Spare battery for Optimus S?

[nikc4]

Hey DoesIt Matter,

You mentioned cutting the battery to fit, and even though this battery did fit, do you think you could cut the mugen battery to fit? Can you cut batteries without hurting yourself? I threw one in a fire once, and i don't think i want to cut one of those open...they make ouchies.

 

[DoesItMatter]

Hey DoesIt Matter,

You mentioned cutting the battery to fit, and even though this battery did fit, do you think you could cut the mugen battery to fit? Can you cut batteries without hurting yourself? I threw one in a fire once, and i don't think i want to cut one of those open...they make ouchies.

From what I've heard other forum members say, the plastic casing of the battery had squared edges, where the stock battery for the Optimus-S has round edges. Since you'd just be cutting extra plastic off, it should not be a problem to trim off plastic. BUT - no idea how deep the plastic goes, so if you cut too deep and cut into the battery itself, you might end up destroying the battery and wasting all that $$. I'd just spend the $9 on e-bay and get one of those that I posted the e-bay link above. It's $9 and about 2-weeks of waiting.

 

[dishe]

Great find... ordered my $9 ebay special since my S has been complaining about charging an awful lot lately (every other day, I'll wake up to find that my phone gave up charging about 10 minutes after I went to sleep, and now has 10% left).

Although I do wish I could get to the bottom of why this happens in the first place, having a spare on charge means no more downtime and guessing if my phone will be alive in the morning!

Ordered today, from the link pasted earlier.

 

[anon(141613)]

As an FYI...the price on these has dropped...to $8 for one battery and charger, and $10 for two batteries and charger. Shipped.

Battery+Charger for LG P500 Optimus GW880 GX500 GX200 - eBay (item 280628191970 end time Mar-12-11 04:20:01 PST)

2 Battery+Charger for LG P500 Optimus GW880 GX500 GX200 - eBay (item 290532931906 end time Mar-12-11 04:20:01 PST)

 

[mangust]

My impression of the Optimus is that it was not really designed for swapping batteries -- I'd be worried about the battery cover wearing out with frequent swaps. In addition, if you are using a phone case case it could be rather cumbersome. Instead I opted for IOGEAR GMP1001B external battery. I bought mine form Newegg for $9 after rebate, but it's usually under $15. It works rather well - just like a slow USB charger, small and light (a bit smaller than the Optimus). The only thing I don't like is that it does not come with the micro-USB tip, so you end up using the Iogear charging cable, the USB female power tip, and a micro-USB cable.
Put all these together while using your phone in public, and you are guaranteed to look like a dork.

 

[cmags]

The only thing I don't like is that it does not come with the micro-USB tip, so you end up using the Iogear charging cable, the USB female power tip, and a micro-USB cable.
Put all these together while using your phone in public, and you are guaranteed to look like a dork.

You could always pick up a mini-USB to micro-USB charging cable, seemingly designed for this situation:

Amazon.com: Wilson Electronics 859967 Micro - Mini USB Charging Adapter: Cell Phones & Accessories

 

[troyernet]

I just got mine today (2 batteries, charger from Ebay) and they fit just fine. They have the rounded corners and are 1500 mAh same as the stock battery.

 

[dishe]

My impression of the Optimus is that it was not really designed for swapping batteries -- I'd be worried about the battery cover wearing out with frequent swaps. In addition, if you are using a phone case case it could be rather cumbersome. Instead I opted for IOGEAR GMP1001B external battery. I bought mine form Newegg for $9 after rebate, but it's usually under $15. It works rather well - just like a slow USB charger, small and light (a bit smaller than the Optimus). The only thing I don't like is that it does not come with the micro-USB tip, so you end up using the Iogear charging cable, the USB female power tip, and a micro-USB cable.
Put all these together while using your phone in public, and you are guaranteed to look like a dork.

I've got two Duracell USB battery extenders and a Solar backup charger that I was given at a press event for mobile tech, and I used to use them on my old HTC winmo phones. But, honestly, they weren't worth the hassle 9 times out of ten, because I couldn't carry the phone around while attached for long enough to actually charge. Have you tried putting the phone + extender in your pocket while attached?
Yeah, not happening unless you have a place to put the phone down, like on a desk. At which point, you might as well have a wall plug. When does this solution actually become useful? Because I couldn't find that scenario (except on a camping trip once, mostly because there was no outlet anyway, so I could leave the phone in my tent charging off the spare extender). So I picked up an HTC spare battery charger similar to the ones being recommended in this thread, and never touched the Duracell or Solar thing again.

Plus, my problem is that my charging port seems to only work half of the time- I often wake up after plugging in my phone and finding that the battery quit charging part of the way in, and now I'm starting my day with 30% left. Spare battery is the way to go- swap and run.

As for the case seeming "flimsy"... its not any worse than my older HTC phones. The Touch Pro had a pretty weak battery door, I was constantly afraid it would snap the little tab. Even worse was the mogul, and the TP2 wasn't too solid there either (although better than the other two).
None of them ever broke on me, and I swapped batteries daily- other parts of the body started to go long before the battery door, it appears. I wouldn't be too concerned about that at all. It might look flimsy, but I think it will take a beating.

 

[cruiserandmax]

$4 replacement batteries safe/good?

Today I dropped my phone in the water at the beach and it's basically dead now. I have insurance that is going to replace the handset but not the battery. I'm anticipating that the battery will also need to be replaced so I looked on eBay, and there are tons of auction for "NEW Cell Phone BATTERY for Sprint LG Optimus S LS670" that amount to about $4 shipped. This seems unusually cheap to me- but I'm not sure since I haven't actually had to replace a lion battery for any device I've owned... Are batteries just cheaper these days or should I be weary of these offers?

 

[ajskhan]

I, too, am interested in this!

 

[apinkel]

Check out the accessories sub-forum. There are ebay batteries that can be found for a very reasonable price but there are a large number of different types of optimus phones so I'd recommend checking the battery thread to find out which sellers have batteries that truly work for the opt S.

Supposedly the ebay batteries are typically sourced from the same chinese plants that supply OEM's (and/or 3rd party battery companies like mugen). If that's true or not, I don't know. I would just recommend going with a seller that others have confirmed good results with.

Battery thread:
http://forum.androidcentral.com/lg-optimus-s-accessories/43704-spare-battery-optimus-s-5.html

 

[sonicbluemustang]

Cant see them giving you a phone with no battery.

 

[sfhub]

They charge you $100 for water damage and won't give you a battery?

 

[debh945]

Agreed, that seems ridiculous that they wouldn't ship a battery. The problem with those cheap batteries is that they ship from HongKong and it usually takes a couple weeks to receive them.

 

[cruiserandmax]

Cant see them giving you a phone with no battery.

They only give you a battery if they are replacing the phone with a different model than the one that was lost/stolen/damaged. It's Asurion.

 

[cruiserandmax]

They charge you $100 for water damage and won't give you a battery?

It's a $50 deductible. It's looking like I'll spend about another $7-$8 on a new battery. So $58 to replace the phone is better than nothing for me.

 

[glitchsta]

I bought 2 batteries and a wall charger for $12 with shipping from china on ebay, took about 3 weeks to get but was well worth it.?.

Sent from my LS670 using Tapatalk

 

[RUSH]

The price of the battery seem reasonable - considering the wide market of venders selling phone accessories. I had bought a few batteries at cheap prices and they are working fine. Just make sure it's the right one for your device, if in doubt send a message to the seller.

Good luck.

 

[cruiserandmax]

Thanks for the replies- sounds like batteries are just cheap nowadays- great! Sorry for the bandwidth on this topic- I should have posted to the accessories sub-forum.

 

[cmags]

My experience with cheap ebay replacement LI-ION batteries is that they work fine but have a shorter lifespan (will hold less charge sooner than the OEM battery). Most of my experience has been with digital cameras though. When I get them they work great, but after a year or so i'm down to being able to take only a couple dozen pics on a charge. The original battery didn't have that problem until like 3 years of age. But, even after half a dozen battery orders, I'm still ahead of the game money wise, so I'm not complaining (~$30+S/H for a new battery, $5 shipped for a pair of generics). I'd rather buy batteries twice as often at a quarter the cost, just got to stay proactive.