NVIDIA today issued a recall notice for the 8-inch
NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet. The company has discovered that batteries for units which were sold between July 2014 and July 2015 are faulty, so much so that they could overheat to the point where a fire may be caused.
NVIDIA is calling this a voluntary recall, which is par for the course for consumer electronics. You’ll be hooked up with a newer unit which has a new version of the battery. Although this recall is “voluntary,” you really should get your tablet replaced if you want to be absolutely sure you’re safe. So how do you go about doing that?
For starters, NVIDIA wants you to make sure you’re updated to the latest firmware you can be on. Go to
Settings > About Tablet and check the date on your
Kernel Version. If it’s
July 1st or later, you have a recent enough update. If not, go ahead and pull it down at
Settings > About Tablet > System Updates.
Once you’re updated, you should now see a “
battery” listing under
Settings > About Tablets > Status. If you have
Y01 as your battery, your system is affected by the recall, and tapping on the button will take you through a device recall app. You’ll need to
go here to submit all of the necessary information to NVIDIA, and they’ll spit out a claim number which you’ll use in that app to verify your recall. Once done, NVIDIA recommends you cease to use the tablet.
Those with
B01 batteries are not affected by this recall, so no action needs to be taken. Many people might be inclined to brush a recall off, but it’s better to be safe than sorry, and we’d hate to see anyone’s homes go up in flames because they didn’t want to be detached from their tablet. And hey, you’re getting a brand new one in its place, so why the heck not? Go take care of it ASAP.
