About a month ago I ordered an aftermarket replacement battery for my netbook off an ebay powerseller. Upon installation of the new battery the netbook went tits and would only start in low graphics mode, disabled the trackpad and had no access to anything beyond the desktop. A reinstall of the OS fixed these but obviously meant I'd lost my data. Could've retrieved it if it was important but it wasn't so I didn't.

Posted on here and several people were adamant that it was just a coincidence and that a battery couldn't have any impact on the system settings.

I left negative feedback for the seller explaining what had happened and after some to-ing and fro-ing and offers of "compensation" to change my feedback they finally accepted that I wasn't going to budge so haven't heard from them for about 3 weeks…

Until today, when a new battery has turned up. Presumably as a good will gesture as I made it very clear I wasn't sending them anything nor did I want anything from them. However there are no "sender" details so can't be 100% it's from them…

Now, do I risk trying the battery to see if the first incident was either a one-off/coincidence or prove that these batteries are in some way responsible for changing the settings? Nothing important on the netbook so would just need a quick reinstall of the OS.

Try it, for sure.

I suggest the OP not use computers and that Santa sent the battery.

Hmm. If the battery is reporting low power, that might explain the disabled track pad and the low graphics, to conserve power. However, I've never heard of this happening before. Usually the laptop warns of such things. But it doesn't explain not being able to access parts of the system.

I would lean towards coincidence too and the fact that a reinstall 'fixed' the problem. I think it should be ok.

Apparently a change of battery can alter the BIOS settings which can then have a knock on impact. No idea if this is what happened but it sounds more plausible to me than 2 years of faultless service then coincidentally failing the first time I put a different battery in it.

Bollocks to it, I'll give it a try…

Just kidding OP anyhting can go wrong randomly these days.

Check the bios battery backup too – should be keeping your CMOS settings.

After an unresolved argument with a seller, they send you some "free" kit with no proof that they've actually sent it? Maybe I'm too suspicious, but I'd have concerns as to whether it's sabotaged.

No way I'd plug it in until I'd got definite confirmation from them that they'd sent it. They can whistle if they want paying for it too – unsolicited goods through the post is legally a gift.

Agree 100%

But I'm going to do it anyway.

Works fine. It'll be my emergency spare.

The battery which really is a bomb has now been activated from being plugged into your laptop… 😯