My recent experience relying on a Autocraft platinum AGM....

[Guitarmageddon]

So driving down the highway this week, my battery light comes on. I figure, ah shit, the belt finally went (it was something the mechanic from an audi dealership told me was "going to break soon" while doing my PPI 3.5 years ago...go figure )

I was about 15 miles from a doctor's appointment so I continue driving to it, car is running fine. I leave the doctor and head about 20 miles back home, calling my preferred shop on the way. No appointments for two weeks. So I call another shop Ive heard of back the direction I just came about 20 miles and they can get me in. I get it back home and inspect, sure enough the belt is snapped but everything else is unharmed. I take it down to the shop (about 50 miles driven solely on battery at this point without recharging.) Yada yada they replace the belt and tensioner, everything is ok.

Kudos to the battery for at least lasting that long (Im sure it would have lasted much longer but who knows) I purchased it about 1.5 years ago.
http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/p/a...15000|L3*15597

And kudos to my warranty for only making me pay 30 bucks out of about 400 for the whole job. "shop fees" arent covered.... At first they did not want to pay for the belt, but I called back to point out the clause "if a NON COVERED part fails as a result of a COVERED part, the non covered part shall be replaced under warranty"

[2004B6S4]

I use a duralast platinum which is the AGM battery from Autozone, it has been working well for me. I had a bad brake light switch that was causing the lights to come on at night and drain the battery if I didn't catch it, well a few months after buying that battery my brake lights got left on for several days and drained it completely, I tried to charge the battery at home but it wouldn't hold a charge at all, took it to autozone and their normal AGM charging procedure didn't work either. The guy was really determined to get it charged though (I got the feeling he'd have taken some flak from his bosses if he did warranty exchange on such a new AGM battery) and after multiple hours of trying, he decided to try some kind of special "deep charge" that actually worked. It was kinda scary carrying that battery home cuz it was so hot, all I could think about was it exploding in my face lol. but it's still working great now and it's been more than a year, maybe even 2 years I'm not sure I'd have to check my receipt to be sure but it feels like a long time.....
so anyways, tldr; the point is that AGM batteries are good and they can even sometimes be salvaged when they seem to be toast

gj finding that clause in the warranty and holding them to it!

[brndll]

Second the notion on battery warranty... had to replace one on a friend's car this past week and her battery warranty was 5 years but the battery was dead 4.5 years in. Because she still had 6 months left on the (now dead battery) warranty, it knocked off almost 50 bucks from the new battery price. So new one at 125, and then 50 off... it was eye opening how much the warranty can save you.