Non-brand laptop batteries? Ok or don't bother?

[Technique]

The battery for my Lenovo L530 laptop is really on its last legs. A charge probably doesn't even last an hour. Maybe it does but that'd be literally it. I'm getting notifications to change the battery and when i charge it the light is orange instead of green.

 

As mentioned in the other thread about cloning drives, i don't actually use the laptop a whole hell of a lot. If it was the main machine in the house i wouldn't even be asking this and i'd just buy genuine.

 

Are non-branded batteries generally ok or are they a false economy? I don't want to be buying non-brand for £25 every 12 months because they can't last beyond that when genuine may cost me £45 for 5 years for example.

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=lenovo+l530+battery&ref=nb_sb_noss_1

 

Green Cell gets decent reviews on Amazon. I've never heard of them myself but then this is the first time i've ever looked at laptop batteries. A search on trustpilot though is not quite as favourable - mentions of 12 month lifespan.

 

Side note: I see the Green Cell and many others are listed as 4400mAh yet the original states 4760mAh. Why is that?

 

Is it better to just buy the original or are non-branded fine enough?

[SuperKid]

I've bought non-branded laptop batteries in the past and only really lasted like 6 months for me. I think I'd go for a genuine replacement if I need to replace a battery in a laptop again.

[spikey_richie]

You get what you pay for with most things. I would spend the extra bit more, and get the genuine article.

[Slugsie]

It's hard to tell, but quality battery cells (i.e. made by Samsung, LG etc) aren't cheap, thus genuine packs aren't cheap. Packs sold under 'off-brand' or unknown names tend to either be made from cheap cells which probably won't last long, or genuine cells that failed quality tests for some reason. They also often outright lie about the capacity.

 

I bought an off-brand battery for my power drill a few months back. Quick test showed that it was less than a half of the advertised capacity, and wasn't able to operate under heavy load (important for a drill). Luckily Amazon gave me my money back no questions asked. Oddly the sellers listing disappeared the same day!

 

Basically you pays your money and takes your chance, but if you need the laptop to run for extended periods away from an outlet, then I wouldn't bother.

[Technique]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

 

I'm aware of you get what you pay for.

 

I also work for a guy who will charge you as much as he can get away with when a store around the corner will charge half as much for the exact same product which is why i don't always swallow the get what you pay for thing whole.

 

I'll buy genuine on this one then i think.

[+Biscuits Brown MVC]

I've bought both branded and non-branded and to be honest, none of them worked as well as the original. One example was for a Samsung laptop. I bought the non-branded from Amazon and the branded straight from Samsung. I've never really figured out what magic was in that original battery but it was never matched.

[Technique]

Jeez it seems pretty difficult to get a genuine battery for this laptop. I mean, properly genuine, not just advertised as genuine.

 

I thought i'd found one. There's the 6 cell and the 9 cell. Mine is the 6 cell i think but on this site they were sold out and only the 9 cells left.

 

I did a quick Google search of the website and trustpilot website panned it as Asian scammers. It had looked pretty convincing too.

 

I've had to email Lenovo themselves and ask how am i to get a genuine battery for this laptop.

[Mindovermaster Moderator]

I always used non-standard batteries and never had a problem. They do die sooner, yes. But you pay much less than the genuine brand..

[Technique]

23 hours ago, Mindovermaster said:

I always used non-standard batteries and never had a problem. They do die sooner, yes. But you pay much less than the genuine brand..

It may come to that because it seems pretty difficult to buy genuine.

 

Whether it's a case of 1 standard one at £25 a pop lasts 12 months and a genuine one at £50 lasts 2 years who knows.

I'll see what Lenovo come back to me with, if anything, and go from there. I remember seeing a few year ago the official battery to buy on their website. The laptop is about 7 years old now so maybe they don't make these batteries any more, i don't know. I only see a couple batteries on their site but they're not for this laptop.

[jpqf]

I think there's probably a lot of used batteries sold as new or ones that didn't pass quality control.  In diy electronics communities, people salvage used litihum ion batteries for projects. There's usually some useful lifespan left in used batteries. Consumers could never tell if they bought a used battery with some life left it in. Not until the capacity notably falls off cliff before they expect it to.

[spikey_richie]

On 24/12/2020 at 11:19, Technique said:

I also work for a guy who will charge you as much as he can get away with when a store around the corner will charge half as much for the exact same product which is why i don't always swallow the get what you pay for thing whole.

That's more about mark-up and commission. Mark-up on electronics is usually 100% (double what they paid for it wholesale). The "store around the corner" must have lower costs, so can afford to sell for a bit less. Clearly their lowest price will be cost + tax.

[ThaCrip]

That's one thing that never seems to last is those generic ones from what I can tell. but sometimes people ain't got much of a choice as I can't see spending top dollar for a name brand laptop battery in general which can get fairly expensive etc.

 

p.s. hell, I am not a fan of rechargable lithium tech in general since, while they can be solid when they do work well, they tend to die faster than NiMh and cost more and can be harder to find (especially once your device reaches a certain age people stop making quality replacement batteries) which is why I always prefer devices to run on more standard AAA or AA sized batteries when possible because with those, even when they go bad, you can easily get QUALITY replacements and be set for many years once again. NOTE: I am not the type of person who dumps their devices every few years as I want my devices to last. because for example one device I got which I wished ran on standard AA or AAA is Sandisk Sansa e200 series audio player as while it still works well with Rockbox firmware, I can tell the battery is fairly shot and all of the ones you can buy for it online are just more generic junk which probably won't be much better than what I got in it (I can tell the device runtime is a lot less than it was when you had a new quality battery). but if it ran on AAA or AA's I could just simply buy a Eneloop (which are the best all around re-chargeable batteries one can get) and easily get several more years of use out of it running at max battery capacity to. that's why short of devices that are power hogs, more manufacturers should make devices run on standard AA/AAA as this way we could use NiMh in them instead.