The case of the too-hot laptop

A couple of months ago, I wandered into a computer store's laptop sales area. An especially nifty-looking laptop sporting a large-screen liquid-crystal display caught my eye and invited me over for a closer look.

A stout cable anchored the laptop and its sloping support platform to a tilted display shelf. I reached for the keyboard to check its keystroke feel, but the awkward angle imposed by the shelf and support made touch-typing all but impossible.

That's a poor way to display a laptop, I mused, and then I noted a description card taped to the platform. "Supports hot laptops for greater comfort— $29.95," I read as I slipped my hand beneath the laptop. Yikes! To my touch, its underside felt uncomfortably warm and almost too hot for prolonged contact.

A few weeks passed, and someone browsing the Internet referred me to a news item bylined from London, England, by Reuters and entitled, "Scientist Burns Penis with Hot Laptop" (Ref. 1). According to the article, after an hour's work, a scientist engrossed in writing a report on his laptop noted a burning sensation. Later, the affected area blistered and became infected. The story notes that the user's manual warned against operating the laptop on one's exposed skin, but the victim wore trousers.

By now, you're no doubt wondering about the test and measurement implications of this story.I anticipate that safety agencies will soon issue a "Laptop Test-Lap Test" directive. To assemble an artificial "lap" test fixture, you'll stuff the legs of a pair of trousers with two bone-in lamb roasts, insert an array of thermocouples, position the laptop on the "legs," and set its screen saver for "medium rare." (Season with garlic salt, marjoram, and black pepper before serving.)

On a more-serious note, did anyone measure a prototype laptop's surface temperatures before releasing the design to manufacturing? Who decided that sleek packaging and fast processing overrode user comfort and safety?

C'mon, people—what's happening to Human Factors Analysis as an engineering discipline? We're besieged by software burdened with crummy user interfaces, hardware studded with tiny controls too small for adult fingertips, and layers of poorly conceived user-interface menus on everything from cell phones to automatic teller machines.

We've already endured a slew of spilled hot-coffee and carpal-tunnel injury lawsuits, but are we ready for "laptop-roasted groin syndrome?" I'll wager that somewhere there's a contingency-fee-hungry lawyer who is.

Can you explain your product's safety-test plan to a jury? If you overlook the obvious, you just might have to.

Contact Brad Thompson at brad@tmworld.com