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- HQRP® Green Line APS Battery Pack plus HQRP® Coaster;
- Battery Type: Ni-MH Rechargeable Battery Pack; Capacity: 3300mAh; Volt: 14.4V.
- High Drain! 15% more charging cycles compared to the standard battery!
- 10% more capacity and extra power compared to the standard battery! Up to 2.5 hours cleaning time!
- 100 days warranty!
Replacement APS Battery Compatible with iROBOT Roomba 550 / 560 / 570 / 580. Up to 2.5 hours cleaning time!
Still going strong in my Roomba 550 after 3 months,
There were several similar products that showed up when I searched for ‘Roomba 500 replacement battery’ on Amazon. This one is not the lowest-priced item, but I selected it mainly because the product description is more specific (it says the capacity is 3300mAh, which is 10% higher than the 3000mAh for original Roomba battery), and it comes with an 100-day warranty. In contrast, other cheaper battery packs (such as the iRobot R3 500 series APS Battery) don’t even specify the capacity, but simply make vague claims such as “50 percent greater useful life than original Roomba batteries”. Furthermore, their pictures show a plain battery pack without any brand names. So there’s no telling what kind of generic battery you will receive.
I installed this HQRP battery pack upon its arrival, and my Roomba 550 powered up immediately. It was even able to run the vacuum for a few minutes before recharging. This is a good sign because it means the battery pack does not suffer from rapid-self-discharge problem like many other NiMH cells. After several charging/discharging cycles (which were necessary to bring the battery pack up to its full capacity ), my Roomba was then able to run for at least 2 hours, with the indicator light still at Orange (instead of Red). Therefore I believe the stated capacity of ‘3300mAh’ to be accurate.
Of course, it is still too early to tell whether this replacement pack will last longer than 12 months in my Roomba. But so far, it has performed beautifully after more than 3 months, with no signs of slowing down – yet. I’ll update this review if any problem turns up in the future.
[Update on Dec 5, 2010]:
Battery pack still going strong after 12 months. I just tested it by forcing my Roomba to run past the usual one hour cleaning sweep. At about 70 minutes the battery indicator turned orange. At about 100 minutes it turned red. So the replacement pack seems to be doing better than my original pack after one year. But I should point out that I used my Roomba about once per week in the past year, compared to 2-3 times per week when I first got it 2.5 years ago.
[Update on June 18, 2011]:
I just tested the battery life again. After 60 minutes of operation, my Roomba’s indicator light was orange. After 80 minutes it was glowing red, and I stopped the test. So the battery pack seems to have aged further, but still in relatively good shape after 18 months.
[Update on March 8, 2012]:
After about 27 months, the runtime has deteriorated to under 20 minutes. Oh well, time for a new battery pack… or a new Roomba.
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|Good battery, not a fake copy,
Now, after a bit over 2 years, it’s only giving me 30-60mn depending on whether I do a deep cycle charge before using it. In other words, the battery is not doing well.
But 2 years is all one should expect from such batteries (including the stock ones), and they were much cheaper than stock, so they’re a must buy.
Thank you to HQRP for selling an honest product.
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