Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Apple
Bad luck with PowerBooks
Have you ever had bad luck with your Macs? I know in the past I've had long stretches of no problems whatsoever, but I remember painfully a G4 tower that had a problematic motherboard that was replaced by another dud, and the first batch of 12-inchers were plagued with warping issues, imho.Jon Hicks is keeping score of the problems he's been having with his new PowerBook(s), and it's not looking good for Apple. The question is: is this the normal sporadic problems, where the majority of the product line is good, but there's a small population of unlucky souls who are plagued with problems? Or is this a trend of manufacturing problems that Apple needs to address? I don't think that Apple is going the way of the Dell with that company's recent trend of using old hard drives and parts in new computers resulting in cheaper craptastic hardware, but I do think that Apple, despite all its strengths in the hardware arena, could stand to beef up those strengths and add a little bit of ironclad goodness to the product line. I mean, Apple is ripe for switchers these days, and one experience like the multiple problems noted by Hicks would pretty much turn me sour on Apple if I were a new user. What do you think?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
mungler said 7:12AM on 11-28-2005
I bought a 1.33Ghz Powerbook G4 12'' last year, and the corner buckled and the screen went a bit off-centre, all within a week! I mean.. unbeleivable. And all I did to it was, er... drop it down the stairs.
D'oh!
(Still works tho - phew!)
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Tom said 7:41AM on 11-28-2005
Last January I purchased a refurbished 3G iPod from the Apple Store (online). Everything was fine for about 9 months, then it became a sporadic sync-er. 3 weeks later the hard drive was toast. Took it to the Apple Store (bricks and morter) and they replaced it that day. 1 month later it died. I'm on my third refurbished iPod and the backlight isn't quite even.
Now come the kickers: 1) the first iPod I owned was perfect (and brand new at purchase). I sold it so I could afford the refurb with the bigger hard drive.
2) I can't buy a new iPod because it's only USB 2.0 and my mac only has 1.1.
Thanks, Apple.
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Buthidae said 7:44AM on 11-28-2005
My first PowerBook (1.0Ghz AluBook) had the lower-slot RAM problem (not being recognised), After two logic board replacements, we got the bottom case replace. Bingo, problem solved!
Other than that, my Macs rock!
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Cyberwhore said 7:53AM on 11-28-2005
I would definately turn sour on Apple if I were a switcher and had different problems over multiple units. It wouldn't cause me to switch back because eventually you have to get a trouble free unit. Right? Once you had a trouble free unit in your lap for a while all bad feelings would be quickly forgotten and the love of the experience could begin.
Also, I hope this thread isn't going to turn into a good example of why everyone needs to change brands of shampoo ... to the "No more tears formula"
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Mike C. said 7:58AM on 11-28-2005
Just like Jon Hicks, my PB's lid latch broke after one week. After two weeks if trying to ignore the problem, I visited an Apple Store and had it sent in to be fixed. I had my PB back three days later, but the screen returned with one dead pixel, one stuck pixel and uneven back-lighting.
Happy with my PB, not so much with the repair.
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Reovox said 7:59AM on 11-28-2005
Earlier this year I purchased a 15" Powerbook, my first Mac. A few weeks down the line, the dvd/cd-rw drive stopped reading cd's...would only read DVDs. Got it replaced with a new one. A few weeks later, the new one wouldnt power-up...dead basically. Took it back, swapped it for an iMac 20" and I got 25 worth of gift vouchers for the trouble (Bought from John Lewis). iMac has been fine tho, touch wood!
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Steve Denton said 8:01AM on 11-28-2005
I have to say that you really can't link this problem specifially to Apple. Some people are unlucky WHATEVER they buy. I used to work with someone who couldn't buy anything, without it going wrong, or there being a problem with either the delivery the installation and/or the repair. I, on the otherhand, could buy exactly the same product at exactly the same time and it worked perfectly. I think "there's a small population of unlucky souls who are plagued with problems" about covers it - and they're always the most vocal.
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Miikka Luotio said 8:58AM on 11-28-2005
If you think you have had bad luck with Mac listen to my story as a PC to Mac switcher:
First i bought the first Mini Mac * Just to see that it made a horribly loud beep noise all the time
Got it replaced, its HD went boing after one week
Got it replaced again - Its CD drive went boing after one week
Got it replaced by a PowerMac 1.8 Single CPU and with it Tiger OSX - Just to found out it had the infamous Freeze issue with fullscreen games and video etc - Also its drive bay sensor went boom and it sounded like a vacuum cleaner 24h - Also its main HD went bad after one month * Replaced it
Got it replaced by a PowerMac 2.0 Dual Core * Its Main HD went boing after 2 weeks replaced it and my secondary HD went boing now i am replacing it.
Bad luck or what?
Bad and good i would say
Since i payed 600e for a Dual Core 2Ghz machine.
I have gained almost 2000 euros in money with the replacement machine. Also i would of liked to actually work with a computer, i have had problems with Macs for 6-7 moths now - I finally hope i am in clear waters now.
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Heck said 8:07AM on 11-28-2005
First of all, I am a long time Apple user and I do prefer their hardware to others, but here's my horror story.
I've had three powerbooks so far and hardware problems with all of them. The first TiBook was really a particular case of "anything that can happen, shall happen to you". Chipped paint, big white spots in the screen, dead pixels, burnt battery charger after a few weeks, hard drive failure, etc. You name it. Apple's service was excellent, and everything gets replaced if needs be. But I'd rather do without their help at all from starters, honestly.
By the way, the power charger has been burnt or doesn't work properly in every single one of my powerbooks, I order a replacement one as a matter of course when buying a laptop from Apple. Ugh. Fix that, people.
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ryank said 8:56AM on 11-28-2005
I purchased a 15 Ti Powerbook about two and a half years ago - still using it, despite being on my third hard drive.
The first one went about 9 months after I bought it, the second one about a year after the first hard drive went.
Thankfully, I bough Apple care, so both replacements were on the house. But losing a significant portion of my data is never fun. I've also had some case cracking, which didn't worry me. But when I sent it in to Apple the most recent time for a HD replacement, the replaced the cracked portion of the the case and tossed in a new LCD. I didn't ask for it...but if they're willing to put in new stuff under warrenty, that's fine with me.
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C.K. Sample, III said 9:05AM on 11-28-2005
Hey, heck,
If your power cable keeps burning out and you're plugging into the same socket, it might be an issue with power surges in that outlet. We have one plug in one of the labs that I manage where the power keeps burning through surge protectors. The way around this is to either get an electrician to look at the plug or invest in a UPS power surge protector with a battery. Sure, this just means that you'll have to replace the UPS every six months or so instead of the power adapter, but it's something.
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Matt said 5:27PM on 11-28-2005
I bought a 12" 1.5GHz Superdrive PowerBook about 2 1/2 months ago because I lost my PCs from Katrina and had been looking to switch for a long time. Everything's great! One note though - it seems as though with all of the Macs that my buddies and I have bought, the factory install of OS X is likely problematic. All of us took the time (at least after a few glitches and crashes) to reformat our hard drives and it was smooth sailing from then on!
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Jehan said 9:18AM on 11-28-2005
I've seen few problems with the new Apple computers I've bought, but for any laptop or all-in-one that I buy, I make sure that an Apple Care comes with it out of the factory. I have a G4 tower that I've rebuilt and it's been giving me some trouble, but that's mostly due to lackluster troubleshooting on my part.
The only time I've actually seen repeated problems is with 2 iPods. One 20 gb 3g and one 40 gb 4g. Each one has been replaced a number of times for verious reasons, and the 4g has just gone up recently without ever being plugged in. I've never seen problems like this, but, once again, I'm thankful for the APP.
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David Moss said 10:06AM on 11-28-2005
The only problem I've had with my hardware since I bought my first Mac in March is with the wireless keyboard, which kept picking up and dropping its connection every couple of seconds. I had it replaced with no fuss by a local reseller and have (so far) had no further problems. I agree though that Apple Care is advisable for recent switchers.
P.S. To comment 2 by Tom, I think I'm right in saying that USB 2.0 devices will work in USB 1.1 ports, but at the lower transfer rate?
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John Faughnan said 10:37AM on 11-28-2005
I also had an awful 3G iPod experience. Apple sent me two bad replacements after my first one went south. Finally I got one I use, even though the USB port doesn't work.
I would NEVER buy a refurbished Apple product. Macintouch had document how unreliable those are. I suspect Apple outsources product recycling and fails to supervise them very well.
As for Apple software products -- my experiences with iPhoto and OS X have convinced me that Apple's product quality standards are fairly low, probably lower than Microsoft's.
I primarily use Apple products and buy Apple hardware and software. The alternatives are not great. Microsoft's products probably have fewer bugs, but they are fundamentally ugly (www.faughnan.com/msword.html). Dell's hardware quality is probably even lower than Apple's, and besides, they only run Microsoft software.
AppleCare is no panacea; they send refurbished devices back and see my comments on those! My iPod debacle was covered by AppleCare, but the hassle factor was enormous. I now use my credit card's extended warranty. If something fails out of extended warranty I replace it.
Recently I bought a G5 iMac and a Nano. Both are working well. I want to buy Aperture, but I'll wait until version 1.1. I do not recommend EVER installing a major software upgrade or new product from Apple or buying a new hardware product (ok, so I bought the Nano -- but I was taking a risk). They simply don't value reliability enough.
Alas, we don't have many alternatives ...
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Mike said 11:01AM on 11-28-2005
I have a 5 year old G4 tower running 10.3.9. I have added additional RAM, an additional hard drive, and a USB 2.0 PCI card. The machine is bulletproof. I try most of the small applicatons that TUAW lists on its website and I have never had any problems. My black and white 4G iPod also works really well. My girlfirend's iPod (both bought for Christmas last year) recently had the HD crash and the local Apple store replaced it on the spot (no more problems, so far). A friend updgraded her iTunes software recently and had the same problem of her music library disappearing that others posters have noted. I got it fixed, but the reason I use Macs is to avoid these PC problems. Apple should be striving to maintain their image as a company that cares about consumers and provides them with the best products possible.
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Peter said 11:50AM on 11-28-2005
i've had problems with both my Powerbook G4 and an old iBook G3 that i used to own. The iBooks backlight would fuzz out and my Powerbook's HD crashed a few months after i bought it. However, Apple was courteous and fixed all the problems under the warranty. Overall, I think their hardware is pretty good, because i haven't really had that many problems in the past 5 years, except for the ones i mentioned above. and i have used other brands, like Dell, IBM, and their laptops and hardware have the same or more problems, so i don't think its a problem with apple specifically, just a problem with manufacturing in general.
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Alex Montgomery said 8:26PM on 11-28-2005
Statistically, Consumer Reports has found that Apple laptops have about a 17% defect rate. Apple ranks second out of eight major laptop manufacturers (Toshiba has a better record). Compaq is the worst at 22%. Apple desktops have a top ranking and a 12.5% rate, about 4% better than the next manufacturer (Sony). Gateway was the worst with a 24% rate.
Individual tales of woe aside (including my own), Apple does pretty well. Computers in general are just pretty awful.
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Nic said 2:24PM on 11-28-2005
I bought a 15" PB in August for school. About a month ago, the battery started going wonky. It would not charge past 74-77%. However, the local Apple Outlet in Vancouver was able to order a replacement battery for me. The only problem was that I had to wait for them to assess the problem over a few days before they could order the replacement.
As a new Apple user, I was impressed with the hassle-free process. This is the only problem I have had with my PB so far. Knock wood!
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Michael Buckingham said 1:16AM on 11-29-2005
I went through 4 completely defective I-Pods in 4 months (not a single one lasted longer than 11 days) and I still never got a working one but despite that, decided to tempt fate and bought a 17" Powerbook tonight. It booted and I can post this. Am I stupid or what?
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