Gizmodo: melting

How to Erase Your Data With Thermite

Kit Eaton — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 06:47:00 EDT

Over at Hackaday they've gone a bit fiery destruction crazy, and posted a guide on how to destroy HDDs with thermite—that's the super-high temperature chemical mix used in welding, fireworks, and generalized military destruction. The guide shows how a kilo of burning thermite melts clean through a PC case, hard drive platters and all, turning them into pools of melted metal...which may be handy if you, uh, ever need to, um, "destroy" your data in an emergency. Hmmm. Check out the video, which is pyrotechnically cool, then see the hard drives post-incineration.

Yup, that glowing mess was once a hard drive.

Thermite's a blend of iron oxide and aluminum, and when it goes off it's pretty crazy, reaching iron-melting temperatures in seconds, and spitting gobbets of metal everywhere. So don't try this at home. Really. 'Cause it might not stop reacting at the bottom of your PC case, and molten metal dropping through your floor is just bloody dangerous. [Hackaday]

Free Fonero Routers Are Overheating, Melting

Travis Hudson — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 15:45:04 EDT

Remember those free routers by Fonero? These routers, 10,000 of which were sent out for free recently, are overheating and some actually melting. This video is of a particularly monotone man and his melting Fon experience.

It is also noted that he isn't the only one dealing with some hot fon problems. A lot of users on the Fon message boards are reporting heating issues, none of which seem to be as extreme as this guys', but nevertheless, a melting router is never a good thing. There is no official work from Fonero, but I would probably suggest disconnecting if the router is getting melty or unusually warm. –Travis Hudson

MagSafe Burning Not Isolated?

Jason Chen — Sun, 25 Jun 2006 13:39:08 EDT

Remember the MagSafe connector on the MacBookPro catching on fire? Some people thought it could have been a result of the guy's cats either clawing or peeing on the connector. Well, it may not have been an isolated incident.

Another user claimed on the Bit-Tech Forums that he was using his MBP in bed, smelled something funny, looked down and the power cable was burning/melting right in his lap! Luckily he was using it at the time and not out of the house, or else Apple may have a very large lawsuit on their hands. – Jason Chen

Original Picture [via Bit-Tech Forums via iBloggedThis]