Replacement Battery for my 15" MacBook Pro
I'm on a quest. Not for the Holy Grail, but for a solid, high-capcity replacement battery for the one currently in my 15" MacBook Pro (which doesn't seem to be able to hold a charge anymore).
Not as easy as it may seem. This is a pretty popular laptop, and a lot of people are making replacement batteries for it.
My criteria:
For MacBook Pro batteries, which all seem to be 10.8V, this turns out to be roughly:
mAhWh540058560060580063
Clearly, I want the last variety.
For warranties, I'm looking for at least 90 days, but preferably 6 months to a year. And price? Well, let's start with the price of a genuine Apple battery from the Apple Store: $129. It shouldn't be any more expensive than that, to be sure, and preferably a lot less expensive.
(As a side note, it's nearly impossible to get the full specs on the Apple-branded battery. I had to assume it was 10.8V, since all the others are. As far as I can tell, Apple sells the middle-of-the-road 5600mAh type.)
There's another thing I considered considering: li-ion (Lithium-Ion) vs. li-poly (Lithium-Polymer). I did some reading on the two, and it seems li-poly is the newer technology, and promises to be a bit lighter. But frankly, if the battery can give me close to 4 hours of work time (I'm getting about 30 minutes on my current battery), I don't care how heavy it is.
Off to Google and Bing! A lot of hits on Buy.com. Searching on their site directly got me a 5800mAh battery for only $64.18 after shipping, with a 1-year warranty. Nice. But I think I can do better.
Enter eBay. (Disclaimer: I work for eBay.) A quick search and some pogo-sticking form the search results to the item description pages, and I've found some pretty good deals, all in the sub-$50 range with free shipping.
In this category (like a lot of the tech categories on eBay), I also need to consider one more thing: Do I go with a Hong Kong seller, or stick with the good ol' USA? I have nothing against the Hong Kong sellers, per se, but for this kind of stuff, all else being equal, I kind of want to buy domestic. Not that the cheapo US sellers aren't getting their wares from Hong Kong anyway (I'm assuming), but if I have any issues and need to return the battery for any reason, I'd rather deal with someone local. Plus, in my experience, shipping from Hong Kong can take a long time (on the order of weeks).
The winner? It's really not as clear-cut as I'd hoped. I can either purchase a 5800mAh battery for $45.58, but with a really restrictive warranty (14 days? Are you serious?), or a 5400mAh battery for $49.30, with a nice 1-year warranty. Now, for $50, I'm willing to make some compromises, and in this case, I think I'll opt for what's behind door #3: a 5800mAh battery for $49.55, with a 3-month warranty. I'm not exceedingly happy about the warranty, but at least they seem less uptight about it (compared to all the strings attached to the meager 14 day return policy of the other seller).
The seller is silicon_electronic, and they have a good seller rating (4.9/5 in all categories but Communication, for which they got a 4.8). So I think that's what I'm going to order. I'm sure you'll hear more if I end up regretting this decision.
Not as easy as it may seem. This is a pretty popular laptop, and a lot of people are making replacement batteries for it.
My criteria:
- high capacity
- decent warranty
- low cost
For MacBook Pro batteries, which all seem to be 10.8V, this turns out to be roughly:
mAhWh540058560060580063
Clearly, I want the last variety.
For warranties, I'm looking for at least 90 days, but preferably 6 months to a year. And price? Well, let's start with the price of a genuine Apple battery from the Apple Store: $129. It shouldn't be any more expensive than that, to be sure, and preferably a lot less expensive.
(As a side note, it's nearly impossible to get the full specs on the Apple-branded battery. I had to assume it was 10.8V, since all the others are. As far as I can tell, Apple sells the middle-of-the-road 5600mAh type.)
There's another thing I considered considering: li-ion (Lithium-Ion) vs. li-poly (Lithium-Polymer). I did some reading on the two, and it seems li-poly is the newer technology, and promises to be a bit lighter. But frankly, if the battery can give me close to 4 hours of work time (I'm getting about 30 minutes on my current battery), I don't care how heavy it is.
Off to Google and Bing! A lot of hits on Buy.com. Searching on their site directly got me a 5800mAh battery for only $64.18 after shipping, with a 1-year warranty. Nice. But I think I can do better.
Enter eBay. (Disclaimer: I work for eBay.) A quick search and some pogo-sticking form the search results to the item description pages, and I've found some pretty good deals, all in the sub-$50 range with free shipping.
In this category (like a lot of the tech categories on eBay), I also need to consider one more thing: Do I go with a Hong Kong seller, or stick with the good ol' USA? I have nothing against the Hong Kong sellers, per se, but for this kind of stuff, all else being equal, I kind of want to buy domestic. Not that the cheapo US sellers aren't getting their wares from Hong Kong anyway (I'm assuming), but if I have any issues and need to return the battery for any reason, I'd rather deal with someone local. Plus, in my experience, shipping from Hong Kong can take a long time (on the order of weeks).
The winner? It's really not as clear-cut as I'd hoped. I can either purchase a 5800mAh battery for $45.58, but with a really restrictive warranty (14 days? Are you serious?), or a 5400mAh battery for $49.30, with a nice 1-year warranty. Now, for $50, I'm willing to make some compromises, and in this case, I think I'll opt for what's behind door #3: a 5800mAh battery for $49.55, with a 3-month warranty. I'm not exceedingly happy about the warranty, but at least they seem less uptight about it (compared to all the strings attached to the meager 14 day return policy of the other seller).
The seller is silicon_electronic, and they have a good seller rating (4.9/5 in all categories but Communication, for which they got a 4.8). So I think that's what I'm going to order. I'm sure you'll hear more if I end up regretting this decision.