That is not correct. I've brought a red top back from fully discharged when it was pretty young and that battery lasted me 8 years before the Arizona heat finally got it a couple months ago.

I hooked a good battery up to the fully discharged red top, then a battery charger to those. The charger sees the voltage from the good battery and charges the red top back up.

I now have a Optima 1200 charger and use it to keep all of my car batteries topped off if they aren't being driven.

I’m glad you were able to bring yours back to life. In my case, the battery was done.

Odyssey Battery
 

I bought an Odyssey battery in 2012, parked the car in Nov. 2014. I put a maintenance charger on it till this summer. It is back in the car and working great. I would never buy anything else.

Quite the consensus here. HA I brought a red top back multiple times with an old fashioned battery charger. I'm sure the severity of discharge is a factor. One thing I'm sure of, they don't hold a charge long. Use a battery tender, drive them bi-monthly or forget them.

I believe that several Battery Tender type trickle chargers will *not* properly maintain an Optima battery. That came as a surprise to me when I learned that. So I bought the less expensive Optima charger and that is working ok.

Your "supposed" to be able to with their charger but I just don't bother. The only way I know how to bring a redtop back from the grave is to pull it up with another battery on the charger. That is what the optima rep(not Jimi) told me years ago long before optima had their own chargers. Since I switched to yellow tops, I just don't have the pesky issues I had with the red ones.

I have one of each in my garage is there any downside or upside running a yellow top over the red?

In the past I've used the CTEK to maintain my Optima but lately I've had some issue with it....not sure if its the battery itself or the actual charger... so I just bought the Optima 1200 and hooked it up to my Yellow Top today........ we shall see if this works better.

I have a red Top in my Camaro....and old red Top on a shelf for years... I'm going to see if I can revive that one

The Dusold answer..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0mvHKEvbpc

If a yellow discharges you can usually bring it back up. Red is usually done.