Only 6,000? Panasonic Must Have Recall Envy

Written by Adam Gosling

Wednesday, 06 September 2006

Considering the number of laptops Dell sells every year, there's little wonder that Panasonic can only muster a piddling 6,000 lithium-ion batteries in its recall, but it's good to see it's trying its best. According to news reports Matsushita (Panasonic) has announced a battery recall of its own after first Dell and then Apple announced massive recalls last month. While Dell's was the full 4.1 million and Apple's a substantial 1.8 million , Panasonic's own effort seems a little pathetic really. That might be because the issue with Panasonic's batteries is not that they were made by Sony, not made to spontaneously combust on occasion, just made with a teensy-weensy little clip that might break off. That's barely worth the 250+ news reports already circulating on the Internet. What's more, the recall is limited to laptops sold in Japan. It only applies to batteries manufactured between April and May 2005, according to some reports. This is not something that has been going on for year, it isn't anything the rest of the world really needs to worry about. While it might be inconvenient for 6,000 Japanese laptop owners, this is hardly the hot news you would think considering the amount of alarmist coverage it is getting. Get back to reading about Steve Irwin. The site is pretty overloaded, but keep trying and you'll get on eventually. Related news items Tiny Rugged UMPC WIth Vista -10/10/2007 HP Goes iPaq Mad -06/09/2007 Leather-Bound ThinkPad Has Its Own Nerd -06/09/2007 Semi-Rugged With Grunt -05/09/2007 Fujitsu LifeBook - 12.1 inch; 11 hours; 1.53kg -21/08/2007 Newer news items Vendors Contemplate Formal Standards For Lithium Ion -21/09/2006 Toshiba Joins Dell, Apple In Sony Recall -19/09/2006 IBM Laptop Explodes At LAX -17/09/2006 Dell, Apple Travel Restrictions Grow -15/09/2006 "Missed Call" SPAM Under ACMA Investigation -14/09/2006 Older news items Unprotected Phones Abandoned At Airports -03/09/2006 Discarded Handhelds Reveal Secrets -30/08/2006 Apple Follows Dell To Replace Sony Batteries -24/08/2006 Naughty Dell Notebooks Powerless On Qantas -23/08/2006 Cell Phone Forces Pilot To Abort Flight -14/08/2006 Tag This Now: