Search
Sign in with
Sign up | Sign in

-Dude, your Dell just freaking blew up!!!

Last response: in Components
Share

Dude, your Dell just freaking blew up!!!

As I sit here typing I'm reminded of what happened at roughly 4 p.m. Central Standard time at my office (about an hour ago); especially since my hands still smell like 'fire extinguisher'. While specifying instrumentation tag names on a flow drawing my attention is turned towards the haze building up on the other side of the engineering area. I started hearing some distant prattle about “fire”, “hmmm... what could this possibly be?” I think to myself. Upon further investigation I've come to the conclusion that someone's Dell laptop just freakin blew up and started a cozy little desktop fire!!!

Since I’m not in the mood for S’mores... "Oh, this is priceless" I think to myself; as I turn straight back to my desk where, from within my back-pack, I whip out my 7.2MP digital camera.

One of our IT guys put out the flames (yes, I said flames) and thusly covered the entire area with fire extinguisher ‘material’. The battery burned its way straight through the laptop creating the beautiful hole with which is so beautifully depicted in the picture. The fire department showed up. The police department showed up. The entire lower floor was allowed to leave early and as we stood there in front of the building we simply couldn’t resist... we jokingly called the engineer a terrorist as he was being asked a few questions by the friendly officer.

The most priceless moment of this entire ordeal is something that I, with regret, do not have a picture of. While taking pictures through the haze (after everyone had evacuated the area and before the fire department came to kick us out), the engineer who’s laptop it was had been spotted out of the corner of my eye. Apparently he heard there was a fire and that we all had to go outside. Being the noble engineer that he is, he quickly wanted to grab his laptop!!! HAHAHA The look on his face, as he stretched out his arms in disbelief was priceless!!! Again, I’m sorry I didn’t get a picture of that... I was laughing too damn hard! (I was only able to get a picture of him walking away, as I was intermittently laughing and coughing at the same time)

Here are a few pictures, please enjoy them as much as the Dell representatives and the AWESOME crew over at THG surely will when I send them the link.

Regards,
The Automation Engineer who had to go home early! :( 




*edit* - This is what it did to the desk...


And my favorite (after having to pry the melted plastic apart to open it up):

More about : dude dell freaking blew

Register or log in to remove
Related ressources
Ask the community

This reminds me of an incident about a month ago when a Dell laptop burst into flames at a Japanese business conference. One of the people attending got some pictures of it. I wish I could remember the link to them.

I wonder if it is a pure heat issue, or if there is some abnormal chemical reaction. Maybe the chemicals from the battery somehow reacts to the case material causing the fire.

You're probably right about that. It probably just overloads and sends way more power than it should until the battery can't take it anymore and explodes. Hopefully there wasn't anyone working too close to that dell and got hurt.

nah, dell can just sell these to the US military as anti armor weapons for the marines.... they'll be like : NOW not only does the dell resist to mimitary life! u can use it as a INCENDIARY BOMB, lomb them at your favorate tech ennemys ^^..

ROTFL !!! i'm glad i bought a mac, allthough i'd think twice before putting that computer on my privates again.... :p 

OMG!! A Dell laptop with an air intake!! :lol:  :lol:  :lol: 
Now that's superb air cooling!! :lol:  :lol: 

Oh, it's a shame what happened to that desk... All covered in fire extinguisher dust. :wink:

Now, speaking seriously, WOW, and i mean, WOW. How can a laptop catch on fire just like that? This and the japanese episode, both laptops were Dell's. That doesn't say anything good about Dell laptops. :wink:

Quote:
You shouldn't have gotten the Turion X2. :wink:


He said he "shouldn't" have gotten a turion. Its a dell, they don't have turions in them. So whatever he was trying to say didn't come out quite right.

Quote:
With that huge hole you could loop something through and attach it to your belt. Now we're talking ultra mobile.


Maybe they could launch a whole line of keychains with those laptops. :wink: :lol: 

now why did u think of that... :p  compensation... lol. dude, if some computer company blew your balls off with a sucky computer like a dell, would you be hollering it all over the world?? might end up like that poor starwars kidd. If it was me i'd go tell them strait, without court appearances and all that painfull shame that comes with it.
a) old computer ( not even some nice shine cool XPS or summat) + b) no more genitals + c)one mad whacky internet community who loves these sordid storys = HOW I RUINED MY LIFE BUYING SHIT FROM DELL. hell u caould write a book and star in some wierd movie along that bobbit dude.

i guess all you yanks are salivating at the promise of a nasty court thingy.. :p  (just kidding, i know how u can be soooo susceptible:p ) If my balls get cookie crusted to kingdom cum ( sorry for the punt) I think i'd go balistic and go stick a battery down Mr dells hiney.

lord , protect us from the evil batts from dell... lol.

for a fire to start like that, that battery must have shorted out, plus the temperatures in there must have been scorching hot, plus it had to have been , the outter skin i meant hurt in some way.

i've seen battery fires on cars and trucks, those are nasty ugly chemical fires started by shorted batts, lucky they aren't like the old sulfuric acid car batterys of ye old ages, come to think of it they still put those in... cars... urgh.....

I used to be a system builder working at Directron.com, and I built so many more computers than I can remember. One of the most memorable things that I remember happening was watching an Intel P4 chip go up in flames in one of our computers. I don't know what happened, maybe the HSF wasn't installed correctly (I swear I did it right) but our testing people turned it on, and a couple of seconds later, a jet of flame shot out (okay, not really a jet, but its a lot cooler seeing it) and the whole system was slag.

I guess what I'm getting at is it could be Dell's fault, or it could be the manufacturer of the battery or lots of things. Stuff happens, and as long as no one gets hurt, then everyone has a good laugh and gets back to work.

Just because I said that dell would have to pay a lot of money in compensation doesn't mean that it would be common knowledge. There are so many court cases and issues that are never revealed to the public and are still settled. Americans don't turn everything into a scandal.

honestly i think that a court case against the largest computer resaler in america (world???) in reguards to EXPLODING laptops, would make headlines in america. some lonley reporter would find out about it suddenly have a career as they tell the world about how some one sued the balls off of dell for being retarded.

Quote:
Huh, are you sure you have the right thread. I'm not sure what the Turions have to do with this topic.
It's known as a "joke". Dell recently announced it's going to use AMD processors, and to anger AMD fans like 9inch people often make jokes about AMD's quality.

Well, the reason why the laptops explode is simple. The plastic casing for the batteries is thin. When the battery heats up through use and heat from the laptop, the plastic melts and exposes the battery to air. When this happens you get a nice fire display because of the affinity the battery matterial has for air. Simple chemisrty, you ever tried holding 100% potassium in air, BOOM!!.

Get em while they are hot !!! New Space Age materials devoloped by NASA for use by the space shuttle !!! If its good enough for reentry then its good enough to protect the family jewels from your blazing Dell !!! Heat intended for external use only limit one per customer and if you act now the first 5,000 orders will come with an asbestos athletic supporter !!! hehehehe Dude your Dell looks like hell :) 

Quote:
If one of these exploded while they were on someone's lap, dell would be so screwed. That person would get sooooo much money from dell in compensation.


I'll never put another laptop on my lap....

Its time to change the name "LAPTOP"
to something else. Most people stopped
using laptops on their laps long time ago due
to power hungry processors.

Back in the day of slower laptops they were
not that hot and ok to put on your laps. Now it is not so.

javascript:emoticon(':lol: ')
Laughing

LOL... so I just took a picture of what happened to the desk. Apparently it also burned it's way through the docking station! I'll have to post it when I get home tonight. :wink:

Quote:
So today I had to examine the damage again... Here is what it did to the desk...



All I can say in all honesty is "Whoaaaa....." I have sooo many questions like "How long did it take" and so on... I mean I just worry that if I buy a new laptop that it could burn down my house if I forget it on or something.

Quote:
Henrik, i don't think that fires are very funny, i am glad that it was a big joke to you because it wasn't your stuff that burned up just wait until you have your house burn up.


I don't think he means to offend anyone. I take it as more of a joke that Dell would have a product that could catch on fire...all by itself...and they're likely one of only a few, if not the only, manufacturer(s) that would tolerate such a dangerous manufacturing/engineering defect.

Quote:
its only a matter of time before this happens on an airplane :p  :lol:  :p 


oh. that guy is screwed

I can see it now: "Well, we're going through a tough time in our company right now." "Why is that?" "Well, our accounting department is in Guantanmo Bay."

so ironic the person with the mac earlier made those comments. didn't mac have to recall their batteries also? i remember a thread of a mac totally bursting in flames. better check your version of mac and see if it was recalled also.

the link below if anybody has a dell to check their battery recall.

https://www.dellbatteryprogram.com/Default.aspx

strange stranger, your model came close, but not listed. good choice, lol.
Register or log in to remove
 
Ask the community
Read discussions in other Components categories
!