Lenovo and IBM are the latest companies to instigate a recall of Sony-made laptop PC batteries - over half a million of them in this round.
According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, the joint "voluntary" recall of lithium-ion battery packs for ThinkPad notebook computers is necessary because they pose a fire hazard.
There's a surprise.
More info - including links to check if you're affected - in this HEXUS.lifestyle.headline.
Trading Standards publish information on product recalls, but if you have a look on their site ( http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/ ) there is NO information on the Dell, Apple, IBM OR Tosh recalls; and there appears to be no active enforcement. There's a bit on the DTI's site ( http://www.dti.gov.uk/consumers/Safety/index.html ), but again no apparent active enforcement and there appears to be no information on anything to do with UK OEMs.
I do hope Sony will suffer as a result of all these product recalls. I'm not a fan of Sony at all! Does anyone know who makes the batteries for Samsung and Acer laptops?
In other news, Sony announced that the PS3 will work 'on the move' with the help of a newly designed battery pack.
"We had all these spare batteries coming in" said Sony's chief hardware architect, "so we dedcided to put them to good use. Development turn around was rapid because we wanted to get something created before the whole project went up in smoke... literally."
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I think thats a quite blinkered and (sad to say) naive view to hold. Sony may not be either the best in your books, nor the most fluffy of corporations, but they do serve an important purpose.Originally Posted by cotswoldcs
Any Economist will tell you its no good having a monopoly, and having Sony competing is only good for us. Also there are going to be a lot of people left unemployed if Sony really suffers as a result. Not good, for us or for them.
Just my 2 cents
Dave
I disagree; there are a great many companies competing in the laptop and AV/hifi markets, so the removal of Sony would not result in a monopoly by any means. I'd also note that Sony "suffering" as a result of these recalls wouldn't automatically result in their being removed as a player. I'd argue that Sony's ubiquity in the home entertainment segment, and their prominence in the laptop market has in fact led them to get away with charging rather a lot for kit that I simply don't think warrants the price premium. A good hard knock to their image and profit margin might actually cause them to re-evaluate their product line and attempt to produce better products that are actually worth the premium that's charged for having that Sony logo on the front. That's got to be good for us.
If you look at it that way, then of course it could potentially turn out to be beneficial for us, as consumers. IIRC, Asus make all sony laptops anyhow, so thats not going to be much different, unless they have a change in markup.
I didn't argue that it would remove them completely as a major player, simply that they would be making significant losses for the next 6 months as millions of batteries are returned. Having seen how companies operate in the face of large losses, job cuts and price rises in some goods may be a possibility.
I spent a miserable couple of afternoons on the phone soon after the Apple recall was announced.
What I was doing was grilling every possible government dept - and also talking to EU people - in an attempt to find someone who would admit to any responsibility or say that their dept, organisation, whatever, was actively looking at the issue of faulty batteries in PC sold by companies who are based in the UK and elsewhere in the EU and don't do business in the USA (and thus don't come under the watchful eye of the USCPSC).
I will, over the next little while, be writing a piece about this.
Okay, the chances of a disaster happening because of a faulty battery may be remote but I just find it sad, stupid and scary that nothing is being done on this side of the pond to look at batteries that UK/EU makers are using, many of which, I have little doubt, are just as hazardous as those millions of batteries being recalled worldwide by Dell, Apple and IBM/Lenovo.
Steven, you are a bad, bad boy!In other news, Sony announced that the PS3 will work 'on the move' with the help of a newly designed battery pack.
"We had all these spare batteries coming in" said Sony's chief hardware architect, "so we dedcided to put them to good use. Development turn around was rapid because we wanted to get something created before the whole project went up in smoke... literally."
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