[HN Gopher] My MacBook Pro had over 10k USD in repairs
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My MacBook Pro had over 10k USD in repairs
Author : pqvst
Score : 199 points
Date : 2021-08-25 12:34 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (pqvst.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (pqvst.com)
| nicholasjarr wrote:
| My 2017 MBP with Touchbar had keyboard issues (some keys popped
| out; replaced the whole keyboard), battery problems (it expanded
| and I replaced it, but it is expanding again), and screen issues
| (pretty sure is a thermal issue; after some hours of use the
| bottom of the screen started to went black to the point of being
| impossible to use and I had to stop using it and wait some hours
| to the black bars disappear). Pretty sure this is my last MBP.
|
| Edit: typo
| jccc wrote:
| "2 complete laptop replacements"
|
| "Factoring in the cost of the complete replacements, it would be
| closer to 10,000 USD!"
|
| I'm not sure how this $10,000 sum works unless you're saying you
| still have all three MacBook Pros rather than returning the first
| two.
|
| I would assume the first two were returned to Apple and
| refurbished, not just immediately destroyed?
| TrickyRick wrote:
| It's the equivalent cost of purchasing that same laptop I
| guess? The old one is probably broken and written off.
| jccc wrote:
| Right, but the idea is that Apple has lost ~$10,000 to
| support his MacBook Pro. That doesn't seem to add up to me.
| tsjq wrote:
| don't Lenovo and Dell have global support / repair plans at
| additional cost ?
| pqvst wrote:
| I'm not sure to be honest. I was not aware of that as an option
| when I bought my previous Dell XPS around 5 years ago. Maybe
| things have improved now though.
| wongarsu wrote:
| If you pay enough (I only checked commercial ProSupport
| Plus[2]) you get service and support anywhere where Dell is
| selling that product [1], as long as you travel less than 6
| Months.
|
| 1: https://www.dell.com/support/contents/en-
| us/article/contact-...
|
| 2:
| https://i.dell.com/sites/csdocuments/Legal_Docs/en/us/dell-p...
| petschge wrote:
| Yes. I have had next-day on-site support for Thinkpads in
| Europa, South Africa and the US. For devices not necessarily
| purchased in that country. The only question I got was with a
| German Thinkpad in the US when the power brick failed: "Do you
| want the replacement with the European plug or the US plug?".
| Everything else was fixed promptly without any questions or
| issues with warranty status. And no Thinkpads don't fail that
| often, I just have used them for more than 20 years.
| detaro wrote:
| Yes, the higher support levels have international options,
| although the details depend on where you are. (although afaik
| the apple-like case of "bring to service partner, have them
| handle it" is covered very widely, but .e.g you won't get on-
| site support everywhere. But well, with Apple you can't even
| get that in your home area, so yeah...)
| coldtea wrote:
| Well, mine had 0$ in repairs for 4 years I've had it. So it looks
| like YMMV.
|
| Poster had "2 complete replacements" (so 3 laptops in total) and
| they still had problems?
| samgranieri wrote:
| My personal MBP is a 2015 that I bought that summer. I had to
| have the screen replaced that fall and last summer I had the
| battery replaced for $200. I have a keyboard cover and a plastic
| case around the laptop to keep it safe. No problems. It basically
| just sits around my house.
|
| I got a 2016 MBP for work back in 2018 and that one also had a
| keyboard cover and a plastic shell around it. This one I
| schlepped all over the Chicago area to and from work. I used to
| use the keyboard on it all day, then switched to an external
| keyboard. That one was basically plugged into thunderbolt dock
| all day long. That one worked fine, up until last winter when the
| battery would not take a charge. I was given a 2018 MBP and that
| one works just fine. Sits on my desk with attached to a
| thunderbolt dock.
| egypturnash wrote:
| Damn, and I thought I've had to take my 13" 2016 Pro in for a lot
| of repairs. There's a design flaw that makes it chew through
| batteries every 8-16 months and I just had to have a week-long
| involuntary vacation while they shipped it off to a repair center
| in another case, where the entire top half of the case got
| replaced for the third time.
|
| This is _the_ most expensive Mac I 've owned in like 18y of using
| the things, even before I count the fact that only one of those
| battery replacements happened before the extended warranty ran
| out, and estimate the cost of several unplanned vacations.
|
| My next machine will probably be a 2022 Air; I had a succession
| of Intel Airs that gave me very little trouble before this
| battery-devouring Pro. I'm hoping their solidity has survived the
| transition to Apple silicon.
| asdff wrote:
| I think its absurd that apple stopped doing a lot of repairs in
| store, but still doesn't offer you a loaner computer imaged
| from yours. Clearly, people are using these computers for work.
| scns wrote:
| Charging the battery over 80% produces more heat and
| degradesvits lifetime, did you ran it plugged in all the time?
| My phones manufacturer stops at 90 but i installed an alarm to
| pull the plug earlier.
| egypturnash wrote:
| I ran it exactly the same way I ran the several Mac laptops
| that preceded it: unplugged in cafes, unplugged in parks, and
| closed while plugged into the external monitor on my desk.
| It's rare for it to spend more than a couple days plugged in,
| even during the pandemic. The exact same usage pattern that
| produced a slow, multi-year decline in battery capacity in
| every other machine resulted in the 2016 Pro suddenly
| starting to shut down completely while it thought 20-60% of
| the battery capacity remained. SMC/PRAM resets did nothing,
| "recalibration" did nothing.
|
| 2016 Pros eat batteries, and while Apple acknowledged this
| enough to pay for _one_ battery replacement, they've still
| hit me for an annoyingly large amount of repair cost, plus
| downtime, plus the annoyance of work lost due to unexpected
| shutdowns before I say "oh god it's doing this again" and
| start getting insanely aggressive about saving.
| ksec wrote:
| > _2017-06-07 - Purchased my First MacBook Pro_
|
| > _2017-07-31 - Lemon Unit_ > _Unfortunately, since day one, my
| laptop was randomly freezing and getting random kernel panics._
|
| Memory issues? Welcome to onboard memory.
|
| > _2017-08-19 - First Complete Replacement_ > _I was able to
| convince them to give me a brand new unit instead. Phew!_
|
| Only because the author bought Apple Care. Without it the
| standard procedure were to fix it.
|
| >2017-10-12 - Enter Key Stopped Working
|
| Key stopped working? Oh people have been complaining since
| _2016_. And Macrumors and 9to5Mac Apple apologist still to this
| day call it a _minor_ issue that blown out of proportion. And the
| whole issue only got noticed once a writer wrote a hit piece and
| YouTuber reporting similar issues which their video and clips
| going in total 20M+ views. i.e Apple only acted when the PR was
| bad enough. Sounds familiar?
|
| >2017-11-23 - Sleep Issues and Crashes >2018-01-13 - Overheating
| and Pink Screen
|
| Quite common if you watch Louis Rossmann Channel. And the Screen
| was the cable being too short an inflexible.
|
| >2018-02-14 - Logic Board Replacement
|
| >2018-04-27 - Broken Speaker
|
| Again, a well known problem on MacBook since even before the 2016
| MacBook. A blown speaker. What is strange is that Logic Board
| replacement usually replace the speaker as well.
|
| >2018-06-11 - Fan and Top-Case Replacement
|
| And the Fan and Top Case replacement dont actually replace the
| speaker. ( In the usual sense )
|
| >2018-08-02 - Second Complete Replacement
|
| Again thanks to Apple Care.
|
| >2018-09-20 - Migrating my AppleCare Protection Plan
|
| >However, Apple said that I could instead buy a new plan on the
| new laptop, and get a refund for my unused period on my old
| laptop.
|
| That is because you now get to buy an _additional_ two year Apple
| Care. Welcome to Services Revenue era.
|
| >2019-03-23 - Exploded USB Ports
|
| Exploded USB-C / Thunderbolt Ports? Hello? This was so common I
| would even consider it a flaw in design. Compared to Magsafe
| which has 0.00000001% of this happening, HN still prefer to use
| USB-C. But every time I mentioned this on HN I got downvoted into
| oblivion. As if it didn't happen.
|
| >2019-08-19 - Sticky Keys
|
| That was actually under the Apple Keyboard replacement programme.
| Not Apple Care.
|
| >2021-08-19 - AppleCare Protection Plan Expired!
|
| Imagine if you didn't have Apple Care?
|
| >As much as I don't want to buy another Mac in the future, I have
| a feeling that I probably will. I'm eager to try out the 2nd
| generation M1 macs when they eventually get released.
|
| There simply isn't another company competing with Apple. So
| despite all of its flaws, Apple is still one of the best if not
| the best. That is the sad state we are in inside the PC industry.
| turtlebits wrote:
| Sounds like a defective machine. I'm surprised Apple didn't just
| give them a new one after the 2nd or 3rd repair.
|
| That said, looking at the keyboard condition makes me think it
| was in some pretty harsh conditions. My 2012 17" keys still look
| almost new.
|
| I've only had a single experience where I had to repair my Mac in
| ~8 laptops, which was my Apple M1 aAr that died from plugging in
| a third party USB-C adapter (multiple reports of this happening).
| pqvst wrote:
| They did. I had 2 complete replacements. I'm on the third one
| now. It's all logged in the blog post.
| kahrl wrote:
| They did replace it. Twice. You should read the post.
| tossaway9000 wrote:
| Since 2016 I've gone through:
|
| 1 Macbook Air (stopped booting one day...) 1 iMac (Became
| unusably slow) 2 Macbook Pros (One stopped booting, one had
| keyboard issues and a swollen battery preventing the lid from
| closing)
|
| and am on my 3rd Macbook Pro now which is plagued with the
| keyboard issues...
|
| Meanwhile I have an E500 Thinkpad from 2011 that still runs like
| a champ and has been abused more than any of the Macbooks.
|
| I'm not buy any more Macbooks to say the least...
| JoBrad wrote:
| I've had a Lenovo X1 Carbon for the past 3 years, and it's been
| the best computer I've ever used. It's ridiculously light, rock
| solid physically, and still performs fast enough to handle most
| of the work I throw at it.
|
| I am getting a MBP, and while I'm looking forward to the
| change, I plan to hold onto my Lenovo.
| chrisballinger wrote:
| You can now renew your AppleCare+ on eligible iPhones, iPads and
| Macs at a monthly/yearly rate after the 2-3 year coverage period
| expires as long as you do it within 30 days of expiration:
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210580
|
| Would highly recommend extending for a laptop needing this many
| repairs.
| pqvst wrote:
| Only in the US afaik...
| abotsis wrote:
| My experience: Apple has been amazing. I bought a previous gen
| mbp from bhphoto that was heavily discounted. It arrived and was
| DoA. I brought it into an Apple store and they gave me the latest
| gen and discounted the money I paid bhphoto and split the
| difference with me. To top it off, I got an extra charger. A year
| and a month later, the logic board needed replaced, they did that
| too. Another year later the battery was swollen, and they
| replaced that for free also.
| throwawaymanbot wrote:
| all by design!!! Nickle and diming your for peripherals was the
| red herring to keep you from noticing that increased build
| quality issues made them way more money.
| DerekBickerton wrote:
| I looked at this person's homepage: https://pqvst.com/
|
| Looks like they use their Mac _a lot_ judging by all the projects
| they 're working on.
|
| I have a strategy that is common to all hackers / nerds /
| technophiles and that is: having multiple devices for different
| things.
|
| It's common to see in hacker circles: This laptop is for gaming.
| This other laptop is for freelancing & business. My other laptop
| is for toying / tinkering etc
|
| You can extend that list to probably 10 devices if you're serious
| enough about compartmenting your digital life. I have long since
| used a single device for _everything_ that I work on.
| upearly4 wrote:
| >having multiple devices for different things.
|
| That's my take, although I don't own $1000 worth of computers
| all added together.
|
| I'm always surprised when people use laptops for professional
| work as I've always had great honkin' company-supplied desktop
| machines. Generally, if something breaks (which is super rare)
| the main cost is the time to rebuild an environment.
| ElFitz wrote:
| I would rather do everything on a remote server, really, with a
| different environment for each project.
|
| But that starts breaking down when working on mobile or
| hardware projects.
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah, you described my computing approach. Including a couple
| tiny PCs like Raspberry Pi, etc. there are currently 12
| computers in the room I'm sitting in (only 3 are powered on),
| and this is just my "office" -- not the "computer museum" I
| have in another room which probably has 30+ computers of
| varying sorts. Each has a different purpose, different OS,
| different architecture, made in a different decade, etc. :)
| egypturnash wrote:
| Do you... regularly carry around like six laptops, then? Even
| carrying two sounds like a hassle, my husband had to do that
| for a while due to a single stupid time clock app installed on
| a corporate laptop that was too locked down to get the rest of
| his work done on.
| digitallyfree wrote:
| I use multiple devices, mostly desktops with varying specs.
| They run off the same Ubuntu master image, primarily use
| network storage, and are managed with Landscape for updates and
| so forth. Now there are times when I will need to use my GPU
| workstation, and others times where an old C2Q would suffice
| for web browsing. In general though, I can sit down on any
| machine and start working right away in a consistent
| enviroment.
|
| Those machines are getting old, and I've been considering
| upgrading my server and using a VDI solution instead. Or maybe
| it's time to switch to a more mobile option...
| WA wrote:
| Most devs with a computer use their device 8-10 hours per day,
| don't you think?
| OJFord wrote:
| > I have a strategy [...]: having multiple devices for
| different things.
|
| > I have long since used a single device [...]
|
| I'm not sure which you're suggesting then?
|
| I understand the desire to compartmentalise... I just think
| real life's too blurry, and then it gets annoying at the edges
| - oh I had this problem on my other one, how did I solve it
| again? etc.
| avgDev wrote:
| I have a gaming desktop, personal laptop(which I almost never
| use), and a work laptop. Why would anyone have 10 devices? That
| is craziness.
|
| Do you have a machine for SQL? Machine for mobile? Machine for
| web?
| Macha wrote:
| I have:
|
| * Personal workstation/gaming machine
|
| * Employer provided work laptop (MBP)
|
| * Surface Go Tablet used for reading around the house, light
| travel, etc.
|
| * Personal Dell laptop used for longer travel
|
| * Old desktop converted to a server for running services I
| always need up.
|
| * A rpi 3b used for running services I want to physically
| separate from the internet accessible main server.
|
| I've considered repurposing some old hardware I have laying
| around into a htpc type thing for gaming/emulation on my TV,
| but that's on hold right now due to GPU pricing.
|
| So I'm not far off 7. Other tech-heavy users may have
| seperate devices for their spouse/kids, or dedicated devices
| for specific OSes (my main workstation is a dual boot, my
| laptop is linux only and the tablet is windows only). So I
| can see a path to 10 for others.
| mrkstu wrote:
| Similar here- work provides MB Pro and Dell Laptop and
| workstation and iPhone/iPad. Personal iPhone/iPad Pro, self
| built gaming PC, Linux Xeon lab server, a couple Pis, M1
| and Intel Mac Minis, random assortment of
| laptop/iMacs/iPads/self built PCs for other family member
| use.
| monkeyfacebag wrote:
| I don't want to yuck anyone's yum but the thought of
| maintaining, keeping charged, finding room for and managing
| data on so many computers sounds like a nightmare to me.
| l30n4da5 wrote:
| the most I manage for machines right now is:
|
| 1 work-provided laptop
|
| 1 personal laptop
|
| 1 gaming desktop
|
| 1 backup laptop (old, like 10 years old)
|
| 1 closet server desktop (also old, but runs terraria servers
| just fine)
|
| On my desk, I use 2 HDMI switches and a USB 3.0 switch to use
| the same peripherals and monitors for both my work laptop and
| gaming desktop. At the end of the day, I just hit the buttons
| on the switches to toggle to my desktop.
|
| I have a USB-C dock that the work laptop plugs into. If i
| ever want to do work for my side project, I can unplug my
| work-provided laptop and plug in my personal laptop, and have
| the same setup as before -- just with a different machine.
| DenverCode wrote:
| It's very interesting to read about other setups and how
| people use them. For me, it's simply a MBA and logitech mx
| master 3 mouse.
| snazz wrote:
| Even just keeping software updates, backups, and your
| personal data up to date on both a laptop and a desktop can
| be frustrating. Two Macs could be doable because of the level
| of syncing that iCloud provides, but I'd probably still need
| Screen Sharing every once in a while!
| Doctor_Fegg wrote:
| Ah, the Mythical Macbook Month.
| TrickyRick wrote:
| I've used a single MacBook Pro for all my work for the last 10
| or so years with no problems. I highly doubt this is the
| reason. Plus, if you have 3 devices and extend their lifetime
| by 3x, it's the same as having 1 device which gets replaced
| more often ;)
| pqvst wrote:
| Yes. My laptop is where I do all my work. Since I work remote a
| lot, I try to stick to as few devices as possible. Having a
| MacBook where I can also run Windows and Linux as VMs when I
| need to, has been a huge benefit.
| zsmi wrote:
| https://pqvst.com/2021/08/24/my-macbook-pro/#2019-03-23---
| ex...
|
| Were you using an Apple adapter when this happened?
| glitcher wrote:
| I definitely agree with this strategy, but try to limit it to
| mainly 2 primary systems, and maybe a couple older repurposed
| systems. Basically I have one for my professional life, one for
| my personal life, and an old laptop dedicated as a tv streamer.
|
| But I don't travel much, and if I did I would probably only
| have one primary system.
| fsflover wrote:
| > You can extend that list to probably 10 devices if you're
| serious enough about compartmenting your digital life.
|
| If you're actually serious about it, consider Qubes OS [0].
| This should be much more secure _and_ convenient than handling
| ten devices.
|
| [0] https://qubes-os.org
| LeoGovender wrote:
| Facebook logins
|
| Username = yagendreng@gmail.com
|
| Password = Alexiag123#
| hinkley wrote:
| I want an electrician to inspect the circuits you're plugging
| into. Sometimes it's not the electronics.
| pqvst wrote:
| The USB port fried while I was staying at a hotel. Might have
| been something fishy there...
| snazz wrote:
| If the author has kept the same power supply/charger this whole
| time, it's certainly possible that that could be a lemon too.
| sfotm wrote:
| MacBooks are great machines, but once you need repairs for a
| fairly new one, you'd better hope you sprung for Apple Care.
|
| I recently had a MacBook that wouldn't start. I'm decent with
| computer repair and have a modest background in it, but let the
| safety screws dissuade me from opening it.
|
| I brought it to a repair store where they said it had water
| damage, which was what I anticipated. I'm guessing they saw that
| the humidity dots had been triggered, which were probably due to
| my laptop being in humid conditions at some point beforehand, as
| I think the water just barely got into a port via condensation
| from a nearby object.
|
| They called back saying that the water damage repair would come
| to $850 level, as they observed "significant corrosion" inside
| the chassis. That's maybe just under a third of what the machine
| costs retail, but there's not really another option at this
| point.
|
| Then I got it back, with all of my data in place, which struck me
| as odd - anything of value is soldered onto the mainboard. If
| there were "significant corrosion", everything would have been
| trashed, and the repair probably would have been much more
| expensive. They definitely weren't going to migrate data from the
| old mainboard to a new one for free, as that's a whole other
| racket that's enabled through these monolithically architectured
| machines.
|
| At the end of the day, I felt kind of ripped off and knew that if
| something like this were to happen again, I had no other recourse
| other than to give it a shot on my own. Given how clumsy I tend
| to be, that'll probably happen sooner rather than later, so I
| kind of see my machine as a liability at this point.
|
| I think I'm going to give the Framework laptop a shot, though
| I'll miss MacOS.
|
| PS: Had a really good time repairing a friend's 2012 MBP
| recently, though. With a replacement SSD, new battery, and
| another stick of ram, it feels like a capable machine without too
| much time or money sunk into it.
| ehutch79 wrote:
| I know you used to be able to buy apple care after the fact at
| any point it would still be in effect
| gambiting wrote:
| >>Swedish customer support they informed me there was no way to
| get a repair outside of Sweden, since that's where I had bought
| the laptop.
|
| That's odd, I've had my UK-bought XPS repaired in Poland without
| any issue, just rang dell customer service and a local engineer
| came over the next day and replaced the motherboard on the living
| room table. It wasn't ever questioned that the laptop wasn't
| bought in Poland.
| cja wrote:
| I was going to write exactly this! Bought XPS in UK in 2017 and
| repaired in Poland in 2018.
| pqvst wrote:
| It was quite a few years ago now, so I don't remember the
| details exactly. It might have been something specific about it
| being a battery issue. In any case, I remembering spoking to
| both customer support in Sweden and Japan and was informed that
| I couldn't get it repaired in Japan.
| gambiting wrote:
| It's entirely possible that the issue wasn't being out of
| Sweden, it was being out of Europe. I think Dell warranties
| are region specific.
| obblekk wrote:
| Interesting. I've owned macbooks since 2010 non stop and each one
| has last 4-5yrs, upgraded only because I wanted something faster
| (ending in M1 which is incredibly solid).
|
| You may be triggering some hardware failure vector given the
| frequent pressurization/depressurization associated with travel
| (particularly if you don't check in the laptop?).
| simonklitj wrote:
| Haven't had anything except display issue on 2009 MB and 2019
| MBP. It's interesting to see this repair history!
|
| Also, cargo holds on typical sized passenger airplanes are
| pressurized too.
| dariosalvi78 wrote:
| More than the support, what's impressive is that what is
| considered a high-end product needs so much assistance in 4
| years. I have changed 3 MacBook pros in the past 5 years, all
| broken beyond the possibility of use, and because of defects. In
| contrast, the cheapest laptop I have bought, an EeePC lasted more
| than 10 years.
| tkiolp4 wrote:
| Anecdote: I bought my MBP 2015 model 15 inch in 2016. It's my
| only laptop and still works like the first time (battery cycle:
| around 600/1000). Zero problems. Still on Catalina, though. I
| removed like half of the stock software that came with it (e.g.,
| Garage band).
|
| Having said this, I'm looking forward to the new MBP model coming
| this year.
| jonplackett wrote:
| Meanwhile my MacBook Pro from Touch wood - 2013 is still chugging
| along with the only issue a slightly reduced battery capacity.
|
| They don't build 'em like they used to.
| asdff wrote:
| I just replaced the battery myself in my 2012 macbook pro and
| I'm so happy with my battery life now, the replacement had a
| higher capacity than even the OEM (that apple no longer sells).
| A full charge with a top off during lunch lasts me a full day
| now. I've never seen this computer run for longer than three
| and a half hours, now it goes for double that.
| TomVDB wrote:
| 2012 MacBook Pro with retina screen here too. I've replaced
| the battery twice, and I've had 2 SSDs going dead, but other
| than that it's still going strong. I love the screen, I love
| the keyboard, I just wish I didn't cheap out on 8MB of RAM
| when I bought it.
| asdff wrote:
| Ahh I had the nonretina screen, which is even more
| repairable and I was able to upgrade the 4gb of RAM it came
| with to 16gb down the road.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| I've never quite seen a repair history like this! Does your
| MacBook get crushed inside of bag/backpack often? Subject to
| unusually high temperatures, cold, or sunlight? Any weird power
| issues at your home? Very curious :D
|
| Thule's Gauntlet cases are great but in your case, maybe a
| Pelican laptop box could work too.
| pqvst wrote:
| Haha, nope. It's perfectly fine and undamaged. I work remote a
| lot, coffee shops, cafes, coworking spaces, airplanes. So it
| moves a lot. No unusually high temperatures.
|
| I always use a soft case when I put it in my backpack for extra
| protection. Heat _might_ be an issue though, especially if the
| laptop is hot and goes into my backpack directly.
|
| Maybe I should consider a Pelican case now that my APP has
| expired... and maybe install some fans as well...
| solidr53 wrote:
| Airplanes man... my 15" MBP 2015 would always make this case
| cracking sound when the plane reached a specific altitude. It
| had some battery swell, not noticeable.
|
| Scared the shit out of me, every time.
| sumtechguy wrote:
| If you do move it around a lot it could be repeated flex
| stress? You would not even see it unless you got the thing
| under microscope. Even then it may be fine but one small part
| in the middle of board may cause other issues that cascade?
| mgkimsal wrote:
| > especially if the laptop is hot and goes into my backpack
| directly.
|
| I'd found MANY times that simply closing one of the more
| recent MacBooks (2019?) would not actually put it to sleep. I
| would close it, put it in my bag, then... hours later, find
| it was overly hot, still running, perhaps with 10% battery
| left. 2008 MB, 2012 MBP, 2015 MBP - never _ever_ had this
| problem. I 'm sure I overheated my 2019 MBP far more often
| than it was designed for.
| olyjohn wrote:
| Back in the day, when I was working at a PC repair shop,
| you'd see every kind of laptop come in. People would bring
| in Mac laptops, and then just open the lid up on the
| service desk and it would wake up immediately like it was
| still running! After all my experience with Windows PCs, I
| would be shocked that people would just shut the lid and
| put them away.
|
| We all knew that you'd never just suspend or sleep a PC
| laptop and put it in your bag. It would always wake up, or
| not go completely to sleep, and you'd end up with a toasted
| laptop.
|
| Meanwhile, every single Mac brought in had no trouble
| sleeping. They never overheated in a bag. The Mac owners
| never powered them off, always just shut the lid and put
| them in the bag. I'd never seen one overheat in a bag. Tons
| of Macs would come across the service desk, and never one
| overheated. Nobody ever shut them down to transport them
| either. They would reliably suspend / sleep every time you
| shut the lid.
|
| Lately though, and I don't even work in a repair shop, I
| see Macs overheating in in other people's bags. I hear the
| fans soaring on them constantly. Mine doesn't suspend /
| resume properly either. They really aren't built as well as
| they used to be, IMO. I don't trust it to just sleep
| properly when I shut the lid, so it always gets powered off
| before it gets put away in a bag.
| mgkimsal wrote:
| I think one thing I did sometimes would precede the 'no
| sleep Mac' thing. I'd have an external monitor connected,
| then disconnect it. Looking back, I did notice that often
| disconnecting a monitor would mean... it might take 20+
| seconds for the OS to be 'normal' again. If I waited for
| a minute after removing a monitor, the sleep would seem
| to work. Disconnecting at office and putting in the
| bag... it never really went back to 'one screen' mode,
| and I presume continued to think an external monitor was
| connected.
|
| I can't say that's behind _all_ the events, but thinking
| back on it more, I know that was a repeating scenario.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| Do you use one of those apps that keeps your screen open?
| Caffeine.app and the like? Some of those used to be
| notorious for keeping the laptop awake when the lid was
| closed.
| Macha wrote:
| I have had this issue on my previous 2015 MBP, and haven't
| had it on the 2018 device I now use, for what it's worth.
| The 2015 would also wake up from sleep (presumably for
| updates?) while in my laptop bag, so I resorted to doing a
| full shut down at the end of a work day.
| j1vms wrote:
| What might be interesting to consider is quality control in the
| various eras of Apple (e.g. 70/80s Steve Jobs, 80/90s Sculley,
| 2010s Cook).
|
| Of course, keeping in mind that Cook-era Apple is operating on a
| more massive scale (product shipped, wider distribution, more
| product lines).
| newbie2020 wrote:
| I can believe it. Our company has to replace multiple MacBook
| pros per week due to butterfly keyboard or battery bulge issues.
| How the mighty have fallen.
| FabHK wrote:
| The 2016 MBPs (Touch Bar, butterfly keyboard, Intel) are bad,
| but I hope they were an aberration. The M1 MBA is fantastic.
| selimnairb wrote:
| Honestly, I suspect that lot of the slowdowns that people see in
| ~4+ year old Macs, iPads, or iPhones is in large part due to
| degradation in flash storage, especially in ca. 2013 MacBook Pros
| where the flash modules were still kind of shitty. This is all
| the more reason why Pro-level Macs should not have soldered on
| SSDs.
|
| The original poster switched to a MacBook Pro at a bad time. The
| 2016/2017 machines were lousy. The 2019 models are better, but
| still not as good as the 2015. I think with the addition of the
| T1/T2 chip and BridgeOS, the machines got too complicated. Add in
| the poor thermals of the overly thin case, and the relatively
| high TDP of the discrete GPUs, and it is a recipe for un-
| reliability. I hope that the new AppleSilicon-based MacBook Pros
| will solve all of these problems. (and it will be a bonus of they
| back away from the USB-C only cliff.)
| zzt123 wrote:
| I have a gripe with every Macbook Pro I've owned, and I've owned
| 4 of them over the last 10 years.
|
| They all lag when I type. I hit a key, and it takes a while
| before it shows up on screen. The effect is at its worst in
| Safari, but it shows up most everywhere else as well.
|
| Sometimes, I'll type a few letters or even words before they
| start showing up. Doesn't matter if I wipe the machine and
| reinstall, and Apple has never been able to resolve it for any of
| their machines I've owned.
|
| I do type faster than average, but I don't think it is humanly
| possible to type fast enough to make a proper computer lag. This
| has never been an issue on any of my concurrently owned
| Windows/Linux machines. Only on Mac, and on every single Mac.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| Wow. Full time Mac user with a very, very high typing speed
| (consistently tested at 90+ WPM), and I have _never_ had a
| keyboard lag issue with a Mac. Sure, I 've had piggy apps --
| usually web apps -- create lags, but that's happened on lots of
| systems, not just Macs.
|
| If my Macs couldn't keep up with my typing, I'd have kicked
| them to the curb a LONG LONG LONG time ago.
| kowlo wrote:
| WPM in the 90s is above average, but not "very, very high"!
| But I can see that you are a really really really big fan of
| adverbs...!
| zzt123 wrote:
| I am quite a bit above 90 wpm. Almost exactly double for
| sustained (1 min+), and more than that for burst.
|
| My theory is that the Intel macs generate too much heat for
| the chassis to handle (I'm currently on a 16" 2019),
| especially when being used by IntelliJ in projects with many
| files, having additional dev stuff running in the background,
| and with an external monitor connected.
|
| Additionally, I perceive more lag on the Mac itself than on
| the external monitor, so I think there is a component that is
| due to the slow speed of the Macbook Pro display.
| tdsamardzhiev wrote:
| My theory is that you generate too much heat by typing that
| fast :)
|
| No, seriously, what's the secret?
| zzt123 wrote:
| Lots and lots of practice during moments of downtime.
| Those small moments add up over the years.
|
| Back when I got my first Mac (2012) I was plateaued at
| 80-100 wpm. From there, it was an accumulation of
| intentional practice for fun and enjoyment.
| reddit_clone wrote:
| I have a strange lag problem too.
|
| My CapsLock key (mapped to Esc because I am a Doom Emacs User)
| gets really slow over days. Like in ~4 seconds to register. A
| reboot fixed the delay. But it degrades again.
|
| Happened twice. Thankfully, after the last reboot, it seems to
| be holding.
|
| Last year MBP running Big Sur.
| zzt123 wrote:
| Coincidentally, my lag issues got a lot worse since upgrading
| to Big Sur. As did my thermal throttling.
| nocture wrote:
| I map it the same way to caps lock and experience exactly the
| same you describe. I noticed after the last patch a few weeks
| ago it went away for now. Been driving me nuts until.
| hpoe wrote:
| I was running an MBP for work and running Doom Emacs got me
| the exact same issue, that would spread to everything.
| Luckily I was up for a new machine before things got to bad
| and on the new Dell Percision I haven't had any issues (after
| I installed Ubuntu on it)
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Have you applied the 11.5.2 update? The Caps Lock
| slowness/beach ball issue seems to be related to the high
| WindowServer CPU issue and has gone away for me since I
| applied 11.5.2.
| nielsole wrote:
| For me it's the '0' key on my numpad on an external keyboard.
| Takes up to 500ms to be scanned. All other keys have input
| lag, but are scanned instantly. Keyboard works flawless on
| Linux. Really weird. Wondering if the '0'key is somehow
| scanned in software on Mac.
| zellyn wrote:
| Huh. Me too. It's like it switches between two modes: typing,
| or emacs-keys-movement. And sometimes gets so bad it takes
| almost a second between them.
|
| Resetting my bluetooth module and factory resetting all
| connected bluetooth peripherals helps usually. But it's a
| pain.
| ksec wrote:
| Same problem and on Safari as well.
|
| But I do think the problem is fairly recent as in the last 4- 5
| years after certain macOS update.
|
| It works when you have little to no CPU usage, but even at
| 20-40% CPU typing speed lag start to show.
| smoldesu wrote:
| I've noticed this too: at first on my friend's hackintosh,
| which I just chalked up to a bad kext or something. I was
| pretty surprised to find that the used MBP I bought also
| exhibited the behavior. Touch-typing on it feels like I'm fat
| fingering a Nokia keypad, with how frequently I need to delete
| and try again.
| mfarr wrote:
| I've noticed the same thing on my 2019 16". In my case, at
| least, it seems to happen only when the integrated GPU is in
| use. If I force the discrete GPU to be used, it doesn't happen.
| I've been able to reproduce this on fresh installs with no
| third party apps installed or running.
|
| It's incredibly frustrating, and just one more thing to add to
| the pile of annoyances that I have with Apple products lately.
| wil421 wrote:
| The only thing that lags from time to time on my M1 is opening
| a Safari tab. Recently did a clean install to get rid of some
| 10 year Time Machine backup cruft I accrued and it's gone. I've
| owned 3 in the past 10 years and none of them lag when pressing
| a key not even my wife's white MacBook with a HD.
| dep_b wrote:
| Safari became unusable to me I might be a tab hoarder but I
| can't be the only one. Sometimes it takes a minute to come to
| foreground again.
| asdff wrote:
| Switch to firefox, there are extensions to put tabs in the
| background so it feels lightweight whether you have 1 tab
| or 1001. All of apples reported efficiencies with safari
| just wash away when you compare it to the performance of
| firefox with tab suspension and ublock origin considering
| the modern web.
| el_benhameen wrote:
| I just wish there was some interoperability with the tab
| syncing and password management features in Safari. I
| know that isn't on Mozilla, but having to migrate the
| massive iCloud database of all my passwords and give up
| tab syncing to my phone makes switching to Firefox a hard
| sell.
| asdff wrote:
| What I did was switch to firefox on my phone as well. No
| issues with passwords in my experiences really.
| amatecha wrote:
| Hmmm.. FWIW, I type at like 130wpm (I have won typing
| competitions), and have never experienced frequent text-input
| latency on my Macs (I've used Macs since the mid-80's). Only
| intermittent due to obvious things like CPU-intensive
| operations in progress.
|
| Did you see it happening on really "simple" applications like
| Terminal? What's crazy to me is how you saw it happening on a
| fresh OS install... had you installed any other software? Or
| any kind of customization to settings, locale, stuff like that?
| Curious how that could be happening!
| zzt123 wrote:
| Fresh is "fresh but with IntelliJ and a large project open",
| but without all the background NGINX etc installed.
|
| Once one app starts lagging, they all lag. Terminal,
| TextEdit, Safari, Notes, IntelliJ, everything.
|
| I'm well north of 130wpm, but I don't think that matters for
| the issues that my Macs have had to deal with, as I used to
| be well below 130wpm and still experienced such issues.
| nathanwh wrote:
| How did you increase your typing speed so much? I'm sitting
| at around 70ish wpm and would like to increase it
| amatecha wrote:
| For me, chatting online for hours on end since ~1997. My
| impatience to get a message out naturally resulted in
| typing faster.. I also played piano since childhood which
| I'm sure helped.
| zzt123 wrote:
| Lots of slowly accumulated, deliberate practice here and
| there over many years. monkeytype.com is probably the
| best site for typing right now. And I just destroyed so
| many of bits of anonymity haha.
| tinco wrote:
| I've got the same issue, I'm a relatively slow typer
| (90WPM) but every now and then the Mac just becomes so slow
| and typing everywhere is lagged. It usually happens when
| I'm working on the frontend of our app which has a
| javascript 3D engine in it, and the editor is visual studio
| code, so I was just assuming it was some weird Blink engine
| problem.
| threeseed wrote:
| We have hundreds of engineers at work who all use the same
| apps on latest MacBook Pros.
|
| There have been zero reports of widespread lagging which
| clearly indicates that there is some problem with your
| setup. IntelliJ is the likely candidate especially if you
| are doing Scala or Kotlin development.
| PolCPP wrote:
| IntelliJ: Thats your problem.
|
| Everytime i tried to run their IDE's on mac os i gave up
| because the abysmal typing/scroll performance.
|
| I think textmate broke my brain back in the day, can't
| stand any editor that can't run at 60fps. (unless it's
| vim/nano on ssh)
| dep_b wrote:
| Doesn't always happen to me but under load yes. Also: letters
| appearing out of the order I typed them.
| draugadrotten wrote:
| If you type on a Mac on display in an Apple Store, does it
| behave the same way?
| zzt123 wrote:
| The M1 Macs I tried at the store are the first ones where I'm
| not sure if there is a lag or not. I'm planning on upgrading
| once the M-series Macs have at least 32gb of ram, so I'll see
| at that point.
| singhrac wrote:
| This exact issue shows up when I type in Terminal, and it makes
| me annoyed every time.
|
| I used to have this on my work computer, and through some
| debugging tools that are not available publically or on macOS,
| I was able to track it down to my shell spawning a git process
| very frequently; until you mentioned this I suspected that this
| was the case on my MBP as well.
|
| Could it be that this is just generally true? I don't remember
| this on my 2014 MBP, just my new 2019 16" MBP. Supposedly the
| latter is a more powerful machine.
|
| It's gotten so bad that I frequently consider wiping my
| computer and seeing whether it'll be fixed with a new
| environment.
| avgDev wrote:
| This honestly seems like a terrible machine.
|
| I own an XPS and had in-home service. I called dell and we agreed
| my keyboard needs to be replaced. A few days later a guy shows up
| at my door and replaces the keyboard. I never had to go anywhere.
| Obviously, the mileage might vary if you travel outside of the
| us.
|
| But......again....that many repairs are downright scary.
|
| There is also one anecdotal fact I want to add about apple. I
| have been told that apple is so amazing because they build
| hardware/software. I was tired of samsung bloat and only 2 years
| of OS updates. So, I switched.......I am having many weird bugs
| with the apple watch not syncing properly. Safari freezing on
| some sites, and some of these issues are quite widespread.
|
| I just hate people who drink the koolaid, there is a similar
| problem when it comes to seeking opinion about cars. Some people
| just become part of the cult and will go above and beyond to
| justify buying a certain product.
|
| I miss the old days of online nerds before "marketing" teams
| realized they can really advertise through social media and now
| you can't even tell what is real.
| colmvp wrote:
| Well FWIW, I have a Retina MBP that's close to ten years old.
| It's been on 24 hours a day, almost everyday since the day I
| bought it. It's travelled with me to different countries,
| endured extreme humidity in some areas of the world, and is
| still running reasonably well today. I've had a lot of
| computers over the past few decades and it's IMO the best
| computer I've owned. I skipped out a few generations of MBP's
| because I didn't feel the need to upgrade.
|
| A few years ago, I bought an XPS because I wanted a PC and it
| was underwhelming considering I treated it with a lot of extra
| care. I experienced various bugs running simple games. The fans
| would go into overdrive despite keeping the drivers up-to-date,
| raising the laptop to give good airflow, and no graphic
| intensive program running.
|
| Ultimately, I think it's a bit of a luck of the draw. I don't
| doubt there are people who have horrible experiences with any
| brand.
| vmception wrote:
| Funny you write that because OP had a bad experience with their
| Dell XPS and is thankful for Apple's service
| avgDev wrote:
| I know, which is why I felt compelled to comment. Most
| business class dell machines and XPS can be purchased with
| next day in-home service. This beats going to a apple store
| for me.
| pqvst wrote:
| Like I said in the post, Dell refused to offer any sort of
| service while I wasn't in the country I had purchased my
| laptop. I don't know if that's changed, but that was a
| complete deal breaker for me back then.
| therouwboat wrote:
| I thought it was funny that being unable to replace Dell
| battery while traveling in Japan is seen worse than having
| crashing and overheating macbook for 2.5 months + all the
| other problems.
| pqvst wrote:
| Honestly the swollen battery made me fear for my life any
| time I used it. On planes it would swell so much (even when
| turned off) that the keyboard almost popped out.
| TylerE wrote:
| This is...unwise.
|
| I would never use a machine with a swollen battery, much
| less fly with one.
| pqvst wrote:
| Indeed. But I had to take it back to Sweden somehow to
| get it repaired lol
| webmobdev wrote:
| > I miss the old days of online nerds before "marketing" teams
| realized they can really advertise through social media and now
| you can't even tell what is real.
|
| Yeah, true. When I was new to HN, I had a minor altercation
| with some mod here because I posted a reply to a particular
| comment that the poster seemed to be doing paid marketing /
| shilling for Apple. My comment was deleted and I was reminded
| that as per HN community rules, I cannot accuse anyone of such
| things. Annoyed, I replied to the mod that it seemed obvious
| that the post was paid social media marketing. Someone (I don't
| remember if it was the mod or another fellow member of HN)
| pointed out that if the same logic was applied to my critical
| and negative posts about Apple, someone could make an argument
| that too was paid social media marketing by Apple's
| competitors. I was honestly stumped for a moment because
| negative campaigns are a fact too (e.g. politicians do a lot of
| negative campaigning through social media; the Chinese are
| aggressively known to do such kind of negative campaigning by
| posting negative reviews of their competitors product on
| Amazon).
|
| That said, it does happen on HN too. It would be unreasonable
| to expect otherwise - the kind of high net worth / IT
| influential crowd that comes to HN is the very market that
| Apple (and others) target.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > A few days later
|
| A _few days_?! Is this not a major problem for you? The author
| is right - a great thing about Apple is I can pop into a store
| in many cities around the world and just get things sorted. In
| some random city in another country with a conference the next
| day? No problem.
| cameronh90 wrote:
| When I had to have my MBP fixed under warranty, I brought it
| into a genius bar and they took nearly a week as they had to
| order in a part.
|
| YMMV
| pqvst wrote:
| I had to wait for parts as well. For example, Taiwan and
| Japan didn't have a Swedish top-case so they had to order
| one. It took about a week. But I could keep the laptop
| while they were waiting for the part to arrive. Once it
| arrived I went back and they fixed it within 24 hours.
| duped wrote:
| I had Apple replace the battery in my Macbook about 6 months
| ago and it took two days. There was a minimum 24 hour time
| frame for them to just diagnose that in fact, they needed to
| replace the battery.
| avgDev wrote:
| No, I can just use an external keyboard. The service was
| normally the next day but they didn't have a keyboard for my
| machine available, so it needed to be shipped. No problem for
| me.
| mgkimsal wrote:
| I had a US keyboard fixed in London same day (3 hours), no
| charge. I didn't even have AppleCare. I was a bit surprised,
| although... London ... big international city - having US
| keyboards probably isn't out of the realm of possibility.
| This was... 2009(?) - things may have changed a bit over the
| years, but that was one of those things that stuck with me.
| PaulWaldman wrote:
| Dell, as well as the other OEMs, do offer better warranty
| SLAs for replacement hardware. I've had techs show up with
| replacement hardware within 18 hours of contacting support.
| webmobdev wrote:
| I went to an Apple authorised service centre in India to
| repair an iPad screen that was not broken but was not
| displaying properly. _I was told that Apple in India doesn 't
| repair iPad at all_. If it is under warranty, they just
| replace it. Otherwise you are out of luck as no replacement
| parts are available! Obviously, I wasn't impressed at all.
|
| On the other hand, Intel once replaced a CPU for me (out of
| warranty) for free (they shipped it from Singapore to India).
| It was an old CPU (5+ years) and I never thought they would
| respond to my complain about it.
|
| When one of my Western Digital HDD conked out under warranty,
| Western Digital asked me if I wanted the replacement drive
| shipped from the US (as I had purchased it there, and they
| had a newer model which they offered) or from India (where I
| was at that time, and had the same model in stock).
| weaksauce wrote:
| I mean any manufacturer will have some unlucky streaks. i've
| had a few macbooks and all of them are going strong still. some
| are 15 years old. slower than they were but hopefully they last
| a while longer.
| xmprt wrote:
| I think Apple are coasting on the brand perception that they
| built from back in the day. 10 years ago, Apple was genuinely
| ahead of competition in terms of reliability but today other
| software and hardware manufacturers have caught up or surpassed
| them.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Not just surpassed them, but when you compare Apples to
| apples, their professional hardware today is utter dogshit.
|
| The most glaring example I can think of is that the Mac Pro
| isn't built seemingly for anyone. For $6000 you can build a
| VFX workstation with an overpriced(!) top-of-the-line
| threadripper and RTX 3090 and 1TB Samsung SSD which performs
| more than 4 times faster than their $13,000 highest-end CPU
| configuration. So what has ended up happening? A lot of
| studios are simply buying high-end PC prebuilts or the
| studios are building their own systems now for desktop-side
| compute.
|
| For that price you get 256 GB and some AMD $150 equivalent
| graphics card, which is worse than what you'd get off some
| random laptop today.
| ehutch79 wrote:
| You're right, it wasn't built for everyone. and the kind of
| people it WAS designed for don't even blink at $10k
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Even studios have budgets. I don't care about spending
| $6-15k for business hardware per inventory unit, plus
| you're not purchasing it frequently or in mass orders.
|
| The problem I and a lot of other firms have is the value
| you're getting for it. It's utter garbage, and has been
| all over the press for years now, so it's not exactly
| news.
|
| When big studios and little firms alike are complaining
| and asking, "Who exactly is this for?" It's clear they
| don't care about mass professional market consumption.
| And I'm talking about businesses that are going to spend
| over $6000 per desktop-compute unit.
|
| The organizations that I have seen are the only relevant
| customers are the ones who have deep Apple-centric
| workflows, and they're not buying a lot of the hardware.
| They might have under 10 units in the office at most.
|
| If the prices were more inline with what the rest of the
| hardware market looked like, I'd provide Mac Pros to each
| staff member because it would be a no-brainer.
| ehutch79 wrote:
| I'm not really disagreeing with you on the value here.
|
| Just saying the target market is the kind of people who
| can just drop 10k+ and not care. 6k isn't realistically
| in the same price category.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| For our business, there isn't a difference in between $6
| or $15k, but most businesses aren't spending more than
| $15k per desktop-side compute station even when we max
| out specs from our partner suppliers, because for that
| type of budget you can work with very large amounts of
| data that hit RAM limits on workstation motherboards,
| versus just large amounts of RAM on consumer
| motherboards.
| seph-reed wrote:
| At this point, the OS is the only thing I'm really hooked on.
|
| And ElementaryOS has been coming along fairly well, so I'm
| hopeful than in ~5 years they'll have something I can fully
| switch over to for my work computer. Right now, I just use it
| for my gaming/media pc.
| city41 wrote:
| Apple's software quality has absolutely tanked over the past 4
| years or so. I've gone from 100% Apple devices (starting with a
| G3 in 1997) to zero as of about 2019 as I got sick of dealing
| with all the bugs.
| outworlder wrote:
| > This honestly seems like a terrible machine.
|
| It does, doesn't it?
|
| My company has thousands of Macbooks. I've never heard of
| anything remotely similar.
|
| My current laptop is a 2016 model. No repairs needed, ever.
| Only now the battery is complaining. Not even the butterfly
| keyboard gave me any issues. It's likely the only repair it
| will ever need is the battery. Or maybe not even that, it's
| overdue for a replacement due to age. But works just fine.
|
| I also have a 2015 model. Also fine. Dropped it in concrete. A
| small dent. Totally fine.
|
| Unless quality has significantly degraded, this sounds like a
| bad unit/batch.
| sandGorgon wrote:
| same experience in India FYI. Dell XPS support is unparalleled.
| armchairhacker wrote:
| Honestly I have a 2015 MacBook Pro and it's still working very
| well. Previously I had a 2012 or 2013 (I forget) and it worked
| well up until a couple years ago.
|
| I also have a 2012 iMac which i think still works ok, but i
| replaced the hard drive with an SSD. When it still had an HDD it
| was incredibly slow, like it took over 10min to start up and 1min
| to do simple things, I thought it was broken.
| dclowd9901 wrote:
| I have a 2015 mbp and it's required one major repair, the SDD
| going belly up. I've been very happy with it and dread when I
| will eventually have to replace it for something faster. My work
| machine is a 2019 and I've had nothing but trouble with those
| units (this is my 3rd one in three years).
|
| I don't know what's happened with these things. They used to be
| bullet proof. I can't say the same anymore.
| mint2 wrote:
| That's the most extreme repair run I've seen. Like some others
| have said, there could be something that's damaging them.
|
| I know exactly what damaged my battery so that now it recommends
| battery service: Overheating using An external monitor and chrome
| tabs. The thermal management at higher cpu of this 3 year old
| MacBook Pro is bad but browsers are needlessly resource
| intensive.
|
| After about six months of ignoring how hot it was getting the
| battery notice started. A while later it would shut off at around
| 40% battery. But I still put off replacing the battery and
| magically after an OS update it no longer shuts off at 40%, and
| goes all the way down as it should. I assume the update included
| some throttling if the battery isn't providing adequate current.
|
| tldr: My Mac has battery issues and I know the exact cause. There
| string of defects you've had seem statistically unlikely as pure
| random ones while not impossible. There may be something causing
| them.
| Symbiote wrote:
| > During a longer trip to Japan my battery started to swell,
| significantly. ... once I returned to Sweden
|
| He took a swollen battery on an aircraft?!
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| In defense of apple, i have an 8 year old Mac tower and a 2 year
| old laptop, neither had a single issue besides the occasional
| memory limit spinner. I used both extensively for work.
|
| Can't say the same for my windows machines and I am a bit of a
| windows fan.
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| I'm curious why anyone would buy an Apple laptop with all the
| stories about unreliability in this thread...
|
| I've had 2 laptops in the last ~11 or so years. A ThinkPad
| (trucked along worry-free for years) and a relatively cheap Acer
| Swift 3 (AMD Ryzen APU) which I still use to this day, worry-
| free. I don't think I've ever actually taken any device in for
| repair, ever, yet somehow in this thread there's a ton of
| anecdotes.
| rip_netrunner wrote:
| shhh... this is a thread for b*tching about problems, not
| actually doing anything about them ;)
| jcpst wrote:
| I must have gotten lucky, or this thread is a concentration of
| the unlucky.
|
| Used my 2004 12" PPC until 2013. My 2010 mini is still the brain
| of my recording studio. The 2018 MBP is use for work is fine.
| I've yet to take a machine into an apple store.
|
| Part of why I've used apples for audio work is I get so many
| years out of them. The first studio I worked in had a 9 year old
| G3 in the B room.
|
| I use Linux for recreational software development, so I wonder if
| dev work on a mac correlates with more issues.
| bserge wrote:
| You have a lemon and should've thrown it under a bus a long time
| ago.
| trangus_1985 wrote:
| I bought a new high end thinkpad (i forget, it was a few years
| ago). The display was clearly defective, serious dark spots.
| Lenovo held a firm line that I would have to send it in and wait
| 3 weeks for a replacement. New out of the box.
|
| They tried to change their tune when I asked for a refund but I
| was finished dealing with their support "quality" - imagine the
| level of support that would happen if something broke outside of
| the return period!
|
| Anyways, I bought a Razer blade, and got some of the worst
| support in my life. I actually got accused of lying on the phone
| by the support agent!
|
| My next laptop will probably be a dell or surface - their in
| house repair service is supposedly extremely good.
|
| > At first, Apple informed me that they couldn't replace the unit
| and would instead offer to repair it. However, considering I had
| almost just received it, and experienced issues from day one, I
| was able to convince them to give me a brand new unit instead.
| titledlee wrote:
| Interesting, i've always had the experience with Apple that if
| it was within the 2 week or 30 day(im too lazy to go check)
| period of having received the device, if there was any issue at
| all, they'd basically just give you a new one on the spot /
| take a refund and just buy the exact same model. Edit: YMMV, i
| might just have been lucky and been dealt with by a very kind
| apple employee
| [deleted]
| S_A_P wrote:
| I have a 2018 Macbook Pro that had 1" of the touchbar stop
| working. I was quoted 1500 to replace it(did not have apple care
| as the 4 previous macbook pros never needed it) So I instead
| bought a new macbook pro and gave this one to my son. 6 months
| later the touchbar magically fixed itself... I really really
| really hate the touchbar.
| yummypaint wrote:
| It sounds like Apple's poor build quality directly netted them
| an extra sale. Why build better hardware when they can
| cultivate brand loyalty?
| stldev wrote:
| Same, with roughly the same ridiculous quote. 2019 MBP touchbar
| died just a week out of warranty. Had it have completely died I
| would have been happier than the persistent flickering it now
| does. In spite of thousands of such reported problems, my
| understanding is that Apple refuses to acknowledge it as a
| defect.
| sokoloff wrote:
| If my touchbar stopped working, I don't think I'd notice within
| three months. (I have a physical esc key.)
| S_A_P wrote:
| That is generally my experience except when coding, I need
| the F keys for that.
| natch wrote:
| After AppleCare expires Apple caps the user cost of hardware
| repairs per visit to some number they look up in a per-model
| table that presumably varies over time.
|
| It appears the author doesn't know this as they seem quite
| nervous about losing coverage.
|
| In my case I got a keyboard / top cover, logic board, and battery
| all replaced for $400 and change, on a 6.5 year old machine well
| out of AppleCare. They only do this while the model is not
| considered obsolete, and they have more discretion to do things
| in your favor if your initial purchase was made directly through
| Apple, and if you previously had AppleCare on the device, even if
| it is expired.
|
| In the US, after five years they declare your device obsolete. Or
| after seven years in some states in the US (edit: in cases where
| it is required to be that long by state law). Then after that,
| your only repair options are DIY or third party.
|
| Also if there is a repair done by Apple at any time, in or out of
| AppleCare, that repair itself is warrantied for 90 days. And if
| an issue was put on the record in Apple's support system for your
| device before AppleCare expired, it can still be covered even if
| it is brought in for repair after AppleCare expired.
| pqvst wrote:
| Interesting. Indeed, I wasn't aware of that. But I wonder if
| the capped repair cost is only available in the US, or if it's
| a global thing. There seem to be some differences between US
| and ex-US when it comes to Apple support.
| natch wrote:
| Yes I would not be surprised if it is US only.
| kureikain wrote:
| I had a macbook pro 2013 which has never had any issue and still
| going strong as my primary jenkins worker node. the controller
| node is in cloud.
|
| After that I had 3 macbook pro 2017-2018 all with keyboard,
| screen and power issue. I went on a M1 and it has been great so
| far.
|
| I see no reason to use a Mac unless I have to do iOS/Mac OS
| works. I hope for day where we can do Mac dev on Linux at that
| point I don't have to deal with this whole Mac fiesta anymore
| timw4mail wrote:
| I've had several Apple laptops, and mostly just normal wear
| issues:
|
| - iBook - hard drive failure
|
| - White plastic Macbooks - only issue is case cracking
|
| - Late 2011? Macbook Pro - Dedicated GPU failure around the time
| macOS support ended, a widespread issue at the time
|
| - Retina Macbook Pro - No issues
|
| - M1 Macbook Air - No issues
|
| Keyboard issues are really common with that generation of Mac
| Laptops, and the screen issue is something I've heard of.
|
| All those issues together, though...that's a load of lemons.
| agilob wrote:
| My macbook from 2011 had recently a fan replaced, it cost me PS10
| on ebay. My ASUS and Dell (each for ~PS350) from 2009 are still
| running, have only upgraded RAM and SSD. It's your fault for
| buying new Macbooks.
| asdff wrote:
| I'm back to my 2012 now. After the battery was on its last legs
| I upgraded last year to a 2020 air, figuring 8 years was a
| pretty good run. The air bricked itself just out of warrenty,
| and I'm back to the 2012 with a fresh battery (since you could
| still replace it yourself on these macs). Its honestly just as
| performant as that 2020 air since I gave it an SSD and 16gb RAM
| a few years ago. Not sure why I even upgraded, I'm planning on
| just shelling out for the repair bill then giving the 2020
| laptop to my parents who are on 2006 era hand me downs still.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Headline is a bit misleading, in that it was Apple who payed for
| all those repairs minus the AppleCare fee.
| robertlf wrote:
| As long as we're having a big bitch-fest here, I'll throw in my
| $.02. Other than expanding batteries, my laptops have generally
| been trouble-free. But the problem I do have is that the older my
| MBP, the slower it becomes when I upgrade the OS. When I upgraded
| my 2015 to Big Sur last year, it essentially became unusable
| because it ran so slowly. It now sits in my closet. Apple should
| stop nagging you to upgrade the OS if your hardware wasn't built
| to support the newer versions. Just give us security updates and
| leave the rest alone. I think that would make a lot of users
| happy.
| 00deadbeef wrote:
| Every MacBook I've ever owned has ended up with a swollen
| battery
| eric_h wrote:
| I've "owned" (they were either mine or belonged to the
| company i worked for) many macbooks since they were ibooks
| and powerbooks and I've only had one end up with a swollen
| battery (a 2015 13" macbook pro)
|
| #anecdata
|
| edit: sample size is approximately 12 machines since the
| ibook was introduced
| wallscratch wrote:
| I assume apple does this intentionally :)
| jppope wrote:
| Apple is the master of planned obsolescence.
| mrweasel wrote:
| They really aren't. They laptops last a very long time and
| you will be provided with OS upgrade way longer than you
| could reasonably upgrade most other laptops, while still have
| reasonable performance.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| Do you mean of master planners of recycling? Since rest of
| manufacturers mostly just make toxic plastic waste, not
| something that can be used 4x longer and then safely
| recycled...
| inasio wrote:
| A bunch of people here are talking about having 2010-2015
| Macs running, in contrast you don't see too many PC laptops
| of that vintage.
| lostlogin wrote:
| I see people say this but I can't see that it it true. This
| current lockdown in New Zealand has 2011 and 2013 Macbook
| airs in daily use and they are working perfectly. There is an
| iPad 2 in daily use also.
|
| Those devices have had hard lives.
|
| I haven't got any other electronics with anything approaching
| this longevity (unless you count espresso hardware).
| Presumably others are having a very different experience.
| Tarsul wrote:
| i basically can't use my ipad mini from 2012 anymore
| because the apps in the app store usually need a newer OS
| version than possible. A laptop from 2012 with Windows
| (whatever version) wouldn't have these problems whatsoever.
| I know it's another device type but it shouldn't really
| matter, both are computing devices.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| That's a 3rd party developer problem, not Apple problem.
| It's like blaming GM for not making leaded gasoline for
| your 1950s car.
| gambiting wrote:
| There are absolutely windows apps that won't run on your
| 2012 laptop too, it's just less likely you would run into
| them. Lack of DX 10 and higher APIs as well as lack of
| things like AVX instructions will prevent certain
| applications from running at all.
| ksec wrote:
| Because you happen to be using the good old Apple's
| MacBook. I mean a 2011 MacBook Air could still be sold for
| $120 2nd hand.
|
| 2016 Macbook has the worst reselling price out of all
| MacBook History. I think this tells a bit.
| EpicEng wrote:
| I don't know how you can say this after looking at the state
| of android. Beyond that, my macbooks have _vastly_ outlived
| any Windows laptop I've ever owned.
| GavinMcG wrote:
| They do a pretty bad job of it if it's planned. My '12
| MacBook Air works great (aside from needing a new battery)
| and I can still boot plenty of even older Macs, going back to
| a Quadra.
| gambiting wrote:
| I'll do you one better - I still have a 2008 MacBook Pro
| that I use daily, it works fine. Also a 7 years old iPad
| Mini 2 that still gets security updates. Yes, planned
| obsolescence indeed.
| abledon wrote:
| my 2011 13" macbook pro, still chugging along... maybe there
| is Quality control issues on 2015->2021 models, but the
| 2011-2013 era seem good? less infatuation on thinnest laptop
| ever woo /s
| ryneandal wrote:
| I disagree. My family's cost of electronics plummeted when I
| switched all of us to iOS. This is due to longer device
| lifetime and fewer broken devices.
|
| Anecdotal for sure, but my kids and most Android devices lead
| to numerous broken electronics, be it screen, micro USB
| charging port issues, or detached SMDs. My 5 year old going
| into Kindergarten has been merciless to his iPad Mini and it
| is still trucking along, after multiple years. My OG iPad Pro
| is still my daily driver for media consumption and is going
| on six years old.
| m_st wrote:
| I agree, same with my MBP at home. And I have the same issue
| with my 2015 XPS 15 at work which first was really fast,
| especially with Windows 10 and now feels slow for everything.
| Even though it is still running "Windows 10" (with Windows
| Update). Changed for the new XPS 15 with the new i7-11800H and
| couldn't be happier though.
| [deleted]
| bobbylarrybobby wrote:
| Also have the 2015 and Big Sur was also a shitshow for me
| performance wise (no serious bugs otherwise though). Updated to
| the Monterrey beta and it's back to silky smooth. No idea what
| they screwed up in Big Sur, but it seems like they fixed it.
| fouc wrote:
| You should downgrade it back to MacOS 10.x version range. I'm
| still on 10.13 myself, I don't feel any strong urges to upgrade
| to Mojave or Catalina. If I stopped using homebrew and started
| using macports or pkgsrc I'd probably be even less bothered by
| needing to upgrade. (homebrew is pretty shitty with older OSes)
|
| I'm also on a 2015 MBP that's still going strong. It's snappy
| and I'm happy. I upgraded the SSD last year, and that made a
| dramatic difference as well. Upgraded to 1TB, write speed
| jumped from 282 MB/s to 1321 MB/s, read speed jumped from 964
| MB/s to 1505 MB/s. (2015 is the last year that Macbook Pros had
| upgradeable SSDs)
| tistoon wrote:
| I would like to upgrade my disk while keeping the OS version
| (clone?). Could you please tell me how did you do?
| fouc wrote:
| I cloned to a USB drive, swapped the SSDs, and then booted
| up with the USB drive, and cloned back to the new SSD.
|
| --
|
| You will need an NVMe SSD adapter similar to this
| https://www.amazon.com/Sintech-Adapter-
| Upgrade-2013-2015-Mac...
|
| There's a whole thread writeup here: https://forums.macrumo
| rs.com/threads/upgrading-2013-2014-mac...
|
| --
|
| You can also download old versions of MacOS installers. I
| forget the link to the easier scripts/installers, there's a
| High Sierra one at http://dosdude1.com/highsierra/
|
| Personally I ended up using ./installinstallmacos.py from
| https://github.com/munki/macadmin-scripts to grab the
| catalog contents
|
| and then temporarily blocked swcdn.apple.com in /etc/hosts,
|
| and then served the /content/ directory so that
| swcdn.apple.com/content/ was pointed at 127.0.0.1/content
| (I used python here in the parent directory of /content/) >
| sudo python -m SimpleHTTPServer 80
|
| and then I opened the High Sierra MacOS app store specific
| link to make it download & assemble the .dmg file properly
|
| Open in Safari to ensure it launches App Store
| https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/macos-high-
| sierra/id12462847...
|
| Can use the same approach to grab other versions of MacOS
| downloaders from apple too if you look up the app store
| links for it and then serve the catalog locally I guess.
| Cockbrand wrote:
| I did the same with my 2015 MacBook Pro, and I'm still
| amazed that a $5 adapter and an Intel SSD are super fast
| and don't cause any problems at all. The machine sleeps,
| wakes, hibernates without any issues whatsoever. Also, I
| sold the original, well used Apple 1TB SSD for more than
| I paid for the brand new 2TB Intel SSD.
| limeblack wrote:
| If you have an Apple store near by they'll set it up for dual
| boot. If you don't mind do it yourself partition and install
| the installer to thumb drive.
|
| I don't condone piracy but you can download the old
| installers(get creative) md5 checksum it and simply reinstall
| the old OS. I am still running a 2012 macbook pro for video
| editing with final cut pro.
| officeplant wrote:
| You don't really have to pirate anything. Apple provides a
| guide for creating USB installers. Used it to bring my 2012
| Mini back to Mojave recently.
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372
| user3939382 wrote:
| You have to poke around but there are ways to disable the
| update badges and checks, eg:
|
| defaults delete com.apple.preferences.softwareupdate
| LatestMajorOSSeenByUserBundleIdentifier && softwareupdate
| --list
| ksec wrote:
| If you dont upgrade the OS they cant claim their installation
| rate and push their new API along with other API depreciation.
| So generally speaking I am pro OS upgrade. But I do think they
| somehow turn off certain optimisation for older devices. It is
| the same with iPhone as well. i.e New OS is only optimised for
| current set / latest devices.
| konart wrote:
| Sometimes I feel like an alien with my late 2013 MBPr working
| all the same with the latest os.
| twic wrote:
| I had this problem with my MacBook Pro, so i upgraded it to
| Linux. It's an early 2011 model, and still going strong!
| everyone wrote:
| It seems like they intentionally throttle older models as a
| feature of the update.. They do it on their phones at least.
|
| https://www.phonearena.com/news/how-to-make-iphone-faster_id...
| Bud wrote:
| No, they do not, and that's an outrageous, silly, completely
| unsupported accusation.
|
| Apple also does not "intentionally throttle" older iPhones as
| a "feature of the update" for some sort of nefarious bullshit
| "planned obsolescence" reason. The opposite is true: Apple
| reduces the clock speed very very slightly on older iPhones,
| so that they can be used LONGER and have a LONGER service
| life. The alternative would be, when the battery is starting
| to lose capacity, just having the iPhone randomly shut down.
| This would quite obviously be an inferior outcome for the
| user, so Apple thoughtfully checks for reduced battery
| performance in aging devices and reduces clock speed slightly
| to save power if necessary.
|
| Apple's reward for this? Literally YEARS of bullshit, bad-
| faith, poorly-researched lying stories in the tech media
| about how they are supposedly "forcing" users to buy new
| devices, when in fact, they are enabling iPhones to last even
| longer. Anyone with any clue knows, of course, that iPhones
| receive many years more software updates than competing
| products, and are also in service for years longer than
| competing products, but somehow, this BS narrative has still
| taken hold, likely because many folks are lazy, desperate for
| any excuse to slam Apple, credulous, and don't really care
| what the truth is.
| salamandersauce wrote:
| Because they didn't tell ANYBODY there were doing this. Did
| they give a pop up explaining that your phone was being
| throttled because the battery was degraded? No. Did they
| announce this "feature" at WWDC one year? No. Take your
| iPhone to a Genius complaining it was slow? Did they
| recommend you just replace the battery? No, they recommend
| you buy a new one.
|
| Part of the problem is that Apple stuck too small batteries
| in their devices for years so they degraded fast. They KNEW
| they were making the phone slow for users in 2-3 years.
| Having a slow phone IMO is more of push to replace a phone
| than a bit worse battery life.
| PolCPP wrote:
| Because someone decided it was better to be opaque on the
| iPhone and do that than do the same thing they had on macs
| and throw a warning when the battery was on bad state.
|
| At least all the drama ended with having a warning and a
| toggle for battery status.
| IncRnd wrote:
| Hopefully, Apple learned from their experience.
|
| By the way, isn't it nice when the hardware manufacturer
| doesn't degrade performance on failing hardware but instead
| tells the user?
| Bud wrote:
| Honestly, I think the best alternative in this case would
| have been to degrade performance (btw, it's a very very
| slight degradation that most users would not even notice
| in routine use) and also inform the user.
|
| But I agree with you, in that I do hope Apple has learned
| from this ordeal. I just wanted to speak out against what
| I see as very unfair, bad-faith attacks.
| [deleted]
| whoisburbansky wrote:
| Your linked article is entirely about the phone. Do you have
| any sources about them intentionally throttling older
| computer models?
| rapind wrote:
| I would go one step further and say only give us security
| updates and bug fixes full stop.
|
| Every update I'm less satisfied with my OS. I just want it to
| run other things and stay the hell out of my way.
| wellthisisgreat wrote:
| I have an MBP2013 with Catalina and it's been smooth sailing,
| good to know I shouldn't upgrade to Mojave even
| dudul wrote:
| That's funny I recently upgraded a 2013 mbp and it's a bit
| faster now.
| wellthisisgreat wrote:
| To Big Sur?
| dredmorbius wrote:
| My understanding is that Sceptre/Meltdown mitigations
| significantly slow processors due to reduced speculative
| execution, and perhaps more integrity tests against attacks.
|
| That's something that's near-universal across AMD64 / Intel
| architectures, regardless of OS.
|
| https://www.howtogeek.com/339559/how-to-stop-the-meltdown-an...
|
| One view is to blame the mitigations.
|
| Another is to recognise that the previous performance was
| itself a mirage, created by ignoring the risks presented by
| speculative execution (which had been long voiced, and long
| ignored by major CPU vendors).
| gdulli wrote:
| I got an iPhone in 2008 and 2 years later an OS update rendered
| it too slow to be usable. It annoyed me so much that it became
| the last Apple product I ever bought.
|
| Every non-Apple smartphone I've had since then has remained
| usable until I was ready to replace it on my own timeline, even
| after as long as 4 years.
| ribosometronome wrote:
| What non-Apple smartphone were you getting in 2010 that
| received 4 years of updates? My experience at the time was
| essentially no updates, or relying on custom ROMs for that
| sort of thing.
| riffic wrote:
| you know, if expanding batteries were so problematic, why the
| heck does Apple glue them into the topcase?
| spullara wrote:
| To make the computer smaller and lighter.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Permanently glued batteries are not any smaller and they
| are no lighter than strapped batteries with easily removed
| adhesives. It's a move to prevent repair.
| mbesto wrote:
| Disagree.
|
| You can see for yourself:
|
| Glued https://guide-
| images.cdn.ifixit.com/igi/noPvQ2CLs1jptX2p.med...
|
| Removal battery https://guide-
| images.cdn.ifixit.com/igi/btDJQp5CYXdILTOO.med...
|
| You get better battery performance, with higher CPU
| performance, better graphics, etc. etc. and save 8oz. in
| weight and nearly half the width.
|
| Moore's law has tradeoffs. I think you can make the
| conclusion yourself with the facts.
|
| EDIT: For the record - it financially benefits Apple to
| have an unremovable battery, but that doesn't mean its
| the _only_ motivation.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| This conspiracy theory doesn't even make any sense. Guess
| who has to replace these batteries? Apple. Why would they
| make it harder for themselves without a good reason.
| SirZimzim wrote:
| The idea is that due to the special repair it will be
| costly enough to the point where you will opt for buying
| a new laptop.
|
| It's $200 for a 2015 MacBook Pro for Apple to replace the
| battery. An aftermarket battery costs around $50 but it's
| tricky to install.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > The idea is that due to the special repair it will be
| costly enough
|
| But Apple has to replace the batteries and pay for it
| under their warranties, not you.
| ksec wrote:
| >But Apple has to replace the batteries and pay for it
| under their warranties, not you.
|
| Apple operate the 1 year MacBook warranty policy across
| the world with only specific countries that they abide by
| the law of 3 years warranty. However if you dont mention
| it, as in UK, they will still charge you for it.
| VortexDream wrote:
| Warranty only goes for 1-3 years. Where the rate of
| failure for batteries is very low. After that, you're
| stuck with high repair costs or buying a new device that
| falls under warranty again. It's a racket and people keep
| falling for it.
| zenexer wrote:
| Maybe it's different in some parts of the world, but at
| least in the US, the scenario described by the parent
| will _not_ be covered by the warranty, and you will have
| to pay for it:
|
| > It's $200 for a 2015 MacBook Pro for Apple to replace
| the battery.
| samtheprogram wrote:
| Apple wants to perform the repairs so they can charge a
| premium. If batteries were easy to replace, consumers
| would do it themselves.
|
| IIRC iOS even detects if a battery has been replaced
| regardless of whether it's an authentic first-party
| battery and warns the user; Apple technicians use a tool
| to prevent these warnings for first-party repairs.
| fsflover wrote:
| What if I want to go to an independent repair shop to
| change my battery? Or even do it myself.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| Apple will do it for you.
|
| So this isn't an argument against repair - it may be an
| argument against repair _by third parties_ if you want to
| suggest that? But then again why would Apple make a job
| that they have to do harder? Doesn 't pass a common-sense
| test.
| gambiting wrote:
| I refuse to accept that as an answer as to why the battery
| is glued in. It's just laziness by apple, there's is
| literally zero reason to use glue to hold the battery, and
| it means that if you want to ever replace it yourself you
| end up looking at a 50-steps long guide on ifixit where one
| of them is pouring solvent behind the battery - it's
| insane. Just have a system of tabs holding the battery
| packs in place, glue is not needed.
| Bud wrote:
| No, it's not laziness. Nothing about the internal design
| of the Mac is due to "laziness". Apple has clearly
| decided that the battery is better held in place by
| adhesive than by a "system of tabs". This could easily be
| for durability or safety reasons. It's a big, big problem
| if a battery gets damaged.
|
| If your argument is that the replacement process has too
| many steps, this argument fails: you'd save at most one
| step (out of your claimed 50) if the adhesive were not
| there. Because the battery is not terribly accessible.
| gambiting wrote:
| >>If your argument is that the replacement process has
| too many steps, this argument fails: you'd save at most
| one step (out of your claimed 50) if the adhesive were
| not there.
|
| Thank you for making an assumption on my behalf, but
| that's actually not my argument - I do have an issue with
| the fact that replacing the battery requires pouring
| solvent behind the case, as the guide clearly warns you
| that if you mess this up you will damage other components
| and the screen. That's an unacceptable process for a
| battery replacement, I don't mind the disassembly of
| everything else to get to there. I will repeat myself -
| there is absolutely no reason to use glue in a case as
| tight as that of a modern MacBook.
| taylodl wrote:
| It's probably being done for ease of manufacturing. The
| bots can handle glue better than tabs and straps. Also,
| they can put batteries in every dead space available in
| the machine to maximize system battery life. I agree it's
| ridiculous you need to use a solvent, carefully, in order
| to remove the batteries. I suppose this is the state of
| the art for now?
| noduerme wrote:
| My 2015 Air has an easily replaceable battery. It's
| needed replacement once and only requires a screwdriver.
| That's good design. Gluing a battery in is only "good
| design" if you want to make it as difficult as possible
| for people to repair their own machines.
|
| Heck, I still have MBPs that had _hot swappable_
| batteries. That was even better design.
| nescioquid wrote:
| > Apple has clearly decided that the battery is better
| held in place by adhesive ...
|
| They decided to glue the battery down. You may assume
| that each decision by Apple seeks an optimum, so you
| concluded this decision was for the best. But better for
| whom -- Apple or the consumer?
|
| Note also, that when I replace a battery that's been
| glued in, there are many more steps than for devices that
| aren't so glued down. Possibly because the people who
| designed it were thinking about repair and replacement
| scenarios.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Glue is not protective. The only purpose of glue is to
| prevent the battery from moving around, which tabs and
| straps do perfectly well. The battery is protected by the
| metal casing and nothing else, glue or no glue.
| qq4 wrote:
| This could easily be done for profit, as well!
| traceroute66 wrote:
| Apple batteries are glued for two reasons:
| - The aluminium laptop case is part of the battery. In
| the old days there was a plastic case/shell around the
| battery cells. Now the laptop case is that shell.
| - It allows them to make the laptops thinner. When you
| are talking about the need to save millimeters here and
| there in order to have a very thin total design then you
| need to remove screws, tabs and stuff that pads up space.
| riffic wrote:
| Planned obsolescence and user hostility, got it.
| riffic wrote:
| I'd prefer a system that was a bit more durable and also
| put the consumables in a place where they were easily
| accessed.
|
| we've reached the point where all advantages to devices
| being smaller and lighter are diminished returns.
| mixedCase wrote:
| If you care about maintainability, you're just not the
| market Macbooks are optimized for.
|
| While most brand-new laptops have unfortunately dropped
| externally removable batteries altogether, you can still
| find plenty that have internal user-replaceable ones.
|
| At home I have a work-provided Dell Latitude, a Thinkpad
| T470 my SO uses and my own Thinkpad T490. Very happy with
| all of them 'cept mine has a shitty screen that I'm going
| to replace at some point.
| amelius wrote:
| Put Linux on it.
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah, I got a 2009 MacBook Pro for free (or like $10 or
| something, I forget), and it's now running the latest
| FreeBSD. BSD, GNU/Linux and other open source OSes typically
| run great on MacBooks, and give them new life. Try it out!
| jwdunne wrote:
| Exact same situation. Couldn't upgrade macOS whatsoever and
| it was slow as anything. Whacked Ubuntu on there and it's
| running as good as new, outside of slow disk reads.
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah! I actually dropped an old secondhand SSD in mine
| and it makes a huge difference. You'd never guess the
| machine is over a decade old other than the slightly
| bulkier form-factor and mediocre resolution, haha (and in
| fact I actually really like the keyboard compared to
| newer models!)
| handrous wrote:
| The newer butterfly keyboards got all the bad press (for
| good reason) but a while back I had to use one of the
| early aluminum models from when they were still thick
| enough to hold disc drives, for the first time in many
| years, and damn, I'd forgotten just _how much_ worse the
| original slim driveless models ' keyboards were, than
| those. Those were basically perfect, for a laptop.
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah that's exactly what this 2009 model is, the nice
| thick keys that actually move quite some distance when
| you press them. So satisfying and tactile! Now when I try
| the latest MacBooks in an Apple Store it's like typing on
| nothing. Very strange feeling.
| math-dev wrote:
| The trick I find is to type very softly, then its an
| amazing wonderful experience. I haven't used my MB
| keyboard for a while so when I went back it felt very
| jarring because I lost my soft touch. Have to retrain
| myself
| Diederich wrote:
| Yup.
|
| I've had a lot of luck putting Ubuntu on older Macbooks for
| quite a few years now. Works quite well.
| zsmi wrote:
| In my experience all software seems to slow down over time.
| Firstly, my expectations of "fast" change, but also all the
| various data structures a system needs to run grow and
| complicate. In addition we ask more of our software over
| time and run more of it.
|
| For many, not even Ubuntu is immune. Hence articles like
| this:
|
| https://www.techradar.com/how-to/how-to-speed-up-
| ubuntu-1804
| alwaysjoe wrote:
| Half of these tips have nothing to do with Ubuntu.
| Changing your SSD will do wonders for your Windows
| installation as well...
| mehphp wrote:
| Yep, I'm typing this on a '15 macbook pro with PopOS on it.
| DanTheManPR wrote:
| A fresh install of Catalina was unusably slow on my 2010
| Macbook pro (to say nothing of even trying Big Sur!). I had
| gone back and forth between MacOS and Linux on this machine
| over the years, and the Linux experience has been improving
| in comparison. Especially now that some apps are falling out
| of compatibility with High Sierra (the last version that ran
| acceptably on this hardware). And it's not as though you need
| to use a lightweight distro; regular Ubuntu works fine on old
| hardware. The focus on keeping everything lean and
| performant, while maintaining compatibility with older
| hardware, is a great advantage of modern linux distos.
|
| Linux hasn't replaced my desktop workstation OS quite yet,
| but the last few years have definitely been "Year of the
| Linux Laptop" for me.
| [deleted]
| pier25 wrote:
| It's absolutely ridiculous that Macs don't come with a 3 year
| warranty by default.
|
| I've bought maybe a dozen macs in the last 15 years (for myself
| and the family) and while some have lasted many years without
| issues, some have died on me on the second or third year.
|
| Because the initial investment is so high you're practically
| forced to add extra Apple Care to protect it because there's a
| 20-30% chance you will have problems during those first years.
|
| And don't get me started on design issues and recalls which take
| years. When my 2011 MBP died because of Radeongate it took Apple
| 2 years to start a recall and replace the GPU. The honest thing
| to do would have been to take the machine and offer 60% of its
| value in credit towards a new Mac. Instead, Apple replaced the
| GPU on a machine that was already a couple of gens behind and I
| couldn't sell without practically giving it away because
| (rightfully) nobody wanted the 15'' 2011 models. That MBP was
| probably the worst investment of my life.
| bengale wrote:
| 6 years in the UK.
| Closi wrote:
| Not quite - I'm from the UK too and I believe we have 6 years
| to file a claim that shows that the item was defective when
| we received it, not that it developed a defect.
|
| Before 6 months it is assumed that if a defect develops, it
| was there when it was delivered.
|
| After 6 months the onus is on the person who brought it to
| show that the defect was there when it was delivered.
|
| Importantly - there is no expectation in law that the item
| has to _last_ 6 years.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _It 's absolutely ridiculous that Macs don't come with a 3
| year warranty by default._
|
| Government should mandate that, as in does in other countries.
|
| But many american consumers don't believe in government rules
| about consumer protection, lest some of this "innovation" we've
| witnessed is discouraged...
| zz865 wrote:
| Which is a good reason why everything in US is cheaper. Sure,
| you get more service and better guarantee is you pay for it,
| there is no reason to force it.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Note that _apparent_ cost and _actual_ cost are not the
| same thing.
|
| The _purchase price_ is lower without a warranty, but the
| _actual incurred risk cost_ is higher.
|
| Absent a warranty, that's not only a _risk shift_ from the
| manufacturer to the consumer, but _a real cost shift_ , as
| steps which might increase reliability are not taken and
| the _consequences_ of those decisions (made by the
| manufaucturer) accrue to the purchaser.
|
| There is also the incidnece cost and the cost of liquidity
| or credit required to front a repair bill in the hundreds
| or thousands of dollars. Given that much of the US cannot
| meet an unexpected $400 expense in a month, this is a
| significant consideration. MacBook owners may represent a
| more affluent portion of the population, but a $10k repair
| bill over four years remains significant. That's a constant
| $208/mo reliability tax on that particular unit, for this
| owner.
|
| Note that in this case, Apple _did_ eat the cost as the
| repairs were covered under the AppleCare Protection Plan.
| vondur wrote:
| I doubt everyone would want to pay the extra 20-30% more that
| Apple would charge to cover this.
| sp332 wrote:
| I don't think the odds of a replacement or repair are that
| high. 20% means one-in-five chance of total replacement.
| coldtea wrote:
| That can easily be fixed if they're also kept on a watch by
| legislators and consumer rights groups for pulling such
| shit up (as opposed to sucking up the cost)...
|
| In the EU, where a longer guarantee is mandaded, state tax
| aside, the prices aren't that different. MacBook Air $999
| US (849 EUR) vs 1129 EUR France. Of that 188 EUR is the
| state tax (VAT), which means the price difference as far as
| Apple pockets is 1129-188 - 849 = $92 or $108 dollars.
|
| So that $999 would be say $1109, a 11% increase, hardly
| 20-30%.
|
| (And that's not even counting the higher cost of business
| in Europe aside the VAT, which also factors in that
| 1129-188 price).
| wwtrv wrote:
| They do offer 2 years in the EU (iirc 3 in the UK) and the
| prices for most of their products are pretty close to the
| ones in US (if you subtract VAT)
| lostlogin wrote:
| This is done for all items sold to consumers in New
| Zealand. A base MacBook is US $999 in the US and NZ $1749
| in New Zealand, which is approximately US $1200. Your maths
| checks out. The tiny market, currency fluctuations and long
| shipping route probably factor in the price too, but our
| legislation is surely the prime reason for the cost.
|
| I absolutely love the consumer guarantees act we have here,
| and the protection it gives.
|
| Edit: NZ has 15% sales tax and this is missing from the
| above equation. It accounts for most the difference.
| [deleted]
| 0xy wrote:
| You're forgetting about the high sales tax of 15% in NZ.
| That explains the vast majority of the price difference.
| lostlogin wrote:
| There is zero sales tax on US Apple store sales? Where is
| tax paid?
|
| I certainly have missed that.
| bialpio wrote:
| Sales tax can vary depending on state (among other
| things), see for example Oregon where it's 0%, vs
| Washington, where it's 6.5% (and my jurisdiction adds
| additional couple percent for a total of ~10%).
| systemvoltage wrote:
| No, that explains precisely $150 in price increase. We
| can do math: $1000 base price + 15% sales tax = $1150.
|
| How is that vast majority of price increase?
| kbelder wrote:
| "...which is approximately US $1200"
| GordonS wrote:
| I think you're forgetting VAT, which in NZ, I think, is
| 13%. Not sure if there are import tariffs/duties to
| account for too.
|
| Considering all these other costs, I reckon a 20% markup
| is great value for a 3-year warranty.
|
| Like others though, I really all Apple products globally
| should come with a 3-year warranty - you pay over the
| odds for Apple hardware, and should get high-quality,
| reliable kit in return.
| lostlogin wrote:
| I have missed tax differences.
|
| In New Zealand you are getting a 3 year warranty and
| getting something guaranteed in return - and the extra
| price appears minimal once tax differences are included.
| wmf wrote:
| Apple charges more like 15% for extended warranty.
| mola wrote:
| OP seem to pay this premium indirectly anyway. So I guess
| people would pay that premium. Like they pay premium for
| mac's anyway. The regulation for warranty just means
| sellers need to actually provide the quality the brand
| induces
| tehjoker wrote:
| Thats why apple would eat most or all of the cost without
| passing it on to consumers or would make more reliable
| laptops. The laptops are already priced at what the market
| would bear and apple makes huge profits.
| Spivak wrote:
| Nah. You're forgetting that that this is Apple. There
| would be an announcement that for new Macs you will be
| required to purchase 3 years of AppleCare+ to have the
| best possible experience. People will bitch for a few
| months but eventually it'll die down and Apple will get
| to market the current price as the base price while
| charing 30% more.
| tehjoker wrote:
| Hard to say. Apple is often able to release new products
| at insane price points, but to reprice existing products
| is more dicey, especially when laptops are one of their
| most expensive products on offer. I think you have
| something of a point: Apple products are mostly aimed at
| people with lots of disposable income, but raising the
| price still reduces the total addressable market size.
| The only way to know is to run the experiment.
| minhazm wrote:
| What Apple does is they make a new model or add a big
| feature to the latest model and drastically increase the
| price. You can see that with the iPhone X, the iPad Pro,
| and with the introduction of the retina macbook pro's, or
| even with the touchbars. Apple knows how to increase
| prices and keep the vast majority of their customer base.
| tehjoker wrote:
| You're right, but the iPhone X is well below the price
| point of their Macbook Pros (closer to Macbook Airs
| though). Their flexibility is reduced the higher the
| absolute price point goes. At a certain point, people
| really can't spend that money.
| [deleted]
| ElFitz wrote:
| Over here we have a 2 years mandatory warranty, and most if
| not all of the price difference can be explained by the
| displayed prices including VAT and dollar -> euro
| conversion.
|
| Now, it only covers defects, but that's what most
| warranties do.
| ksec wrote:
| Apple are already making higher margin on M1 Mac than on
| Intel Mac. Did you notice the higher discount rate running
| on all M1 product compared to old Intel Mac?
|
| Those extra margin could have been repurposed to Service
| Revenue, getting Apple Care+ by default. ( May be having
| one accidental damage instead of two ). Just like how the
| Mac is putting money into services revenue for MacOS,
| iCloud, Map and Siris.
|
| The consequence of that is instead of a possible lower cost
| Mac lineup with M1, you now have the same cost but longer
| warranty. Apple now also has an incentive to make the Mac
| last longer to minimise any AppleCare cost they get within
| three years.
| [deleted]
| savant_penguin wrote:
| Is it really? People still buy them in droves. As much as I
| hate devices I can't fix (and this makes the short warranty
| times problem even worse), many people don't seem to care.
| chadcmulligan wrote:
| > a 3 year warranty by default
|
| come to australia, consumer guarantees give you a 3 year
| warranty. In fact my MacBook Pro gave up the ghost a few weeks
| after the 3 years had expired, Apple replaced the bits under
| warranty.
| Macha wrote:
| In the EU, there's a _seller_ obligation for 2 years for items
| in the same class as laptop to ensure they are free from
| defects and fit for purpose. It won't help you if _you_ break
| your laptop, and after 6 months the burden of proof in the
| event of a dispute switches from the seller to the buyer, but I
| feel like pretty much all the issues the OP encountered would
| be covered under this.
|
| A lot of add on warranties don't cover much more than this
| anyway, which makes them much harder to justify here.
| asdff wrote:
| My macbook air died one month out of the yearlong warranty. In
| their troubleshooting at the apple store they managed to wipe
| the device and still couldn't breath life into it or figure out
| what happened. >$400 flat rate repair and they didn't even
| offer me a loaner in the mean time while the computer was
| mailed off. I would think apple could compete on customer
| service with the shade tree mechanic and their loaner car but I
| guess not.
| zzt123 wrote:
| This is why I either buy Applecare or equivalent (depending
| on product) if it's mission critical, or buy using a card
| that extends the warranty by at least one year, such as the
| Chase Sapphire cards.
| brianwawok wrote:
| They have a 14 day return on all laptops, you can pick your
| own loaner off the shelf.
| asdff wrote:
| I'll have to keep in mind the $1200 deposit for loaner
| computers next time I am in need of a critical repair
| ericmay wrote:
| Charge it to a credit card and then the charge will get
| reversed when you return the item, and you won't have to
| worry about it. Just providing a solution here that works
| easily (not that the problem and solution need to exist).
| t0mas88 wrote:
| And if 14 days isn't enough, it's 30 days when ordered
| online depending on the country.
| morcheeba wrote:
| I had the opposite experience. My macbook air battery was
| dying, so I paid the $129 to replace it. When I got the
| computer back, it wouldn't charge. So, they replaced the
| motherboard. I got it back and it still wouldn't charge - so
| they handed me a brand-new next-gen macbook air.
| Inconvenient, sure, but exceeded my expectations. I've found
| they've been generous with battery replacements.
| asdff wrote:
| I've found the opposite. Before that computer bricked
| itself I noticed capacity was fading fast. Apparently
| apples threshold was if you are under 85% within a year of
| ownership you have a defective battery, according to the
| customer service agent I was chatting with. So they had me
| open up system profiler and we confirmed my battery was
| well within threshold for replacement, and they set me up
| with an appointment. I took it to the apple store and told
| them what the Apple customer service representative told me
| about the battery being defective. They ended up running a
| battery test using their internal tooling and surprise
| surprise, it turned out a different capacity number than
| system profiler said I had, and it happened to be just
| above the threshold for replacement. 1 year of use for full
| time work should not mean losing 15% of your battery
| capacity, but evidently according to apple this was in
| spec.
| emeraldd wrote:
| My experience with Dell laptops seems to match up with your
| experience on the MBP. If something is going to fail, it will
| usually fail immediately or last the "lifetime" of the device.
| Batteries being the main exception as those age out fast ..
| ethbr0 wrote:
| I'm actually becoming a fan of factory refurbished for these
| same reasons. I'd rather have something that's been shaken
| down, repaired for the problems that appeared, recertified,
| and shipped back out.
| jasonwatkinspdx wrote:
| Depends on the manufacturer. I've had good luck with Dell's
| refurbs and outlet store over the years.
|
| On the other hand I bought a refurb projector from BenQ and
| it was straight up junk. The focusing mechanism breaks
| easily. It's quite clear this is a design flaw, I assume a
| gear that's weak plastic that should be something more
| durable instead. I've sent it back twice now to have it
| fixed, paying shipping each time under their terms. The
| last time I got it back it died with just 15 hours of use.
| It's clear they knew this thing was a straight up lemon and
| just used their refurb program to dump the product. It
| certainly means I'll never touch another BenQ product so
| long as I live.
| CTOSian wrote:
| +1 from me for Dell's refurbs (from their outlet).
| DLay wrote:
| The one thing I really miss about my Dell laptop is being
| able to call support and having them overnight ship
| replacement parts so the tech can come over to my place the
| next afternoon and fix it. The next available service
| appointment for someone at the Apple Store to take a look at
| my MacBook Pro's malfunctioning keyboard won't be until
| 4:20PM next week.
| mola wrote:
| Why did you keep buying macs then?
| pier25 wrote:
| It took a long time for me to understand all this. I bought
| my last Mac 3 years ago. I'm still using an iMac which I'm
| really happy with, but I will most likely not buy another Mac
| again.
|
| My machine for gaming and other hobbies is an AMD with
| Windows, and once this iMac dies I will probably switch to
| Linux for my work machine.
| nicce wrote:
| The most relesellers in my country give 3-5 years of warranty
| for MacBooks. I guess things are good here.
| sombremesa wrote:
| > Because the initial investment is so high you're practically
| forced to add extra Apple Care to protect it because there's a
| 20-30% chance you will have problems during those first years.
|
| Here's the inverse argument: it's absolutely ridiculous I have
| to pay 20-30% extra for my Macbook even though I don't care
| about the mandatory 3-year warranty. They should let me opt out
| for a discount!
|
| Well, they do.
|
| > you're practically forced to add extra Apple Care
|
| Are you really pro-freedom (see argument above), or just anti-
| Apple?
| 0x0 wrote:
| Or, you know, it's absolutely ridiculous that they sell
| broken stuff and then want to charge you more for you to
| receive a working product that you paid for in the first
| place. Maybe they should try to engineer things so that they
| don't break within a reasonable time frame under normal
| wear&tear. Would save money for both themselves and the
| customer in the end.
| sombremesa wrote:
| > Maybe they should try to engineer things so that they
| don't break within a reasonable time frame under normal
| wear&tear. Would save money for both themselves and the
| customer in the end.
|
| You sound pretty confident, but just think about this: do
| you really know more about how Apple should be run than all
| of their executives combined, or is there a false
| assumption here?
| pier25 wrote:
| I'm not anti Apple at all. I'm using an iMac right now and I
| also use an iPad Pro daily.
|
| What I'm saying is, Macs should include 3 years of warranty
| at current prices. If Macs had the reliability of iPads and
| iPhones it would make more sense to not get the extended
| warranty.
| acdha wrote:
| > If Macs had the reliability of iPads and iPhones it would
| make more sense to not get the extended warranty.
|
| They do. People who don't have problems don't complain so
| you have to be careful basing your impression on what
| people feel motivated to mention.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I'd much rather save $$$ than to pay everyone else's repair
| bills.
|
| That said - its just ridiculous how much Apple charges for
| individual a-la-carte repairs. Or rather lack thereof -
| they'd just say replace the entire motherboard or display.
| gmac wrote:
| If you make them guarantee it for three years (or perhaps
| five) you give them a stronger incentive to build it to last,
| and you can be sure it's going to last that long. There's a
| strong environmental (public good) aspect to this, so no, you
| should not be able to opt out.
|
| I find it even more ridiculous that big items like fridges,
| ovens, and washing machines are also often only guaranteed
| one year. I think a ten year minimum would be reasonable for
| white goods.
| bigbob2 wrote:
| My significant other owned a 2011 MBP and experienced the same
| thing... She didn't know about the recall and I didn't get a
| chance to investigate and find out until after the recall
| window was closed. I can't really avoid using a Mac for work,
| but for personal use it has definitely trained me to avoid
| Apple products when at all possible. She would concur with you
| that her 2011 MBP was a terrible investment.
| snow_mac wrote:
| I started on Mac in 2007, in 3 years I had 4 logic boards and
| hard drive failures. It was a White Macbook plastic edition. I
| was so impressed with the warranty in spite of the crappy heating
| issues, I later bought a Macbook Pro all metal edition. I got the
| 3 year warranty then and used it once when my logic board
| overheated. After that I held it for nearly 10 years until I
| replaced it last year.
| tekkk wrote:
| Jesus, that sounds terrible! I feel lucky my own MBP 2015 has
| fared without much problems although I did drop it once it which
| caused the bottom cover's screws pop out one by one in half a
| year. Bottom cover replacement + replacing a swollen battery
| (which naturally requires replacing the keyboard) have been the
| only repairs I've had to do. And charger. I feel the charger
| wires could be a lot sturdier.
|
| But I hope I'll get at least 5 years more out of it. Although
| buying a new cool M2 MBP sounds tempting I feel for me there is
| no particular reason to do so. If I can run an editor, Chrome,
| some Docker containers and the laptop works well, I feel work-
| wise I'm pretty much set.
|
| Certainly the OS updates will stop at some point which
| conveniently will then phase out my MBP. Oh well.
| etempleton wrote:
| The 2015 MacBook Pro was an absolute tank for me. I recently
| replaced it with an M1 Air, which so far has been incredible.
| Dare I say the best laptop I have ever used. The keyboard is
| great, even better than the 2015 pro and Touch ID is great to
| have as well.
|
| I think Apple has learned some lessons, they fixed the
| keyboards, they added a physical Touch ID button, and it seems
| like the divisive Touch Bar is probably going to fade away, or
| at least be optional.
|
| I think OSX could use an update that focuses on power users and
| the finder, but other than that I am pretty happy with the
| current state of the Mac.
| zucked wrote:
| Agreed - I've used virtually all the variants starting back
| with Powerbooks. I think the 2015 MBP Retina was the most
| durable, reliable machine I've personally used.
|
| My only complaint is non-upgradable RAM - if it had
| upgradable RAM, I'd keep using mine _well_ into the future.
| dingosity wrote:
| Your MBP had 10K USD in repairs. Your point?
| riffic wrote:
| Apple is basically the BMW of computers at this point.
|
| it's a shame, it would be nice to go back to a point where there
| was more quality/durability inherent in the product.
| masklinn wrote:
| > Apple is basically the BMW of computers at this point.
|
| > it's a shame, it would be nice to go back to a point where
| there was more quality/durability inherent in the product.
| reply
|
| Apple has _always_ had hardware reliability issues.
|
| The unibodies had suicidal GPUs (pretty much every dGPU model
| between the 2007 and 2013 had a service program at one point or
| another) as well as battery issues, the retinas had
| delaminating antiglare coating, the polycarbonate unibody
| macbooks had cracking issues through the entire case, ...
|
| It's possible that the pre-Intel models had less issues (that's
| when I switched) but I doubt it, I was always told to avoid
| first gens of new design like the plague (not that taking later
| revisions was a sure bet, but the first gens have always been
| full of flaws).
| zsmi wrote:
| I don't know about always. Apple has been around a long time
| and apparently the MacBook Pro 15" Unibody Mid 2012 was a
| decent machine for repairability, according to asdff and
| ifixit anyway.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28305508
| masklinn wrote:
| The older macbooks were definitely pretty good at
| repairability (though iirc you had to take the G4s apart
| completely to access anything, but the unibodies had easy
| access to most things, on the whitebooks I think the
| battery was even removable and that gave you access to the
| ram and hdd slots), but I was talking about the reliability
| (durability) not the repairability.
| npongratz wrote:
| > ... though iirc you had to take the G4s apart
| completely to access anything ...
|
| Powerbook G4s (at least, the titanium one I used for
| about 10 years) had a keyboard you could lift off to
| access some of the guts. I found it quite nice.
| zsmi wrote:
| Yes, I missed the distinction. On the other hand, we're
| talking about repairing a laptop which is nearly 10 years
| old and still having it be useful, so there must be some
| durability there.
| riffic wrote:
| 68k macs were pretty solid though.
| jandrese wrote:
| My parents still have the Mac LC that boots fine although I
| think the 40MB HDD is starting to have issues.
|
| The hardest part is getting data off of the machine since
| all of the I/O options are obsolete. I had to use floppy
| disks last time.
| asdff wrote:
| 2012 macbook pro is basically like an e30 series bmw.
| Completely workable with common tools. I've gone into this
| computer for repairs or hardware upgrades over the years a
| dozen times by now and thanks to its repairability and
| performance with updated components I am still using it today.
| zsmi wrote:
| Interesting.
|
| https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Retina+D.
| ..
|
| "MacBook Pro with Retina Display 15" Mid 2012 Repairability
| Score: 1 out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair)"
| asdff wrote:
| Mine is the 2012 model before the retina display. Phillips
| head screws everywhere instead of the pentalobe. Open the
| case and you have access to everything. Battery can be
| replaced in 2 minutes. Hard drive in 1 minute. RAM in 30
| seconds. Trackpad another 2 minutes after pulling battery.
| I even took out my optical drive and installed another hard
| drive in the bay since its SATAIII on that model. Then they
| came out with the retina mac and glued and soldered almost
| all of the above.
| zsmi wrote:
| Gotcha. That one did do significantly better.
|
| It's interesting to compare that machine to today's.
| 5.6lbs vs today's 16" at 4.3lbs. 2012 is 0.93" thick and
| today's is 0.64". I suppose, based on this datapoint, we
| can say there is something like a ~25% mechanical
| overhead for "repairability" then.
|
| "MacBook Pro 15" Unibody Mid 2012 Repairability Score: 7
| out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair)."
|
| https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Unibo
| dy+...
| asdff wrote:
| The old macbook airs of that era were still light and
| just as repairable too.
| zsmi wrote:
| On that ifixit disagrees. 4 is not a 1, but not a 7
| either.
|
| "MacBook Air 13" Mid 2012 Repairability Score: 4 out of
| 10 (10 is easiest to repair)."
|
| "All the components--including RAM and SSD--are
| proprietary." Although I suppose there are probably 3rd
| party options by now.
|
| https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Air+13-Inch+Mid+2
| 012...
| feifan wrote:
| Empirically, the 2016-2020 MacBook Pros seem to be relatively
| unreliable. My 2016 would frequently have wake-from-sleep
| problems, occasional kernel panics, and fried its logic board
| with a pop after about 3 years. My 2019 thermal-throttles every
| day, kernel panics a few times a month, and has a battery that
| just gives up under load.
|
| Meanwhile my 2019 Mac Pro (tower) is probably the most rock-solid
| reliable computer I've ever used. Months of uptime, never has
| sleep/wake problems, and only one kernel panic in the 1.5 years
| I've had it.
| ganoushoreilly wrote:
| I agree, though i've had some minor issues with big sur and
| third party (OWC) SSD PCIE devices on my mac pro. Once I
| removed the cards things were solid. Prior to big sur no issues
| were abound. Once I upgraded i found sleep didn't work
| appropriately and bootcamp was a non-starter as well.
| skunkworker wrote:
| I work on a 2019 16" MBP and have had no issues other than the
| space gray finish wearing off of the hand rest on the keyboard.
| The CPU definitely runs warmer than my 2015 MBP retina, though.
| I'm looking forward to a worth M1X/M2 16inch to run a lot
| cooler.
| okprod wrote:
| My MBP Retina 2013 has been going strong in various
| environments, not babied at all.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| Yea, my 2012 is going strong.
|
| I've been meaning to put a ssd in it, but procrastinating.
|
| Love the screws Apple.
| Isthatablackgsd wrote:
| I strongly recommend this if you can install it. I did it
| for my tech-illiterate partner for his 2014ish MBP,
| installed 1/2 TB SDD. It is snappy than before and the
| FaceTime finally works on his MBP. Before then, his MBP
| will not get the FT call notification until the last
| ringing and then it will send the notification but it is
| too late. I am not sure how spinning rust have a impact on
| FT from loading. He is not screen recording or anything, it
| just will struggle so hard to load FT and often failed on
| spinning rust. Now on SDD, it load normally without issue.
| Strange behavior. I tried to find info about this but I
| couldn't find any information about this. Looks like it is
| one-off deal thing.
| cronix wrote:
| Same here. It's what I'm typing this on. The only thing I've
| done is replace the battery about a year ago. 7 years was a
| good run. Works 100% as well as the day I bought it and the
| last Apple product I've purchased. Took 10 minutes from walk-
| in to walk-out at a non-Apple branded Mac repair store for
| 70% of the price using the identical official replacement
| battery. No appointment.
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah, I have a 2013 MBP as well, and it has been problem-
| free. The battery still lasts hours! I think it's because I
| almost always used it plugged-in, so the battery has a very
| very low cycle count. I am SUPER impressed with how well
| the machine has lasted, considering my heavy usage of it!
| bigbob2 wrote:
| Agreed... 2019 MBP here and the touchbar went toast in less
| than a year. At this point I'll never purchase an Apple product
| for personal use unless my hands are tied.
| pram wrote:
| Exactly the same. My Mac Pro literally hasn't crashed one time
| I think. I have it loaded up with the 2 HDD mount, 1 NVME SSD
| for scratch, a capture card, W5700X MPX, and a Wacom attached.
| No issues in Blender, Clip Studio, nothing. I thought I'd
| regret the purchase but it's probably my favorite computer ever
| (makes a good footrest too)
| [deleted]
| abledon wrote:
| I think the obession with 'thin' laptop that crept in towards
| 2015 onwards has something to do with it
| thearn4 wrote:
| My 2011 MBA needed a new battery a few years ago, but still
| works amazingly well as a daily-driver computer for my wife
| trollied wrote:
| Regarding the Mac Pro. I think the addon cards are a taste of
| things to come. They remind me of the old Acorn Archimedes
| slices on the RISC PC https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risc_PC -
| you could add CPUs (ARM - this is where ARM started!, x86 and
| DSPs).
|
| They definitely took inspiration from that, and I think they're
| going to reveal a game changer with the next Mac Pro. I suspect
| it'll be similar. Imagine being able to add loads of M-spec CPU
| daughterboards & a few AMD ryzen ones for your virtualisation
| antics?
| jasongill wrote:
| > After speaking to a friend, they told me I had probably
| received a "lemon" unit (i.e. faulty from the beginning). To be
| honest, I'm not quite sure where the term comes from.
|
| The term comes from the automobile industry, where a "lemon" is a
| new car that has some kind of issue so severe that it cannot be
| reasonably repaired under warranty and the buyer can try to seek
| a refund or replacement vehicle.
|
| Wikipedia says that the term originally comes from early 20th
| century slang: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_(automobile)
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| https://www.etymonline.com/word/lemon
|
| lemon (n.2)
|
| "worthless thing, disappointment, booby prize," 1909, American
| English slang; from lemon (n.1), perhaps via a criminal slang
| sense of "a person who is a loser, a simpleton," perhaps an
| image of someone a sharper can "suck the juice out of." A pool
| hall hustle was called a lemon game (1908); while to hand
| someone a lemon was British slang (1906) for "to pass off a
| sub-standard article as a good one." Or it simply may be a
| metaphor for something which leaves a bad taste in one's mouth.
| Specific sense of "second-hand car in poor condition" is by
| 1931.
|
| "You won't get a lemon... from Toyota of Orange." :-D
| dougifresh94 wrote:
| regarding "lemon" unit (i.e. faulty from the beginning). To be
| honest, I'm not quite sure where the term comes from. - It's
| origins are pretty interesting:
| https://blogs.cornell.edu/info2040/2016/12/02/origin-of-lemo...
| pqvst wrote:
| Hah, thanks!
| sangd wrote:
| I have a 2015 Macbook Pro 15. I had a swelling battery issue
| twice. My Macbook wasn't part of the battery recall but it had
| the exact same issue detailed in the recall. The first time I had
| to call the customer service and in the end they let me be part
| of the program and replaced it for the 1st time.
|
| The replacement also included a screen replacement that cost
| $400+. The total cost was ~$600.
|
| However, after exactly 12 months, the battery was swelling again
| and it wasn't covered any longer because it has passed a few days
| when I called in.
|
| Then I recently I have both of the Macbook speakers broke and
| made lots of static sound. It would cost ~$300 to replace them.
| I'm debating whether I should just buy a new M1 or wait for
| another M1X coming.
|
| Having & maintaining a Macbook is costly over years. It does
| break just as often or even more often than my Dell Latitude. And
| the cost to fix is often in the 5x-10x range.
| theonlybutlet wrote:
| Don't know what they're like these days but my 2011 Lenovo
| Thinkpad works great! Solid laptop, replaced the keyboard once
| aside from that still going strong.
| _Anima_ wrote:
| My company provides either MacBook or Lenovo (I have a t480s
| and just received a t14s). I have yet to hear someone having an
| issue with their Lenovo (most run Fedora). Not sure about
| MacBooks reliability. The weak point of Lenovo seem to be the
| thunderbolt docking stations. Mine worked perfectly on the
| t480s but is unreliable with the t14s and IT support told me
| they are overwhelmed with docking station issues.
| deltarholamda wrote:
| Maybe it has something to do with the year 2011. My 2011
| Macbook Pro 13" is still alive and kicking. With max 16GB RAM
| and replacing the spinning rust with an SSD, it's remarkably
| nimble as well. It's done a lot of travelling, and I've
| replaced the battery 3 times due to battery life going down too
| far.
|
| I finally upgraded to an M1 Macbook Air, which is also really
| nice, but the number of miles on that old axe was impressive. I
| still have it, and the kids use it for various school things.
| My only complaint is it is now at EOL for OS updates.
| theonlybutlet wrote:
| That's great, think my next move will be the M1 MacBook.
| Perhaps cliche but may be worth trying Linux on there now,
| elementary OS or something, everyone mostly just use the
| browser anyway.
| sylens wrote:
| This is why I've always been so reluctant to drop big money on a
| Macbook. I feel like I'm chained to that AppleCare, whereas on a
| PC I can probably try to service it myself
| ruleryak wrote:
| This reads like a cult member dismissing abuse while attempting
| to recruit to their cult.
| ardit33 wrote:
| The 2016 - 2020 Macbook Pros have been lemons, especially the
| 2016 - 2019 years
|
| My 2018 had:
|
| 1) Catastrophic hardrive failure, just one month after the 1 year
| warranty. I lost everything (I had some back ups somewhere). This
| was a common issue with their controller, that failed, yet I
| still had to pay for it (later it was recalled).
|
| 2. Keyboard starting failing, with one shift key coming out
| completely, and some keys with registering repetitive/duplicate
| keystrokes and key fading. I had to buy an external keyboard to
| use with it, and carry i with me.
|
| 3. The battery completely failed. To the point that can't hold on
| more than 1min without shutting down without power, turning
| basically into a desktop. I bought an external battery (Anker),
| which is the only way I can use it outside.
|
| I don't want to send my laptop to fix these issues, as they will
| take a week or two, and I need my computer for work.
|
| I am waiting for the new redesigned macbook pro coming out, and I
| will buy that, and send this for repairs. (the keyboard had a
| recall, and a free repair).
|
| I thinking with the m1 laptops Apple is turning the corner, but
| it is risking to become like Alfa Romeo, or Land Rover brand.
| Building beautiful machines, and with poor reliability and that
| break down randomly and expensive to maintain.
| js2 wrote:
| WTF. I've owned dozens of Apple computers over the years,
| starting with an Apple II and then a IIgs, on through many
| generations of Macs: LC, iMacs, powermacs, powerbook, Macbook
| Airs and Pros. I've recommended Mac laptops to at least a dozen
| family members. In all this time, I can think of three failures:
|
| - An iMac that had a bad GPU. Known issue.
|
| - Ditto with an MBP.
|
| - Recently, an MBA that had the system board go bad such that it
| would throttle the CPU to 100%.
|
| That's it. Apple took care of two of those via warranty. The
| third, the iMac was way out of warranty but my dad fixed it
| himself by reflowing the graphics board in an oven.
|
| I've also replaced a few batteries, but those are consumables and
| they didn't fail prematurely.
| sys_64738 wrote:
| Trigger's Broom?
| AzN1337c0d3r wrote:
| I had a 2016 that got the keyboard replaced 7 times before they
| upgraded me to a 2017 on which I replaced the keyboard 5 more
| times before I gave up and sold it.
|
| Each time they replaced the top-case which includes the entire
| battery assembly, touchbar, speakers. Valued at $800 just for the
| parts each time. That's $9600 for everyone keeping score.
|
| I called Apple's bluff on saying their keyboards are reliable.
| 0xFACEFEED wrote:
| I'm still holding on to my 15-inch 2014 MBP. I've been using it
| for work daily going on 7 years now. Never taken it into service.
| It just keeps going...
|
| Fingers crossed for the new MBPs this year. I'm planning on
| finally retiring this beautiful machine if the new MBP looks
| good.
| millzlane wrote:
| I would not buy a Macbook under no circumstance until apple
| changes the requirement of needing to connect it to their
| proprietary configuration system to verify the repair and parts
| have been setup in their internal service repair portal.
|
| Dell on the other hand can be fixed, all on your own, with no
| support from dell. Other then the disassembly instructions that
| they will gladly give you in the owners manual. Try to get
| disassembly instructions from apple as a consumer. Go ahead, I'll
| wait.
| sam0x17 wrote:
| > There are some other interesting options out there, like the
| Framework Laptop or System76. I do also like the look of a Dell
| XPS or Thinkpad, but I don't trust those companies to provide
| global support.
|
| I will say, Lenovo for one is really good at global support if
| you get their better plans. That said of those choices I'd
| definitely lean towards the System76. They are solid as hell.
| Been using mine for the last year.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| VERY misleading headline. The article makes clear all the costs
| were covered by AppleCare, so the story here is (a) he got a
| lemon, which happens in literally every product category and (b)
| the vendor stood behind the product and took care of him.
|
| So I'm honestly not sure what the point of this post is. The only
| laptops I've had that have handled the high-travel workload I
| traditionally subjected mine to remotely as well as Apple were
| pre-Lenovo ThinkPads. The keyboard thing was distressing, but it
| happened entirely between purchases for me so I didn't directly
| experience it; however, a good chunk of the outrage over it was
| precisely _because_ of how rock-solid the products had
| traditionally been.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| I wasn't mislead, his story is pretty much what I thought it
| would be -- I didn't think that someone would pay out of his
| own pocket repair costs that are 3X what the laptop cost to buy
| new.
|
| I'm kind of surprised at the number of problems he's had, my
| 2018 MPB has has zero issues, despite a lot of travel in
| addition to bouncing around my bike's pannier on the way to
| work. The battery life is getting pretty short, but since I've
| been WFH for the past 18 months, staying close to a charger
| isn't an issue, no need to go to crowded meeting rooms where I
| can't plug in.
| JoBrad wrote:
| My take is that the article is about this person's reliability
| issues with their MBP. Regardless of which party actually paid
| for the repairs, the fact that so many repairs/replacements
| were required doesn't speak well for Apple.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| Well, maybe it does and maybe it doesn't. Literally every
| manufacturer of anything complex is going to have customers
| whose whole experience goes sideways for whatever reason. You
| can't take away from this story that "gee, Apple has a
| quality problem" if the broad market doesn't experience the
| same kinds of failures. Honestly, with this sequence of
| events one wonders if there's just something about this GUY.
|
| My experience is that Apple makes the best laptops I've ever
| used short of glory-days-of-IBM Thinkpads. Observed
| reliability in our org is that they perform DRASTICALLY
| better than equivalently high-end Dells or whatever.
| slantyyz wrote:
| Well, at least Apple took care of that person.
|
| That is a way better experience than many of us who had the
| infamous early-2011 15" MBP with overheating issues had.
| driverdan wrote:
| I downvoted you because it was clearly not a single lemon.
| There were two entire computer replacements, both of which also
| had issues.
| slantyyz wrote:
| > so the story here is (a) he got a lemon
|
| Well isn't that misleading too?
|
| The OP's experience includes two _replacement_ computers, and
| the original "lemon" was replaced a little after two months
| after purchase.
|
| Depending on how you want to look at the replacements, OP got a
| total of two, or maybe even three lemons, since the second
| replacement computer appears to have had its share of issues
| too.
|
| Looking at the OP's issue history in the post, that seems to be
| a LOT of issues to have in that time span, no matter how good
| the AppleCare service is.
| jandrese wrote:
| Several of the issues were with the keyboard, which on this
| model was the infamous butterfly model that has well
| documented reliability issues.
|
| Apple sacrificed durability for thinness and it came back to
| bite them in the ass with many many AppleCare claims. On the
| plus side it probably didn't cost Apple a full $400 each time
| they had to replace a keyboard.
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