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There's a trade off to having a laptop that seemingly defies the capabilities of the day - they have to glue parts and remove coverings. Apple has been sheddin

There's a trade off to having a laptop that seemingly defies the capabilities of the day - they have to glue parts and remove coverings. Apple has been shedding ports & user-serviceable parts in laptops for years to get them thinner and lighter. Almost every complaint in the article has a counterpoint. Bought AppleCare but didn't register it. Complains about the Genius Bar repair time - try finding somebody to even speak to you in person for free about your PC laptop.

vetinari 11y ago
Disclaimer: I currently own both Apple laptop (MBP13) and Lenovo laptop (T430s). When my previous Thinkpad T400 needed servicing - a line of bad pixels developed on the display - the display was replaced by the next business day, for free (under warranty). The kicker is, that I didn't buy the NBD service and I didn't need to prove anything about the date of purchase or something - I forgot to bring my proof of purchase and the service center looked up everything they needed in their system. I can't expect anything approaching level of service for the Apple laptop. In my country, we don't have Apple Store and Genius bar, and in the past it took the authorised repair center cca 3 weeks to do anything, including simple swapping faulty power supply. Not because they are lazy (they are great guys actually), but because they have to wait for spares.
- jakejake 11y ago
  Proximity to a particular repair shop is obviously a factor, that's fair. Where I'm at I can be at an Apple store talking to a tech within 30 minutes. For a major problem, I can be walking out of the store with a brand new laptop within an hour. Apple does all the same stuff with your registration, as long as you bother to register it, unlike the author. Getting a PC fixed, on the other hand, it's pretty much going to the retail store where you bought it (which has a tech team that's barely qualified to install anti-virus software) or calling up the company and finding some mom-n-pop repair shop that services their warranty repairs.
- dkonofalski 11y ago
  That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. The issue here was the he was outside the standard warranty but still within the extended warranty that he hadn't registered. There's no way for Apple (or any company) to know that you bought an extended warranty from a third-party unless you notify them/register it with them. That's the crux of the issue here. If you have an Apple warranty, you can even take it to a third-party authorized Apple center and they can fix it. Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine, if it works (which it would for a battery issue), in order to get something that takes longer to order.
  - vetinari 11y ago
    > That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. Yes, mine has been under warranty. It is important to note however, that this Thinkpad came with 3 years warranty as a standard. (Looks like they scaled that down to 2 years since then). > Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine, I assume this is US-specific thing. As I wrote, I was always waiting for weeks for the spares to arrive (once for HDD and twice for power supply). There is only third party service center - only 8 out of 28 EU countries have Apple Stores - and they are not allowed to stock spares. They also have to send the swapped parts back to mothership.
zipwitch 11y ago
I've never been able to understand the appeal of the ultra-light, ultra-thin laptops. That it comes at the cost of user-serviceability just makes it that much more incomprehensible.
scholia 11y ago
Depends if you are buying a business machine. If you buy, say, a Dell, you can buy three or four years of next-day on-site support for a relatively small charge. This isn't complicated -- it's a check-box item -- and it really works (in my UK-based experience). Incidentally, it turned out that on-site didn't mean a specific site. My son got on-site service both at home and at his student digs, 200 miles away. Dell also offers 24/7 phone support. Apart from that, there are independent third-party support services that will handle PC laptops, and most cities have both large and small shops that will repair PCs. Repairs are, of course, much less of a problem with desktop PCs, which sensible businesses use for ergonomic reasons (as well as for their superior price/performance and greater longevity).
- wlesieutre 11y ago
  My housemate in college had a Dell with business support. IIRC he used the on-site support once, and another time just had them send a new part to install himself. And it was cheaper than AppleCare.

vetinari 11y ago

Disclaimer: I currently own both Apple laptop (MBP13) and Lenovo laptop (T430s). When my previous Thinkpad T400 needed servicing - a line of bad pixels developed on the display - the display was replaced by the next business day, for free (under warranty). The kicker is, that I didn't buy the NBD service and I didn't need to prove anything about the date of purchase or something - I forgot to bring my proof of purchase and the service center looked up everything they needed in their system. I can't expect anything approaching level of service for the Apple laptop. In my country, we don't have Apple Store and Genius bar, and in the past it took the authorised repair center cca 3 weeks to do anything, including simple swapping faulty power supply. Not because they are lazy (they are great guys actually), but because they have to wait for spares.

jakejake 11y ago
Proximity to a particular repair shop is obviously a factor, that's fair. Where I'm at I can be at an Apple store talking to a tech within 30 minutes. For a major problem, I can be walking out of the store with a brand new laptop within an hour. Apple does all the same stuff with your registration, as long as you bother to register it, unlike the author. Getting a PC fixed, on the other hand, it's pretty much going to the retail store where you bought it (which has a tech team that's barely qualified to install anti-virus software) or calling up the company and finding some mom-n-pop repair shop that services their warranty repairs.
dkonofalski 11y ago
That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. The issue here was the he was outside the standard warranty but still within the extended warranty that he hadn't registered. There's no way for Apple (or any company) to know that you bought an extended warranty from a third-party unless you notify them/register it with them. That's the crux of the issue here. If you have an Apple warranty, you can even take it to a third-party authorized Apple center and they can fix it. Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine, if it works (which it would for a battery issue), in order to get something that takes longer to order.
- vetinari 11y ago
  > That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. Yes, mine has been under warranty. It is important to note however, that this Thinkpad came with 3 years warranty as a standard. (Looks like they scaled that down to 2 years since then). > Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine, I assume this is US-specific thing. As I wrote, I was always waiting for weeks for the spares to arrive (once for HDD and twice for power supply). There is only third party service center - only 8 out of 28 EU countries have Apple Stores - and they are not allowed to stock spares. They also have to send the swapped parts back to mothership.

zipwitch 11y ago

I've never been able to understand the appeal of the ultra-light, ultra-thin laptops. That it comes at the cost of user-serviceability just makes it that much more incomprehensible.

scholia 11y ago

Depends if you are buying a business machine. If you buy, say, a Dell, you can buy three or four years of next-day on-site support for a relatively small charge. This isn't complicated -- it's a check-box item -- and it really works (in my UK-based experience). Incidentally, it turned out that on-site didn't mean a specific site. My son got on-site service both at home and at his student digs, 200 miles away. Dell also offers 24/7 phone support. Apart from that, there are independent third-party support services that will handle PC laptops, and most cities have both large and small shops that will repair PCs. Repairs are, of course, much less of a problem with desktop PCs, which sensible businesses use for ergonomic reasons (as well as for their superior price/performance and greater longevity).

wlesieutre 11y ago
My housemate in college had a Dell with business support. IIRC he used the on-site support once, and another time just had them send a new part to install himself. And it was cheaper than AppleCare.