Apple sent me a scratched Snow Leopard disc (with pictures)

[namtuo]

EDIT:

I obviously didn't choose my words correctly because everyone would rather pick apart what I said and did rather than acknowledging that...

Apple sent me a scratched Snow Leopard disc.

These things do happen so make sure you always backup your data and always check the disc before you put it in your computer. Even if its from a company you love and trust.

ORIGINAL POST:

So Snow Leopard arrived today and without wasting any time I popped the install dvd into my macbook and begun the process. It was all fine and dandy until I got toward the end of the installation. Everything suddenly stopped installing. The load bar just hung. And it kept hanging for an hour or more... Eventually I decided to call Apple. A guy in tech support told me to try shutting down and resuming the installation, so I did. However when I turned my macbook back on I got nothing. No resumed install... Just a blank white screen. Followed five or ten minutes later by a blinking folder icon with a question mark in it. The Apple tech told me "this was bad" and asked me to pop my original leopard install dvd into my macbook so we could repair the permissions. To our surprise when I ran the utility on my Machintosh HD there were no permissions to repair. There was nothing that could be done other than a clean install. The faulty Snow Leopard dvd had trashed my partition and everything in it. Wow...

I ejected the Snow Leopard install dvd to examine it. Surprise! It was scratched. Not a small scratch. Big ring-like scratches all over the install dvd. It looked like a vinyl record. My disc drive has never done this to a disc and afterwards I tried it on a few CD's to make sure... They came out fine. So the conclusion we reached was... Apple sent me a scratched disc. NICE!

So apparently they're sending me a new Snow Leopard dvd. In five or ten days... But that doesn't ease the pain of me having to restore all my apps and files.

I decided to post this for two reasons...

1.) I want to call Apple out on this. It was very lame of them and they haven't offered to compensate me in any way for the trouble that was caused by this.

2.) Advice... Always check a disc before you put it in your drive.

 

[iBookG4user]

That really stinks, I hope that you can get the new disk quickly! And I would agree, always check an important disk before putting it in your computer.

 

[calderone]

I don't see any scratches.

How should Apple compensate you?

 

[namtuo]

I don't see any scratches.

How should Apple compensate you?

Are you kidding? Do you not see the rings on the second picture? Those aren't natural! I can take another picture if anyone else has trouble seeing them.

As for compensation, anything would be nice. A t-shirt, some stickers, a hug! They could have at least given my replacement copy over-night shipping but they said they wouldn't.

 

[calderone]

Are you kidding? Do you not see the rings on the second picture? Those aren't natural! I can take another picture if anyone else has trouble seeing them.

As for compensation, anything would be nice. A t-shirt, some stickers, a hug! They could have at least given my replacement copy over-night shipping but they said they wouldn't.

I thought the rings were from a typical point and shoot camera lens. They don't appear to be "scratches" though. Abnormalities? Yes. Scratches? No. That is not to say your disc isn't messed up.

Is that a UTD? You want them to compensate you for something you paid $9.95 for?

 

[BlackiBook]

I also do not see scratches, those lines look normal to me! But I am not trying to say the disk isn't messed up!

 

[namtuo]

I thought the rings were from a typical point and shoot camera lens. They don't appear to be "scratches" though. Abnormalities? Yes. Scratches? No. That is not to say your disc isn't messed up.

Is that a UTD? You want them to compensate you for something you paid $9.95 for?

Compensation would be for the headache of having to recover my files and the days of work I lost. And I'm not trying to make a big deal about it. I'm just saying it would be nice of them.

The scratches are all around the disc. Its hard to see on a webcam. This is another shot.

 

[calderone]

Compensation would be for the headache of having to recover my files and the days of work I lost. And I'm not trying to make a big deal about it. I'm just saying it would be nice of them.

A headache you could have avoided by properly backing up you data. And if your work was critical, I think you could have waited until a better time to upgrade.

I simply don't see how you can get upset when you clearly set yourself up for disaster.

 

[Switz213]

Yeah, well it would be nice if you gave me 500 bucks, but I'm not whining over it. It would be nice of you, though.

 

[namtuo]

I didn't post this to get compensation or sympathy. At this point its all I can do. And considering a major company known for good products and customer support did this I fell I SHOULD say something. I would rather be playing with Snow Leopard right now but I can't.

For god sakes. Apple sent me a defective OS X install dvd! How are you putting all the blame on me? Sure, I don't backup every single day and maybe I should have looked at the disc before I put it in my computer... But I took a leap of faith and assumed everything would go well. And really, everything should have gone well... Companies shouldn't be sending out damaged product.

 

[MRU]

Welcome to LIFE™

Apple sent me a scratched disc. NICE!

You did not check the disc, so that is only your 'assumption'. Proving that would be another matter entirely.

It was very lame of them and they haven't offered to compensate me

I didn't post this to get compensation or sympathy.

Mirror mirror on the wall... Who's the most schizophrenic poster of all j/k

Seriously these things happen. You lost a few hours of your life. It's not like you lost a limb

 

[Sun Baked]

It's great you don't need or want compensation or sympathy.

People tend not to like my form of delivery for the sympathy they complain and whine about wanting.

Especially since it involves smacking them around with a sack full of wet noodles.

 

[niuniu]

I will send a T-Shirt. But really, next time, backup. There's no excuse for not backing up, for many of us, our businesses would collapse if we lost our data, and there's no compensation available for that - your life, your responsibility.

Lesson learned the hard way, but that's usually worthwhile in the end.

 

[namtuo]

Welcome to LIFE™

You did not check the disc, so that is only your 'assumption'. Proving that would be another matter entirely.

Mirror mirror on the wall... Who's the most schizophrenic poster of all j/k

Seriously these things happen. You lost a few hours of your life. It's not like you lost a limb

I did check the disc. After it trashed my files. It is indeed scratched... I wish I had a dsrl camera instead of an isight so I could show everyone how badly its scratched.

I know these things happen. However it sucks and posting about it is all I can do. This community obviously isn't on my side. You guys would rather pick apart the words I've used instead of acknowledging the actual issue.

When I'm shopping around for a product I look at forums like these. In the hope that if there are any issues people will have posted about them. Even if I'm the only one this has happened to, as a potential customer I would want to read something like this. Please don't turn this into a flame war about how I didn't do a million and one things to protect myself from a faulty disc. The fact of the matter is... They sent me a faulty disc. I would have posted about it regardless of what it did to my files or how Apple compensated me.

 

[namtuo]

I will send a T-Shirt. But really, next time, backup. There's no excuse for not backing up, for many of us, our businesses would collapse if we lost our data, and there's no compensation available for that - your life, your responsibility.

Lesson learned the hard way, but that's usually worthwhile in the end.

I couldn't agree more. I think someone learns more from failure than success.

I do backup my files. However not everyday. From now on I'll back up right before I install an OS.

 

[chrono1081]

Just send it back and get a replacement.

Apple didn't do this maliciously. With any type of mass produced anything this stuff happens.

Also I can't see what scratches your talking about : / One thing you will want to do though with your new disk is make an image of it first. I do this all the time. If your image doesn't pass then something may be wrong with the disk.

 

[arkitect]

So Snow Leopard arrived today and without wasting any time I popped the install dvd into my macbook and begun the process.

By wasting time I assume you meant:
"and without doing any backups of (at the very least) my most important files…"

 

[namtuo]

By wasting time I assume you meant:
"and without doing any backups of (at the very least) my most important files…"

I do backup, just not everyday. And I took a leap of faith not backing up before I tried to install Snow Leopard. However like I've tried to stress. That isn't what this is about.

 

[cruelmemory]

Apple claims that this shouldn't have happened if your disc was defective:

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2951

I just find it interesting that one of the new features for the installer failed like this.. then again, maybe this feature was scratched off of the disc...

 

[maflynn]

So apparently they're sending me a new Snow Leopard dvd. In five or ten days... But that doesn't ease the pain of me having to restore all my apps and files.

I decided to post this for two reasons...

1.) I want to call Apple out on this. It was very lame of them and they haven't offered to compensate me in any way for the trouble that was caused by this.

2.) Advice... Always check a disc before you put it in your drive.

Stuff happens, and apple shouldn't need to compensate you. They're rectifying the situation, personally would have headed over to an apple store and got a replacement from them.

While its a hassle to do a restore, I'd really not define it as pain and they need to compensate you for your troubles. Its kind of silly to ask for money/stuff from apple when a 24 dollar dvd came scratched.

 

[namtuo]

Its kind of silly to ask for money/stuff from apple when a 24 dollar dvd came scratched.

For the last time that isn't the point of this thread... If I really wanted compensation from Apple I would have sent these pictures to them. All I said was that it would have been nice of them (good customer support) to do something for me. But its no big deal, I'm over it.

Fact is Apple sent me a bad disc. If this is a problem people should be aware and I ended that post by saying "Always check your disc".

I don't know why on forums people take one little thing you say, blow it out of proportion and try to make it the topic at hand.

 

[bradmurray]

I am in a similar boat. I received my $9.95 DVD on the 1st. I put it in to start the install and it said it was going to take about 45 minutes. So I got up from the chair and put the laptop (new MBP15) on the chair. I went back a few minutes late to check and it said the disk was unreadable - clean and try again. I did and got the same error. When I looked at it it looked exactly the same as yours. If they don't all look like that my guess is that the movement of the laptop while spinning the DVD trashed it which from what I've read used to be a problem, but isn't supposed to be anymore. I was fortunate that it failed early enough that I am still able to run Leopard, but now I am nervous about actually doing the upgrade. Are these slot-load DVD drives that terrible? The DVD drive is a Matshita UJ-868.

My other larger complaint is that the support call took about 30 minutes (mostly me waiting for them to log stuff) and I never received an email confirmation of the case. The case number he gave me is not in the system so I had to call and wait another 30 minutes for them to find it. The original support person told me the replacement would be shipped out overnight and I would have it today. When the finally found the case today they said it was shipped out regular mail and they don't have the ability to overnight it so I get to wait 6-10 business days to receive it.

If I had known it would take me so long from release date to get this I would have bought it at the store for $25. Of course I didn't know they would be selling it for less than Apple does until it was released and my order was already shipped.

All in all this was a terrible support experience from a company that is supposed to be pretty good at support.

 

[namtuo]

I am in a similar boat....

Normally I would have blamed this on movement as well. However my macbook (which I've only had for a couple of months) was sitting perfectly still the entire time.

I also had some trouble with the customer support however I think that was only because its a rare issue. Usually Apple customer support is top-notch.

 

[czcczc]

How to scratch a CD/DVD with a MacBook Pro

Insert your AOL CD in the MacBook Pro.
Wait for the high pitch spinning sound.
Hold you Macbook Pro and pivot it around different axis.
You'll hear a scratching sound.
Eject the CD, and look at the pretty scratch rings.

Moral of the story, don't move your MacBook Pro when you're using the optical drive!

I don't think Apple is at fault here, it's simple physics.

 

[bradmurray]

I have had plenty of laptops before that have never done anything like this. I have also had CD Walkmen that had no problem with physics and that was 15 years ago. If this happens anytime the drive is in motion and you move the laptop, Apple is ignoring a serious design flaw. This is a laptop, not a desktop.

Here's the real kicker - Apple told me they sent a replacement overnight on the 5th and I still have nothing. Fortunately I gave up waiting and borrowed an upgrade disc from somebody else.