Taking the piss

[ffutures]

When I got my iBook the battery was capable of 2-3 hours operation, more if I turn off WiFi. Since I wanted to use it at trade shows where they charge £100+ for the use of a mains socket I got a second battery fairly cheap on eBay, which had about the same life.

Today the original battery has about an hour's capacity, and the second one is below two hours. So I went along to the big Apple shop in Regent Street and asked prices tonight. And it turns out they cost £89.95 each. And unless I can find replacements a hell of a lot cheaper than that I'm afraid that my days as a Mac user may be somewhat more limited than I'd anticipated.

So if anyone sees anyone selling genuine batteries for a 14" screen iBook G4 cheapish please let me know.

Comments

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the battery in my mums generic-brand laptop PC died a year ago, the warranty from PC World (Damn their oily hides) didn't cover the batteries. And they were wanting £75 for a new one.

The PC has run off the mains ever since.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Thing is that batteries for the average PC-compatible laptop are probably one hell of a lot easier to get cheap than Mac batteries, and that most of my reasons for owning a laptop require something that does not run on mains power. While the internals of battery packs aren't fearsomely complicated, the general reluctance of Mac users to buy anything that doesn't have the Apple logo means that there's little or no market for alternative suppliers, but I know that several companies offer alternative PC batteries.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

OK, maybe there is a market - I just found a Hong Kong supplier selling a generic replacement for 22 quid plus 12 quid postage, but I'd expect a customs duty hit on top of that.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Ah, is Apple one of those companies who fix it so that you can only use Apple approved spares?

I tried to take an old Nintendo apart once, but found you could only get it open if you had the special nintendo screwdriver.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

It's part of the casing, rather than fitting inside - you can change batteries very easily, but nothing else will fit apart from a workalike clone.

[timill]

Ebay search "battery ibook g4" 'UK only' shows a dozen for sale at around £30-40 inc delivery.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Yes, I just put several onto my watch list, all of them auction prices, not buy it now.

[heliograph.livejournal.com]

I don't recall what kind of iBook you've got, but one thing to potentially keep an eye on is calibration. If you've had an older battery in your Mac and then put in a fresher one, the Mac might have trouble calculating remaining life.

Unless you're going by the blinky lights on the battery itself...

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Yes, I checked that - they're fully charged. I used to have no trouble getting 6-7 hours with a battery swap and WiFi turned off, but the old battery has faded a lot and the new one isn't as good as it used to be.

It's just the standard white 14" iBook G4.

[ckd]

Have you run each battery through the calibration procedure lately? I doubt it'll make a huge difference, but it doesn't cost anything to try.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Tried it, didn't help.

[saranjeuhal.livejournal.com]

Put each in a freezer/ziplog bag and freeze them for 24 hours. Allow them to thaw and air dry. A lot of people have success revitalizing batteries this way. Unfortunately batteries are Li-Ion and end up losing charge capacity over time due to breakdown of the chemical soup that provides the charge.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Thanks - I'll give it a try once my freezer is a bit emptier.

[saranjeuhal.livejournal.com]

For extra safety, use double bagging with the ziploc seals bags.

[ckd]

I don't know if Newer Technology has a UK reseller, but their 74 Wh battery is US$120 here. Shame about the US$30 shipping.

You might be able to find an external battery pack with an iBook/Powerbook plug that can be used as an "extender".

Li-ion batteries

[nojay.livejournal.com]

The problem is that lithium-ion (and the rarer lithium-polymer) batteries have a fixed lifespan of a couple of years before they start to deteriorate. Four or five years after manufacture they don't hold a charge particularly well and the laptop's charging circuit will give up on them at that point. In contrast I've got nickel-cadmium packs for a cordless drill that are over a decade old and they still hold about 70% of the original rated capacity.

The manufacturers went for Li-ion because it gives the best capacity for the volume and weight, two important factors in laptop marketing. There's a newer technology on the horizon from Toshiba with rechargeable cells that last over ten years and which can be charged very rapidly (5-10 minutes if the charger can deliver the juice!). The downside is they're not as capacious as Li-ion.

As for price, I've been quoted 115 quid for a new battery pack for my small Japanese Lifebook laptop. There doesn't seem to be any aftermarket suppliers for that model, unlike the Apple laptops. The one thing to watch out for is that second-hand batteries are likely to be on their way out; buy new even if they are OEM. The other solution is to buy three cheap 6V gel-cell lead acid batteries from Maplin or similar (the sort used in electric kiddy bikes and go-cars) and assemble an 18V external pack you can take with you to the trade shows, plugging it into the laptop where the regular mains adaptor goes.

As for me I'm waiting for a couple of rechargeable camera battery packs I've ordered to arrive. Whwn that happens I'm pulling the fresh Li-ion cells out of them and refurbishing a dead battery pack for my laptop. It works out at about 20quid or so, plus my time and effort desoldering and resoldering the cells.

Re: Li-ion batteries

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit leery of the Mac power pack socket with the glow-in-the-dark plug etc.; if I went the external power pack route would there be any unusual problems, or is it just a straightforward connection?

Re: Li-ion batteries

[nojay.livejournal.com]

Point -- Apple are renowned for designing in weird power connections that nobody else can build to.

Here's a second solution for you -- 12V-240V converter (150W) @ 14.99:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?TabID=1&ModuleNo=218810&doy=14m12

plus two of Maplin's L21AC 6V lead-acid gel-cell batteries on special offer right now at 3.99 each. That will run your laptop for about as long as a regular Apple battery would (3-4 hours) plus it'll drive anything else main-powered you want to run off it like a phone charger etc. Extra batteries are cheap to stretch your power-on time too. No hacking at the Apple's power port required.

I suspect if you dug around you could get a better price for the power converter and batteries but Maplin are, well, there.

Re: Li-ion batteries

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Heavy, but certainly a possibility.

[robertprior.livejournal.com]

I've got a 14" iBook battery, nearly new, that I'm not using. I think it's been charged maybe 10 times (at which point my iBook died and I got a replacement MacBook.)

You seem to find lots of neat used tech-toys that would be useful in a school science lab. Maybe we can do a swap?

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I can't give you the centrifuge, I'm afraid, it's got to be disposed of safely. Were you looking for anything in particular?

[robertprior.livejournal.com]

I figure the centrifuge would be too expensive to ship, anyway.

I'm not looking for anything in particular. A microscope slide attachment for my Nikon Coolscan V slide scanner could be useful, as could a microscope adaptor for my Nikon D80, but I suspect you have spares of neither :-)

Send me a postal address and I'll put it in the mail to you next week. (Probably Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on what this latest winter storm does.) It won't arrive until after Christmas, though.

[robertprior.livejournal.com]

Oops, hit Post too soon. Meant to say that I'll send you a list of the kind of things that might be handy, and trust that sometime before we both retire you'll come across something handy and let me know.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough I do have a Nikon-fit microscope adaptor I'm not really using - got it when I bought my D50 but for one reason and another the need for it had passed by the time it arrived. It's not a particularly good one, but it works. I can sure as hell make a lot more use of the battery!

YHM