Macbook Battery Problem

Question

Hi all, this is my first post, but something weird happened to my macbook that I have to share with you.
Ok, my Macbook Core Duo 2.0GHz (1st generation) have had no problem during its first and half year. Then I left the notebook sitting at home for one month as I was away on business. Came back, the machine won't start, used AC adaptor and showed the battery not charging, "x" and everything. My warranty expired, so I bought a new battery. Once I got that, it worked fine for almost 7 months.
Another business trip left my macbook for 1 month, I came back, the battery is dead again!!! So I went to apple support and bought another new battery. This time I installed it at home, and it doesn't charge what-so-ever. I tried everything from SMU reset, PMU reset, P-RAM reset. NOTHING WORKED.
So I took a friend's macbook battery to try, and it worked! I can charge that battery with my macbook, and my battery won't charge on his macbook. So scientifically I thought its the battery defect. I went to Apple Care and they say they will replace it for me, but think that it should be my macbook's problem. Must be the Logic Board, I explained why I disagree, and that the battery came with only one LED blinking when I got home to charge, the current was already too low to charge.
Anyways, I was able to buy a second-hand battery really cheap but with limited life-span and use it until my replacement battery returns. Everything seem fine and I can charge it up to 100% although it will only last me 50-mins, still not bad, right?
I was reluctant to completely drain this battery now since I am afraid it will drop to zero and won't recharge like the other ones.
I am using Boot Camp, and Vista as well as OS X. Suddenly today, two days after I bought the 2nd hand battery, I was using Vista to show my friend the battery problem is fixed. But suddenly out of nowhere the battery dropped from 95% charged to 0% in seconds. It shuts down automatically, and the battery was flashing one LED indicating it's dying.
I started back in Mac OS X and found the charger able to recharge, but it fixed at 0% for 20 minutes. I thought I am screwed and went out for a smoke. I came back to see the battery charging back to 5% and then slowly to 10%, and 20%, suddenly it went back to 85% in seconds, and then 100%. I try to unplug it and it seemed fine. I left it on without the adapter for 20 minutes, the battery drain normally, to 70% (it's fine considering the battery was 2nd hand) My friend thought I should try to switch back to Vista to see if the same thing will occur. So I did, and before the Vista screen came up, the macbook blacked out. I checked the battery indicator and it's flashing one LED again!!!
So I switched back to Mac side and re-do the charging, this time it took longer to get back to +90%, I thought this is normal, 'cause I did use the battery longer on the Mac side before switching to Vista for the test.
I thought to myself, why Vista drained my battery, and then I remember the first battery that died on me was about the time I switched the PC side to Vista. Prior to that, the PC side was using XP. The second time it died it was in Vista as well. I also remember I wanted to reduce the size of my PC partition, so I trimmed off unnecessary features like hibernation by (Powercfg -h off). It saved 2G in size but it may be causing some problem to the charging circuit for the Mac-hardware??? Don't know for sure.
So I erased my Vista partition, and re-installed XP. Since then I tried both sides without adaptor, usually for 10-minutes or less, and no sudden dropped to 0% occurred since.
Everything else is working fine with my macbook, except the power features. Right now at least I can charge the battery, but I am always worried about when or IF the battery will dropped off and kill itself.
I am waiting for the replacement battery to return from APPLE, and hopefully when it returns, my Macbook will be able to recognize the DEFAULT low-charge of a new battery. I'm still not sure if my macbook is defective, and if it did killed the first battery replacement they gave me a few days ago. If it did kill a decent battery, will it kill this new replacement as well??
I know for a fact that the reason why the machine won't charge the battery is because the current of the battery has become too low for the machine to be able to charge it. If the current becomes lower, the "X" will occur suggesting that the machine doesn't even recognize it's a battery. But what I want to know is what caused the battery to drop to such a low current if I turned off the macbook during storage.
Sorry for the length of this post, but I have to be clear on all the details if I want help, I suppose. Right now my question is (1) Why is this occuring?? (2) Am I right in assuming that by removing Vista with XP, the problem will not repeat?? (3) Is it likely for any new or 2nd hand functioning battery to drop to the state of the other battery any time soon?? (4) Am I doing proper care for my Macbook, and what should I do in the future to avoid the same problem from occuring??

Answer 1

gpotts,
Thanks again, here's my battery profile: (keep in mind this is the 2nd hand battery I am profiling) BTW, something happened when I was doing this message, I left the notebook on for about 20 minutes, it dropped from +90% to 48%, macbook prompted me that the battery is running low. I plugged the adaptor and it went back to +95% within minutes...
Good thing is, I haven't seen the sudden drop to 0% ever since I removed Vista, and also I am able to charge my battery everytime I try now, no more "NOT CHARGING" or "X" indication.
Any clues??? Thanks in advance.
Battery Information:
Model Information:
Serial Number: DP-ASMB013-34cf-** <Edited by Moderator>
Manufacturer: DP
Device name: ASMB013
Pack Lot Code: 0001
PCB Lot Code: 0000
Firmware Version: 0102
Hardware Revision: 0300
Cell Revision: 0100
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh): 1533
Fully charged: No
Charging: Yes
Full charge capacity (mAh): 1597
Health Information:
Cycle count: 349
Condition: Good
Battery Installed: Yes
Amperage (mA): 466
Voltage (mV): 12597
System Power Settings:
AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 60
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 60
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On LAN: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Battery Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 2
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Reduce Brightness: Yes
Hardware Configuration:
UPS Installed: No
AC Charger Information:
Connected: Yes
Charging: Yes