Replacement Laptop Battery for Acer Aspire

I have owned an Acer Aspire (5749) laptop for a couple of years now, and was very happy with it until a couple of weeks ago, when I spilled some water on the keyboard. No problem, I bought a replacement keyboard that was easy to replace, and everything back to normal.

Today I noticed my battery icon flashing, with a message “Consider replacing your battery”. Clever, I thought - I didn’t realise this was being monitored.

So, I look on eBay & Amazon, and find dozens of compatible batteries, costing from £13 to £122 for the real thing. Now, I’m not spending £100+ on a new battery, but on the other hand, I don’t want to spend £13 on a laptop battery that contains **fire cells.

Is there any way of knowing what is likely to be a reliable (and safe) replacement battery for a laptop, other than the genuine branded product?

The funny thing is that when the keyboard began playing up, I thought “oh good, new laptop”, until I read how simple (and cheap) it was to replace the keyboard.

Maybe if you shot for the center between those two price points, you’d get something reliable and safe, yet not overpriced? A dedicated battery website that does all kinds of batteries might be a safe bet.

Thanks for the comments. My predicament is an odd one I guess - I never buy **fire cells for my lights, but at least I can see what I am buying, largely thanks to HKJ’s reviews. In a laptop battery, I just assume the things are crap, and price alone isn’t a guarantee of buying something with decent cells inside. There is certainly no way a $20 replacement can contain nothing but rubbish cells.

I guess looking for a reputable battery supplier is a good first step. I haven’t seen too many 2nd hand “genuine” batteries on eBay.UK.

I’d be looking for a UK based store with a decent warranty to back it up. Most shops that specialize in these things, should be able to tell you what kind of batteries are in the packs. Definitely don’t go cheap, my 2 hour runtime is down to 20 minutes after about 10 months :frowning:

This looks reasonable, Samsung cells and 2yr warranty.

http://www.battdepot.com/uk/model/notebook+battery/acer/aspire+5749/lac215-ap.aspx

I can say that in relation to Ebay listings, you can not rely on the statement contains Japanese cells. Original battery run for around 3 to 4 hours. The replacement even on low power settings would last maybe 80 mins.

Gjs link looks good if its legit Samsung cells.

You have to consider: Is it the battery just being old, or did the bath damage the charging circuitry and replacing the battery won’t fix it?

Try using the term: OEM (original equipment manufacturer) in your search bar

Thanks for all the suggestions. Strangely enough, the warning message has disappeared this morning. :~ I don’t expect it will be too long before it comes back.

@texaspyro - I did wonder about that, but it was literally a splash from a glass of water, so I doubt if it did serious damage (I was surprised when the keyboard started playing up, and assumed it would just dry out and work again). 0:)

@Gj - I had a look at battdepot, but I’m not too confident about them. First, no address shown, and when I googled some bad reviews.

I’ll have another look around - the OEM is a good idea, and I certainly wouldn’t trust “Japanese cells” just because an eBayer says so.

Thanks again.

Is it possible to analyze the accupack with a hobby charger? If so then i would test the old accupack and the new accupack. Amazon reviews of accupacks could be helpful too, sometimes some cracks do exactly this: analyze the pack or disassemble it.

Have you got a link for the new keyboard? :)

I don’t have a hobby charger, so can’t analyse the battery. I bought the keyboard from Amazon.