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Sony Announces Global Battery Recall
snafu109 writes "Since the laptop battery recalls initiated by Dell, Apple, IBM/Lenovo, Toshiba & Fujitsu, some may have wondered whether the entire lot should be recalled. Well, over at MarketWatch, a new article reports just that. 'Sony said Thursday it will initiate a global replacement program for certain battery packs that use its lithium-ion cells in notebook computers in order to address concerns related to recent over-heating incidents.' In related news, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has released some tips on how to lower the risk of your laptop batteries exploding, no matter who the manufacturer."
but this is still going to be one hell of a bill.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Favorite Quote from the Consumer Products Safety Comission: "Computer batteries can get hot during normal use. Do not use your computer on your lap." Not much good as a LAPtop, then.
Ok, here's the deal. Now sony is going to have millions of highly explosive batteries. Who thinks this might not be a good thing...
Today: Rootkits, and DRM
Tomorrow: Holding the world hostage with boiling lithium..
eeek...
As a rule, I never trust dark brown ketchup.
It looks to me like they are trying to save face here.. though i don't think it will help much..
Sony just keeps digging a bigger hole each way you look... I have to wonder if the exec's arn't stipping the company apart from the inside
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
Sony announced today that, as part of their Global Replacement Program, they will be replacing the entire globe. "Yes, we screwed up so badly, that it is cheaper to leave and start a new planet than to fix everything that Sony has done wrong," said a Sony representative. Among Sony's past transgressions include rootkit-enabled laptop batteries, exploding CDs, and firing Nellie McKay. "On our new planet, we will build a Sonyful utopia, a planet by Sony, for Sony forever. A DRMed paradise for all to behold."
Unknown host pong.
PS3 fiasco
Rootkit
Laptop batteries
BluRay
RIAA/MPAA support
Sony is looking more and more like a company that is poorly led and one that maybe can't be trusted. These are all (so far) huge public relation disasters. I think they need to rethink their strategy, in the meantime, I will be politely avoiding their products.
Laboratree - Scientific collaboration based on OpenSocial.
And yet no recall on the batteries in my Sony Vaio laptop?
Not only do they have to do a full recall, but it gets dragged out through months of bad press. People will be calling their relatives asking if their laptops have Sony batteries in them. Do you think the laptop companies are going to blame anyone but Sony?
Sony should have seen this coming and bit the bullet at that point. This has turned into a PR disaster. Most people don't understand the concept of a root kit, but they do understand "can't bring laptop on a plane, because it might bring the plane down" (Virgin Atlantic did ban several brands of laptops because of this issue) or "laptop bursts into flame, everybody blames Sony". It's a very simple concept and everybody can understand it. When technology doesn't work properly or worse becomes a hazard, people become angry and scared. And the last thing a company wants is to have its name associated with fear and pain.
Check E-bay in a few months, as well as all the discount suspiciously-low-price stores through Yahoo. There are going to be a helluva lot of cheap laptop batteries for sale in "as is" condition....
$nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts
So, taking a low-ball figure of 20 million for total notebooks in use from 1/01 thorugh 8/06, that's still just over 2 incidents per million notebooks... I wonder how many incidents there would be per million notebook-use-hours.
To contrast, the rail system in the US was very pround when, in 1993, they were able to reduce reportable safety incidents below 3.0 per million train miles.
What I'm trying to say is that people are getting very worked up over a not-very-big deal (not that the goal shouldn't be 0 incidents per million hours) -- and considering the minor harm that such fires are likely to cause, is it worth the economic and financial impact of these recalls?
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
* apologies to Happy Fun Ball/SNL
Sony Batteries
-only $14.95-
* Warning: Pregnant women, the elderly and children under 10 should avoid prolonged exposure to Sony Batteries.
* Caution: Sony Batteries may suddenly accelerate to dangerous speeds.
* Sony Batteries Contains a liquid core, which, if exposed due to rupture, should not be touched, inhaled, or looked at.
* Do not use Sony Batteries on concrete.
Discontinue use of Sony Batteries if any of the following occurs:
* Itching
* Vertigo
* Dizziness
* Tingling in extremities
* Loss of balance or coordination
* Slurred speech
* Temporary blindness
* Profuse sweating
* Heart palpitations
If Sony Batteries begin to smoke, get away immediately. Seek shelter and cover head.
Sony Batteries may stick to certain types of skin.
When not in use, Sony Batteries should be returned to its special container and kept under refrigeration...
Failure to do so relieves the makers of Sony Batteries, Sony Corporation, of any and all liability.
Ingredients of Sony Batteries include an unknown glowing substance which fell to Earth, presumably from outer space.
Sony Batteries have been shipped to our troops in Afghanistan and is also being dropped by our warplanes on Iraq.
Do not taunt Sony Batteries.
Sony Batteries come with a lifetime guarantee.
Sony Batteries
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES!
Universal Media Disk
PSP "White is Coming" ad campaign
Lack of PSP title support
My Dell was one of the laptops with the recalled battery, so I promptly sent for a replacement. Mind you, I never had any problems with the battery at all - the computer ran cool as a cucumber (And never exploded). Of course, why would I turn down the chance for a new batter, if for no other reason than it should be better at holding a charge then my 18 month old one. Got my new battery in the mail last week, and guess what? The darn thing runs so hot, even when the laptop is running of of A/C power, that I'm practially burning my left palm everytime I use it. Is it too late to get my old battery back?
Good thing there wasn't a trigger happy air marshall there! If only he had some water to put out the... oh, wait. If I were this guy I'd be thankful to be alive.
Ehm .. are we in the process of creating a nuclear fusion reactor (ITER)? Let's try to create a good battery first!!
Just in case some of you are wondering why these batteries explode. A scientific summary would be: They become overcharged.
And if you are wondering how overcharging can create an explosion. Another scientific summary would be: If you put more energy into an environment which cannot handle it. It becomes unstable.
If you are wondering why an environment becomes unstable when too much energy is involved: It comes down to atomic science.
Wondering why it comes down to atomic science? You might want to think about going back to school, we need more scientific minds like you.
Why don't they just market their batteries under the Sony Xplod brand?
.... And when I get my new battery, will it be made by Sony or someone else? If it's made by Sony, you'll excuse me if I am a bit gunshy about using it.
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
So what happens to all these batteries? Would hope there will be some massive recycling going on. Anyone with more information?
Get up!
Where can we find more details of the entire recall - TFA didn't mention it and the SOny Web site seems to just be full of how wonderful they are.
AT&ROFLMAO
Thanks to the story here yesterday on the IBM/Lenovo battery recall, I went to the website and checked my battery on my T43. Whaddya know, it's one that's part of the recall. I called and they transferred me to a call center in Atlanta and I was on hold for about 10 minutes. I should have my replacement within 4 weeks. Of course they said not to use it anymore - i.e. just use AC power (that's alternating current, not anonymous coward power!) and I know they have to say that but I'm going to keep using the battery. It's never gotten hot and I can't go 4 weeks with no battery. It's an extra capacity battery that keeps my machine going almost 6 hours. Gotta love that.
I am wondering why it took IBM so long to decide to recall the batteries, and I wonder when the flaming Thinkpad battery incident described on the CPSC website actually happened.
The great thing is, I've gotten to use this battery for a year and a half, and now I get a fresh one for free! I hope it has the same capacity or I will be unhappy.
...the future crusty old bastards are already drinking the Kool-Aid.
No, they don't take back your old battery, then give you a new one. They first send you a new one, then you send the old one back in the provided box using a pre-paid shipping label. The instructions I received from Dell with my replacement battery even said the shipment would be refused if more than one battery was included. It's not like they're dying to get the old ones back since they (ultimately Sony, I'm sure) have to pay for disposal.
"In related news, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has released some tips on how to lower the risk of your laptop batteries exploding, no matter who the manufacturer." Tip #1: DON'T BUY BATTERIES FROM SONY. Tip #2: see tip #1.
To be fair though, you have to look at it as an opportune expense. The energy would be spent in any case, but is this the most efficient use or process?
Like you samples, it takes a lot of energy/emissions to create a solar array. That 'wasted' energy reduces the total life cycle energy performance of solar arrays. But is the final performance better or worse than a coal burning alternative? And depending on what life cycle? (Energy, longevity, emissions, cost, prof fit, etc...)
It takes a lot of energy to create nuclear fuel, to keep a nuclear plant operating, and to dispose of (err, not to dispose of in the US's case) spent nuclear fuel, but the amount of energy created by the plant can offset that amount greatly.
As compared to alternative fuels like ethanol (in the US!) where you are looking at barely breaking even once you consider the fuel and chemicals required to grow the feed stock, process the fuel, and transport the fuel.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Let's turn the question around... If you have a laptop with a faulty battery which can kill you, do you want to keep it that way?
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0
!ERR: Signature not found.
It is interesting that everyone is blaming Sony and no one talks about Toshiba here. Back when Apple recalled batteries, quite a few people in this forum bitched about Apple. Now that Apple, Dell, Lenovo, and Toshiba have recalled batteries, people do realize who's fault it is.
If I had been Sony, I would have asked the manufacturers to recall batteries all at the same time. Instead, they are getting bad press four times in a row as all the reputable manufacturers recall their batteries. What a PR disaster!
I write this on a 12" Powerbook G4 1.5GHz; Apple recalled my first battery a year ago (it was an LG battery) and replaced it with a faulty Sony. I am currently awaiting the second replacement battery for this faulty Sony.
Betamax was an okay format that they actually licensed far and wide, despite the popular myth that they didn't
... I don't know what they were thinking, CF was already quite entrenched by then.
JVC just had a format that was better and cheaper. It could store two solid hours on a tape, Beta couldn't, and that clinched it.
The minidisc medium was a really damn nice one, and ATRAC would have been decent had not Sony killed it with various stupidities.
Memory stick
I like the form factor of UMD, but there's hardly anything else to like about it.
PS: Hey slashdot, you can filter out carriage returns and newline characters and replace them with HTML br with the following perl commands.
$string =~ s/\r\n/####/isg;
$string =~s/\n/####/isg; #Where #### is the HTML br tag. Am I missing something?
Hey pizpot, use the "Plain Old Text" input type and it will already do this for you. It also allows HTML tags in the "Plain Old Text" posting format.
(Posted with Plain Old Text)
There are two kinds of people: 1) those that need closure
Just to clarify ...
"Since the laptop battery recalls initiated by Dell, Apple, IBM/Lenovo, Toshiba & Fujitsu"
BS .. The only one to initiate the recall was Dell .. And they took a lot of heat for it. Please be accurate in your reporting !
... for the battery in a PSP to take some 9-year-old's finger off.
Lawsuit of the century.
hey, they're used to make stuff blow up, what could be better? sony makes out like a bandit selling to a bandit. strong buy on sony US certificates. they can even throw in the source code for their rootkit!
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?