My Laptop's in Memphis
Well, actually it's back now, it just took a short vacation.
Last Wednesday evening I went to wake my laptop up from sleep and found that it had shut itself off. I booted it back up and in a few minutes it shut itself off again, while I was typing! I plugged it in to an outlet, but the same thing happened again. It took me a couple of reboots, but I was able to back up all of my emails and lab data to my desktop. It passed the hardware test, but continued to shut itself off after only a few minutes of use.
The next morning, it wouldn't boot at all. Just a dimly lit black screen and the sound of fans.
Luckily, I had decided to be a sucker and bought Apple's extended 3-year warranty a few months ago, because the normal 1-year warranty had run up. Now, normally I hate extended warranties as much as any one, but I made an exception because:
1) I've never had an Apple computer before and they're notorious for being difficult to repair (it's hard to find parts/open them up yourself). Plus, they've got kind of a bad reputation for first generation products (mine is the first version of the iBook with the G4 processor in it).
2) I've never had a laptop before and they're notorious for being difficult to repair (it's hard to find parts/open them up by yourself). Beyond the hard drive and the ram, there's not much you can do. Almost everything else is soldered directly to the motherboard.
3) The 25% student discount took the edge off a little, dropping the price from asinine to just plain ludicrous.
4) If I did decide to sell it and upgrade in a few years, it would be much easier to sell if it was still under warranty.
The process was fairly painless. Apple shipped me an empty box which arrived Monday morning. I packed the laptop and the shipper picked it up that afternoon. It was in Memphis Tuesday morning and fixed and on it's way back out by that evening. I actually got it back at about 8:30 this morning. All in all it was nice to know that I was covered and it would be taken care of with minimal effort on my part. And my total time without it was only a week. Really, to keep the repairs moving quickly, I don't think they actually do any diagnostics. The report says they just swapped out my motherboard with a new one.
I did have quite a scare though because the repair report stated that my repair was not covered under warranty and that I would get a bill in 5 to 7 days. I called Apple and they swear it's a typo, someone forgot to change the default setting on the form, and that I will not get a bill. They'll certainly be hearing about it if I do.
-Tim
Last Wednesday evening I went to wake my laptop up from sleep and found that it had shut itself off. I booted it back up and in a few minutes it shut itself off again, while I was typing! I plugged it in to an outlet, but the same thing happened again. It took me a couple of reboots, but I was able to back up all of my emails and lab data to my desktop. It passed the hardware test, but continued to shut itself off after only a few minutes of use.
The next morning, it wouldn't boot at all. Just a dimly lit black screen and the sound of fans.
Luckily, I had decided to be a sucker and bought Apple's extended 3-year warranty a few months ago, because the normal 1-year warranty had run up. Now, normally I hate extended warranties as much as any one, but I made an exception because:
1) I've never had an Apple computer before and they're notorious for being difficult to repair (it's hard to find parts/open them up yourself). Plus, they've got kind of a bad reputation for first generation products (mine is the first version of the iBook with the G4 processor in it).
2) I've never had a laptop before and they're notorious for being difficult to repair (it's hard to find parts/open them up by yourself). Beyond the hard drive and the ram, there's not much you can do. Almost everything else is soldered directly to the motherboard.
3) The 25% student discount took the edge off a little, dropping the price from asinine to just plain ludicrous.
4) If I did decide to sell it and upgrade in a few years, it would be much easier to sell if it was still under warranty.
The process was fairly painless. Apple shipped me an empty box which arrived Monday morning. I packed the laptop and the shipper picked it up that afternoon. It was in Memphis Tuesday morning and fixed and on it's way back out by that evening. I actually got it back at about 8:30 this morning. All in all it was nice to know that I was covered and it would be taken care of with minimal effort on my part. And my total time without it was only a week. Really, to keep the repairs moving quickly, I don't think they actually do any diagnostics. The report says they just swapped out my motherboard with a new one.
I did have quite a scare though because the repair report stated that my repair was not covered under warranty and that I would get a bill in 5 to 7 days. I called Apple and they swear it's a typo, someone forgot to change the default setting on the form, and that I will not get a bill. They'll certainly be hearing about it if I do.
-Tim
posted by tjmcardl | 9:08 PM
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