Another quality delivery from HP!
You've got to love them...
HP Inc has issued a "worldwide voluntary safety recall" of its laptop models due to potentially fiery batteries, with over 50,000 affected machines in the US and Canada alone. The announcement applies to batteries in 15 models of laptop sold globally between December 2015 and December 2017, as well as any replacements or …
"You have to run their utility which runs only on THEIR OEM build of Windows."
You are wrong.
The HP download page also has a version that includes the "HP Framework" package: "If you do not meet minimum requirement's, please download the fully loaded battery validation utility that will install the required frameworks."
I agree that it is stupid not to be able to check the s/n online.
We have to buy what we are told, recent HP models which had replacable batteries held by a plastic clip are now under a cover which have crappy screws compared to spring loaded type screws (Turns a 10 second job into a ARGH WHERE HAS THE BLEEDING SCREWS GONE WHY WHY WHY!).
Having the lovely job of going through now to find I have a 650 G2 thankfully not with one of the batteries. Oh well the PFY can take over this from Monday.
"For whatever reason the AMD models they do use a different charger + battery."
HP has for a couple years now transitioned to a smaller 4.5mm plug for several laptop models - probably because some laptops are too thin to sport the older 7.4mm barrel connector. Nothing to do with AMD. A few models only have a USB-C for charging.
This is the sort of thing "Mugabe" Meg was afraid of over on the other side of HP. Making things is almost as dangerous (to C suite bonuses) as employing people in jurisdictions that have the concept of employment law. Far better to abandon this last century concept of "products" and concentrate on real estate deals with surplus factories, warehouses and offices. In C21 it's all about being a "brand" rather than a "product".
"What, make genuine HP ink ourselves? No, we just price it as if it were liquid diamonds so no one buys it; the real money is in suing other people for making knockoff cartridges and refill kits, and for reverse-engineering the cheat chips in our printers that force users to waste ink on 'test' pages and replace our cartridges when they are still half-full. We fired all our production workers and leased the factory out as a chemical waste storage dump, and diverted that money to the patent lawyers."
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Too many ignore the heat generated while discharging and especially charging a battery. The chemical reactions usually generate excess heat, more when recharging. This heat must be allowed to properly dissipate or you could have any of a number of problems depending on the battery chemistry with Li-ion batteries being prone to fires.
so the number that remain in actual use is triflingly small
Sadly, we only buy HP at $ORKPLACE so, even if I beat this one to death with a live mains cable the replacement will also be HP[1]. And, knowing my luck, probably the one used by the heavy smoker with a penchant for eating cheese-on-toast while using the laptop..
[1] Unless I somehow reach the rarified heights where I get one of the few Microsoft Surface Pro 4's floating about. It's more likely that Trump will suddenly resign on the basis that he has suddenly realised that he's not really capable of the job..
This is getting silly. I've got more than a slight suspicion that some, perhaps most, of the problem is caused by "designers" making the shiny thinner and thinner to the point that the mechanics of the battery are totally impractical.
One wonders what the impact is on realisable battery capacity, let alone reliability.
How many of us would gladly accept a chunkier and slightly heavier lappy with user replaceable nickel metal hydride cells, bonus if they are in a standard format? The humble AA goes up to 2.5 AH these days, I wonder what's possible in larger sizes?
This laptop was too clever
So for now it's farewell
And maybe it'll come back,
With HP, who can tell?
It's the FINAL RECALL!
Duh-duh-duuuh-doo....
Where were we? Oh yeah NiMH. Well, it will have to be somewhat bigger. This table:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density
says maybe a factor 6.
"How many of us would gladly accept a chunkier and slightly heavier lappy with user replaceable nickel metal hydride cells, bonus if they are in a standard format? The humble AA goes up to 2.5 AH these days, I wonder what's possible in larger sizes?"
Problem is, they still only discharge at 1.2V, and most laptops need at least ten times that (most portable devices I've seen won't take more than eight; most top out at four). Not to mention IIRC NiMH is still more vulnerable to memory effects than Li-based batteries.
HP is as much a victim here as consumers due to the fact HP purchases the batteries from Panasonic or other suppliers. If a part is defective on your car, you might also incorrectly fault the car maker because they warranty the vendor supplied part but it's the supplier who has produced the defective component, not the car maker or in this case the PC maker.
I bought an HP desktop for my father, called them up 2 days later to return it because it was such a piece of junk.
The person on the phone asked me if I would take a massive discount in price to keep it... I said "I wouldn't keep it if you gave it to me".
I do not feel HP does anything good any longer.
Having both Dells and HPs, I'd buy a Dell any time over an HP these days. New HPs are a veritable PoS with so many issues that simply stop you working. In fact, whilst troubleshooting an HP to such an extent I had a buy a cheap Dell, one third of the price, as a temporary replacement just to keep working, but now this Dell cheapie has become my laptop of choice. Wasted a fortune on the HP.
I tried to fix an HP desktop 20+ years ago for someone-- started with defrag that trashed the system. Opened the box (which at that time would void the desktop warranty! I guess adding memory or disk drives was reserved for expensive authorized personnel), saw the cheap insides... refused to touch HP "computers" since then, and the quality apparently has only declined in the intervening years.