Wait!  Don’t push that button just yet. Within weeks of the Dell and Apple laptop battery dilemma, there is another huge recall in the midst from another Japanese company, but to the relief of CEO Idei, it’s not Sony this time.  Apparently these Japanese companies have lost their touch with keeping the magic smoke inside electronics because Canon announced yesterday that it would recall more than 140,000 personal copiers because they could produce smoke and catch fire. The recall will cost the company somewhere in the neighborhood of $1.7M.

About 2 million of the copiers have been produced, but Canon estimates only 270,000 of the devices are still in use and only about 141,000 are affected by the recall. If that ratio holds, it means of these 1.7 million retired units, over 800,000 would have been affected by the recall.  I wonder how many of them went out in a blaze of glory.