Review: UM08A73 5200mAh 6-cell battery (purchased from eBay)

OK I thought I'd take the time to review a battery I just received from a seller on eBay. The battery purchased is a UM08A73 5200mAh 11.1v 6-cell battery, from a seller named "happy_power" (currently 100% feedback rating on 158 transactions). I received the white version to match my white AAO. I'm in Australia and the seller is located in Hong Kong. Delivery was VERY fast. It was shipped on Thursday the 12th of February and I picked it up from the post office on the 16th of February, not bad at all. Upon opening the brown bubble-padded bag I removed this box:



Inside the box the battery was in a static bag sandwiched between two thick pieces of foam, nice and snug:



Also included is a small instruction booklet and some tasty desiccant for a delicious treat (disclaimer: do not eat desiccant):



Here is the 5200mAh 6-cell battery removed from it's static bag. It's heavier of course than the standard, but not as bad as I thought:



Side-by-side shots of the new battery and the original Acer 2200mAh 3-cell:





Yes, so of course it's bigger, but it's not that bad, and it barely lifts the AAO off the desk. In fact, it's probably a good thing to improve airflow. The 9-cell behemoths seemed too extreme for my requirements and I wanted a good balance between portability, weight and battery life. You'll be pleased to know that the AAO also fits into it's original sleeve cover without a problem with this battery installed, so long as the battery is at the open end of the sleeve:






The extra bulge at the back will prevent the screen from going back as far as it used to, but the angle is still good and it shouldn't affect normal operation of the AAO at all:



So, how does it compare to the original? Well, my original 2200mAh 3-cell battery would show about 2h20m remaining on a full charge, and would usually last me about 2h or so with wi-fi enabled and just regular usage, web browsing, text editing etc. When I first installed the 5200mAh 6-cell, it showed about 53% charge and about the same amount of time remaining as the standard battery. I have since run two full discharge and recharge cycles (the instructions recommend 3-4 cycles to obtain the optimum performance from the battery). Let's pull out the power cord and see what Windows reports:



Wow, 6h25m - that's quite a bit of a jump! That's while sitting at the desktop, idle. When doing something CPU intensive I saw the meter drop as low as 4h30m, but only for a moment. Your mileage may vary of course depending on what you use your AAO for.

So overall, I think it was a good purchase. I bought mine for $85.95 AUD ($56.75 USD), and the seller has good communication and free shipping for most (if not all?) batteries they sell. Given how quickly it arrived I think it was a great deal. I'm very "happy" with my "power":

http://shop.ebay.com.au/merchant/happy_power

I hope this can be of help to someone.

Cheers,

{R}

 

Hmm I just read a post here that said these batteries could be labeled as 5200mAh when they are in fact 4400mAh:

viewtopic.php?f=75&t=11229#p71681

Worth looking into... I'm not super concerned though because I wanted a 4400mAh originally and thought the 5200mAh would be a bonus. Either way it's still a lot more battery time than the original. Would not be cool if the seller was knowingly selling something which claims to be more than it is.

 

Nicely done RainmakeR. I bought a 9-cell and it IS big and heavy (comparitively) but I like the ability to use it all day on photo shoots. Still, I might have been better served with a 6-cell. Thanks again for the effort put into this.

 

Yes, that's me. I am engaged in discussions with Sunny (Happy Power) at the moment to resolve this problem. Hopefully this is a labelling error on the manufacturer's part and nothing more sinister.

It would be worth checking the capacity using something like Notebook Battery Info or PC Wizard 2008. I have attached a screenshot from Notebook Battery Info taken after my battery was first fully charged.

The designed and actual capacities will be reported in mWH. Divide this by the nominal voltage (11.1V) to get the capacity in mAH. In my case, the designed capacity is 48840mWH which equates to 4400mAH. The actual capacity is currently less than 45000mWH which equates to ~ 4000mAH. This represents a wear rate of 8% after only a few days and goes some way to explaining why I'm struggling to get more than 4 hours runtime. IMHO it would also suggest that low grade cells have been used.

[attachment=0:29sjnrur]BatteryInfo.png[/attachment:29sjnrur]

 

ronime: Any update on your situation? I also contacted Happy Power, before ordering and Sunny told me it's 5200 Mah. I haven't ordered yet. Thanks

 

I may grab one from him as well, my battery seems to be knackered, thanks mate

 

Yes. Sunny has offered me a full refund if I send the battery back to him. I posted the battery to HK on 21 Feb, so hopefully I will be able to report further in 5 - 7 days time.

I was rather disappointed that he did not take the opportunity to send me a tested 5200mAH battery instead of refunding me, but there you go...

 

Please take your spam elsewhere. Oh, and your prices are higher than just about every other seller. No thanks.

 

The package was delivered and signed for in HK on 24 Feb. I pointed this out to Happy Power last week but the refund is still not forthcoming.

I'm through with this joker. My experience with this ebay seller has been a disaster from day one. It's over to PayPal and my credit card provider now for dispute resolution and chargebacks...

 

In the end I had to raise a dispute with PayPal in order to get a refund. The promised refund of my return postage costs is still outstanding.

Caveat Emptor.

Update: The vendor has contacted me after I posted negative feedback on ebay and now wishes to resolve this issue to my satisfaction. I will let you know the outcome of these negotiations.