With the limited amounts of internal SSD storage Apple will put in their computers (and then zero internal upgrade ability after purchase), solutions like this will become increasingly necessary unfortunately.
It used to be better. In 2009 it was easy to remove the optical drive and plug in a SSD mounting bracket adapter. By 2011, or was it 2010, they put a huge ribbon cable over the optical drive assembly, over the drive. Remove it, or if it looks like it was moved, your warranty and AppleCare too would be summarily void.
Apple's profit margins are impressive, but preventing post-purchase add-ons seems much. Having worked in tech for 25 years, the claims of "static discharge causes all these returns" seems excessive; are people rubbing their pet dogs while adding RAM or sticking their finger in an active light socket while swapping a replacement HDD? (Usually people return items because it doesn't suit their needs or the item truly was defective
before adding in a component, and laptops are made to make the user-replaceable or customizable components easy to get at, to reduce risk of damage and other problems... and for robustness; noting how Macbook cover removal exposes the
whole circuit board and battery, with most ribbon cables being gently underneath it all, it's a bit strange that a sole 1" wide cable is placed along one particular spot and looking very un-clean and un-Apple-like, yet so tight that without the most deft touch and knowing precisely how to undo it that it will break... Apple wants to be the sole source of upgrades, given the markup. While still better than in years past and in 2007 the upgrade items were exorbitantly priced considering it's all off-the-shelf stuff, there still is a needless markup - most consumers aren't entirely computer-ignorant. Maybe lazy, but then we have products encouraging laziness to make people lazy before we blame them as being lazy...)
