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Toxic Fumes From Mac Pros?
Fanboi Killa writes "Apple is investigating damning claims, published in a leading French newspaper, that its computers emit a toxic odor containing chemicals including the cancer-causing benzene. Apple has not denied the accusations. Its spokesman, Bill Evans, told Macworld the company had not found any evidence to support the claim but Apple would continue to investigate. Posts on Apple's own discussion boards suggest the Mac maker knew about potentially toxic odors being linked to its computers as early as December last year."
Saying "Apple has not denied the allegations" is sensationalistic, and doesn't belong in the summary. They "found no evidence", which, logically, is as strong a denial as can possibly be made.
What do you think an odour is? Magic smell-waves? It's particles of the smelly item in question landing in the receptors in your nose.
Am I the only one that noticed that in the article, the screen of the machine is showing a Vista interface?
Read the article -- the whole thing is sensational.
Even if the Greenpeace lab did detect chemicals with known health risks you still need to know the concentrations.
You can get a all sorts of poisonous fumes coming off of anything with silicon caulk -- like aquariums -- especially when they get warm. Good stuff like toluene and ethylbenzene -- just not in concentrations that can actually harm you.
I'm NOT trying to claim there is no problem. I'm just saying that there is nothing from the article to support that there IS a problem either -- just some anecdotes and a bit of scientifically illiterate journalism.
With the strong smells coming off some machines, it is worth running a few tests to make sure that whatever is being emitted is not coming off at dangerous concentrations. In the meantime, though, not much to see here.
Life is short: void the warranty.
Would the author of the summary prefer if Apple denied the allegations without investigating the matter?
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""My entire room smells bad and I have had to resort to a few air fresheners just to be able to work on it," one report read."
"I recently have had a bird die 'mysteriously' which was caged near my MacPro which has had the terrible smell for months. The vet said it was likely he inhaled something toxic!!!"
Both of those "quotes" or "reports" are pulled from the Apple forum. With no follow-up, no real names, and no fact checking. I guess it's good that they did in fact link to the posts... I'm sad to see Slashdot posting this article.
I wonder if there is some particular manufacturing issue with certain mac pros, or are users primed to be unusually sensitive about their experience with expensive hardware? I ask because there doesn't seem to be anything unusual about the mac pro. Aluminum case, not much outgassing there, industry standard drives, RAM, chipset, chips, nothing there that isn't in 10s of millions of boring beige boxes. All the specific components, motherboard, PSU, etc. are presumably sourced from the same OEMs that manufacture for everybody else.
I can imagine that people would be more apt to notice galling details in a machine they paid over 2000 for, but I am hard pressed to believe that the mac pro is actually emitting any chemicals that numerous other machines wouldn't also be. PCB manufacturing isn't all puppies and roses, and everybody's PCBs are manufactured in essentially the same way.
``They "found no evidence", which, logically, is as strong a denial as can possibly be made.``
No, as strong a denial as can possibly be made is "That is incorrect. It is not true. Our products do not emit the fumes referred to."
All "found no evidence" means that where they looked, using their methods, they couldn't find the fumes.
I'm not saying they -didn't- launch a thorough investigation, but there's nothing in particular to indicate that they did, either. Certainly there's people with complaints.. unless they're all making things up, I suspect that their "[continued] investigation" will dig up some particular packaging material or electronics supplier that happened to have a bad batch.
I wonder what the ratio is of Mac Pro users that eat Taco Bell regularly is.
There could be a link.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
Actually, it seems that Mac users are getting a hell of a lot sicker. Maybe they are taking a page out of Nick Naylor's book: "Although we are constantly exploring the subject, currently there is no direct evidence that links MacBook usage to brain cancer."
Apple even replaced the power supply and subsequently the entire mac because of "smell". I call that a little service.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
That's all. Soap-box science is fond of the "X contains Y, Y causes Z!" without considering the exposure, which is the absolute be-all and end-all of toxicology. As a rule of thumb, the air around you contains non-zero amounts of anything you claim to mention. Your computer mouse could quite possibly have a whole molecule of deadly hydrogen fluoride on it. This will not kill you.
100 spin points to Greenpeace for changing VOC from "volatile organic compound" to "volatile organic contaminant", by the way. It's nice to know that I can order in 99% pure bottles of "contaminant" from Sigma, or indeed that my air freshener is busily filling my surroundings with "contaminants".
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
What did you think that "new computer smell" is? Volatile organic chemicals, including benzene!
Once again we see that by mentioning Apple by name (especially in an environmental story) can magically make a pointless story into front page news...
0 1 - just my two bits
I seem to recall Greenpeace going after Apple in the past as well. Haven't they been trying to slam Apple for not being ecologically friendly for years now? Not saying there isn't a problem, just saying Greenpeace isn't exactly a neutral party. Maybe one of these problem systems should be sent off to a lab that really is neutral and can say for sure whether there's a problem or not.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
It's Greenpeace. Trying to get half-assed scare stories into the press by associating themselves with major brands is their whole purpose these days. Heaven forbid that they actually hook up with some real environmentalists and get themselves noticed on the basis of the science.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Not to mention that the tests were run by Greenpeace, and they have absolutely no credibility whatsoever. In conclusion, this is a stupid story written by stupid people and the massive attention it has received in the press just goes to prove that there are a lot of stupid people out there.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
It looks like they corrected that.
You know, for people who are so unwilling to let us edit or delete our own posts, they sure are willing to make corrections to their stories without noting that there even was one.
From the Slashdot FAQ:
Will you delete my comment?
No. We believe that discussions in Slashdot are like discussions in real life- you can't change what you say, you only can attempt to clarify by saying more. In other words, you can't delete a comment that you've posted, you only can post a reply to yourself and attempt to clarify what you've said.
In short, you should think twice before you click that 'Submit' button because once you click it, we aren't going to let you Undo it.
Think twice, indeed.
Apple is slick package marketing. We pretend we're different because we bought something different. My problem with this: quality is more important than appearance. Should be obvious to any /.:er.
Postglobalism: Reclaiming civilization
In an unrelated story, recent studies have shown that French bashing was old and stale 7 years ago.