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AppleCare is honestly a great deal, especially for laptops. M1 Macbook Pros from 2020 are humming along just fine for regular people who see no reason to upgrad

AppleCare is honestly a great deal, especially for laptops. M1 Macbook Pros from 2020 are humming along just fine for regular people who see no reason to upgrade. The future is now, old man.

tim-tday 6mo ago
Bought AppleCare for my AirPods. Never again.
- bombcar 6mo ago
  AppleCare is only worth it for expensive things with big repair costs; the "repair fee" for AirPods is such a high percentage of the replacement price that it just is not worth it.
- phil21 6mo ago
  AppleCare is leaps and bounds better than any other insurance you can buy for mobile or laptops. For accessories I don’t see the point, those are effectively disposable wear items. Ironically a large part of deciding to migrate to an iPhone from android was final frustrations with even Google purchased devices under warranty coupled with hardware quality requiring repairs. My wife’s experience with AppleCare won me over. If nothing else it’s first party insurance. I will never purchase device insurance offered via a third party ever again. Either its first party so I’m dealing with the place I bought it or nothing at all.
  - echoangle 6mo ago
    > AppleCare is leaps and bounds better than any other insurance you can buy for mobile or laptops. Which doesn’t tell you a lot because they are pretty bad, too. Being better doesn’t mean it’s a good offer.
  - Gigachad 6mo ago
    Insurance for things you can afford to replace never makes sense anyway. The expected cost of insurance will always exceed the expected cost of replacement in the long run. Unless for some reason you know you will be breaking your device much more than the average person. Insurance is for things that are unlikely to ever happen but would financially ruin you if they did.
    - klausa 6mo ago
      >Insurance for things you can afford to replace never makes sense anyway. The expected cost of insurance will always exceed the expected cost of replacement in the long run. "Peace of mind" is not free. Paying ~ten bucks a month to insure my phone and not have to worry about it getting damaged is worth it to me, even if I could afford to replace it if I broke it; because now I just _don't worry about it_.
      - dbdr 6mo ago
        Why would you worry about it if you can afford to replace it? If you say you worry about the cost, shouldn't you worry even more about the higher cost of the insurance? Sure, for one item the variance is higher if you are uninsured, but if you have several such items, variance goes down, and you are saving all the more money.
        klausa 6mo ago
        Because even though I can afford to buy/repair a new phone if I break mine; it still _feels_ terrible to have to spend 500+ bucks because I was a dumbass. I literally toss my phone to my couch or my bed from across the room dozens of times a week without worrying about misjudging the throw (which happens more than I’d like to admit), toss is on the ground at the gym, have no problems taking long baths with it, washing it under the sink if it gets dirty, and do dozens of things I would not do if I had to pay a full price if I ended up actually breaking it. Having AC+, lets me treat the device with the level of carelessness that is worth the price to me. Math-wise with how durable recent flagship devices are, you are probably correct that I’d be better off financially to just accept that I will break a phone every couple of years and just eat the cost. But psychologically, I’m happier paying ~120bucks a year, than $500 in repair fees once in a while.
        dbdr 6mo ago
        Yes, the argument is that the entity providing the insurance is surely earning more income that they are paying out since in addition to payouts, they also have overhead costs and must be profitable. Said another way, their customers are paying more than they receive, on average. That's a mathematical and economical certainty. You are right that it might still feel better to you to pay regularly instead. That's subjective. Knowing that you will likely end up paying less in the long term if you don't pay the insurance might help getting over that feeling, but that's a personal choice in the end.
radley 6mo ago
I've never worried about AppleCare for my Apple products, until this year when I signed up for AppleCare One. I bought a few new devices, including the Studio Monitor XDR. For the XDR alone it's worth it, since replacing the screen is a multi-$1k repair.
AussieWog93 6mo ago
I just looked up Apple Care. Costs $449 AUD (~$300 USD) for 3 years of coverage on a MacBook Pro. A quick search shows that it's ~$500-$600 to fix the screen if it does break; I didn't bother looking up the keyboard but I'd assume it's much, much less. So basically, on the off chance that your MacBook does shit the bed in the most expensive way, you save ~$150 or so? But in the almost-certain case that your Macbook is fine, you're down $450? That is not a great deal at all, haha!
- klausa 6mo ago
  >A quick search shows that it's ~$500-$600 to fix the screen if it does break; I didn't bother looking up the keyboard but I'd assume it's much, much less. _The_ point of that the article you're commenting on, is that a keyboard replacement on a MacBook is very expensive. Why would you make that assumption? The "most expensive way" to shit the bed is also not the peripherals of the computer dying, it's the logic board giving up the ghost.
  - AussieWog93 6mo ago
    I'm a repair tech - hence made some assumptions that the author did not make. Have done riveted keyboards on non-Mac machines before and would be surprised if an independent shop charged more than about $150 USD for it. It's not that hard to do. You're right about the logic board being an extremely expensive fix, but it's also significantly less common than something like a keyboard, USB port, speaker or screen. This is also something extremely Australian-specific, but consumer guarantees would probably cover any logic board damage within the first 1-3 years anyway, regardless of AppleCare warranty.
- knivets 6mo ago
  What if your screen breaks or logic board? Top of the line MacBooks cost ~4-5k. I recently had to service a battery and they replaced a top case and a keyboard free of charge. I will continue paying for AppleCare as long as they will allow me
- subpixel 6mo ago
  You’re underestimating the probability of multiple things needing attention over 5-7 years. That is baked into the price of AppleCare just like any insurance premium. I definitely think coverage should be free for 2 years though.
akvadrako 6mo ago
I had AppleCare when my keyboard failed. They blamed it on me because of an dent about 1mm wide I never noticed on the back corner. So you just get screwed twice.

AppleCare is honestly a great deal, especially for laptops. M1 Macbook Pros from 2020 are humming along just fine for regular people who see no reason to upgrade. The future is now, old man.

tim-tday 6mo ago

Bought AppleCare for my AirPods. Never again.

bombcar 6mo ago
AppleCare is only worth it for expensive things with big repair costs; the "repair fee" for AirPods is such a high percentage of the replacement price that it just is not worth it.
phil21 6mo ago
AppleCare is leaps and bounds better than any other insurance you can buy for mobile or laptops. For accessories I don’t see the point, those are effectively disposable wear items. Ironically a large part of deciding to migrate to an iPhone from android was final frustrations with even Google purchased devices under warranty coupled with hardware quality requiring repairs. My wife’s experience with AppleCare won me over. If nothing else it’s first party insurance. I will never purchase device insurance offered via a third party ever again. Either its first party so I’m dealing with the place I bought it or nothing at all.
- echoangle 6mo ago
  > AppleCare is leaps and bounds better than any other insurance you can buy for mobile or laptops. Which doesn’t tell you a lot because they are pretty bad, too. Being better doesn’t mean it’s a good offer.
- Gigachad 6mo ago
  Insurance for things you can afford to replace never makes sense anyway. The expected cost of insurance will always exceed the expected cost of replacement in the long run. Unless for some reason you know you will be breaking your device much more than the average person. Insurance is for things that are unlikely to ever happen but would financially ruin you if they did.
  - klausa 6mo ago
    >Insurance for things you can afford to replace never makes sense anyway. The expected cost of insurance will always exceed the expected cost of replacement in the long run. "Peace of mind" is not free. Paying ~ten bucks a month to insure my phone and not have to worry about it getting damaged is worth it to me, even if I could afford to replace it if I broke it; because now I just _don't worry about it_.
    - dbdr 6mo ago
      Why would you worry about it if you can afford to replace it? If you say you worry about the cost, shouldn't you worry even more about the higher cost of the insurance? Sure, for one item the variance is higher if you are uninsured, but if you have several such items, variance goes down, and you are saving all the more money.
      - klausa 6mo ago
        Because even though I can afford to buy/repair a new phone if I break mine; it still _feels_ terrible to have to spend 500+ bucks because I was a dumbass. I literally toss my phone to my couch or my bed from across the room dozens of times a week without worrying about misjudging the throw (which happens more than I’d like to admit), toss is on the ground at the gym, have no problems taking long baths with it, washing it under the sink if it gets dirty, and do dozens of things I would not do if I had to pay a full price if I ended up actually breaking it. Having AC+, lets me treat the device with the level of carelessness that is worth the price to me. Math-wise with how durable recent flagship devices are, you are probably correct that I’d be better off financially to just accept that I will break a phone every couple of years and just eat the cost. But psychologically, I’m happier paying ~120bucks a year, than $500 in repair fees once in a while.
        dbdr 6mo ago
        Yes, the argument is that the entity providing the insurance is surely earning more income that they are paying out since in addition to payouts, they also have overhead costs and must be profitable. Said another way, their customers are paying more than they receive, on average. That's a mathematical and economical certainty. You are right that it might still feel better to you to pay regularly instead. That's subjective. Knowing that you will likely end up paying less in the long term if you don't pay the insurance might help getting over that feeling, but that's a personal choice in the end.

radley 6mo ago

I've never worried about AppleCare for my Apple products, until this year when I signed up for AppleCare One. I bought a few new devices, including the Studio Monitor XDR. For the XDR alone it's worth it, since replacing the screen is a multi-$1k repair.

AussieWog93 6mo ago

I just looked up Apple Care. Costs $449 AUD (~$300 USD) for 3 years of coverage on a MacBook Pro. A quick search shows that it's ~$500-$600 to fix the screen if it does break; I didn't bother looking up the keyboard but I'd assume it's much, much less. So basically, on the off chance that your MacBook does shit the bed in the most expensive way, you save ~$150 or so? But in the almost-certain case that your Macbook is fine, you're down $450? That is not a great deal at all, haha!

klausa 6mo ago
>A quick search shows that it's ~$500-$600 to fix the screen if it does break; I didn't bother looking up the keyboard but I'd assume it's much, much less. _The_ point of that the article you're commenting on, is that a keyboard replacement on a MacBook is very expensive. Why would you make that assumption? The "most expensive way" to shit the bed is also not the peripherals of the computer dying, it's the logic board giving up the ghost.
- AussieWog93 6mo ago
  I'm a repair tech - hence made some assumptions that the author did not make. Have done riveted keyboards on non-Mac machines before and would be surprised if an independent shop charged more than about $150 USD for it. It's not that hard to do. You're right about the logic board being an extremely expensive fix, but it's also significantly less common than something like a keyboard, USB port, speaker or screen. This is also something extremely Australian-specific, but consumer guarantees would probably cover any logic board damage within the first 1-3 years anyway, regardless of AppleCare warranty.
knivets 6mo ago
What if your screen breaks or logic board? Top of the line MacBooks cost ~4-5k. I recently had to service a battery and they replaced a top case and a keyboard free of charge. I will continue paying for AppleCare as long as they will allow me
subpixel 6mo ago
You’re underestimating the probability of multiple things needing attention over 5-7 years. That is baked into the price of AppleCare just like any insurance premium. I definitely think coverage should be free for 2 years though.

akvadrako 6mo ago

I had AppleCare when my keyboard failed. They blamed it on me because of an dent about 1mm wide I never noticed on the back corner. So you just get screwed twice.