Mac Pro's emitting Benzene? (NOT Macbook Pros)

[Jansku07]

Mac Pro, le pépin toxique pour Apple? asks French newspaper, Liberation (Babelfish translation). Strong-smelling Mac Pros have been discussed on Apple forums, but an anonymous CNRS researcher (a molecular biologist) went to Greenpeace. Greenpeace got Analytica involved, and then Inéris, France's national institute covering the industrial environment. Apparently benzene is a component of the smell, and this could be risky.

... "Over time, sensitive people could develop leukaemias", ... Annie Leszkowicz, experte en risque chimique auprès de l'Agence française de sécurité sanitaire de l'environnement et du travail ... says.

Unconfirmed stories suggest the problem Mac Pros have been built in China, not at Apple's European factory in Cork. If so, the risk could affect few or no UK users.

Source

The real news here is that the smell is toxic… but still no official answer from Apple. I’ve submitted this piece of news to let english-speaking Mac Pro users know about it (since it was published in french). Libération is a very well known newspaper in France, it’s not a blog or anything like that, so normally you should be able to trust this article.

I just called AppleCare (in France). They confirmed the problem but they told me it only concerned Mac Pros built before 2008 (without mentioning if being built in China was a condition, as suspected by users on the Apple forums). Mine is early 2008 so I should not worry they said.

When I asked them to send me this answer in written form, even by e-mail, they refused. They put me on hold for 40 minutes to forward me to the customer relations service, but apparently they didn’t want to talk to me so I got instead a level 2 technical agent who told me the exact same thing: don’t worry, we guess your Mac Pro is safe, but we can’t confirm in written form which Mac Pro have toxicity problems until Apple decides to communicate about it. Apple did nothing since they knew of this problem, which may be in the beginning of 2007, so we can still wait very long for any change in their policy…

The fact that my Mac Pro may not be concerned is not the problem I have with their answer. The problem is that I could very well own one of those toxic Mac Pro and never know about it, with Apple never issuing a Mac Pro recall to prevent serious health problems. Considering the problem exists for more than a year, some people have been knowingly exposed to toxins, and if some of them ever develop a blood cancer it will not be before some years, and Apple will silently get out of this problem. This problem is as bad for Apple as the contaminated milk problem for China, and it may very well be the first scandal of this kind in the computer industry.

Apple doesn’t want to confirm which Mac Pro have a problem because they know users could sue them for this reason. I invite all Mac Pro owners around the world to send a letter to Apple and ask them which Mac Pro have the toxicity problem, in written form. If Apple doesn’t change its methods very fast, a class-action lawsuit may unfortunately be the next step…

Source

Posts on Apple's own discussion boards suggest the Mac maker knew about potentially toxic odors being linked to its computers as early as December last year.

While benzene was not mentioned in the posts, many users complained of experiencing headaches, nausea and dizziness. The smell has been variously described as "new car smell", "musty", "rotting carpet" and even cannabis.

"My entire room smells bad and I have had to resort to a few air fresheners just to be able to work on it," one report read.

Another user on Apple's discussion board linked the toxic odour to the death of their bird: "I recently have had a bird die 'mysteriously' which was caged near my MacPro which has had the terrible smell for months. The vet said it was likely he inhaled something toxic!!!"
...
...Greenpeace, which sent the computer to the Analytica lab for analysis. Seven "volatile organic contaminants" were identified, including styrene, benzene and its derivatives.
...
Although officially Apple says it has found no evidence of the toxins, its customer support staff have allegedly told some callers that the company was aware of the problem, which concerned Mac Pro computers built before this year.
...
But some users on the company's discussion boards have come up with their own solution. Some reports say the smell - apparently caused by a protective resin coating on some of the circuit boards - disappears after an initial "burn-in" period.

Others have fixed the problem by removing small plastic strips from the side door of the computer case.

Source


NOT my finding, original xtremesystems thread here.

 

[Atnevon]

Holy crap. Thats pretty serious stuff. I wonder how Apple in the US will respond to these reports. Thanks for that post.

 

[Jansku07]

May well just be misinformation and/or rumours, but you never know. They haven't yet made thurough tests..