back to article Sammy had Sweet Fanny Adams to do with Swiss Fanny madam's blast

Last week's thigh-roasting "Samsung" smartphone battery has turned out not to be from Samsung at all - proving yet again the hazardous nature of cheap knockoff batts. When 18-year-old Fanny Schlatter's pocket went off like a firecracker the finger was quickly pointed at the battery in her Sammy Galaxy S3. But an investigation …

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        1. This post has been deleted by its author

        2. Intractable Potsherd

          Re: @Ledswinger @ Steven Roper

          "You are Adria Richards and I claim my £5."

          Nice one, Steven! I had to check my wife hadn't turned into Ms Richards the other day when she went into a rant about a meeting where people had found the word "dongle" to be funny ...

          I'm sure the decades from the 1979s onwards are going to be regarded as a later version of the miserabilism of Cromwell's time ... :-(

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Headline excellence...

        "Or maybe not. I can't see the few female readers of the Reg being amused"

        Tough. Go and read Take-A-Break if the dishwasher doesn't need filling...

  1. Mystic Megabyte

    CE? not

    I bought some red LED fairy lights for my submarine dungeon house from Hong Kong via eBay.

    After five minutes the clear heat shrink on each LED had gone black and was too hot to touch.

    I cut them up and binned them.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Windows

      Re: CE? not

      CE = "China Export"

      The feel when you realize you may have thrown away a working cold fusion device!

    2. TheVogon
      Mushroom

      Re: CE? not

      "After five minutes the clear heat shrink on each LED had gone black and was too hot to touch."

      That's generally what happens when you plug 110V fairy lights into 240V AC....

  2. Tom 11

    Bill Ray, you are wasted

    With titular tongue-twisting talents such as those paraded here, you quite clearly need a job writing headlines for the sun! love it :)

    1. Bill Ray (Written by Reg staff)

      Re: Bill Ray, you are wasted

      That's very kind but I'm afraid I can't take the credit. Most of our headlines (and all of mine) are written by a specially-trained team of sub editors toiling in a basement without light, water or (in some cases) connectivity.

      I'll take credit for the copy, but the poetry of the headlines is a skill beyond my own.

      Bill.

      1. LinkOfHyrule
        Paris Hilton

        Re: Bill Ray, you are wasted

        Those guys do important work! The sub editors here sometimes get a little bit of stick for the odd typo slipping through into articles but their headlines are always crafted to perfection - this ones a corker, it should be entered into this years Booker Prize for literature!

        Paris because this headline's worth it!

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Trollface

        Re: "specially-trained team of sub editors"

        Specially trained to write the headlines, but not read and correct the copy?

        1. diodesign Silver badge

          Re: "specially-trained team of sub editors"

          "Specially trained to write the headlines, but not read and correct the copy?"

          You guys...

          C.

        2. LinkOfHyrule
          Happy

          Re: "specially-trained team of sub editors"

          Oh come on, they do their best! I'd like to see you do a better job of it without any light, water or hope of freedom and the constant threat that senior el reg staffers will get their whips out!

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Devil

            Re: the constant threat

            But that's how it is supposed to work: a flogging for every missed spelling error, a day hung up by the thumbs for every missed misuse of a hyphen or apostrophe. It is the grand tradition of the industry. It's the sort of thing that separates journalism from blogging

            1. Rampant Spaniel

              Re: the constant threat

              With my English skills it would be like a Max Mosley heaven.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Headmaster

    Sweet Fanny Adams

    I used to work in the town where Sweet Fanny Adams met her grisly demise and it's a rather horrible story. In fact the version on Wikipedia is even worse than the one I was told locally:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanny_Adams

  4. David Roberts

    Is it just me?

    Or does any news story with the victim called "Fanny Schlatter" where her ....ummm... fanny has been.....ummm...schlattered lose a certain amount of gravitas?

    Sympathy to anyone who has had their nether regions roasted by technology, but it took me a while to decide that the news report was serious.

    If she had been called Joan Schmidt then the question would not have arisen in my no doubt over trained mind.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Headmaster

      Re: Is it just me?

      Hopefully it is just you!

  5. ecofeco Silver badge
    Holmes

    Most people can't spot fakes

    That's why they are called "Fakes" and "counterfeit".

    Most people are also not anywhere near technical enough.

    Most people also have budgets. $40 for something the size of a business card puts most people off right away.

    That said, tech fakes are a HUGE worldwide problem. Even top tech companies have been fooled to the tune of millions. What chance does the avg punter stand?

    1. Alien8n
      Alien

      Re: Most people can't spot fakes

      "Even top tech companies have been fooled to the tune of millions. What chance does the avg punter stand?"

      Not to mention several governments going by the sales figures for golf ball cleaning bomb detectors...

  6. Joe Gurman

    So perhaps....

    Apple's insistence on not letting punters put their own cheap knockoff batteries in their phones isn't such a bad idea, after all?

    1. Intractable Potsherd

      Re: So perhaps....

      That's the excuse manufacturers will use, no doubt. However, I disagree - changeable batteries are one of the things (along with SD card slots) that I look for in a phone.

      1. Rampant Spaniel

        Re: So perhaps....

        Ditto. Until a phones battery can last for 80% of its original runtime after 24 months of hard use they need to be replaceable. If they cannot then there needs to be a sanely priced and quick service for getting them replaced.

        I don't believe all phones should be mandated to have user replaceable batteries, but the choice is good. I do carry an external power pack but its not always convienient to use it and you cannot charge whilst using mhl or usb otg at least as far as I know.

        I like the look of the htc one and the new sony's but the battery \ lack of sd slot kills them and the sony only going to at&t is another nail in the coffin.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re. RE. fake batteries

    Hi, I've also had this problem.

    I bought a T68I "Genuine Replacement" that actually had a Li-Ion coin cell badly soldered in place, instead of the expected LiPo, good thing I took it apart to check why the capacity sucked.

    It even showed up on my phone as genuine, apparently the scammers "recycle" dead cells this way by the thousand to work around smart batteries.

    Since then I've been sent numerous pictures of "genuine" batteries with everything from bits of lead (byebye RoHS) to old screws inside to disguise the poor quality parts used.

    The scumbag faking scum are even using ultrasonic welders to put genuine cases (recycled obviously) on fake cells, and even going as far as labelling them NiMH on the Customs forms to get around the lithium restrictions.. !!!!!

    If you don't believe me google it, there are lots of deathtrap electric drill batteries around using recycled laptop packs where the one bad cell is simply removed and the completed stack soldered up and repackaged with genuine PCB and a genuine case.

    Needless to say, the e-bike users are also feeling the pain from this, as a lot of the more expensive bikes need the exact pack to work so rebuilds are commonplace.

    I am thinking about starting a counterfeit battery analysis and testing company as this could help a lot of people get their money back in a way similar to h2testw for fake memory cards..

    AC/DC

  8. bordersboy

    Reality Check

    As most of these products come from China tracing supply is impossible. Also believing the stickers is also impossible as anyone who has dealt wiht China will tell you, whatever you buy comes with the stickers you request doesn't mean a thing........

    Remember its only a few years ago a fake NEC was found out there.

    We have so much bought on our behalf out there that the supply lines are blurred and safety concerns from the maker are non-existant

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Fanny Schlatter

    Sounds like an accident all in itself.

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