my apple care for my early macbook pro 2011 is coming to an end in like few weeks. what are some things i should look for? also, one of my keyboard keys is kinda loose and messed up but its one of them that i never really use. is this covered under apple care?
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apple care coming to end, what are things i should inspect for?
- Thread starter pcomac
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Are you thinking about extending your Apple Care? I'm not a big fan of extended warranties but I think AC is a good deal.
-P
Ah, I think if you are a student it is $250-ish and if not maybe $350. I cannot check Apple's site at the moment but you can look up AppleCare on their site. I think it is a good deal.
-P
You could run Prime 95 and memtest to check for errors/issues. You can check your battery to make sure it has 0 signs of bloating. If it's not charging fully that would be another thing to note. I'm not sure what else. Applecare to me is common because laptops in general, including all of those made by Apple, have a high rate of problems. I'm not really convinced it's worth plopping $200 more down on a 13" at this point. You're looking at possibly more than 20% of its current value. You should check used pricing in your area. Student pricing on the newest 13" is $1100. You can always buy it with a credit card that extends the warranty a year if you have one (people on here mention AMEX frequently). I don't suggest leaving it on there, but there's no reason you can't do this and pay it off right away. If the 13" goes for $800-900 in your area on CL or something like that, why not do that?
2012 wasn't an enormous bump, but the HD4000 is a good step up. The slowest 2012 13" cpu model outpaces the fastest 2011 13" by a small margin(so no reason to go higher). USB3 finally made it into the damn system, and that is a big one.
Anyway these are just my thoughts. Either way someone will be using that computer whether it's you or another person. I'm just not big on paying $200 to extend the warranty on something currently worth in the realm of $800-900. Apple charges way too much for their extended warranties relative to many other brands. Just for reference, the late 2011 13" 2.4 i5 (i5 vs i7 means very little in the laptop range) is $929 in the refurbished section with a year warranty. You would pay roughly $200 to extend yours an additional 2 years. With that said, I have seen many parts break as the internals break just like any other computer. When it comes to sourcing parts, consumer electronics always come down to cost cutting somewhere.
http://www.squaretrade.com/laptop-reliability-1109/
It doesn't tell you everything. As an example Asus shows a low repair rate. Many of their computers are supposedly quite reliable, yet they have a terrible reputation for warranty service if you do need it. Square Trade is a company that does third party warranties. They're sometimes discussed on the forum. The link has an available pdf although I didn't link right to it. That pdf report has been referenced multiple times on here.
2012 wasn't an enormous bump, but the HD4000 is a good step up. The slowest 2012 13" cpu model outpaces the fastest 2011 13" by a small margin(so no reason to go higher). USB3 finally made it into the damn system, and that is a big one.
Anyway these are just my thoughts. Either way someone will be using that computer whether it's you or another person. I'm just not big on paying $200 to extend the warranty on something currently worth in the realm of $800-900. Apple charges way too much for their extended warranties relative to many other brands. Just for reference, the late 2011 13" 2.4 i5 (i5 vs i7 means very little in the laptop range) is $929 in the refurbished section with a year warranty. You would pay roughly $200 to extend yours an additional 2 years. With that said, I have seen many parts break as the internals break just like any other computer. When it comes to sourcing parts, consumer electronics always come down to cost cutting somewhere.
http://www.squaretrade.com/laptop-reliability-1109/
It doesn't tell you everything. As an example Asus shows a low repair rate. Many of their computers are supposedly quite reliable, yet they have a terrible reputation for warranty service if you do need it. Square Trade is a company that does third party warranties. They're sometimes discussed on the forum. The link has an available pdf although I didn't link right to it. That pdf report has been referenced multiple times on here.