5 ms·

My pattern is that I buy a MacBook, use it for a few years, resell it and get a new one. I'm at my 5th or 6th MacBook in over 10 years, and I've always sold th

by GuiA 10y ago

My pattern is that I buy a MacBook, use it for a few years, resell it and get a new one. I'm at my 5th or 6th MacBook in over 10 years, and I've always sold the laptops back with their original charger. I have a 2011 MacBook Air that I take everywhere with me - the battery is at over a few thousand cycles (and lasts about 40 minutes) last time I checked. The charger for this one is dirty and chipped, but not frayed. I've seen frayed cables, so I know it's a real problem, but given my experience I can't help but wonder... what are people doing with their chargers?

josefdlange 10y ago
This! This! I used to lose chargers frequently, when I was in college, but I didn't take good care of them. Knowing how I treated them then (Stuff in bag, and even if I wound it, it was without the slack you're supposed to give the cord coming off the brick) it doesn't surprise me that I destroyed so many. Now, I've had the same charger for three years without issue. I suppose part of that lifespan improvements is I really have two of them -- one for my desk that never moves, and one that's always secured in my bag and well-wound. I wonder if I had just one and moved around with it all the time if things would be different.
ssharp 10y ago
It could be good fortune but I've been on Macbooks since around 2003 and have had substantially better luck with power adapters since MagSafe came out. I had a few pre-MagSafe adapters fail but the only post-MagSafe adapter I've had break was a knockoff.
- bigiain 10y ago
  I recently (early this year?) had to replace the cable on the charger from my 2006 MacBook Pro (one of the black ones). I've got other chargers from the 2009 MacBook Pro, the 2010 one, I had a 2013 one for almost two years, and I've got a 2015 MacBook Air - all of which have perfectly fine charging cables. I've never used the ears to wrap up the cable, I tend to just loop it up and stuff it in my bag if I'm taking the charger with me. I also have mostly had enough chargers around compatible with several in-use MacBooks that I'd leave a charger at work and another on the couch and another in the workshop, and rarely move the chargers around anyway. So I;m probably treating them as nicely as possible (purely by accident rather than from any desire to not damage them - I am, and Steve would have said "holding it right"...) I do realise there is a systemic problem though - once I'd fixed my old old one, a bunch of friends can out of the woodwork asking me to repair theirs as well.
ak217 10y ago
> given my experience I can't help but wonder... what are people doing with their chargers? Forcefully bending their cables when winding them around the charger, or tensioning the cable under the little plastic bracket. Also, there are actually several manufacturers of the various generations of Apple chargers, with subtle differences in the materials used.
- chiph 10y ago
  Don't use the little fold-out ears. The winding around them puts too much stress on the wire. Get a piece of self-adhering Velcro and use that to keep the wire together.
smnscu 10y ago
I'm not particularly careful with my devices yet I never had something break in the last decade - however, 2 out of about 6 Macbook power adapters have had their cable messed up and needed replacing, without any obvious reason. Ironically, the more abused power adapters (i.e. mostly taking to work everyday) fared better and are like new (except dirtier).
Spooky23 10y ago
They completely unwrap and re-wrap the cord. The design is defective, and cannot handle the typical stresses that it is subjected to.
- cookiecaper 10y ago
  Yes. "Blame the user" is not an acceptable approach to resolving a problem with even a slight incidence rate. "We don't see that behavior often enough to commit resources to addressing it" is valid, but "they're touching it wrong" isn't when you're making a mass-produced consumer-grade product, especially a product that's meant to be carried to and fro (Apple had to learn this with the iPhone 4 too). Some people may take pride in carrying their chargers around on special hand pillows to ensure that they are kept pristine over the years, but I personally want my products to work without demanding special accommodation for themselves. I went through 3 chargers in the 4 years I used a MacBook Pro. I didn't mistreat the stuff, I just didn't pamper it. The answer in this case is pretty obvious, though; Apple knows that an $85 power cable isn't going to cost them any meaningful quantity of customers, and actually the breakage tends to net them $85 extra per year, so they kind of like it. There is no incentive for them to un-plan the planned obsolescence of the charger.
  - Spooky23 10y ago
    The ridiculous thing about it is the power supply itself is almost an engineering feat unto itself. In my personal experience, I've owned hundreds or thousands of electrical devices, but to date I've only gotten an electrical shock from my old MacBook Pro's power brick, which was an amazing device in every other way. It speaks to the hubris of their design org.
btgeekboy 10y ago
I've never, in 10+ years of MacBooks, had to replace an adapter due to fraying. I suspect it's because I don't yank the cable out (instead grabbing the plug), but more importantly, because I don't use the cable wraps included. Just a quick over-under coil, tossed in the bag, and I'm good to go. I still use the adapter that came with my 2006 MacBook, having added one of the plug converters for the Retina laptops.
rectang 10y ago
> what are people doing with their chargers? In my case, the problem is that I use my laptop on my lap. Even if you're careful, there's no avoiding the occasional bend. The cable can't handle this over time and breaks next to the magsafe connector. I understand that Apple considers my use case outside of the tolerances they designed for. Nevertheless, other laptops I've used do not have such failure-prone cables.
- yodsanklai 10y ago
  My girlfriend showed me this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIo8xGTUX0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIo8xGTUX0 a little pen spring to reinforce the cable need the connecter. I do it too, not sure if it's useful though.
ksk 10y ago
Frayed cables are the result of normal use coupled with bad design. Other manufacturers have been making robust cables for decades. (e.g. http://imgur.com/a/kQt77 http://imgur.com/a/kQt77)
Larrikin 10y ago
You appear to be the exception. I've been through atleast 4 laptops, and 3 tablets. Owned various Mp3 players starting with one of the original Creative Nomads. At this point countless phones as well. When I was younger I'd travel with most of console video games and of course the actual handheld ones with their chargers. I've never had a single cord fray nor had the need to replace a charger that I didn't lose for any device except every single Apple device. With my MBPr I knew how awful the iPad and iPod cords were so I was careful to not wrap it too tight around the little feet. Both feet broke but still worked after a month. The cord still started fray on one end after about 3 months and one foot completely broke off. I still try to wrap it loosely but there doesn't seem to be much point as the amount of electrical tape I need keeps increasing on both ends whenever I replace it. I don't think they intentionally designed them poorly, but I do think they are refusing to fix a widely known problem to bilk user out of more cash yearly. I now only buy third party iOS device cords and I wish there was a viable third party alternative for my MBPr brick.
- developer2 10y ago
  The problem with Apple's cords is that the rubber insulation seems to be too long for the wire beneath. Both my iPhone 6 and MacBook Pro cords have their rubber peeling away from the wire. It's not fraying, it's peeling because the rubber is pushing itself away from the wire from too much tension. Luckily, at least with the newer cords, the wire is very sturdy. The coating seems to be more for cosmetics than insulation these days. The technology inside may be impressive, but the overall quality of the product still screams "made in China". The only real explanation after many years of the same shoddy cords is that it is intentional on Apple's part, to get people buying new cords at $100 a pop every couple of years.
givinguflac 10y ago
I agree. I have a spare charger from my wife's now unused 2006 MBP that still works and looks fine. Using it with a MagSafe 2 adapter. Ten years and no fraying, though it is dirty.
cocoflunchy 10y ago
The problem is Apple put 'wings' on their charger so people wrap the cable extra-tight around them like this http://imgur.com/a/VZHoD http://imgur.com/a/VZHoD when they should really be using the only safe method for rolling cables: Over/Under coiling (I just learned this name!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over/under_cable_coiling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over/under_cable_coiling

by GuiA 10y ago

josefdlange 10y ago

This! This! I used to lose chargers frequently, when I was in college, but I didn't take good care of them. Knowing how I treated them then (Stuff in bag, and even if I wound it, it was without the slack you're supposed to give the cord coming off the brick) it doesn't surprise me that I destroyed so many. Now, I've had the same charger for three years without issue. I suppose part of that lifespan improvements is I really have two of them -- one for my desk that never moves, and one that's always secured in my bag and well-wound. I wonder if I had just one and moved around with it all the time if things would be different.

ssharp 10y ago

It could be good fortune but I've been on Macbooks since around 2003 and have had substantially better luck with power adapters since MagSafe came out. I had a few pre-MagSafe adapters fail but the only post-MagSafe adapter I've had break was a knockoff.

bigiain 10y ago
I recently (early this year?) had to replace the cable on the charger from my 2006 MacBook Pro (one of the black ones). I've got other chargers from the 2009 MacBook Pro, the 2010 one, I had a 2013 one for almost two years, and I've got a 2015 MacBook Air - all of which have perfectly fine charging cables. I've never used the ears to wrap up the cable, I tend to just loop it up and stuff it in my bag if I'm taking the charger with me. I also have mostly had enough chargers around compatible with several in-use MacBooks that I'd leave a charger at work and another on the couch and another in the workshop, and rarely move the chargers around anyway. So I;m probably treating them as nicely as possible (purely by accident rather than from any desire to not damage them - I am, and Steve would have said "holding it right"...) I do realise there is a systemic problem though - once I'd fixed my old old one, a bunch of friends can out of the woodwork asking me to repair theirs as well.

ak217 10y ago

> given my experience I can't help but wonder... what are people doing with their chargers? Forcefully bending their cables when winding them around the charger, or tensioning the cable under the little plastic bracket. Also, there are actually several manufacturers of the various generations of Apple chargers, with subtle differences in the materials used.

chiph 10y ago
Don't use the little fold-out ears. The winding around them puts too much stress on the wire. Get a piece of self-adhering Velcro and use that to keep the wire together.

smnscu 10y ago

I'm not particularly careful with my devices yet I never had something break in the last decade - however, 2 out of about 6 Macbook power adapters have had their cable messed up and needed replacing, without any obvious reason. Ironically, the more abused power adapters (i.e. mostly taking to work everyday) fared better and are like new (except dirtier).

Spooky23 10y ago

They completely unwrap and re-wrap the cord. The design is defective, and cannot handle the typical stresses that it is subjected to.

cookiecaper 10y ago
Yes. "Blame the user" is not an acceptable approach to resolving a problem with even a slight incidence rate. "We don't see that behavior often enough to commit resources to addressing it" is valid, but "they're touching it wrong" isn't when you're making a mass-produced consumer-grade product, especially a product that's meant to be carried to and fro (Apple had to learn this with the iPhone 4 too). Some people may take pride in carrying their chargers around on special hand pillows to ensure that they are kept pristine over the years, but I personally want my products to work without demanding special accommodation for themselves. I went through 3 chargers in the 4 years I used a MacBook Pro. I didn't mistreat the stuff, I just didn't pamper it. The answer in this case is pretty obvious, though; Apple knows that an $85 power cable isn't going to cost them any meaningful quantity of customers, and actually the breakage tends to net them $85 extra per year, so they kind of like it. There is no incentive for them to un-plan the planned obsolescence of the charger.
- Spooky23 10y ago
  The ridiculous thing about it is the power supply itself is almost an engineering feat unto itself. In my personal experience, I've owned hundreds or thousands of electrical devices, but to date I've only gotten an electrical shock from my old MacBook Pro's power brick, which was an amazing device in every other way. It speaks to the hubris of their design org.

btgeekboy 10y ago

I've never, in 10+ years of MacBooks, had to replace an adapter due to fraying. I suspect it's because I don't yank the cable out (instead grabbing the plug), but more importantly, because I don't use the cable wraps included. Just a quick over-under coil, tossed in the bag, and I'm good to go. I still use the adapter that came with my 2006 MacBook, having added one of the plug converters for the Retina laptops.

rectang 10y ago

> what are people doing with their chargers? In my case, the problem is that I use my laptop on my lap. Even if you're careful, there's no avoiding the occasional bend. The cable can't handle this over time and breaks next to the magsafe connector. I understand that Apple considers my use case outside of the tolerances they designed for. Nevertheless, other laptops I've used do not have such failure-prone cables.

yodsanklai 10y ago
My girlfriend showed me this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIo8xGTUX0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIo8xGTUX0 a little pen spring to reinforce the cable need the connecter. I do it too, not sure if it's useful though.

ksk 10y ago

Frayed cables are the result of normal use coupled with bad design. Other manufacturers have been making robust cables for decades. (e.g. http://imgur.com/a/kQt77 http://imgur.com/a/kQt77)

Larrikin 10y ago

You appear to be the exception. I've been through atleast 4 laptops, and 3 tablets. Owned various Mp3 players starting with one of the original Creative Nomads. At this point countless phones as well. When I was younger I'd travel with most of console video games and of course the actual handheld ones with their chargers. I've never had a single cord fray nor had the need to replace a charger that I didn't lose for any device except every single Apple device. With my MBPr I knew how awful the iPad and iPod cords were so I was careful to not wrap it too tight around the little feet. Both feet broke but still worked after a month. The cord still started fray on one end after about 3 months and one foot completely broke off. I still try to wrap it loosely but there doesn't seem to be much point as the amount of electrical tape I need keeps increasing on both ends whenever I replace it. I don't think they intentionally designed them poorly, but I do think they are refusing to fix a widely known problem to bilk user out of more cash yearly. I now only buy third party iOS device cords and I wish there was a viable third party alternative for my MBPr brick.

developer2 10y ago
The problem with Apple's cords is that the rubber insulation seems to be too long for the wire beneath. Both my iPhone 6 and MacBook Pro cords have their rubber peeling away from the wire. It's not fraying, it's peeling because the rubber is pushing itself away from the wire from too much tension. Luckily, at least with the newer cords, the wire is very sturdy. The coating seems to be more for cosmetics than insulation these days. The technology inside may be impressive, but the overall quality of the product still screams "made in China". The only real explanation after many years of the same shoddy cords is that it is intentional on Apple's part, to get people buying new cords at $100 a pop every couple of years.

givinguflac 10y ago

I agree. I have a spare charger from my wife's now unused 2006 MBP that still works and looks fine. Using it with a MagSafe 2 adapter. Ten years and no fraying, though it is dirty.

cocoflunchy 10y ago

The problem is Apple put 'wings' on their charger so people wrap the cable extra-tight around them like this http://imgur.com/a/VZHoD http://imgur.com/a/VZHoD when they should really be using the only safe method for rolling cables: Over/Under coiling (I just learned this name!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over/under_cable_coiling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over/under_cable_coiling