Hi all,

Pretty much killed my Dell laptop battery using a cheap 12v-240v inverter to charge it (6hr life down to 1hr).

Official battery from Dell is over £100. Will something like this be any good? Can anyone recommend a half decent battery shop?

http://www.power-supplier.co.uk/laptop-battery/3074/DELL/Dell%20Vostro%203350.htm?gclid=CO7WsoHJhb4CFUmWtAodh3EA8w

Ta,
Duane.

I got one from eBay. Just did my research on companies with good feedback, UK based and a long history. It’s been fine for 2 years so far.

Pretty much killed my Dell laptop battery using a cheap 12v-240v inverter to charge it (6hr life down to 1hr).

I suspect you didn’t, but anyway – never bought a 3rd party battery and not been disappointed.

Why not? The inverter and battery got very hot (about too hot to touch) when in use.

My 12 month old Dell laptop battery has never managed more than 90 mins.

Hm, lost my post.

What I was going to say was that you aren’t connecting your power supply to the battery, you are connecting it to an intelligent charging circuit which should be managing the battery. It shouldn’t matter what the power supply is doing – if it’s enough power, it should work. The charging circuit should smooth out any noise I reckon.

Batteries can simply fail, but heat also deteriorates them. If it’s getting hot, it might well be due to the heat from the computer itself.

I bought , what I hoped was a reputable Dell non oem battery with 100% feedback off fleabay and it lasted about 6 months. Neighbour works for Dell, said get a proper Dell one and he gave me a code for friends and family discount . Still worked out at £140 with his discount 🙄
He said not to bother. Got another battery from another seller now and is twice as heavy as the old one and is fairing up well so far. 5 months and counting.

What I was going to say was that you aren’t connecting your power supply to the battery, you are connecting it to an intelligent charging circuit which should be managing the battery. It shouldn’t matter what the power supply is doing – if it’s enough power, it should work. The charging circuit should smooth out any noise I reckon.

Batteries can simply fail, but heat also deteriorates them. If it’s getting hot, it might well be due to the heat from the computer itself.

What he said. laptops aren’t great homes for batteries, 2 years of reasonable life is doing well in my experience.

EDIT: Oops forgot the question! I’ve had non OEM batteries that were rubbish and OEM batteries that were rubbish. Personally I’d go on good feedback and buy the cheaper option.

I paid around £12 for mine from a high feedback ebay seller its been fine for months and lasts a good three hours. No complaints.

ive not had a good experience with cheap batteries, best case is they don’t hold their charge after a few months of use and worst case with a cheap ebay special, it exploded and caught fire which could have been bad news if it didn’t happen whilst I was using the thing. Luckily damage was limited to a burnt desk & laptop was fine still. If you go third party at least buy from a Uk supplier where its likely had some QC and testing on it.

I brought this Anker one from amazon recently which seems to work ok so far.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005DPVPCE/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1