Laptop battery advice: 4 short-answer questions.

My HP zv5410 laptop's battery recently went from 2.5 hour charge to
2-3 minutes. I have done the 'refresh' process (full drain and
recharge) and have only made things worse (from 30 minutes to 2-3
minutes).

Here are the four questions:
1. Can this battery be saved?
2. I used a borrowed power supply with slightly lower power than the
original. Computer worked OK, battery recharged OK -- but did using
this power supply affect performance?
3. I'm about to purchase a replacement battery. HP original no longer
available. Websites list replacement batteries from $90 to $212. Am I
likely to have problems with a $90 replacement?
4. What would you do if you were me?

1. I believe you have done the right processes, so I am afraid this
battary is unsavable. you may try this, use the battary while without
the power pluged until the machine shut down automaticly and then
charged it up to full and don't stop change but continue charging at
least several hours or a night might be properly. redo this for over
three times to see, if it get better.

2. I don't thinks so, actually you might use some kind of SW to check
the CPU speed while run some big prgram to make the laptop working
under the biggest workload. if the CPU is running at the MAX speed,
that mean no problem just like what I guessed.

3. it might be good to check the resource of the product before you
buy it if you don't trust this site because it dangerous to use bad
made battery, really dangerous.

4. if you are good at handwork, actually you can replace the core of
the battary by yourself althought it's not difficult, i will not
suggest you to do so if are not capable of knowledges realted.

actually, goto ebay.com may bring u some suprise.

Regards
Aeolus1982

My best friend replaces the internal batteries that are bad. IF you
open a laptop battery, you will see individual batteries, that is,
they look like AA type batteries, except they are a special type, nimh
or whatever? I just assumed there was a complex chemical assembly, but
no, it's individual cells that are wired together.

He is a lucky man. He takes something like a screwdriver, and places
it along the electrically welded seam, and hits it a sharp blow.  For
him, it splits in half, breaking at the seam. I assume with my extreme
talents (NOT) I would simply wreck the whole assembly. Sigh.

Then, he finds out which type it is, after using a meter to locate a
cell which reads differently, and goes to R***o S***k, and gets one
with the tab welded on each end.

He hacks out the bad cell, then solders in the new cell(s) as needed.
He uses electrical tape or some other material as needed. I call this
"cobbing it up" but they seem to usually work when he is done, thus
costing a few dollars instead of a hundred. This is really not
something you could do commercially, only for yourself.  Use your
imagination in sealing the assembly again, things like epoxy or tape,
just so the contacts mate with plug, and it will fit in the hole in
the side of the computer.

Note the usually comment about results.

I cannot say there are no risks or downsides to this, since I have not
personally done it. He has done it several times and they all work
great now.

If you are considering rebuilding your battery pack, a detailed and
illustrated explanation was poste to this earlier question:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=531983