Hewlett-Packard (HP) has issued a recall of rechargeable lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries used to power a range of HP and Compaq notebook computers due to a risk of overheating and catching fire.

The voluntary recall was issued in cooperation with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and Health Canada and could involve up 70,000 of the Chinese made batteries.

To date HP and the CPSC have only received two reports of batteries that have overheated and ruptured, and in each case the result was “flames and fire that caused minor property damage.”

The recalled Li-ion batteries are used with HP Pavilion, Compaq Presario and HP Compaq notebook computers with the following model numbers.

Owners of these model computers can verify the model numbers by looking at the top of the service label on the bottom of the notebook. Batteries subject to the recall will have one of the following bar code labels (^ in the code can be any letter or number):

62940^^AXV^^^^ 65033^^B7U^^^^
65033^^B7V^^^^65033^^BGU^^^^ 65035^^B7U^^^^
65035^^B7V^^^^
65035^^BGU^^^^
65035^^BGV^^^^ 67059^^V8U^^^^
67059^^V8V^^^^

The notebooks were sold by computer and electronics stores nationwide, hp.com and hpshopping.com from August 2007 to March 2008. The batteries were also sold separately for between $100 and $160.

HP advises owners of batteries subject to the recall to immediately remove them from their notebook computer and contact HP to determine if their battery is included in the recall and to request a free replacement battery. The company advises consumers that they can run their laptop on AC power until the replacement battery arrives.

Additional information is available from the HP Battery Replacement Program Web site at http://www.hp.com/support/BatteryReplacement