Dell's Exploding Laptop Autopsy

An anonymous reader writes "Dell has gone to the Consumer Product Safety Commission looking for help determining the cause of death for its exploding laptop. Dell has been blaming the lithium ion battery; the commission seems to have had a few problems with those batteries in the past."

Re:So there are two cases now?

[andrewman327]

Actually, they already have lists of the affected batteries online. They apply to many manufacturers, and not to some Dell computers. I will try to dig up the link, as this is not at all a direct problem with Dell.

Computer companies make almost none of their own parts, and keeping track of what comes from where must be a nightmare. Dell will change battery type (maybe battery manufacturer as well) and this problem will start going away in new laptops. Hopefully the old ones will have battery recalls for the most dangerous types, but the recall will affect many companies.

Links!

[andrewman327]

For once my local NBC affiliate is really on the ball. They had a story about "exploding laptop batteries" months ago. I can't find the actual story, but here are two related links:

1. HP laptops burning [nbc10.com]
   
2. Cooked Apples [nbc10.com]

Re:Li-Po use in RC

[weeboo0104]

That's why I still use NiCd's in my RC cars. I wasn't happy with the NiMH's because they were not very tolerent of high temps caused by either changing or discharging.

Although it probabley would have been cool to watch an RC truck roll over and burn during our races.

Re:Plugged in?

[frostoftheblack]

Based on this picture http://www.theinquirer.net/images/articles/dell%20 banger2.jpg [theinquirer.net] It doesn't appear to be plugged in, although I can't tell for sure.

Re:So there are two cases now?

[andrewman327]

"For example, I know someone who works in the oil industry out in Alberta and drags a laptop around from site to site to help keep track of stats. I don't know how many issues they have with fumes at the rigs, but I can easily believe that an exploding laptop would cause problems."

Those computers are generally ruggidized to MilSpec (military specifications). Instead of using your friendly neighborhood Dell, he is probably using a Toughbook or similar unit. These are designed to operate without actually bringing air inside. There are a lot of rumours of these things actually stopping bullets in Iraq, though I can't seem to find a picture. I imagine that the batteries are just as tough, considering the operating enviroments they are designed for.

Re:More exploding laptop pictures

[KD7LRJ]

Crap! Here's a good link: http://kd7lrj.blogspot.com/2006/07/dell-laptop-bat tery-trouble-at-novell.html [blogspot.com]

Bulletproof Laptop

[SPQR_Julian]

It took me some creative digging, but I found what you were talkingabout. I remember seeing the article in Popular Mechanics a couple years back when it first came out. http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/compute rs/1279251.html [popularmechanics.com]

Re:We beat the British back with Flaming Dells

[chgros]

the electrical battery (invented in modern times by good ol' Ben Franklin)
Actually it was invented by Volta [wikipedia.org]. If you read your link more carefully you'll discover that Franklin's batteries were actually banks of capacitors.