You seem to be under the impression that if you had waited around for the Genius Bar to get replacements in, you would have been issued a brand-new one, but instead you were "tricked" to mail your iPod in, and because you mailed it in, you were mailed a refurbished one back.
That impression is false.
Do I have to repeat myself again?
The Genius, if you can call them that, specifically told me that I would be receiving a new unit in the store. When he started the swap process I asked him if it would be brand new or refurbished. He said brand new. When he saw there was no stock and suggested mail-in or him ordering, I asked if mail-in would still give me a brand new unit, not refurbished, he said yes.
Replacements are replacements. Some are brand-new, but the vast majority of them are refurbished. Having your repair done at the Genius Bar vs. AppleCare doesn't change your odds one bit in regards to what you're going to receive. Genius Bars do not only issue brand-new replacements.
Again, the person helping me specifically stated I would be getting a brand new replacement. Whether it happened in store or mail-in.
Apple's refurbs comes with a 100% brand-new exterior shell and a 100% brand-new battery. You couldn't visually distinguish it from a brand new one. And as you experienced, getting a "retail new" unit is hardly any guarantee that its quality is perfect.
Anything with Apple is not guaranteed to be perfect!
However, I paid for new. I want new.
The employee you dealt with gave you bad information. You should call back the store and speak to a manager so the employee can be corrected.
I don't care about correcting the employee. I paid $168 for a device, after taxes, that should have been priced more about $75. I want what i paid for or a refund.
you should have bought the Touch ... all this spewing over Nano
Have an iPhone 4. Needed something small for active use.
Cool, whats your source? Give some factual information, because otherwise, it doesn't really matter what you say when you speak for a whole.
Look at sales. Macs are still single digits and Android is taking over iOS.
I disagree. There are many reasons why people don't buy a Mac.
Including COST and the fact that you get significantly less hardware, less capable hardware, and almost no upgrade path.
Macs are reliable. A Mac laptop from 2003-04 is still good today.
How? A 2003-2004 iBook would have had a G4 800MHz, 256MB of RAM (limited to just over 1GB upgrade), a 30GB HDD, a CD writer, and a Radeon 9200 32MB. And it would have sold for $1100. A PowerBook from 2003-2004 would have had a G4 1GHz, 256MB of RAM (upgradeable to 2GB), a CD writer with a DVD writer being an extremely expensive upgrade, and a 60GB HDD. And it would have cost $2,000.
The fact that anything from Apple pre-2006 uses PPC architecture means it is obsolete. Apple has abandon support for the architecture and none of their new software releases even support that architecture any more. Before you know it, 3rd party browsers won't even support PPC.
Let's not forget the upgrade paths for those systems. The last generation of iBook was only upgradeable to 1.5GB. Good luck upgrading the HDD, unless you like performing full system surgery on it.
What did you get in 2003/2004 from a PC? $1300 would have gotten you an Athlon 64 2GHz or Pentium M 2GHz, Radeon Mobile 9700 with 128MB of RAM, DVD writer standard, 60GB standard, 512GB to 1GB of RAM, etc.
Also, do you think your the smartest person in the world? Mac users arent stupid. They don't buy computers just for looks.
Well, you certainly don't buy a Mac for horsepower. Not when a $1500 desktop system comes with a dual core Core i3.
For $1000 bucks, I got a
-thin laptop
Thin? So? Thin also means poor cooling system, which means a hotter system on your lap and lower quality internal components that run cooler.
And so what about thin? When my laptop leaves the house its in a case. I'm not carrying it by its own body.
Core 2 Duo and GeForce 320M? Fast in 2006 maybe. $1,000 in the PC world will get you a dedicated GPU faster than anything in any shipping Mac as well as a true quad core 8 thread Core i7.
Soft metals that scratch, bend, warp, etc. aren't exactly "Sturdy".
-excellent battery (in terms of battery life and longevity)
The only positive thing about Apple's systems would be the battery life. However, that comes as a result of having extremely low end hardware, by modern standards. Theres also a lot of shortcuts taken to get to that point, like down clocking the GPU a lot. However, my HP in 2007 had better battery life than my Mac in 2008 thanks to double capacity batteries and user replaceable batteries. I had 10 hours of battery life across two batteries while Macs didn't even have 4 hours real world.
Longevity? Thats debatable. The batteries on my HP are still original and still reporting 98% capacity. My MacBook's battery was not even a year and a half old when it swelled up and died while supposedly at 98% health itself and less than 200 cycles.
Runs cool? Depends on your definition of cool. My HP has a Merom based Core 2 Duo at 2GHz and my Mac has a Penryn Core 2 Duo at 2GHz. Technically, the Penryn should run cooler and use less energy. Oh the HP has a dedicated nvidia GPU as well. The HP runs an average 30-40F cooler under load and idle and while playing games compared to the Mac, thanks to Apple's poor cooling design and focus on being thin rather than useful.
-has OS X (the main reason for buying an Apple computer. People who buy Macs aren't idiots. They value OS X and are willing to pay for it)
I bought my first Mac nearly 4 years ago for OS X. In that four years, going from Tiger to Snow Leopard now, I see absolutely no benefit in OS X compared to Windows. None. I can think of a lot of things that Windows can do that OS X can't, like proper video decoding and blu-ray playback. But I honestly cannot think of a single thing that OS X can do that Windows cannot. I can think of things Windows does better. But I can't think of anything OS X does better.
Don't make me laugh. There is NOTHING better about the build quality of a Mac compared to a PC. The plastic Macs have all kinds of issues with cracking, discoloration, and other failures.
Go and compare the MacBook "Pro" to the actual professional lines from HP and Dell. Those things are built like tanks. You don't have to worry about setting it down hard denting it, or heat warping it. Or a non-user replaceable battery swelling up.
Those systems also tend to come with 3 year warranties as standard as well as on-site service and accidental damage coverage.
Don't even get started with this.
Explain to me how a $999 plastic MacBook that will crack and discolor and comes with a 4 year old processor architecture, 2GB of RAM, and integrated graphics is somehow priced appropriately against a $999 PC that will have a quad core 8 thread CPU, dedicated graphics, 2-3x the RAM, blu-ray, larger screens, etc.
That's what you think. Not everyone is buying their computer for looks, if you didn't know that. Sorry if you did.
Well, why would you honestly buy a Mac? I can think of no good reason other than developing iOS apps. In that case, a Mac mini will be just fine.
I don't think that Apple products are poorly built. You've probably never owned anything but an Apple product if you say that.
I've owned several notebook PCs. Including that $1300 one I mentioned earlier.
Like all products, there are faults. Don't expect everything to be perfect.
When I pay 2-3x what a product is actually worth, I expect it to be perfect.
Honestly, what is your point? everyone has different tastes/opinions.
Again, to show people what Apple really does when you have an issue.