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Dell users hunt for answers

A battery recall that affects millions has customers wondering the same thing: "Is my laptop safe?''

By DAVE GUSSOW
Published August 16, 2006

Jennifer Adkins spent Tuesday afternoon checking to see if the battery in her Dell laptop was a fire hazard and included in Monday's largest consumer electronics recall ever.

"I'm not a computer whiz," said Adkins, 20, a Florida State University student from Palm Harbor. "I just thought it was a hot battery. If I sat with it on my lap, it felt a little toasty."

Adkins bought the computer after graduating from Palm Harbor University High in 2004. The model number was right, and the battery picture on the Dell Web site looked the same. She just wasn't sure whether it had the affected part number.

And her father sent her a message to check it out to be safe. "He doesn't want me to burst into flames," said Adkins, laughing.

A lot of people who bought Dell laptops between April 2004 and last month probably went through the same exercise as the Adkinses after Dell and the Consumer Product Safety Commission announced the recall Monday.

It affects more than 4-million laptops worldwide, with about 2.7-million in the United States. While lithium-ion batteries are used in a variety of consumer electronics, such as cell phones, digital cameras and MP3 digital music players, only the Dell battery, which is made by Sony, is involved in the recall. Sony has promised to share the cost of the recall.

The recall comes as students and parents prepare to head off to college. One of the traditional big-ticket items for back to school is computers, and laptops have been an increasingly popular choice on campus for years.

Most schools don't recommend specific brands of computers, and since campuses in Florida won't greet returning students until this weekend, it was difficult to gauge the level of concern.

The University of South Florida computer store received a steady stream of calls about the problem. The staff helped walk people through the process of checking to see if their computers were affected.

"It doesn't have to be purchased through our store" for the staff to check it, said Carl Smith, the store manager.

Dell is popular at USF, where Craig Woolley, director of computing and technology in the College of Arts Sciences, estimates that the company probably has 80 percent of the campus market.

"Of the two I've checked, neither has been affected," Woolley said. "I haven't heard a whole lot of buzz about it."

It was quiet in Tallahassee at the FSU computer store, too. "We got one call from a parent this morning," said Bill Gargano, the store's coordinator. "We checked it and it was fine."

The store, where students can buy Dell products at a discount, is prepared to help students exchange their batteries, said Gargano.

At Lakewood High School in St. Petersburg, Lou Zulli, the school's network administrator, worked on a Dell laptop computer Tuesday with no problems, as did students. They had no fear about the recall.

"We haven't had any overheat," Zulli said. "We've had them in constant service since they've been purchased."

Zulli says if families are concerned, they can simply take the battery out and run the computer on a power cord. Or they can buy a third-party replacement battery if they don't want to wait for Dell.

His choices were more limited. The school uses six mobile computer labs, and Zulli was reluctant to shut them down.

"If I do, then the kids can't learn," Zulli said. "If I don't, what am I going to do? I can't have them all plugged in. That defeats the purpose of being a mobile lab."

Information from Times files was used in this report. Dave Gussow can be reached at dgussow@sptimes.com or 727 445-4165. Read his blog is at www.sptimes.com/blogs/tech.

WHAT TO DO:

Dell customers should contact the company to determine if their notebook computer battery is part of this recall.

Please visit the firm's Web site at www.dellbatteryprogram.com or call toll-free 1-866-342-0011 from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. weekdays and 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekends.

Customers may continue to use the notebook computers safely by turning the system off, ejecting the battery, and using the AC adapter and power cord to power the system until the replacement battery is received.

[Last modified August 15, 2006, 23:20:28]