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Barnes and Noble Recalls 147,000 NOOK Tablet 7 Power Adapters Due To Shock Risk (betanews.com)
BrianFagioli quotes a report from BetaNews: Want to know something shocking? Like, literally shocking? Barnes and Noble is recalling 147,000 faulty NOOK Tablet 7 power adapters due to shock risk. In other words, owners of this tablet could face an electricity related injury when charging it. If you own this tablet, it is important that you stop using the charger immediately. While there is no guarantee that you will be injured, it is not worth the risk. Barnes and Noble will replace the power adapter at no charge. To make up for the inconvenience, the company will also give you a free gift. "Consumers should immediately stop using the recalled power adapters and register online for a free replacement adapter along with a Barnes and Noble $5 gift card. Once registered, consumers will be able to print a pre-paid UPS label to return the recalled adapters to Barnes and Noble. Consumers will receive replacement adapters in the mail. Until a replacement adapter is received, consumers are advised to charge their NOOK Tablet 7 through their computer using a USB cable," says Barnes and Noble. The book-seller also says, "This recall involves the black power adapter sold with the NOOK Tablet 7. The adapter bears markings: model number TPA-95A050100UU, manufacture date 201610. The NOOK Tablet 7 model number BNTV450 is located on the back of the NOOK. Barnes and Noble has received four reports of the power adapter breaking or pulling apart exposing the metal prongs. No injuries have been reported." If you are affected by this recall, you can visit this site and follow the instructions.
I'd be curious to know if it was a design flaw; or somebody pinching pennies hard enough that no QA was done and the workers were being pushed fast enough that some units didn't receive all the assembly steps they were supposed to. 4 reports out of 147,000 seems a little low for some fundamental design issue; but wholly plausible if the correctly assembled ones are just durable enough, and the line is moving fast enough that the ones that pass while the glue is being refilled just don't get glued(or any number of similar mishaps).
Well-built AC adapters tend to be a huge pain in the ass to open, even if you are quite deliberately attempting to do so(especially the ones high-wattage enough that the whole assembly is potted, the least exciting reward for fighting your way through glued and/or ultrasonic welded plastic); so ones that you can open by accident have definitely been cut to the bone; but as an absolute failure rate those numbers aren't terribly high.
More generally: Is it time for vendors of cheapo USB powered/charged devices to just stop pretending to care by including an 'eh, probably won't catch fire' quality adapter in every box; and leave that job either to computers or to separately purchased adapters? On the one hand, I'm not entirely sure that the savings would be passed on to the customer; but on the other, I know that I have rather more USB chargers than I have devices that need them(through a mixture of device attrition and things I only charge from computers or hubs); and that the really cheap AC adapters must cost a nonzero amount of money to include; but are sufficiently untrustworthy that they are of negligible value to me, which seems like a lose/lose situation.
Am I just a nerd with an atypically well stocked junk drawer, or are others glutted with dubiously trustworthy pack-in adapters as well?
When I was working in an electronics OEM, I witnessed such tendency: the bigger and more reputable the buyer brand is, the more hellbent they are on the most ridiculous cost saving measures.
Conversations like one below was happening pretty much with all an every American buyer
"-how thin can you make the plastic on this part?
- 0.8mm but I would really would not recommend that...
- guy interrupts, "can you make it thinner than 0.8?"
- yes, but...
- Amazon idiot interrupts again, "how much will it save us per piece?"
That was a sourcing project for the first Amazon ebook reader wallwart. We also did the cover and sleeve cases for them.
We did things that were to bigger extent more stupid than bad on extent of material scale: putting diodes in parallel, doing wire fuses, using leds in a diode role, making cases out of PLA or even crappier plastics, intentionally using recycled li-ion cells, aluminium wiring and stuff like that... All on explicit demand of a customer.
The biggest ever saving any client had through any of those measures was 6.36 US cents per piece.