The US Consumer Product Safety Commission along with Hewlett Packard has issued a product recall on 135,000 batteries – 50,000 of which have been sold outside the US – for a range of Compaq and HP badged notebooks.
The Commission says there is a danger of a short circuit in the battery packs that may lead the cells to overheat and melt or char the plastic case resulting, potentially, in a burn or fire hazard.
Hewlett Packard says that it has received reports of sixteen batteries overheating, twelve of which were outside the US. Although no injuries have been so far been reported there are reports of four cases of minor property damage – one in the US and three outside.
The notebooks affected are HP Pavilions and Compaq Evo and Presarios. The batteries were made in China and Taiwan and were sold between March 2004 and May 2005. The recalled battery packs have bar-code labels starting with GC, IA, L0, or L1.
HP says that it is recalling all the lithium ion batteries affected and will replace them free of charge. The company emphasises that only the battery is suspect and the notebooks themselves are perfectly safe. HP recommends that until a replacement is provided, owners of the affected notebooks should run them from the mains adaptors only.
To find out if your battery is included in the recall visit the HP web site or call them direct.
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