Dell Laptop - Inspiron 600M exploded and caught fire.

All,

A few days ago my Dell Laptop - Inspiron 600M suddenly exploded and caught fire.

The laptop was on the dining table and my wife had just finished uploading pictures of our Son’s birthday party on the laptop from the digital camera. Our 18months old daughter was walking around the table with a milk bottle in her hand. At that time one of my wife's friends and her 12month old son came to our place. So my wife closed the laptop and went to chat with them in the family room.

After few minutes, suddenly my wife noticed some weird sounds and she went to living room to check. She was shocked to see fumes coming out of the laptop. Having some presence of mind, she immediately removed the power cable from the wall outlet. She asked her friend to take the kids to the backyard. By this time the laptop suddenly started exploding (multiple explosions) and it caught fire with flames going all over the place. My wife was in a state of shock and didn't know what to do. She took the fire extinguisher in our kitchen and tried to extinguish the fire, but it was in vain. She asked her friend to call 911. She didn't know what else to do other than praying. She went to backyard and waited for fire truck to arrive. The firemen finally extinguished the fire. There was a mess in the Living Room, Kitchen and Family Room. Come to think of it, my wife/daughter or her friend/her son could have been injured due to the explosion. If nobody were at home, the whole house could have burnt. By god's grace, fortunately no one got injured.

When this happened, I was at work. I came home as soon as I got a call from my wife. By the time I came home, the firemen had left. I was shocked to see the burnt laptop and the mess in the house. We spent many hours cleaning the mess. We had to call maid-service next day to do some more deep-cleaning. Even after 2 weeks, we still have the burnt smell in the carpet, burnt marks on dining table and walls in living room and kitchen. My wife and daughter are still in the state of shock. My wife is scared of using her office laptop. My daughter gets scared every time she hears any similar sound. We also lost the pictures of my Son's birthday party. My son usually keeps the laptop on his lap while using it. It scares me to death imagining this happening while he’s using the laptop. I hope my family recovers from this trauma soon.

I reported this incident to Dell Customer Support. I was told that this will be escalated and I will receive a call/email from Dell within 48 hours. It's been more than a week and I haven't received any communication from Dell. I tried to follow up by calling Dell Customer Support, but I was transferred 4-5 times from one representative to another, finally the call going into indefinite wait time. I finally decided to write to this forum, may be some support person will reply after reading this post.

A frustrated customer.