May have to replace my battery. Seen them on Ebay and Amazon but was wondering how to gauge what's a smart/safe buy beyond the ratings and warranty as many seem similar in that regard.
Thanks
I can only tell you what I considered when buying a battery on Amazon. In my case it all worked out well.
1 Only buy from Amazon itself or 'Fulfilled by Amazon' - unreliable batteries are not likely to go wrong straightaway so you'd have little chance of grabbing the original seller for any redress if you bought from an 'Amazon Marketplace' seller [who can just disappear overnight]. Buying from Amazon itself or 'Fulfilled by Amazon' means there is somebody to seek redress from.
2 Only buy a product that has an average 4 stars or greater.
3 Only buy a product for which the 1 star & 2 star reviews account for less than 10% of all reviews
4 Only buy a product that has at least 10 customer reviews so that there's a decent chance that shortcomings have been spotted & reported on.
5 Look for explicit statements of compatibility with the relevant computer model in the product description itself. Any endorsement you find in the user reviews is a bonus but not a substitute for the seller's description.
These criteria are what I apply to most Amazon purchases.
Denis
Thanks. I look for the same things though not with your level of specificity.
What falls under generic? I'm clueless about battery brands.
VFN -
'generic' just means one that is not 'branded', not sold as "genuine" Dell/HP/etc. In other words, one that is not made to their technical standards and that might therefore be made of unreliable components.
Denis
The first basic rule is to look on the label of your current battery and find 3 things: the output voltage, the Amperage (usually listed as mAh), and the number of Cells.
It is very important that the output voltage match exactly. Failing this is where most complaints originate from.
Amperage is less important in terms of working properly. But in general, the higher the amperage the longer the battery will last on a single charge. So if your current battery is 2200mAh you would not want to get less than that, but more would be OK.
But if you want to get a true OEM replacement try and match all the specs exactly.
The number of Cells refers to the number of roughly AA size battery cells that are inside the battery's casing. The more cells the more battery life. So OK to get more but not OK to get less. Again a true OEM replacement will have the same number of cells.
Finding real OEM batteries is really tricky. You either need to get them direct from the OEM at a premium price or take your chances on 3rd party sellers. There are a lot of generic knock-offs with false labeling. It pays to check your product carefully when you get it to compare to your original. Send it back if the label looks different.
After market battery manufacturers are OK to use for the most part as long as they are reputable (good reviews), been around a while, and offer replacements with exact specs.
And also, it is usually a good idea to get a new charger with the new battery. Otherwise you will need to be sure to match the input voltage also.
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