Toshiba Recalls Overheating Laptops

About 41000 Toshiba Overheating Laptops were recalled

Japanese computer manufacturer Toshiba issued a recall of about 41,000 laptops after more than 100 reports of overheating and melting cases were filed by customers. There were also claims of minor injuries resulting from the alleged defects.

The development highlights the difficulties of putting high-powered components into smaller spaces in tinier, lighter, and thinner laptops coveted by the market.

Toshiba is recalling its Satellite T135, Satellite T135D, and Satellite ProT130 notebook models because they “can overheat at the notebooks' plug-in to the AC adapter, posing a burn hazard to consumers,” according to a bulletin by the US Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The company is the latest laptop maker to experience overheating issues with its laptops, with Sony having issued its own recall of more than half a million Vaio laptops in July.

“In rare instances, these notebook computers may overheat due to a potential malfunction of the internal temperature management system, resulting in deformation of the product's keyboard or external casing, and a potential burn hazard to consumers,” a statement from Mike Lucas, senior vice president of Vaio for Sony said then.

Prior to the Sony recall, HP recalled some 100,000 laptop batteries in May, following complaints of overheating, rupturing, and posing injury risks to customers.

From an engineering standpoint, it has become increasingly tougher for manufacturers to integrate more heat-generating parts into smaller and thinner cases.

AMD and Intel have recently developed new processors which combine core processing and graphics processing within a single chip. This reduces power consumption and heat generation for the next models of notebooks.

Posted by Melanie Mendoza on Monday September 06 2010, 8:27 AM EST. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News, Shopping. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0