IBM To Repair Smoking Monitors

Rio writes "A local6.com story says IBM is recalling to repair 56,000 G51 and G51t computer monitors because the circuit board can overheat and smoke, posing a fire hazard. IBM has received several reports of monitors overheating and smoking, including one report of minor property damage, according to the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Comission." And I thought all that smoke was just my mobo overheating.

Comments

They missed the marketing boat.

[Anonymous Coward]

"IBM G51: The hottest monitor available!"

OT What kind of tech news site is this?

[binaryDigit]

When right next to the article on the monitors, is this:

Man Who Allegedly Ate Cat's Tail Ruled Insane

and

Thousands Flock To See Gold Toilets

Mobo?

[chowdmouse]

And I thought all that smoke was just my mobo overheating.

Did you mean mojo? Yeah, Baby!

Nice to hear

[stratjakt]

It's good that a company actually has the balls to recall a faulty product. It's kind of a shame that it has to be a fire hazard to make it happen, and not poor quality. I guess it's the lawyers who made the call, fearing wrongful death suits when some kid dies of inhalation while playing UT.

The PC market is flooded with second rate, faulty, poorly designed and nonfunctional hardware.

I once had an NEC monitor that burned out on me, had it replaced, that one burned out, replaced again, that one burned out ad nauseum - 5 in a row. By the 6th, they had stopped manufacturing them and I got a different one, which still works fine today.

I knew the monitor was designed poorly, they knew it was designed poorly (they only made 'em for like 6 months). Wouldnt a recall have been easier and cheaper than cross shipping me 5 replacements in a row?

Oh well. I just wish there were more corporations willing to stand behind their merchandise.

Re:Nice to hear

[vasqzr]

The PC market is flooded with second rate, faulty, poorly designed and nonfunctional hardware

Consumers want $1,000, $500, $300 PC's. What do you expect?

Let's go back in time a few years. The Pentium 133MHz had just come out, making the 120MHz look like a sweet deal. 16MB of RAM was pretty good, and 56K modems were all the rage. You'd get this kind of a deal for $1,999.

A monitor back then, 14" and 15" were standard, would cost you nearly $200. A 17" was a $350-$400 luxury. 19"? $500-700. And 21" monitors would cost you $1,000-$2,000!

Think about how cheap monitors are now. You can't GIVE away a 15". 17" are available for $69 after rebate from any retail store. 19" monitors are $200-$300. Once considered extravagant, 21" monitors are just a little more than the 17" monitors of yesterday. Hell, you can get a 15" LCD for $199.

The problem has always been quality. Sure, the bargain basement monitors work, but the colors are bad, they lack focus, and aren't the brightest, or are too bright.

The de facto standard has usually been the Sony Trinitron displays. I'd rather use a 3 year old Trinitron than a 1 year old bargain brand.

Now, the PC market is flooded with crappy monitors. (Not to mention OTHER components) Take a look at the Apple side of things, or the SGI/Sun workstations. They've had their share of bad products, but much of the OEM equipment is re-branded Sony models etc.

FLAME POST!

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

Not true dude. I'm using a Deskstar right now and it has never fai^HHHHHHHHHHHH[no carrier]

More than 56,000

[EinarH]

From the IBM-site. :

Between 1997 and 1999, a total of approximately 700,000 G51 series monitors were manufactured for IBM in Malaysia and China by LiteOn Technology International, Inc. Approximately 117,000 monitors that could potentially include this component were shipped worldwide, and about 56,000 were sold in the U.S.

They are withdrawing all the 117,000:

If you live outside of the US, click here. for a list of phone numbers to contact a repair center.

[rant]
It's only the US-centric slashdot, who want us Europeans to burn... ;-)[/rant]