Toasty
As reported on CNN and who knows how many other sources by now, Apple is recalling 1.8 million laptop batteries due to potential overheating and fire hazard issues. This news came pretty soon after exploding batteries caused Dell to recall 4.1 million batteries. The whole battery issue tracks back to Sony, the manufacturer of both companies batteries. Dell recall may end up costing up to $430 million and when you add the cost of Apple’s recall to that sum, Sony’s not going to be very happy they end up paying the bill.
Apple has set up a support page which offers more information on the issue. That being said, I happen to own an iBook that was built on October 2005. This issue seems to affect 12-inch G4 iBooks and PowerBooks and 15-inch G4 Powerbooks, so check. Apparently affected batteries were built between October 2003 and August 2006. Check. Affected iBook battery model number is A1061. Same as mine, so it’s three hits and no misses so far.
After checking to battery serial, it indeed seems to fall between one of the affected ranges (3K429 – 3K611). Looks like we have a winner, folks… I haven’t yet filled the exchange form so I guess the jury’s still out, but looks like my battery is one of those which can “overheat and pose a fire hazard”. Nice.
Realistically speaking, it’s a bit over 12 months old and and hasn’t acted funny so far, so I guess there’s no immediate risk of it turning crispy. Which means I plan to continue using it. Still, I’m going to check if the battery validates on the support form and if that’s the case, send it back to Apple when the replacement arrives.