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United States Hardware

Samsung Could Face Second Recall As US Probes Burnt Phone (bloomberg.com) 150

The Federal Aviation Administration and the Consumer Product Safety Commission are investigating Wednesday's incident, when a passenger's phone emitted smoke on a Southwest Airlines plane readying for departure from Louisville, Kentucky. Bloomberg reports: "If it's the fixed phone and it started to smoke in his pocket, I'm going to guess there'll be another recall," said Pamela Gilbert, a former executive director of the consumer agency. "That just doesn't sound right." Samsung has been engulfed in crisis since the Note 7 smartphones began to burst into flames just days after hitting the market in August. The Suwon, South Korea-based company announced last month that it would replace all 2.5 million phones sold globally at that point. Samsung said it had uncovered the cause of the battery fires and that it was certain new phones wouldn't have the same flaws. The first indications of the existing recall's financial impact could be seen Friday with the company's release of earnings that rose at the slowest pace in five quarters. Operating income increased just 5.5 percent to 7.8 trillion won ($7 billion) in the three months ended Sept. 30.
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Samsung Could Face Second Recall As US Probes Burnt Phone

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  • Re: (Score:2, Redundant)

    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by JoeyRox ( 2711699 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @09:46AM (#53031339)
    I understand how sensitive authorities will be to any battery issue on the Note 7 post-recall, but nearly every Li-Ion phone model has had these kinds of thermal runaway events, including the iPhone. It's premature to start talking about a second recall before the investigation on the Southwest Airlines event has even started in earnest.
    • Removable batteries (Score:4, Informative)

      by emil ( 695 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @10:25AM (#53031635)

      All of this would have been avoidable with removable batteries.

      Lithium-Ion batteries are required to implement five separate safety systems [wikipedia.org] to prevent these combustion events.

      Samsung is having quality-control issues. If the batteries were removable, the situation would not be trashing the company, but this does serve poetic justice.

      • by ColdWetDog ( 752185 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @11:27AM (#53032165) Homepage

        All of this would have been avoidable with removable batteries.

        Why? They can explode and fail like other batteries. Just because you pull it out of the rest of the circuit doesn't mean you've isolated the problem. Samsung would still have to recall the batteries. It's just as easy to recall a phone entirely. Might have saved Samsung some money but that doesn't really change much of anything.

        Removable batteries are a whole other conversation, but bad QA is bad QA. Hell, the batteries on the 787 were removable. Didn't help Boeing much.

        • by mcisely ( 643971 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @11:39AM (#53032269) Homepage
          Fixing Boeing's problem didn't require replacing the entire plane.
        • All of this would have been avoidable with removable batteries.

          Why? They can explode and fail like other batteries. Just because you pull it out of the rest of the circuit doesn't mean you've isolated the problem. Samsung would still have to recall the batteries. It's just as easy to recall a phone entirely.

          Samsung would have saved a lot of time: instead of paying for the shipping of the phone from user to Samsung + from Samsung to user, they could have just sent the batteries to the users. Basically, Samsung could have at least halved the shipping expenses, but actually more, because the phone would require more packaging for shipping. This is equally true whether the batteries/phones are shipped as single or as bulk.

      • Yeah, because all those Sony laptop batteries that we saw blowing 3 foot flames out of notebook computers weren't all removable.

        No wait, they were. As it turns out, badly designed energy-dense electronics can still be badly designed.

      • It's possible they would still have to recall the whole phone, if the issue is in the charging circuit, and that circuit / controller is not on the battery which can be replaced.

        Besides, if they didn't immediately have all the batteries needed for the recall, you're just as screwed with a battery recall on a replaceable unit, because you still don't have a working battery.

        The odds of it being easier / cheaper do go up though. But it's far from certain.

      • The idea of replaceable batteries is a lost cause.
        If you feel that strongly about this cause. I would suggest that you put effort into designing a replaceable battery design. That maximizes battery space, minimizes weight, makes the device waterproof, insures proper battery life. and doesn't make the device any bulker.

        Then you are good to go.

        • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

          The idea of replaceable batteries is a legislative cause and while we are at it forcing a required battery shape and connection are also on the cards. Here's betting the replaceable battery crowd will win because the current design of forced resource wasting, unnecessary pollution generation, redundancy program is psychopathically insane and must be stopped.

          Contrary to any bullshit out there due to size and shape of phones making them waterproof is very difficult and there are none in the consumer market

    • While it's true that one-in-a-million thermal runaway events can happen to pretty much every phone, consider your choices:
      1) Samsung fixed the issue and had the unfortunate luck of a one-in-a-million thermal runaway in the weeks immediately following the fix.

      2) Samsung failed to (fully) fix the issue, allowing the FAR more likely [slashdot.org] issue they've been dealing with for months to immediately pick right back up where it left off before the recall/people stopped using the devices.

      Smart money is on the latter, but

      • or
        3) This is a phone with the original fault, unfixed. They haven't ruled that out yet. There are going to be thousands, if not millions of phones with the original fault unfixed out there for years. People don't always turn things in on a recall.

        • by Anubis IV ( 1279820 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @11:15AM (#53032065)

          3) This is a phone with the original fault, unfixed. They haven't ruled that out yet.

          From The Verge article on the incident [theverge.com]:

          More worrisome is the fact that the phone in question was a replacement Galaxy Note 7, one that was deemed to be safe by Samsung. The Verge spoke to Brian Green, owner of the Note 7, on the phone earlier today and he confirmed that he had picked up the new phone at an AT&T store on September 21st. A photograph of the box shows the black square symbol that indicates a replacement Note 7 and Green said it had a green battery icon.

          [...]

          Running the phone's IMEI (blurred for privacy reasons) through Samsung's recall eligibility checker returns a "Great News!" message saying that Green's Galaxy Note 7 is not affected by the recall.

          Unless some fraud took place (either someone swapping an original device into his new box or the guy trying to pass off an original device as a new one for some twisted reason), we can say that it's NOT an original device.

          • How many counterfeit 'safe' phones do you think are out there? Easy scam.

            1. Get the bad phone
            2. Slap on Green Dot
            3. Resell / replace phone
            4. Profit!

            • And somehow hack the firmware through an undisclosed vulnerability so it shows the green battery icon, denoting that it is a post-recall phone?

              Yeah, 'easy scam' alright.

              • Is there evidence that it ever showed a green battery icon? He could be lying to place the blame on someone else.
                • There's admittedly no evidence he ever saw the green battery icon, but there is evidence that this is a newer phone. After all, he provided pictures of the box, which had the correct markings to indicate it was a newer model; he provided his phone's IMEI number, which Samsung's site verified was for a newer model; and he claimed to have purchased it brand new through an authorized AT&T store, which would cause his whole story to fall apart if it was untrue, since it's an easily verified claim.

                  We can't r

    • I understand how sensitive authorities will be to any battery issue on the Note 7 post-recall, but nearly every Li-Ion phone model has had these kinds of thermal runaway events, including the iPhone. It's premature to start talking about a second recall before the investigation on the Southwest Airlines event has even started in earnest.

      To be sure, nearly everything with a Li-ion/Li-Po battery has had one instance of catastrophic battery failure; but is the close-clustering of battery events in one make and model that, like the same thing with the cheap hoverboards, has the authoriTIES (Cartman voice) (understandably) all up in arms.

  • by burtosis ( 1124179 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @09:47AM (#53031341)
    I know it helps with water resistance ease of manufacturing, but when will phone manufacturers reconsider the whole non removable battery issue? Apple was a leading "innovator" of this, now it's being adopted industry wide and we are seeing losses exceeding a billion dollars of valuation. A user removable battery would streamline much of a recall process while adding safety to boot.

    Now if only a lack of a USB card and headphone jack would start fires we may see some actual positive changes.
    • by Aaden42 ( 198257 )

      As a user, I'd much prefer the water proofing, smaller overall size / greater capacity, and other benefits that come from an integrated battery.

      Sure, a removable battery might make this recall easier (assuming the flaw is solely in the battery & not in the phone). I'm really not interested in buying consumer devices that are designed with the idea of making it easier to replace the exploding battery though. Design & test the thing properly, and you won't have to do any recalls.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by Joce640k ( 829181 )

        As a user, I'd much prefer the water proofing, smaller overall size / greater capacity, and other benefits that come from an integrated battery.

        Stop believing the Apple sales pitches. None of those things is incompatible with a removable battery.

        • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

          by NatasRevol ( 731260 )

          Says the guy not actually designing, making or selling phones.

          • I own plenty of waterproof gadgets that have removable batteries.

            • How does that qualify you to answer if that would make them smaller/greater capacity?

              The answer is: Not at all. You are still wholly unqualified to make design decisions on waterproof vs battery size.

              • It's almost as if you believe that Apple just invented waterproofing.

                • Nothing close to that.

                  But you believe that putting more stuff inside makes no impact at all to size/capacity.

                  So, you literally believe in physical impossibilities.

                  • My 200m water-resistant divers watch uses a 0.3mm gasket.

                    0.3mm.

                    0.3..

                    Get back to me when that number has sunk in.

                    • Your 200m water-resistant divers watch doesn't contain a 2500+ mAh lithium-ion battery that has lots of safety regulation around it, concerning shielding, casing, latches, connectors, etc. that are required with a removable battery.

                    • So you know that they could have made the battery last longer or the size even smaller if they had not used replaceable batteries?

                      Throwing out random gadget details shows you know the specs. Nothing else.

                    • The only difference between an "integrated battery" and a removable one is that the removable battery is encased in plastic packaging (and is actually a battery).
                      "Integrated batteries" are really just daisy chained cells with one layer of packaging removed, possibly located in separate areas of the device if the designers are very bad at Tetris.

                      Removable batteries need a bit more volume for a given capacity than "integrated batteries" do, but it's more than worth it as it makes the thing more durable which

                    • Yes, because clearly when you have a user replaceable battery, there is not more shielding and you pull the bare cells out because they didn't put the battery into any kind of casing itself to prevent accidental damage. And also, all non-replaceable batteries have latches holding the battery in place for some reason, even though it's not meant to be removed and couldn't be without taking the phone apart. Oh, and big fat easy to decouple connectors meant for not removing.

                      You're a fucking moron.

                    • The only difference between an "integrated battery" and a removable one is that the removable battery is encased in plastic packaging (and is actually a battery).

                      It's almost as if you believe that's an inviolable law of the universe: Batteries MUST have a rigid plastic case.

                      I wonder where I've been buying those batteries without a case all these years. Beats me.

                    • Completely unlike the one in the iPhone 7, right?

                      https://weblizar.com/wp-conten... [weblizar.com]

                  • by fnj ( 64210 )

                    CHUMP.

        • Please point me to the waterproof phone with a replaceable battery which is as thin & light as the iPhone 7, with equivalent performance & battery life.

          • False argument. The fact that it doesn't exist yet doesn't mean it can't be built.

            Many things like waterproof watches are sealed using 0.5mm O-rings. Google "0.5mm O-ring" if you don't believe me.

            Would a 0.5mm O-ring add too much bulk to an iPhone? Don't be an idiot.

            Plus: How exactly do you think the iPhone 7 is sealed? Unicorns and rainbows, or ... a rubber gasket and silicone gunk just like everything else?

            Could people mess up the waterproof seal if they were allowed to take the back off? Sure, but that's

            • Um, the fact that it doesn't exist doesn't mean it can be built, you know. You're talking about adding stuff to the phone without taking up volume or weight, and that's got some inherent problems.

              If the battery isn't replaceable, it doesn't need its own shell, and since the connections with the phone are inside the case they don't need their own waterproofing. The phone case isn't arbitrarily broken up to fit a battery, and hence can be made inherently stronger. Make it replaceable and you're adding a

          • by merky1 ( 83978 )

            Samsung S5 - Headphone Jack, USB, and replaceable back.

            Once again Apple claims innovation that existed for several years. And sadly the rest of the industry has followed blindly into this corner, leaving me without any upgrade path for 3+ years now.

            • Samsung Galaxy S5 dimensions: 145.3 x 73.4 x 8.9 mm, 170.1 g
              iPhone 7 dimensions : 138.3 x 67.1 x 7.1 mm, 138 g

              I won't even bother with the benchmarks, because we're comparing phones that are 2+ years apart--but obviously the iPhone kills the S5.

              You ever think that maybe the reason Samsung has followed Apple on the integrated battery (etc.) is because they can't compete otherwise?

        • by Aaden42 ( 198257 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @10:19AM (#53031595) Homepage

          It's common sense and physics. The additional plastic of the battery housing, the internal space in the phone to make a user-serviceable space inside, the exterior cover and latching mechanism to hold it on, etc. All of those things take up space and add weight. That space could be more lithium or a smaller, lighter phone.

          You can convince me otherwise when you can demonstrate two designs (one with an integrated battery and one removable) that yield the same battery capacity and device size & weight using the same battery technology.

          • Google "0.3mm O-ring" and get back to me, will you?

            (0.3mm is what my 200m water-resistant watch uses to keep water out...)

            • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

              by Anonymous Coward

              There is a little problem with that... Your watch needs a new O-Ring every time you open it and replace the battery. Otherwise it's VERY likely that it will no longer be 200m water resistant.

              Besides, in order to get away with such a thin O-ring, you need 2 flat surfaces that do not move against each other. Easy to do in a watch, a lot harder in a phone that is much bigger.

              • Many automakers have moved to not having a gasket at all on their exhaust manifolds, those have to be air tight not just water proof. A car engine is a lot larger then a phone, has to handle thermal expansion, and constant vibration yet they are able to do it.
          • by Toshito ( 452851 )

            The LG G5 has a removeable battery and it's only 0.2mm thicker than the iPhone 7.

            We can't really compare them for overall size and weight since the screen on the G5 is way bigger than on the iPhone 7.

            But it still proves that you can have a removeable battery in a phone and keep it thin.

          • It's common sense and physics. The additional plastic of the battery housing,

            Wait a minute... are you unaware that non-removable batteries have the same kind of housing that removable batteries have?

            • by Aaden42 ( 198257 )
              Non removable batteries in an iPhone are just the battery's plastic wrap outer layer with no puncture protection at all. Every phone I've encountered with a removable battery had at least some kind of plastic or aluminum exoskeleton beyond the thin plastic from the battery manufacturing to give it some chance of not instantly folding or puncturing and catching fire when it wasn't installed. That plus the mechanism to open and latch the case and the extra bracing required internally add up to quite a bit o
        • As a user, I'd much prefer the water proofing, smaller overall size / greater capacity, and other benefits that come from an integrated battery.

          Stop believing the Apple sales pitches. None of those things is incompatible with a removable battery.

          Must be the Samsung sales pitches, too. But you are wrong either way.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        you understand that S5 was waterproof and still had removable battery, right?

      • As a user, I'd prefer replaceable battery. It's not a phone, but my older son has a Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 tablet. After a year and a half, it began having battery issues. It wouldn't charge at all - showing a charging screen but recycling as if we kept pulling the plug and plugging it back in. We tested other cords and it didn't work. I finally bought a battery online and paid someone to open the case (after I failed to be able to) and replace the battery. This fixed it for about 8 months, but his tablet sta

        • As a user, I'd prefer replaceable battery. It's not a phone, but my older son has a Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 tablet. After a year and a half, it began having battery issues. It wouldn't charge at all - showing a charging screen but recycling as if we kept pulling the plug and plugging it back in. We tested other cords and it didn't work. I finally bought a battery online and paid someone to open the case (after I failed to be able to) and replace the battery. This fixed it for about 8 months, but his tablet started this up again. Still, replacing the battery should be as easy as buying a replacement online, popping the case open, putting the new battery in, and snapping the case back on.

          If you had two battery failures that quickly, there is something wrong with the charging-circuit. My iPad 2. which is almost 5 years old, is still on its original battery, still gets about the same battery life as it did when new, and gets used HEAVILY each and every day.

          Samsung needs to stop baking their batteries to death with each charge cycle.

          • Yes, at this point I think there's something else wrong with the tablet. Replacing the battery let me get my son's game data backed up. He's on the autism spectrum and playing video games is one of his coping mechanisms. When he first faced the prospect of losing all of his game data, he melted down badly. Now, I'm looking into the possibility of replacing his tablet with a Chromebook since I heard that some of them can run Android apps. This way, he can still have his Android-based games, but also use the

    • Apple has had non-user replaceable batteries since the original iPhone (almost 10 years now) and they haven't lost a billion in valuation due to that.

      • Apple has had non-user replaceable batteries since the original iPhone (almost 10 years now) and they haven't lost a billion in valuation due to that.

        iPhones have had battery recalls [apple.com]. Moreover many iPhones, pods and pads have suffered unusually short battery lifetimes. My kids had two iPod touch 5th generation both purchased at the same Apple Store on the same day and both used nearly identically and charged on the same charger the same amount of time yet one battery failed within 6 months and the other is fine after two years. Apple has been lucky with fires and they did lose stock value over the issues with iPhone 5, just not a billion dollars like

        • Is it luck or better engineering?

          Perhaps the issue that caused that one phone to have a shorter life span was from a designed where if it used the battery as is, it would had exploded.

    • by Thruen ( 753567 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @10:38AM (#53031717)
      I see a lot of people saying they'd prefer a phone with a removable battery. Here's the thing: They exist, you have that option, everyone does and nobody takes it. Phones with removable batteries don't sell very well and that's why you don't see them advertised all over the place nor do you see manufacturers trying to pack in more features when it's not worth the effort for them. I know, everyone wants to believe the lack of removable batteries is so you'll be forced to replace your phone due to a dead battery instead of getting a new battery. I am going to tell you what my S/O who has sold this stuff for the last decade has told me repeatedly: They made a lot more selling extra batteries than they do selling replacement phones, there has been no notable increase in the rate at which people replace phones while we've made the move to non-removable batteries, and it's actually less common that people come in with complaints about their battery now than before as batteries now typically work well for as long as the average consumer uses their phone. It's also worth pointing out that, back when replaceable batteries were common, folks would often complain about the short lifespan of their batteries claiming they were being forced to buy replacements just to keep their phone on for a day at a time.

      I know, I've been using the same phone for years, too. I could use a replaceable battery as mine is not holding a charge the way it used to. We are the minority, most folks don't suffer many ill effects from not being able to replace the battery in their phone. This situation is a fluke, and even after this you will only see a very small minority of folks talking about the need for replaceable batteries. The vast majority of consumers don't care about replaceable batteries and wouldn't really benefit from them.
      • All you're really saying is that's not a selling point for most people.

        ie. Ignorance is rife, film at 11.

        • by Thruen ( 753567 )
          Are you suggesting companies should develop and produce products that they expect only a small minority of the market will have any interest in over products with broader appeal? Ignorance is rife.

          If it's not a selling point for most people, it's not as profitable a pursuit as that which is a selling point for most people. This isn't rocket science. As I said, you can still purchase a phone with a replaceable battery so for the few people that want it it's there, but you can't expect them to make an alte
          • Hey, we're special snowflakes. Companies should listen to us on tech issues? Right.

            Besides, this entire argument is silly. You can replace an iPhone battery when it gets weak. Takes about 20 minutes. If you don't have the technical chops to do it yourself, Apple will do it for $100 and Juanita at the mall will do it for $40 in two hours.

            Back to explosions ....

        • You know, disagreeing with you is not prima facie evidence of stupidity or ignorance. People legitimately have different priorities from each other. You're asking companies to produce phones that are inferior to what they've got except that they have removable batteries, and complicate their supply chains so they can sell you and a few others what they want.

      • There's more to it than a removable batteries simply being unpopular. Lithium-ion batteries have a shallower voltage curve [batteryuniversity.com] than other rechargeable battery chemistries. That is, the voltage does not change that much as you discharge or charge the battery. This makes it trickier to detect how much remaining charge there is, and when the battery is at full charge. Doubly so when you add in voltage depression due to load, and elevation due to the device being charged. Add in Li-ion's tendency to experience
        • It seems to me that, if phones with removable batteries would outsell their fixed-battery cousins, someone would try that. Then other manufacturers would want to cash in on the sales and copy them. This isn't happening, so you're probably wrong.

    • All is in the title.
      And, my Fairphone does have removable batteries...

    • by fnj ( 64210 )

      when will phone manufacturers reconsider the whole non removable battery issue

      When the regulatory authorities get off their incompetent asses and REQUIRE it.

    • I know it helps with water resistance ease of manufacturing, but when will phone manufacturers reconsider the whole non removable battery issue?

      Never.

      Elvis has left the building on that one.

      Even if my iPhone had a user-replaceable battery, I'd still buy it from Apple.

      A computer-magazine I read once ordered twelve replacement-batteries (from twelve different ebay-sellers) for some Samsung-phone. They were all fakes. Some very good, but all fake in the end.

      We'd probably have more fires with user-replaceable batteries these days. Not less.

      And try suing that Chinese ebay-seller operating from the basement of his aunts flat.

    • by arth1 ( 260657 )

      when will phone manufacturers reconsider the whole non removable battery issue? Apple was a leading "innovator" of this

      I believe this consumerism started with the Palm V [wikipedia.org] PDA.
      I have one, and would still have been using it[*] if it weren't for the battery.

      [*]: Best e-book reader I ever had. Ambient lit single-color LCD is far less stressful on the eyes, and there's no e-ink reader that size.

  • by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @09:47AM (#53031345) Journal

    Let's hope this doesn't lead to the typical FAA overreaction and banning of the use of any electronics in flight until they can spend years deciding that it's safe. Like how WiFi devices were going to start causing planes to drop out of the sky. And somehow cellular communication is still suspect (or at least it's suspected that it will result in a reduction of Airline revenue if people can use their own data and make calls in-flight using the standard cellular network).

    • You are far too high up for a cell phone to work on a typical flight. Only during takeoff and landing would you be close enough to towers. Also if you are moving too fast that may cause issues as well.

      It can't be that dangerous because fully 1/4 of people never shut off their phone and at least one in twenty is texting, updating Facebook, or straight up placing a call on take offs and landings. I fly a lot and it's amusing how low the level of compliance is.
      • If it was really dangerous the 'terrorists' would be using it as a weapon.

        I'd be OK with it if they blocked voice calls and allowed texting/data. There's not many things worse than being sat 18 inches from some idiot yakking on a phone for a few hours.

      • You don't need to be using your phone for online activities for it to heat up. I play some games on my phone and some of the more graphics intensive ones can warm my phone up a bit. Not nearly enough for my phone to explode, but replace my phone with one that has a defective battery and it just might.

      • by mysidia ( 191772 )

        Only during takeoff and landing would you be close enough to towers.

        Depending which band and how much power that cell phone is operating on, they can reach out to 20+ miles.
        Being in the air should be no problem, unless they're flying over wilderness.

        On the other hand, the base station may refuse to allow, because operating them in the air
        can disrupt cellular services on the ground......

  • Just about all modern cellphones use a lithium polymer battery which will potentially explode or catch on fire if you damage / bend or drop the phone hard enough. If you've ever watched gizmoslip on youtube you'll notice that even iphones will get dangerously hot if you drop them hard enough. From what I heard the Note 7 had a failure rate of about 1/1000 which means even if you get something out of the bad batch the chance of it exploding is somewhat rare. Unfortunately this brings with it a lot of bad

    • From what I heard the Note 7 had a failure rate of about 1/1000...

      That's statistically REALLY high, actually. Think of how many GN7s there are! Didn't they say something like 2 MEELION phones were being recalled???

  • by fluffernutter ( 1411889 ) on Friday October 07, 2016 @10:12AM (#53031545)
    I like Samsung phones, but I'm glad I didn't end up with a Note 7. But every corporation is out there trying to cut every corner they can, and this is the chance they are taking.
  • I read somewhere (sorry I forget where) that the problem may be that the Samsung phones have a 3500mWH (or something like that) battery which is significantly larger than the iPhones which (I think) are less than 2000. Are the batteries the same physical size? That, and I heard that they charge in roughly the same amount of time.

    So does that mean that they are pumping in almost twice as much current? Is it possible to damage the battery that way? Can a battery store more energy by just overloading it?

    Ma

  • One lesson from this is that if the Note 7 had removable batteries, this all could have been a lot easier for Samsung to deal with.

    I am not quite getting how/what it is that they managed to screw up so their batteries keep catching fire. How did this make it through Q/A the first time, and how is it that the so-called replacements are still having issues.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      I am not quite getting how/what it is that they managed to screw up so their batteries keep catching fire. How did this make it through Q/A the first time, and how is it that the so-called replacements are still having issues.

      Soooo.... you don't know what causes the problem but...

      if the Note 7 had removable batteries, this all could have been a lot easier for Samsung to deal with.

      You know the solution?

      How does that work, exactly? You sound like a clueless user when you say

      • Well, the thought goes something along the lines of "if the battery was user detachable, then they would only need to recall the battery instead of the whole phone."

        It's still bunk, because you still can't use the phone without the battery, and using the battery before getting the replacement means risking a chemical fire. And, if the problem is in the charging circuit, then you're still recalling the whole phone.

        But don't let that get in the way of mindless scapegoating.

  • Thanks to you, the iPhone 7 is breaking all sales projections.

    Keep up the good work!

    Love,

    -Tim
  • Well, what are those US probes doing burning the phone in the first place?!

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