I’m guessing if it was their fault and they damaged the machine to an extent it wasn’t useable they’d go out and buy a replacement on the spot, spare computers take up space and money, especially if they are sat in a box for just in case which may never come vs walking in to a store and walking out with one there and then.

It’s common to get given temporary mobile phones if in for manufacturers warranty repair so why not offer it for laptops?

@coldtea’s advise is still sound.

If you pour cold tea on your only laptop at 7pm just before a gig, buying and setting up a new laptop could prove difficult.

> If you pour cold tea on your only laptop at 7pm just before a gig, buying and setting up a new laptop could prove difficult.

Your hypothetical is not consistent with the redditor's complaint. The redditor implies that he can survive without the laptop for a day or two--but things become problematic around five days, so I think @tiew9Vii's point-of-view is reasonable.

It's also consistent with my situation. I make my living off of my laptop. I don't have a spare, which I think would be a financial waste. If my laptop suffers a catastrophe, I will rent/purchase a stop-gap device. I can take a productivity hit for the 24-48 hours it takes me to get back up to speed.

You have your data backed up, yes? Just curious.

If something is that important then you really should have a backup, even if it's something like a VM that can be spun up quickly in the cloud, or an older machine that's still better than nothing. It makes sense not to rely entirely on the manufacturer's ability to investigate, draw a conclusion, and issue a replacement in a time frame that's guaranteed to be reasonable for you.

Many people cannot imagine live without phones. Computers at home on the other hand are not perceived as a necessity. And at work typically there is a spare PC or some other way to survive while the computer is under repair.

But the Reddit poster uses the Mac for his job in the music industry. So I'd say it is a necessity.

> But the Reddit poster uses the Mac for his job in the music industry. So I'd say it is a necessity.

The general idea is that when it comes to business, contingency planning and backups (data and hardware) are considered to be requirements.

>Then you wouldn't have any laptop, but also no justification to demand an immediate replacement or deem not receiving one "unacceptable"

My computer failed to start one morning, it was my work only computer that I use for my job(work remote from a village) so I went in the city with the PC, I found a shop, the person there tested my RAM,CPU and other parts, the motherboard was broken, I baught a new motherboard , paid the poerson to replace it, I also asked for a GPU upgrade and a cleaning.

In a few hours I was back working. If this was a MacBook there is no store in the small city I live near, I would probably had to find someone that could "illegaly" test the laptop and that would use his connections to find me some "illegal" parts and wait for those parts to arrive.

I am also using my PCs after the warranty expires and fix them if a component breaks(like memory). My old AMD Phenom 2 is still running (my son uses it for lite gaming). is the one that I had to replace the motherboard. (I also bought a quality APS to keep my equipment safe)

Based on this information I infer that you have a desktop machine. If you had a PC laptop you’d be equally screwed, with zero chance the shop had a spare motherboard for your machine.

Granted you’d be equally screwed with a Mac Mini or iMac but fundamentally this has nothing to do with Apple vs PC. Desktop PCs that can be changed with standard parts or even custom built are not the market norm anymore and entered the specialised market realm long ago.

Your post also reads very much as "You're wrong to use Apple" but you have to realise that they produce a very reasonable solution for many. My use case covers a wide spectrum of mobility, security, dev, music, and photo/video editing, and while alternatives can do things like that they won't do so as efficiently and with the same quality across that whole spectrum for me. It would be foolish to shoot myself in the foot by nerfing my workflows every single minute of the day for a rare event. I do have a spare machine (which does not need to be the latest and greatest so can come out pretty cheap), which allows me a very quick turnover to continue working, well within an hour of a fatal failure (and that's even though I have an Apple Store 5 min away from my place).

> entered the specialised market realm

The reasoning in this thread started with something along the lines of "if you use your computer professionally... [statements]". I would argue that if you use your computer professionally you should definitely consider using specialised products, which includes custom built desktops as you correctly noted.

For many people—particularly those in creative professional fields like music production—a Mac laptop is the specialised hardware they need, because it is the only thing that supports their workflow (certain software required, must be able to be on-site with it, etc).

Not true,IMO

1 I would have got the person at the shop check it and tell me if I need a new laptop or a new part, this happened to a laptop of mine and I decided I would get a new laptop, then the shop person offered to buy the display and RAM from me and I sold it, so a different person would be able to fix his laptop

2 a spare part can be found from a different laptop or ordered online by the shop, so they can order it at the time I arrived with my broken laptop

I don't think that I would have been screwed but let me know if you still disagree.

> this happened to a laptop of mine and I decided I would get a new laptop

Equally true for Apple hardware, that you can get in most reasonably sized shopping malls basically anywhere over here (France). Most places that sell laptops also sell Apple hardware.

Maybe I do not understand your point, but can you go with a broken Apple laptop , without a schedule to shopping mall, have someone test it, tell you a diagnose and how much will it cost, ifv you decide you want a new one would the shop offer you money for the working parts of your Apple laptop( Apple is trying to make this illegal, reusing parts)

Oh, maybe it's just me that was confused and did not understand your case. Let me fix that: you went to the shop for a diagnosis maybe expecting a simple operation and was told the computer requires unexpectedly expensive repair, so you bought a new one instead? I thought you knew it beforehand since it was old already.

In that case where there is no Apple sanctioned repair presence such shops either usually sell Apple hardware and gladly perform support and diagnosis if that can bring them a sale, or they're nice enough to help you anyway with the diagnosis out of good will (people are generally like that in digitally scarce areas) and will direct you to get a new one at the mall (or, they're dicks and then, screw them).

You have every right to call me an optimist about human behaviour though ;)

Right, is the same here in Romania, a third party shop will try to help you fix any laptop,phone,tablet , I dislike the fact that Apple is attacking this shops with lawsuits, FUD campaigns, preventing others to buy parts etc.

So other laptops are exactly like macbooks, but presumably the spare parts are less prevalent?

No, the laptop was old and not in a great condition, I would have to buy new motherboard,CPU and who knows what, I preferred not to invest my money into that and get a new one.

There's a tradeoff involved. Not always, but often: Either [A] the part is easy to access and replace, or [B] the part fits in a smaller space or the hardware can be faster and less likely to fail in the first place.

If you would prefer to trade away smaller, faster, and more robust for accessibility, you should do that. MacBooks are for the folks who side with [B] a lot, and they make that fairly clear.

NB: Of course, sometimes there is a 'tradeoff' where a part of the device is basically just crappier for no real gain, and sometimes the non-standard part's primary gain is 'cheaper', which can be an upside, but it can also be some nickel-and-dime baloney that is clearly a bad tradeoff and the company making the device is trying to get away with it hoping nobody notices. I'm not talking about those tradeoffs.

Examples:

* Using a non-standard screen connector cable because all the available standards do not allow for a single cable to connect device to screen (the case with imacs)

* The effect of soldering the RAM straight onto the motherboard (much smaller and more robust; banging a laptop into a corner is less likely to unseat soldered-on RAM than RAM in a replaceable bay whose engineering is focused more on it being really small than the connection being particularly robust. Yes, YOU can fix it, but your average user perhaps isn't quite as cavalier at opening it all up).

* A single replaceable battery is nice, but if you just glue a bunch of packs in there you can fill every nook and cranny. For what it is worth, apple is still trying to make this as replaceable as possible within reason: I've done a battery replacement on a non-retina macbook air 11, and the 4 separate packs are glued onto a sheet of plastic so you can remove the entire assembly (after disconnecting various ribbons).

Separate from that, there's the notion of 'whose responsibility is it?' – this is a more hairy topic. If you open up your own PC and stick a giant, overclocked CPU in there and then attach a teensy tiny cooler to it all, perhaps due to unfortunate circumstance some of the capacitors on the motherboard blow up due to the excessive heat wafting off of the CPU, which manages to peg itself to 90ºC and survives. If you then make a warranty claim vs. the manufacturer, that feels inappropriate. A manufacturer that tries to stop this from happening would either have to excessively spec out the precise limits of what you can and cannot do (a good idea, but such rules need wiggle room, which means it can't be as fast/small/cutting-edge as it could be), or do what apple does and basically say: Hey, if a qualified apple service engineer isn't doing the work, you're on your own.

I'm not exactly happy with this state of affairs, but I don't see a strictly better alternative either.

The main issue I have with Apple is that they are pushing to make it impossible to repair things, not selling parts, trying to make illegal refurbishing parts, trying to prevent third party repairs and finally straight lying about things, like telling customers "your data can't be recovered, say goodbye to it" when in fact this is false and the truth is "Apple won't bother do data recovery for you, third parties do this but we don't want to talk about that"

That's why I would never buy a Ferrari. In my small town, I wouldn't be able to find anyone to work on it. What a crap car.

Do you insinuate that Apple hardware is a fashion statement and not for real work?

If I live in a big city can I get my iMac/MacBook fixed without scheduling in 1-2 hours? I seen the LTT saga with the iMac where they could not fix it so it would be like you crash your Ferarri and you have to wait for them to first train the mechanics and create the spare parts and after that have it fixed.

Absolutely not! I haven't a clue why you think that. My point is, the guy I responded to complains that he can get his commodity hardware fixed anywhere while his Apple needs to be taken to a "specialty" store as if they were the same thing.

can you respond to this :c an you get it unscheduled repairs from Apple in the same day?

I had more then 1 point, let me be more clear:

1 I had more then one repair shop in a small city, so I have choices

2 I got the unscheduled issue diagnosed and fixed in max 2 hours

3 I even made a GPU upgrade and I had choices AMD or NVIDIA

Btw even living in a village I can get things fixed like any other people, like when a new thing I bought broke in the first week I sent it back, it took 3 weeks to have it replaced but it works on small villages too. My example was about a PC that was important for my work and that was out of warranty, though with PCs, in the way I buy them I have warranty for each part so I have the option to go in the town, have someone test and replace the broken part(maybe I buy a cheap GPU or RAM) and send only the broken part back.

That's great that everything works so well for your use-case but this isn't a PC vs Apple issue. There's no need to repeatedly try to convince anyone that your way is better. We all live different lives and make different choices.

What would be wrong if Apple customers would have choices? Nobody would force you to use a third party repair shop.

>be like you crash your Ferarri and you have to wait for them to first train the mechanics and create the spare parts and after that have it fixed.

Yeah, that’s actually exactly how it works. Good luck getting spare parts for a new Ferrari, all the parts will be headed for the assembly line and not towards your car.

Similar to Tesla then, this is not acceptable for some hardware you use to do your work. When you sell your new shiny product your repair shops should have been trained, should have all the parts,manuals, software needed to fix the problems that would appear, things break, even if the user is at fault he should be able to have it fixed.

what is your point? you do realize that there exists a scenario where you wouldn't be able to go to the city and get your PC fixed? so is your recommendation then to build a factory where any PC component can be produced on demand within a day?

if macbook is not an option because of circumstances you're in - don't buy a macbook. this need to publicly defend and rationalize your life choices along with implicit condemnation of choice of others is just weird.

people have different preferences and live in different circumstances. - yours truly, captain obvious.

My point is that we need "right to repair", there should not be a monopoly on who can fix something or who can create parts, A second point is that waiting 5 days for someone to look at your hardware and tell you if it can or can't be fixed is also a problem. At least you don't wait 1 week for a response, then a week for parts to arrive and then a few days for the thing to be fixed.

I am not sure why you felt the need to respond in such a way, you can respond with the scenario I did not consider and explain why your opinion is the correrct one.

You already have a right to buy stuff and put it together yourself and fix it. Go do that. Or pay someone to do it.

I prefer the super thin, svelte designed devices that simply cannot be made easily repairable.

There is no “right” to enforce your particular design and implementation standards on manufacturers. You’re inventing rights that do not and should not exist.

If you want to tinker, that’s great. Go tinker. Most of us do not. It’s idiotic for a tiny percentage of people who do want to whip out a soldering iron and go to town to put constraints on what the rest of us are allowed to buy.

And FYI, I do like to put together a machine every once in a while and fix it and tinker with it. It’s fun. I enjoy it. But that doesn’t mean I have some sort of fundamental human right to make every thing buildable by me, personally.

The right to repair is like the right to live your whole life without ever being offended by anything or encounter an idea you find uncomfortable. Enforcing your personal right abrogates other people’s rights and denies other people things they like to say, think, and buy.

But the real truth is that the right to repair always boils down to some clown on the internet who read an iFixit tear down and thinks, “man, I could make my own i-whatever for, like a hundred bucks if only Apple could be forced to sell me all the parts in exactly the right configuration at a price that only accounts for the bare basic raw materials.

If you want the fancy things, pay for the fancy things. If you want a brick house machine that you can cart through the jungle and swap out a new motherboard every time you drop it in a river, then buy one of those. No one is stopping you. The choice you want to have already exists.

You are covering up the actual facts:"

1 if you publish Apples repair manuals apple with come after you, explain me how is this hurting the consumer, how is this making your phone thinker ?

2 Apple is preventing imports of parts from refurbished hardware, is this helping with the phone dimensions?

3 I don't want to repair my computer, I want others to repair them for me, It is idiotic(your words) to insinuate that people want to fix stuff themselves, it is not, is it possible to stop repeating this "idiotic" statement???

4 some companies introduce DRM to prevent fixing stuff, is this helping the consumer? how? if I have 2 identical broken laptops and I want to move parts from A to B to get 1 working one why should DRM prevent this? Is is my hardware, I have the right to use it as I want, it is a right to do with my property what I want if I do not hurt others, Please, please let me know why DRM should prevent me do what I want with my hardware,

About your thing phone statements, I am not proposing hardware companies make them like LEGOs, If they make it so fixing a key means replacing the entire phone or laptop the company will pay through their nose when the keys start failing, so I personally I am not your target for thin phones rage.

The issue with Macs is that repairing one often isn't a straightforward process. My current MacBook Pro had video issues when I first got it; I was lucky to have Apple replace it on the spot, but often options for repair through Apple are very time-consuming and often costly.

And the real issue here is that this is an absolutely unacceptable level of service for a company that tries to sell itself as a premium brand.

A long time ago I had a Dell laptop. When there was a problem Dell arranged an onsite and it was fixed within 24 hours.

Given Apple's margins and market cap, the fact that Apple refuses to offer a similar level of service even as part of a paid support contract is a symptom of complacency and outright penny-pinching greed.

And short-sightedness. It's a fair bet that legendary customer support would do some wonderfully positive things for the Apple brand - and perhaps even for profits.

But Cook seems too busy disappointing customers and counting his pile of beans and to consider that as a possibility.

> A long time ago I had a Dell laptop. When there was a problem Dell arranged an onsite and it was fixed within 24 hours.

I have had a similar experience with Dell - and on a laptop that cost a fair bit less than a MacBook Pro, FWIW.

Hmm not sure I have come across Uber driver having a second car as a backup.

MacBook Pro is an expensive piece of equipment and someone who produces music for living (or any other freelancers really) must have stretched their budget to get the primary machine itself.

If I pay top dollars for anything then I do hope that I don't have to pay top dollars again for having a backup of that.

I agree with you in general, but the username is whitepandamusic; if they're actually White Panda they're a fairly prominent DJ and producer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Panda

Edit: Looks like it is! https://twitter.com/whitepanda/status/1133847982317723648

Yep, he's very well-known in certain circles, having started working on singles with solo artists alongside the previous duos mashup work.

If this resulted in substantial data loss, it could be really bad.

The thread says he hasn't taken a backup in a year, so that's that I guess. The SSD is unlikely to survive a fire.

That's uncalled for. No need to blame the victim.

A laptop going into flames is generally a manufacturer's fault. If one were to damage the machine through fault of their own, they wouldn't demand a replacement.

"Blaming the victim" is standard operating procedure for Apple. Remember "you're holding it wrong?"

> Either put up with your computer exploding and not being able to do your job for a few days, or spend another two grand to buy a whole other computer you probably won't use.

Fixed that for you. I get the point generally, but there's a great difference between "I damaged my computer and it will take a week to fix" and "My computer spontaneously combusted and it will take a week to fix". Namely, fault and impact. When you damage your computer, you are at fault and you are impacted. Fair. When your computer goes boom, Apple is (probably) at fault, but you are still impacted.

Though yeah, not backing up your stuff is inexcusable in the age of cheap, ubiquitous storage space. Particularly in the cloud.

Isn't this what AppleCare is for?

At least with Dell my experience is that they just come to you and replace what is broken and also replace what might have been broken.

But Dell computers can be opened and components can be easily replaced (most of the time without tools).

As others point out this is the disadvantage of Apple laptops. Not to speak of the Microsoft surface which gets a score of zero @ iFixit.

I think the issue is that Apple used to be a more service-oriented brand.

My Dual G4 tower years ago had a run of bad processor modules. AppleCare sent service reps out three times in the space of four days trying to get it working correctly. Today, almost everything has to go back to Apple to be replaced; there are no more Apple-sanctioned repair outlets and the Apple store can't do much more than elevated diagnostics tests.

If you get into a car accident, you can take it to the dealer for repair but it'll likely be much more expensive because their goal is to keep the car running to their specifications. If the repair costs are excessive, your insurance might just total the car. You could still take it to a garage, get it repaired for a fraction of what the insurance claim was and get many more years of use out of it.

With Apple, there's not really much option for repair, as they usually won't sell parts to aftermarket repair outlets.

Exactly, even we're not at fault we shouldn't completely rely on other parties. I keep my old laptop as a backup in case my new one fails. It never did since I bought it in 2014 but who knows what's about to happen. Git pull, USB disk with backups and some installations and I should be OK for the couple of days I need to order and get the new parts.

Yeah, professional mindset grants for backup plans. Unless you like walking on wires.

> While here it's Apple's issue, it could just as well be your fault that the laptop died (e.g. dropping it).

Sure, and it could have been trampled by an escaped rhino, and then the zoo would owe him a new laptop. But we're not talking about random hypotheticals. A company has different responsibilities when their product explodes than when the customer breaks it.

Also, How about the part where Apple told him they'd call back in 24 hours and didn't?

"Just buy two!"

Another case of someone passing the blame from a manufacturer of faulty hardware (Apple) to the customer.

Is there a going term for this phenomena? There should be, by now.

even though it is a bit harsh i agree. rely on yourself, not on some warranty notices and customer support from tech giants... that has hardly ever served someone well. (i.e. support from a tech company can't recover your burnt data either way... product error or human error aside..)

if you make a living from something, protect it, otherwise you risk your livelyhood. protect it YOURSELF.

I think they could drop him a loaner here.

If a working MacBook would really be as strictly needed as he states it (earning his living with it). He could have simply bought a new one, not able to work for a week may be more financial damage. And Apple has a 14 day return policy, he is absolutely overstating the impact a missing macbook has for him!

"Just buy a new one" would be my personal approach too, but at least I have the humility to understand that not everyone is as fortunate as me.