Laptop battery replacement
December 7, 2014 3:19 PM Subscribe
Hey, all. I have a three-year-old Gateway laptop (NV55C) that was having battery problems, so I bought a replacement battery from Amazon. When I got the replacement battery, it included a list of battery models it replaces, and the model of my old battery was not among them. Is this bad?
My old battery is an AS10D31; of the battery models the new battery replaces, the closest is AS10D41. The new battery is working fine, but I'm concerned it could overheat or something. I'm not really sure what the difference in models is, though the new battery is of slightly higher voltage. Thanks!
My old battery is an AS10D31; of the battery models the new battery replaces, the closest is AS10D41. The new battery is working fine, but I'm concerned it could overheat or something. I'm not really sure what the difference in models is, though the new battery is of slightly higher voltage. Thanks!
Best answer: Many models of laptop accept 3 or more models of battery. Different revisions, different capacities, etc. I used to own a dell that could accept something like 7 different batteries(and more models of charger than that).
That laptop seems to take a seriously generic battery design too, if you look at for example this amazon page for a replacement for that model, it lists it as working with several brands of laptop. I'm sure that just means acer was the OEM for this model, but still. This isn't like certain sonys or something where it takes some super weird battery specific to that one model.
If the voltage is the same(that machine seems to want 10.8v) i wouldn't worry about it at all. Even if it isn't, i'd do some more research to make sure that it's not just that different revisions of that battery for that machine don't output different voltages. Because i've seen that too, ditto with charger voltages(there's something like 3 any magsafe mac can accept, for instance).
Modern batteries have overtemp/overcurrent/overvoltage protection, and modern charge controllers are pretty advanced. Most machines will actually spit out an error if you connect the wrong charger or battery, before even booting up. If it plays nice with it and seems to be working fine, you're not going to burn your house down. Especially since acer seems to really try and make their batteries fit a ridiculous number of models including ones they make for other brands.
In my experience repairing acers, two of the same model might not even have the same screen, or brand of hard drive, or any number of other things. I wouldn't be shocked if you found out that some revisions of this same model shipped with the other model number of battery out of the box.
posted by emptythought at 4:04 PM on December 7, 2014
That laptop seems to take a seriously generic battery design too, if you look at for example this amazon page for a replacement for that model, it lists it as working with several brands of laptop. I'm sure that just means acer was the OEM for this model, but still. This isn't like certain sonys or something where it takes some super weird battery specific to that one model.
If the voltage is the same(that machine seems to want 10.8v) i wouldn't worry about it at all. Even if it isn't, i'd do some more research to make sure that it's not just that different revisions of that battery for that machine don't output different voltages. Because i've seen that too, ditto with charger voltages(there's something like 3 any magsafe mac can accept, for instance).
Modern batteries have overtemp/overcurrent/overvoltage protection, and modern charge controllers are pretty advanced. Most machines will actually spit out an error if you connect the wrong charger or battery, before even booting up. If it plays nice with it and seems to be working fine, you're not going to burn your house down. Especially since acer seems to really try and make their batteries fit a ridiculous number of models including ones they make for other brands.
In my experience repairing acers, two of the same model might not even have the same screen, or brand of hard drive, or any number of other things. I wouldn't be shocked if you found out that some revisions of this same model shipped with the other model number of battery out of the box.
posted by emptythought at 4:04 PM on December 7, 2014
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posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:22 PM on December 7, 2014