life just not long enough. i'm only able to get 3.5-4hrs tops out of it when i drop CPU all the way down to the lowest speed and LCD dimmed out.

let us know how it goes for you.

contacted the seller ... they assured me that they never had problems and assured that the supplier/manufacture has done testing on it. we shall see.

[moucon]

Here's my .02. Unless it's an authentic Lenovo/IBM battery - it will be junk. I've tried any number of replacement batteries and they were all useless. A couple actually smoked and nearly caught fire. This stuff is offshore junk thrown together out of who-knows-what parts. Don't waste your money- buy a real IBM/Lenovo battery.

[wakka2u]

Here's my .02. Unless it's an authentic Lenovo/IBM battery - it will be junk. I've tried any number of replacement batteries and they were all useless. A couple actually smoked and nearly caught fire. This stuff is offshore junk thrown together out of who-knows-what parts. Don't waste your money- buy a real IBM/Lenovo battery.

after getting it, the thinkpad doesn't recognize it creating a number of alerts of not being authentic. The readings on the battery life is also all over the place, including the health of the battery.... knowing this first hand, i would lean on getting a authentic battery, it's worth paying that little extra more. thanks for your comments.

[b0yd07]

I bought it as well... got it Monday. It certainly isn't as nice as the OEM battery I have, but hell it costs less than a third of the price and carries a warranty for an entire year. The seller seems to be willing to do whatever necessary to keep his reputation high.

I'm happy with my purchase overall. I had to write a paper yesterday and I averaged 5:30-6:30 hours battery life, twice. That's with a low brightness and Word + Firefox open.

Is there a way to do a stress test on the battery to find defects? If there's anything wrong with it, it goes back and I get a new one no questions asked I'm pretty sure... and I can do it 12 months from now if I so choose. It seems to be working fine though....

after getting it, the thinkpad doesn't recognize it creating a number of alerts of not being authentic. The readings on the battery life is also all over the place, including the health of the battery.... knowing this first hand, i would lean on getting a authentic battery, it's worth paying that little extra more. thanks for your comments.

I can agree with the battery life readings all over the place. Whether that's abnormal or not I have no idea. My guess is when Windows does its periodic battery life "scan," I'm doing something a little more cpu intensive. With normal usage, I've seen +/- 3 hour fluctuations on the radar (that's opening/closing apps quite a bit, playing music, youtube, itunes...). If I let it sit, the battery life skyrockets to the +3 hour side of the band and it'll move linearly.
I was worried about the non-authentic issue myself when I tried it out the first time... not happening with mine. I haven't seen any warnings about the health of the battery either...
EDIT: I bet those warnings are from Lenovo. I'm running Windows 7 with nothing from Lenovo besides the green HUD software for brightness and sound.

EDIT: Mine shows 4 hours remaining with 70% battery life. About a minute ago it showed 3 hours. Staying at 4 hours. Whatever.
EDITx2: Ten minutes later and I see 65% with 4hr20min.

http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/96/img1140v.jpg
http://img197.imageshack.us/img197/4039/img1144y.jpg
http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/3871/img1139g.jpg

The plastic is not the same as the rest of the laptop. Instead of the rubber texture you'll find the hard shiny black kind of plastic. The lock slider on it is also a piece of crap. The entire battery slides into and out of the laptop chassis about 1mm before the locks hit it... my 4 cell did the same, though. When I got it the battery caused my computer to rock even more to the front right corner than it did before. I removed the back right rubber pad off the battery and now my laptop sits PERFECTLY, thank the Lord. It even swivels now which is pretty cool.

[mulambo187]

i believe i have had bad luck myself, with an R32 i bought an ultrabay battery, i believe its a genuine one and came new in box, but still it died on me out of the blue, i dont think its worth the risk on such expensive items, and likely following murphy's law, the failure will happen at the worst time (deadline for submission in 15 minutes etc.)