[jumpee]

I Greet As Start Up New Batteries As Not Original .
As Make Code-duplicate Battery.

I Apologize For My English
Please Help .

[JSanders]

I don't understand your need.

[jumpee]

It SEE IT :

[devnull]

wow, never seen anything like that before.

[Dubdub]

I am thinking you do not have a REAL BB. Never seen or heard of that before.

[hrbuckley]

Looks like somthing to duplicate the battery ID. I'd try to get my money back and buy genuine BlackBerry parts. Well, really I never would have bought that part in the first place.

And Dubdub is probably right.

[DallasFlier]

I've seen a number of aftermarket batteries on eBay which come with a little header and instructions like that. I've never bought any, but they seem to be common on eBay. Something about transferring the battery ID from the OEM to the aftermarket battery. I have no idea how it works or why it would be necessary (or even IF it works.)

[aiharkness]

I have gathered that one of the "smarts" of the smart batteries today is that the battery tells the device (or the device queries the battery) that it is the proper battery. If it does not tell the device the correct information, the device disconnects the battery from the power circuit. That fits what is posted above. But I would agree it is an all around bad idea to not use either an OEM battery or a reputable aftermarket battery that requires no such trickery of the device protections.

[DallasFlier]

Originally Posted by aiharkness

I have gathered that one of the "smarts" of the smart batteries today is that the battery tells the device (or the device queries the battery) that it is the proper battery. If it does not tell the device the correct information, the device disconnects the battery from the power circuit. That fits what is posted above. But I would agree it is an all around bad idea to not use either an OEM battery or a reputable aftermarket battery that requires no such trickery of the device protections.

To be honest, I don't like either side of this situation. It smacks of the situation with a lot of newer HP inkjet printers. If you put a non-HP cartridge in, its identified as "not HP OEM" and the printer refuses to print. The primary difference between OEM cartridges from HP and aftermarket cartridges? HP charges obscene prices - at least double and often triple or more what aftermarket cartridges cost.

OEM Torch battery from shopblackberry.com: $79.95

OEM Torch battery from eBay: as low as $24.95

aftermarket battery from eBay: as low as $7.95

Are the OEM BlackBerry batteries worth $79.95? No way in h-e-double-hockey-sticks! Are the $7.95 batteries of lesser quality than the OEM? Not necessarily - in fact, some (not all) of them likely come from the same factory that RIM buys and brands the OEM batteries from.

The BlackBerry F-S1 1270 mAh Battery features a secure, cryptographic chip to ensure you're using a battery specially designed to work with your BlackBerry device.

What does that "secure, cryptographic chip" do? Likely little more than enable higher profits for RIM. To be sure, its not just RIM - most electronics manufacturers try to rape their customers on battery prices. I regularly buy replacement cordless phone batteries on eBay - generally cost around $5, instead of $40-$50 from the phone manufacturer. And in over 10 years of doing it, I've yet to have one that was defective or didn't last at least as well as the (original) OEM battery costing 10x as much.

As always - buyer beware. But you can buy a lot of $7.95 batteries and even have a bad one or two or three, before you ever get anywhere close to spending $79.95 you'll pay on blackberryshop.com.

[aiharkness]

To use the HP example, it is reasonable that a company would want to assure the customer has a high quality experience with its product, and forcing the customer to use consumables that it controls, and not aftermarket products it does not control, is one way to do it. Think of the boneheads who would blame bad performance, and hence the product, on what is really a substandard cartridge. We see it here with people blaming RIM and the device for something the carrier did, a third-party app, or third-party theme.

But BlackBerry batteries are not print cartridges. A print cartridge isnt going to overheat or explode in your pocket, nor ruin the device. That's worst case and may be rare. Best case with a cheap aftermarket battery is you just waste your money.

The thing is, you do not have to pay full retail for an OEM BlackBerry battery, and you can get one that is in satisfactory condition for about half of full retail.

The thing to recognize is that lithium ion batteries have a shelf life. Though there is little reason to pay full retail as the benefit probably does not justify the cost, there also would seem to be too much risk to buying the cheapest OEM battery (or worse, just the cheapest battery) you can find.

There could be other factors involved besides shelf-life. Knockoffs. Units that fail QA and go out the back door instead of into the scrap bin. ... If you see OEM batteries for $8 a piece, the automatic assumption is not that other sellers are charging too much. The question should be what is wrong with the OEM batteries that are being sold at prices at the bottom of the price range. Yeah, you can buy a lot of batteries at those cheap prices; but just hope the worst that happens is you waste your money.

[DallasFlier]

Originally Posted by aiharkness

If you see OEM batteries for $8 a piece, the automatic assumption is not that other sellers are charging too much. The question should be what is wrong with the OEM batteries that are being sold at prices at the bottom of the price range. Yeah, you can buy a lot of batteries at those cheap prices; but just hope the worst that happens is you waste your money.

Its possible that the cheapest batteries do have diminished capacity or other issues/defects. Its also possible that other sellers (in particular, the OEM) are charging way too much. Assuming that either of the above is absolutely true and the other is absolutely false is not being an intelligent consumer. As I said previously, let the buyer beware (and be intelligent.) As also mentioned, I've not (yet) bought one of these inexpensive BlackBerry batteries, but over the last decade I've bought 2-3 dozen for cordless phones, and they've all worked and lasted the same as the original OEM battery - for about 10 cents on the dollar based on buying from the phone manufacturer. That order of magnitude price difference makes it worth the experiment, to me - and my results to-date make further experimentation even more likely to be worth it. If I buy an $8 replacement battery for my Torch which ends up having diminished capacity or other issues, you can be sure I won't be here complaining. On the other hand, I sure enjoy the hundreds of dollars I've saved on electronic device batteries over the last decade or so.

[aiharkness]

Clearly we see things differently. And it should have been apparent that I wasn't speaking of absolutes but rather risks, but I should have known that with you one has to spell everything out and leave no loose ends.

However, I'm speaking to those who need the advice. If what is on the BlackBerry is worth more to you than a few bucks, and if knowing the BlackBerry is going to be working when you need it most, and that reliability is worth more to you than a few bucks, then avoiding the cheapest batteries should be worth it to you for the added piece of mind. That does not mean you have to pay full retail or buy the battery from the BlackBerry store. And it does not mean people do not have good experiences with cheap batteries or knockoffs. It's about risk, and not just risk of losing money, but possibly risk of damage to your BlackBerry, or harm to you.

I will agree with DF on this: Be an intelligent buyer.

[BSTS]

Originally Posted by DallasFlier

Its possible that the cheapest batteries do have diminished capacity or other issues/defects. Its also possible that other sellers (in particular, the OEM) are charging way too much. Assuming that either of the above is absolutely true and the other is absolutely false is not being an intelligent consumer. As I said previously, let the buyer beware (and be intelligent.) As also mentioned, I've not (yet) bought one of these inexpensive BlackBerry batteries, but over the last decade I've bought 2-3 dozen for cordless phones, and they've all worked and lasted the same as the original OEM battery - for about 10 cents on the dollar based on buying from the phone manufacturer. That order of magnitude price difference makes it worth the experiment, to me - and my results to-date make further experimentation even more likely to be worth it. If I buy an $8 replacement battery for my Torch which ends up having diminished capacity or other issues, you can be sure I won't be here complaining. On the other hand, I sure enjoy the hundreds of dollars I've saved on electronic device batteries over the last decade or so.

I bid on a set of those batteries on Ebay and AFTER they sent me an email telling me that I won and I paid the seller with Paypal, Ebay pulled the listing saying it "might be counterfeit". I opened a dispute saying that I don't want anything counterfeit and their answer was that the seller sent them a shipping confirmation and CLOSED THE CASE.

I received the batteries yesterday. They are counterfeit in my opinion. The seller listed them as "OEM" and "the same battery that comes in your Blackberry". However, it comes with a plastic holder to insert the original battery that then tranfers the info to the counterfeit battery. But, if you don't have an ORIGINAL BATTERY for some reason, it won't work at all. That said, it appears to work. The question is what kind of life and for how long. Who knows, maybe it's even made by THE SAME factory in China that makes them for Blackberry and instead of them copying the code from an original, they have you do it, so they can say that they didn't infringe on anything AS SOLD.

[DallasFlier]

Originally Posted by BSTS

I bid on a set of those batteries on Ebay and AFTER they sent me an email telling me that I won and I paid the seller with Paypal, Ebay pulled the listing saying it "might be counterfeit". I opened a dispute saying that I don't want anything counterfeit and their answer was that the seller sent them a shipping confirmation and CLOSED THE CASE.

I received the batteries yesterday. They are counterfeit in my opinion. The seller listed them as "OEM" and "the same battery that comes in your Blackberry". However, it comes with a plastic holder to insert the original battery that then tranfers the info to the counterfeit battery. But, if you don't have an ORIGINAL BATTERY for some reason, it won't work at all. That said, it appears to work. The question is what kind of life and for how long. Who knows, maybe it's even made by THE SAME factory in China that makes them for Blackberry and instead of them copying the code from an original, they have you do it, so they can say that they didn't infringe on anything AS SOLD.

Again, buyer beware. If the batteries were clearly listed as "OEM", then reopen the case with eBay - that's clearly fraudulent, and I'm pretty sure eBay will take action.

As for life, obviously only time will tell. My guess - the percentage of life compared to the original battery will greatly exceed the percentage of cost compared to the original battery.

And as for the chicken-little arguments of threats to your health/life from exploding batteries - they're exactly that, chicken-little the-sky-is-falling threats. I think the few & far between reports of any such thing happening were traced mostly to defective OEM laptop & cell phone batteries, and resulted in recalls from those manufacturers. I challenge anyone to present any evidence that there's a higher risk of an exploding battery because its "non-OEM." Remember, all those phone and laptop companies buy their batteries from some (likely offshore) battery manufacturer too!