Hi all .. Well I think its time I bought a new battery for my N900 as the old one is becoming well, 'old' .. So any recommendations ? Should I buy the official Nokia N900 battery or do third party ones work fine ? Any links to actually tested batteries would be appreciated ..

Always go for genuine one. My own recommendation to you

I bought a "genuine" Nokia one from Expansys. It was only 850Mah. Hologrammed and everything.

So get a genuine one, and get it from somewhere trustworthy.

This one, right here, from "The OEM Shop". They've got bad communication sometimes, but their products are totally legit and the price is great.

Click the "14 New" or whatever it is, and they'll be one of the first ones.

im having a great experience with this japod: http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.32398, which is also seconded here in the archives: http://talk.maemo.org/archive/index.php/t-57878.html

Alright well I just got a new battery from the OEM Shop .. How long should I charge it for the first time ? Also, can the phone remain on during this initial charge (My work requires me to remain in touch) .. ?

I just bought a couple of the deal extreme japod ones. At that price you can afford a couple of dodgy ones I reckon.

I would recommend getting a charger. With three batteries I can have one in the phone, one in the charger and one in my pocket. I am using the charger I got for my n810 batteries. The n900 batteries are smaller but the contacts are the same.

First time - charge it until it is full. Li-Ion doesn't suffer from memory effects, but does suffer from performace loss through shallow charging. So charge it to full, from (near) empty as often as you can.

I am assuming that you can use while charging, I expect that the power is sourced from the charger rather than the battery when plugged in. I could be wrong though.

I just bought a japod a few weeks back. I have to say, that I was reluctant at first, but it's a very good battery. It even last a little longer that the original.
I'd say, it's safe to go for it.
It's also always good to have a spare battery in your pocket as said by paulkoan.

here is the link :
http://www.bestofferbuy.com/japod-bl...rugrumlvj6d8g5

Discharge it completely then charge it up fully. May take three to five cycles to get maximum capacity.

Li-ion does however suffer from being discharged too much, continually letting the battery run empty will cause it to degrade much quicker. Like you said Li-Ion doesn't suffer from memory effects, so better to keep it fully charged where possible and ideally don't let it go below 30% (at least not on a frequent basis). Charging the battery whenever possible has worked well for keeping my netbook battery in good shape, at least until recently when I got lazy and disregarded my own advice on a frequent basis letting the battery run near empty, the capacity loss has been noticable, and even more telling is looking at the battery on my sisters identical but newer netbook, my sister was bad at keeping it charged up and often let the battery run low and it now only has 40% of its original capacity whereas mine has 60% and would have more if I wasn't being careless with it (I've had my netbook well over 2 years now, nearly 2 and a half). Also my N900 which I bought second hand in August (the original buyer bought it last April) I put on charge whenever I could even if it was only for 10-15 minutes and it still was reading over 1200mAh after a full charge. But the downside to that with the N900 is wear and tear on the usb port, mine has just broken If I can get a warranty repair I'll definitely go for an external charger and maybe hotswap the battery rather than let it get too low, but I won't be able to keep it as fully charged as I like.

I have never heard that Li-ion suffer from shallow charging though, it certainly doesn't tally with my own experience, have you got any sources to back that up?