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HP Recalls 50,000 Lithium-Ion Laptop Batteries Over Fire Risk (consumerreports.org)
HP announced this week that it is recalling the lithium-ion batteries in more than 50,000 laptops because of the danger of fire in cases of battery malfunction. From a report: "These batteries have the potential to overheat, posing a fire and burn hazard to customers," the company said in a statement. "For this reason, it is extremely important to check whether your battery is affected." The recall affects the battery, not the entire computer. Consumers should run HP's Validation Utility software to determine if their battery has been recalled. If the battery needs to be replaced, they should then install an update that will put the device in Battery Safe Mode, which will discharge the battery and prevent it from being charged until it's replaced. This update will allow consumers to continue using the computers safely with AC power while they wait for a new battery. The recall affects batteries sold with, or as accessories for, the following models: HP Probook 640 G2, HP ProBook 640 G3, HP ProBook 645 G2, HP ProBook 645 G3, HP ProBook 650 G2, HP ProBook 650 G3, HP ProBook 655 G2, HP ProBook 655 G3, HP ZBook 17 G3, HP ZBook 17 G4, HP ZBook Studio G3, HP x360 310 G2, HP Pavilion x360, HP ENVY m6, and HP 11 Notebook PC.
So there's a lot of conflicting stories out there on the net about how you should treat lithium polymer batteries, to the point that it is _very_ hard to tell what is truth and what isn't. I'm wondering if there is anyone in the /. community who knows about battery chemistry and things and can provide reliable information on best practices for charging your LiPoly powered devices.
HP is doing the right thing by disabling the battery and recalling the the defective. Instead of stone walling, denying a problem, or shifting the blame. What has the world come to?
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
So customers (like me) who immediately removed Windows and the HP bloatware from their laptop in favor of a free operating system must reinstall Windows to find out if their battery is affected?
HP isn't doing well; in order to differentiate themselves from competition (such as Apple), HP must both promise to help its customers and actually do so.
You get what you pay for. You can pay for only whatever is available.
No HP got so many complaints it was doing the recall only after a fear of class action lawsuit. If they did the right thing, they would have purchased better quality batteries in the first place avoiding these issues for people. Notice how many of these models are also "Pro" series which apparently means nothing these days. HP has a pretty significant hinge problem on many laptops too. But I don't see recalls or even warranty extensions for these issues. Only when it could cause significant harm will a company recall anything.
Mostly, such batteries and OSs these days have built-in protection mechanisms. Unless there is a flaw, you shouldn't worry about it, because the engineers have already worried about it for you.
That being said, the one thing you can worry about is how you cycle the battery; the lifetime of these batteries is determined by charge/discharge cycles, and such charging and discharging is cumulative: If you discharge to 50% and then charge to 100% and then discharge to 50% again and then charge to 100%, well, that's a complete cycle (like discharging to 0% and then charging to 100%).
However, discharging a lot and then charging a lot puts a lot of stress on the battery, causing it to wear out faster. So, it's actually best to let it discharge only to 75%, and then recharge it thereafter. Indeed, I've read it's actually best to keep the battery around 50% capacity the whole time, and to charge slowly, but most products don't allow the consumer to configure battery usage in this way.
So customers (like me) who immediately removed Windows and the HP bloatware from their laptop in favor of a free operating system must reinstall Windows to find out if their battery is affected?
HP doesn't support Linux so as soon as you removed Windows, you are on your own. Linux is an edge case which most companies don't support and you know this so quit whining about it
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
According to the FAQ page, if you can't install the validation tool, you should contact HP through the support form: https://batteryprogram687.ext....
When someone says, "Any fool can see
Fuck you "quit whining", It's not like windows became dominant and hardware over the last 10 years because extremely linux unfriendly by companies being "nice". The companies flogging this shit deserve to be whined to... honestly I wonder if 99% of the world have some kind of stockholm syndrome with consumerism.
and it's an easy swap unlike apple need to re glue screen to change battery there
And it doesn't cot $29 either.
Plenty of options here:
1) Install Windows 10 to an external hard drive. Run the utility before Windows Activation kicks in.
2) Contact them through the battery recall web site and give them your laptop serial number and battery barcode number (yeah, you might have to take it apart - what do you expect?)
Why do they need all that info? They could just put a list of serial or lot numbers up.
If I was a cynic I might suspect they're trying to put people off.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They almost certainly weren't smart enough to keep track of which battery went into which laptop.
If they were trying to put people off, they would have made an EFI-bootable USB image. Would have been better for Linux users and worse for most of their customers.
Just get an explosion- and fire-proof battery bags to store the batteries in.
I'm surprised that hardware level stuff like this doesn't have a BIOS level utility for reading serial numbers, configuring hardware, etc. Or their own little HP support s/w partition.
Have gnu, will travel.
We have plenty of ProBook 650 G2 and G3, and replacing the batteries on them is actually a ton of work compared to all the previous ProBooks. HP really took a dump on IT with their newest models by making them a pain to open up.
Your writing is absolutely atrocious, by the way. You have to go back, and you will.
HP may not support Linux, but this is a hardware problem. What does this validation utility do? Does it read a serial number from the battery's microcontroller? If it does, the serial number is probably also printed on the battery and this whole thing is just to make it easier to access for regular users. AC is right to be pissed off about this.
#DeleteFacebook
HP doesn't support Linux, which is an unsupported edge case, so they aren't going to write an application for Linux. As AC's laptop didn't come with Linux and HP doesn't sell it with Linux and doesn't support it with Linux, explain why AC has a right to be pissed off. It is the equivalent to buying a Jaguar, replacing the engine with a small block Chevy V8, then being upset that the Jaguar dealer has no way to tell if the engine is causing shifting problems for the transmission.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
yet this is not nearly as widely reported and inflated in media as when a foreign competitor in a lucrative market has a few dozen smoking batteries. Interesting.
Replacing the OS on a computer does not change the hardware, your analogy is flawed.
But it's also true that HP has no requirement to make their utility for Linux, since as you say they only sell the laptop with Windows.
Another example: maybe he needed to install an older version of Windows for reason X, and the utility only works on Windows 10 so he couldn't run it either.
But my point still remains, if all the utility does is read a serial number in a microcontroller, number that also happens to be printed on the battery casing then the support page should also mention that, for these cases.
#DeleteFacebook
People complain every time there's a summary that leaves out key details. This one includes the model numbers. Thought it only right to give praise where due.
Nope, no sig
The point of the analogy was that making a major and unsupported change to a product or device effectively guarantees that the manufacturer isn't going to support what one has done to the product or device.
I could have said "It's Linux. Decompile the app and write a version for Linux." instead of actually explaining why it is irrational to expect HP to support something he did to his computer that they don't support when he asked if he had to reinstall Windows to check it. The simple fact is that OPs complaint is that HP isn't supporting something he did that they never supported doing in the first place. It is quite possible that OP voided his warranty by removing Windows and installing Linux and that is why they aren't bothering with providing a list of whatever. He may very well have made his machine ineligible for the recall.
Importantly, you pointed out that this is about hardware but the utility only runs on their delivered, supported platform. Show me where it says they must support something that is not their delivered platform.
Finally, there is the fact that many of these devices are not considered user serviceable and the batteries not user replaceable. They will want the laptop to go to a service center for it to be changed.
HP is providing battery replacement services by an authorized technician at no cost.
They don't want users opening the devices to look at the batteries and possibly breaking something in the process then complaining about it and demanding a new computer. And, once it goes to the service center, it may very well come back with Windows installed on it.
The simple fact is that OPs complaint is that HP isn't supporting something he did that they never supported doing in the first place. It is quite possible that OP voided his warranty by removing Windows and installing Linux and that is why they aren't bothering with providing a list of whatever. He may very well have made his machine ineligible for the recall. And, even if he didn't void his warranty, he still has no reason to expect them to support anything other than what they delivered including providing a list of serial numbers for batteries involved in the recall.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
It is the equivalent to buying a Jaguar, replacing the engine with a small block Chevy V8.
In the words of Tim Allen. Ruh! Ruh! Ruh!
You need to remove the entire top cover amd keyboard to evem see the battery on some (all?) of those models. Pain in the ass.
One of the things it asks for is the serial number. If they can't find it from that I'm not seeing how mother's maiden name, favourite actor & shoe size will help.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
MS Windows only. Its a wonderful world we live in where a web page can read raw data from an arbitrary memory address with no elevated privileged but a utility to check the serial on your battery will only run on a specific OS, and has more dependencies than your average CAD software.
They almost certainly weren't smart enough to keep track of which battery went into which laptop.
Citation? Otherwise I'll make the exact opposite statement and give the follow:
Manufacturers, particularly larger integrators like Dell, buy tons of parts from suppliers and assemble them into their finished products. Tracking what batches of supplies are where in the production chain and what equipment they wind up in is critical to finding and tracking problems so they can be addressed...well so they can do a cost analysis of broad replacement vs. individual and similar.
Based on experience (20+ years in end-user IT support) this holds true any time I've contacted my manufacturers regarding recurring issues. In that regard, I expect Dell will shortly announce something similar.
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.