first off... thanks for the great advice i found on this forum.
i wanted to relate my experience at the apple store today, on black friday of all days. a week or so ago, i found a mid-2011 13" macbook air in an e-waste bin. i figured i'd salvage it and see what was wrong with it. i checked the warranty status, and it was not covered by apple care. the laptop had some scratches but otherwise looked in great shape. sadly, it would not boot. powering it on would only result in the fans running at full-blast. after getting a screwdriver from ifixit, i took it apart and found the logic board had a blue/white residue on one small section, and some tiny components looked fried. the i/o board also had a similar residue on it. searching for logic boards on ebay, i found they ranged from $400 and up.
after reading some threads on this forum, i found out about the depot repair, so i decided to take a shot at the apple store. sure enough, after running some tests and opening the laptop up, they came back and offered a flat-rate depot repair for $280 plus tax. i didn't even mention the service, as the genius rep just offered it to me. he said they'll replace anything that's broken, and i'll have it back in a week. i was pretty impressed with the service i received, given there was no apple care, and that the laptop had obviously more than $280 worth of repairs. so yeah... yay apple.
i wanted to relate my experience at the apple store today, on black friday of all days. a week or so ago, i found a mid-2011 13" macbook air in an e-waste bin. i figured i'd salvage it and see what was wrong with it. i checked the warranty status, and it was not covered by apple care. the laptop had some scratches but otherwise looked in great shape. sadly, it would not boot. powering it on would only result in the fans running at full-blast. after getting a screwdriver from ifixit, i took it apart and found the logic board had a blue/white residue on one small section, and some tiny components looked fried. the i/o board also had a similar residue on it. searching for logic boards on ebay, i found they ranged from $400 and up.
after reading some threads on this forum, i found out about the depot repair, so i decided to take a shot at the apple store. sure enough, after running some tests and opening the laptop up, they came back and offered a flat-rate depot repair for $280 plus tax. i didn't even mention the service, as the genius rep just offered it to me. he said they'll replace anything that's broken, and i'll have it back in a week. i was pretty impressed with the service i received, given there was no apple care, and that the laptop had obviously more than $280 worth of repairs. so yeah... yay apple.