cobalt mine-Ion - The type of battery you would want to have for your laptop. The fast charging effect make it good for users on the go (need not wait for a long time for the battery to get charged completely). It is also environment friendly as well.
To avoid this you can check date of manufacture and buy one that is more recently out the gates of the factory. As a workaround you can buy any netbook while it's under warranty test the battery and if it's not up lithium facts to your expectations you can send it back as dead on arrival and demand for a replace.
Nickel-Cadium - Ni-Cd batteries is one of the oldest and best performance types of rechargeable batteries but it has a major problem. After a long usage ( a few years), the battery will suffer from the dreaded memory effect. This means that the lifespan usage of the battery will deteriorate as time goes by.
OThe first type of battery used in laptops was Nickel- Cadmium (NiCad). These can still be found in some older laptops. Their lifespan between recharges is about lithium bettery stock two hours however this decreases with each recharge. Also, if a NiCad laptop battery is charged for too long it may explode.
The only drawback on this type of lithium based battery is the high cost. Since it is expensive, it makes sense to use it the right way to extend its service life.
Today, many of the latest computers have a fast recharge feature where you can recharge 90 percent of the battery power by charging it for around one hour. The balance 10 percent is recharged slowly. If your laptop has this facility, do use it. This helps to extend the life of the battery. However, do not recharge the laptop battery until it has less than 30 percent charge remaining.