The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

Lenovo and IBM recall 500k+ batteries

Curse of the fire-breathing Sonys

Cloud based data management

Lenovo and IBM today issued a recall on notebook batteries sold with various ThinkPad models between February 2005 and September 2006.

More than 500,000 units are affected - they are powered by the now notorious lithium-ion 'Zippo' batteries made by Sony, which have a nasty habit of exploding into flames.

Last week, a Lenovo-made laptop exploded in Los Angeles airport and this presumably grabbed the eye of the US Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is named in today's product recall.

To our knowledge, the LAX Thinkpad was the first from Lenovo to go up in flames. But reports of exploding Dell notebooks have been much more common - Dell sold the dodgy batteries for a longer period, between April 2004 and July 2006, and it also sold a lot more notebooks, period. Some 4.1m notebook batteries were recalled by Dell last month. Apple has also issued a recall, for some 1.8m Zippos.

According to Reuters, this round of battery recalls could cost Sony $430m. ®

Regcast training : Hyper-V 3.0, VM high availability and disaster recovery

More from The Register

Samsung Galaxy Note 8: Proof the pen is mightier?
Sammy’s iPad Mini killer has a stylus to stab other rivals too
Microsoft lures buy-curious vixens, corduroys with a cheap fondle
Surface slab sales latest: Will no one rid Ballmer of these turbulent tabs?
First look: iOS 7 for iPad
No, Apple hasn't released it yet, but that doesn't stop intrepid devs
 breaking news
Curtain drops on Apple Store ahead of WWDC: What lies behind?
Steve Jobs watching from on high. No pressure, lads
 breaking news
Cold, dead hands of Steve Jobs slip from iPhones: The Cult of Ive is upon us
Billionaire biz baron's death clears way for uber-shiny iOS 7
Airbus imagines suitcases that find themselves
Point your mobe at your smalls to track their every move
Surprise! Intel smartphone trounces ARM in power trials
Tests show equal performance while sipping significantly less juice
Samsung plans LTE Advanced version of Galaxy S4
1Gbps download capability could stiffen drooping S4 sales forecasts
Apple said to be 'exploring' 5.7-inch iPhone
Who's the copycat this time, Mr. Cook?