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Legit battery for 17" 2008 MBP -- does it still exist?
- Thread starter DenisK
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Have you checked out the NewerTech NuPower batteries? They are sold out on OWC/macsales at the moment but people have at least reviewed them last year. Also, Apple did sell official replacement batteries in-box back in 2008, there are some that float around eBay sometimes.
Edit: Here's an image I found of them:
Secondly, every battery official or not will probably bulge at some point.
Edit: Here's an image I found of them:
Secondly, every battery official or not will probably bulge at some point.
Have you checked out the NewerTech NuPower batteries? They are sold out on OWC/macsales at the moment but people have at least reviewed them last year. Also, Apple did sell official replacement batteries in-box back in 2008, there are some that float around eBay sometimes.
Edit: Here's an image I found of them:
Secondly, every battery official or not will probably bulge at some point.
In another thread, I brought up a question about Apple-OEM batteries for laptops seeming to not bulge the way so many aftermarket ones do, even when they’re nearly completely exhausted.
Since I posted that, I got the chance to look through and inspect a few old unibody-era white MacBook and MacBook Pro OEM batteries alongside unibody aftermarket variants.
All of these — OEM and aftermarket — were plenty used, and some were destined for the battery recycling drop-off. For reasons about which I’m still not clear, the Apple-OEM batteries were, by and large, all just completely exhausted (or very much on their way out), yet nearly none presented swelling issues. Nearly all the aftermarket batteries, meanwhile, were either beginning to swell or had swelled to comically bad proportions. (Note: none originated from Newertech, so I can’t speak to how an exhausted Newertech battery fares).
Without question, there were likely some stringent quality control standards Apple imposed on the production of their OEM batteries which get left largely under-checked and/or lax in most of what remains available for sale in the aftermarket realm (which for pre-unibody and even unibody models, are almost entirely aftermarket now).
I’m often left to wonder whether the factories under contract by Apple to produce Apple’s OEM batteries stopped making laptop-series batteries (after Apple end-of-life’d a series) because Apple’s contract stipulated they must cease, or because the factory (or factories) no longer considered it cost-worthy to turn profits whilst relying on the same OEM specs and quality control — albeit under an aftermarket brand.
For a series like the unibody, which spans some eight-plus years of sales, there are unquestionably north of few million units still in some kind of use even today (out of, rough guess, probably ~40–50 million 13/15/17-inch variants sold across those eight years). Given this, I gather there is probably some restrictive contract language involved.
As for pre-unibody MBPs, I’d be curious to learn in what year Apple EOL’d OEM battery replacements for the 15 and 17-inch MBPs for the 2006–08 series, and also the late 2008 unibody batteries — namely because as I end my second year of using my rejuvenated A1261, I’ve gone through
I don't know where you live, but in Germany my only choice would be this:
www.duracelldirect.de
In fact I am using it right now.
So far so good.
That battery looks and feels legit at least.
It has a metal encasing from the outside.
Apple MacBook Pro 17" Early 2008 EMC2137 (A1229) Akku (3 Zellen)
Apple MacBook Pro 17
In fact I am using it right now.
So far so good.
That battery looks and feels legit at least.
It has a metal encasing from the outside.
I don't know where you live, but in Germany my only choice would be this:
Apple MacBook Pro 17" Early 2008 EMC2137 (A1229) Akku (3 Zellen)
Apple MacBook Pro 17
In fact I am using it right now.
So far so good.
That battery looks and feels legit at least.
It has a metal encasing from the outside.
I’ve seen (and read) a steady series of generally favourable reviews for Duracell laptop batteries and have long wanted to try one myself, but they are sold strictly in the continental European (EU) market. The last time I visited the Duracell site, it was located in the Netherlands.
For North America, I think our best available alternative are the NuPower NewerTech line of laptop batteries.
Update: Indeed, it appears Duracell Direct doesn’t have an outlet for Canada, while the U.S. market only has batteries shown for select Asus and Toshiba models only.
Sorry to hear that mate.
I only went for the Duracell. as the situation with NewerTech batteries actually was the same you experienced with the Duracells.
Well not quite.
They could be ordered.
But I would have to wait 2-3 months to get them.
And the only retailer who still sold them in Germany was advising against them as he had a lot of complaints from others customers.
I hope you find a good copy, but in general, I think it’s best not to expect too much from these 3rd party batteries.
And better to run the old machines on the cable anyway most of the time.
To be able to use them as along as possible.
Because that Mac will run without battery on a reduced speed.
One observation: this is not true of newer Apple OEM batteries. I've had two Apple batteries swell in my now-traded-in mid-2014 retina 15"; my mom had one swell in her late-2013 retina 15". Worth noting that these were laptops rarely used on battery; the battery life was still I think quite reasonable at the time of the swelling.
I've also seen swelling in built-in Lenovo batteries...
My sense is that there's something about the built-in batteries vs the removable ones enclosed in plastic that makes the built-in ones more likely to swell, or at least to visibly swell...
Good point, and I will concur here: one of the pods/cells on the OEM battery in my early 2015 13-inch rMBP, before I killed the retina display, was in the process of bulging.
My observation at a laptop battery recycling shop is: The removable batteries were built based on multi 18650 cells, which are less likely to detect the swell because if only 1 cell busted, the whole battery would fail. They normally popped out 1 end and leaked inside the plastic case.
In your experience, how often did you see, specifically, PowerBook 17-inch batteries which expanded/bloated like this? I ask this, specifically, of the 17-inch variant, as those were, to my knowledge, the very first lithium-polymer-based batteries — in lieu of a series of 18650 cells — to reach a Mac product.
[Also, I’ve long been curious to learn how many polymer layers were employed in the 17-inch PowerBook G4 battery design, as on those I’ve used which had dying polymer packs/cells within, progressive failure doesn’t happen in percentages divisible by three — i.e., 67, 33, 0 — or four, but closer to eight or even ten. Even then, I’ve not run across any OEM A1140 (and its interchangeable predecessor) batteries in my memory which began to swell as we came to see with later lithium polymer batteries, such as the aftermarket 17-inch pre-unibody MBP batteries I’ve had which swell up like a
Related: when I‘ve had 18650 cell-series batteries fail on older batteries, such as on iBooks, they tend to fail one cell at a time, in that the failed cell remains intact and current may be passed through, but the cell itself is no longer storing or discharging current (whether by internal circuitry inside the 18650 cell or, more likely, the battery logic circuitry of the battery pack itself). Eventually, all the cells will fail, but not before seeing (for example, an 8-cell battery) ~12.5 per cent of total battery capacity “vanish” from coconutBattery each time one fails.
I‘ve observed a similar thing also play out whenever a lithium-polymer pack begins to swell: whatever the capacity for the swollen cell, coupled with the total number of cells of that battery, once it fails, current may still be passed through it (leaving the remaining polymer packs to hold and discharge capacity), but the swollen pack which failed will no longer hold and/or discharge its own capacity. This is probably, again a guess, the battery pack logic circuitry disabling charge/discharge to that cell for safety purposes. Of course, with continued use, that cell will probably continue to expand with gases until, inevitably, it can expand no longer and then ruptures — unlike the 18650 cells, which have the venting feature and, as you have observed, detaching of the elements within, via a “popping out”.
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My original post was meant to reply to the comment about user removable batteries with plastic cases in ancient windows laptop, not the non-removable flat lithium polymer batteries in modern laptops and Macbook computers.
We don't deal with lithium batteries, although the price of recoverable lithium is high, how to handle it safely is beyond our level.
Ancient? Lenovo was still using those (in combination with a built-in battery Apple-style) in some ThinkPad models in 2015... that's not that old, is it?
If you charge them everyday, of plug in AC power source 24/7; a laptop battery needs to be replace every 2~3 years.
In that perspective, battery of 2015 model are ancient.
OWC Macsales batteries are fine, I always buy mine from them and never had an issue. Just replaced the battery in a 2020 Macbook Air M1 I bought from them no problem.
Do not generalize.
You compare recent battery technology with that from at least 14 years ago.
Back then batteries were not that sophisticated with respect to power management and also didn’t last that long as the cells were not that efficient.
So you compare apples with oranges.
And OWC also don’t make them themselves but buy from a China manufacturer.
I’ve bought batteries for everything from my G4 powerbook all the way up to my new M1 Macbook Air. All no problem.
I’m giving you my personal experience from about 6 different purchases.
I’m comparing batteries to batteries.
Don’t listen if you don’t want to.
I can provide my own experience with regards to this. My 2006 17" MBP battery is the original, and it is swollen. The plastic case has been separated for years due to the expansion of the battery. I have never had any other laptop batteries swell like this. Only times I've seen battery swelling in my own devices would be cell phone type batteries which I have to toss regularly.
And I would respond that I've had two swelling batteries in a mid-2014 retina MacBook Pro, my mom had swelling batteries in a late-2013 retina MacBook Pro, and I also had... two?... Lenovo T550s at work where the built-in batteries swelled (the T550 was an interesting transitional machine, combining both an Apple-style built-in battery and a traditional removable Lenovo battery).
What those machines had in common, I suppose, is rarely running on battery.