Mac Pro, le pépin toxique pour Apple? asks French newspaper, Liberation (Babelfish translation). Strong-smelling Mac Pros have been discussed on Apple forums, but an anonymous CNRS researcher (a molecular biologist) went to Greenpeace. Greenpeace got Analytica involved, and then Inéris, France's national institute covering the industrial environment. Apparently benzene is a component of the smell, and this could be risky. Liberation says:



«Le benzène peut avoir des effets sur la moelle osseuse. Imaginons qu'une personne travaille huit heures par jour pendant deux mois en inspirant de telles vapeurs, des personnes sensibles pourraient très bien développer des leucémies», affirme Annie Leszkowicz, experte en risque chimique auprès de l'Agence française de sécurité sanitaire de l'environnement et du travail.

Over time, sensitive people could develop leukaemias, she says.

Unconfirmed stories suggest the problem Mac Pros have been built in China, not at Apple's European factory in Cork. If so, the risk could affect few or no UK users.

Note, we're not talking about an ordinary "new equipment" aroma. The original poster at MacRumours said his new 3.0 Mac Pro Octo

stinks to high heaven. It's a plastic-burning type smell, seems almost toxic, the smell coming out the back fan. I have to shut it down and leave the room every few hours to air it out, it's that bad. I've heard about the "new mac smell" and had a tiny taste of it with a new macbook last summer, but this is different -- it's intense, nauseating, and makes you feel funny. Friends and neighbors have agreed: this can't be good.

Another poster said: "It takes longer now to produce the problem, but after running about 2 hours the Mac Pro stinks like he did before. It is so intense that you can't stay in the room."

There's a difference between something being smelly, which is unpleasant, and being a health risk, which is serious. Time for Apple to respond, don't you think?

An Apple Core reader, also anonymous, says at ZD Net: