I'm planning on buying my first Mac...a refurbished MacBook. I've heard Apple's warranty and customer service are EXCELLENT, but I was wondering if AppleCare's extra 3 years are really worth an extra $250?? I'm trying to save money here and not buy things I don't need, but I don't want to regret it. Any thoughts?
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Is AppleCare worth it??
- Thread starter PSUgirl208
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Ok. Applecare is like insurance. it used by both the user (i.e. you and me) as well as AAPL for purposes of risk management. It is up to you to consider whether Applecare is worth it to manage the risk of a hardware failure.
Consider it mathematically:
What do you expect the probability of suffering a catastrophic hardware failure between time periods (0-1 years) and (3< years) (since it's a probability, it's between 0, it will never happen, and 1, it's guaranteed to happen)? Multiply that probability by the purchase price of your machine. If it exceeds the cost of the applecare, then your expected value of the applecare purchase is higher than the cost which suggests you should buy it. If it's exactly equal to or below the cost of applecare, you should not buy it.
My MBP was $1799. I purchased Applecare for it for $205. Intuitively, I deduced that my MBP had a probable failure rate of greater than 11.4%. If Applecare costs $500, I probably wouldn't have purchased it. If you owned a company with 20,000 macs, you exploit the law of large numbers and Applecare is no longer your best option. You'd save money paying for repairs in cash.
There ya go.
Consider it mathematically:
What do you expect the probability of suffering a catastrophic hardware failure between time periods (0-1 years) and (3< years) (since it's a probability, it's between 0, it will never happen, and 1, it's guaranteed to happen)? Multiply that probability by the purchase price of your machine. If it exceeds the cost of the applecare, then your expected value of the applecare purchase is higher than the cost which suggests you should buy it. If it's exactly equal to or below the cost of applecare, you should not buy it.
My MBP was $1799. I purchased Applecare for it for $205. Intuitively, I deduced that my MBP had a probable failure rate of greater than 11.4%. If Applecare costs $500, I probably wouldn't have purchased it. If you owned a company with 20,000 macs, you exploit the law of large numbers and Applecare is no longer your best option. You'd save money paying for repairs in cash.
There ya go.
To be clear, if you are not going to keep your computer longer then a year then it is not worth it. It increases resale value, but, you are not going to recover the investment.
whoops... didn't realize there were so many!
I didn't know you could wait to purchase it- I thought you had to buy the Applecare at the time you bought the computer. That's why I was confused when people were asking about ebay and such. So bottom line- you can wait and not even buy Applecare through Apple?
I didn't know you could wait to purchase it- I thought you had to buy the Applecare at the time you bought the computer. That's why I was confused when people were asking about ebay and such. So bottom line- you can wait and not even buy Applecare through Apple?
Yes, you can most def. wait. You have until one year from the purchase date to buy it. I would not buy it off eBay, if you are a student you can get it for $183 in the edu store, which is pretty cheap. eBay has numerous problems, a lot of which are covered here. If you are not a student, I'd get it from L.A. Computer, you can get it for around the same price as the EDU Store.
You have to buy it within 1 year of purchasing your Mac. Yes, you can buy Applecare from 3rd party resellers. Beware of eBay! Amazon.com has Applecare for a little cheaper than Apple.
Apple Student Price: $183
Amazon: $190
The OP's name seems to indicate she might be a student and a female.
Yeah it's $250 through Apple and my school is not much cheaper than that. I hope to use my computer for a long time (I had a Dell and it just died on me last week), so I guess it would make sense to cough up the extra money. I have less than a year left of school, but in that year I'll probably put it through a lot. That's why I've been undecided on buying the extra warranty.
Glad I found this forum though- you guys are really helpful!
Glad I found this forum though- you guys are really helpful!
I can't believe nobody's mentioned L.A. Computer Company yet, who has the Applecare for Macbooks at only $180.
It's worth the peace of mind
(I bought A/C on my Mac Pro, actually...because if a Xeon dies, that's a BIG expense, and because I got it clearance priced when CompUSA went out...I think it was like $120.)
It's worth the peace of mind
(I bought A/C on my Mac Pro, actually...because if a Xeon dies, that's a BIG expense, and because I got it clearance priced when CompUSA went out...I think it was like $120.)yes
i think that Apple care is worth it for anything portable. My sisters had broken once within the first year of having her macbook and was replaced free of charge. She didnt buy apple care though and shes already had to replace her hard drive again (cost her the equivalent of $100) and is currently experiencing problems with her dvd drive. Apple is charging the equivalent of $30 just to have the disk in it removed and if the drive is really broken, it will cost her even more. if she had bought apple care, all these things would be fixed by apple free of charge.
Buy Applecare and you could save a lot of money.
i think that Apple care is worth it for anything portable. My sisters had broken once within the first year of having her macbook and was replaced free of charge. She didnt buy apple care though and shes already had to replace her hard drive again (cost her the equivalent of $100) and is currently experiencing problems with her dvd drive. Apple is charging the equivalent of $30 just to have the disk in it removed and if the drive is really broken, it will cost her even more. if she had bought apple care, all these things would be fixed by apple free of charge.
Buy Applecare and you could save a lot of money.
That's the wrong idea; unless AppleCare is free, it's not that these latter repairs would have been competed free of charge; in all cases you prepaid for repairs.
That said, AppleCare is still a good buy; I've had my motherboard replaced, computer exchanged.
okay i don't think i did a good job in explaining my point =P yes, it wouldn't have been free because you're still playing for the applecare, but any repairs that exceed the cost of apple care would be free.
it's only an extra 2 years, not 3......it's a 2 year extension that totals 3 years from the day you bought the computer
and the odds are you wont use it, most people don't.....but if having to pay for a major repair would be a financial disaster, then maybe it's worth it
I mentioned it
. To make sure everyone is clear, L.A. Computer's pricing is usually the same or virtually the same as the EDU Store.My odds say I'd use it. Power Chargers, batteries, etc. If you are keeping it for three years, $90 a year is fully worth it.
Well, I bought my Applecare off eBay for $163. All the seller did was e-mail me the code (which is all you really need) and I just went to the applecare website to activate it, which worked perfectly. So as long as you buy from an eBay seller that has a greater than 98% feedback, you should be fine.
Agreed, my harddrive crashed on my iMac, took it in to my local Apple store and it was replaced and back on my desk the same day.
It is extra 2 years on top of the 1 year warranty that is given for all Apple hardware. And yes, it will be well worth it if you need to use it even once. And if you don't have to, you have bought some peace of mind for few years
if you know you tend to be unlucky, then that would be another reason to buy it
My logic board broke on my MacBook Pro and Apple replaced it for free. The cost of AppleCare was definitely worth it in my case as I saved hundreds of dollars. Just the piece of mind I had was enough to make AppleCare worth it to me as well, but in the end, is when you will truly know if AppleCare was worth it or not based on if you got any use out of it.