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The sole reason I never bought a Macbook for almost ten years.
You realize that they were produced for less than 5 years in total, right? (less than 4 years if you don't count the 12-inch MacBook, because - who does).
Yeah sure, the 1st gen retina MacBook Pros (2012-15) had their own set of issues (staingate, faulty trackpad cables) but I don't know about any pressing trouble with new Macs after 2020.
 
they'll pay an hour of Genius Bar worker @ $16/hr + hour of labor @ $16/hr + parts + shipping of parts + inventory storage + brand damage + lower demand for the product. for what? for a chance at a user encountering a malfunction *after* warranty ends just so that they have to upgrade to the newest product?

does not make financial sense.
You seem to not be able to see the forest for the trees here, economically speaking.

First off, you're assuming that most people who buy Apple products also buy AppleCare and keep it current. They don't. The majority of computers that come in for repairs are not under warranty. Outside of situations like this (where Apple screws up so royally that they have to extend the warranty on their own dime), Apple isn't paying the Genius bar guy $16/hr plus the cost of parts. The customer is paying all of those costs plus very healthy mark-up.

Secondly, those computers that are under AppleCare beyond the first year are only still covered under warranty because the customer is paying for the extended warranty. For every computer that comes in for an extended warranty repair, there are probably twenty that never require a covered repair. Making computers non-user-serviceable is a great incentive to get people to pay for extra warranty coverage. Extended warranties have been a famously lucrative hustle in the electronics business for far longer than you and I have been alive.

And Thirdly - there are other economic benefits to making their computers non-reparable, not the least of which is reduced manufacturing and parts inventory cost. That benefit alone far outstrips any economic loss Apple sees by having to pay a few highschool kids to replace a defective keyboard once in a while.
 
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Out of how many laptops? 2 can be a big or small number relative to others. Just curious.

I really didn't like the keyboard and had a "sticky" key after just a few months. Never liked that keyboard.
We had about 150 laptops with the butterfly keyboard. Most were 2018s.
 
I don’t know, the Macbook Pros had faulty gpus for five-six years, my 2011 mbp had 5 logic board switches in 2 years. The laptops always have some major flaw. Airs have been less prone to breaking than pros.
2011 MBP GPU failure is a good contender, but it was really only isolated to one year. Butterfly was 2016-2019.
 
2011 MBP GPU failure is a good contender, but it was really only isolated to one year. Butterfly was 2016-2019.
The same gpu issues ran from 2010 to around 2015-16 if I recall correctly. All the models that had nvidia gpus.
 
The same gpu issues ran from 2010 to around 2015-16 if I recall correctly. All the models that had nvidia gpus.
Not exactly.

Unibody Macs were the height of my repair days. I had a decent clientele and managed to get stacks of laptops for pennies from a surplus place pretty frequently.


2010 Nvidia GT 330 - Some issues, pretty minimal
2011 AMD Radeon 6490/6750/6770. Almost guaranteed failure on 6750/6770.
2012 Nvidia GT 650 -no issues
late12/early13 Nvidia GT 650 - Some issues that can be repaired/resolved with tape in-between GPU/CPU
2013 GT 750M -Minimal
2014 GT 750M -Some issues
2015 AMD R9 M370X -No issues

A couple bad years but 2011 by far stands out, they did have a whole recall for it and I guarantee you, if you buy a 2011 today and try to run a hard game on it for a years time, that GPU will fail.

All that being said it doesn't even matter lol. GPU problems and keyboard problems sucked.

Best laptops are easily

2012 Unibody
2015 Retina
2019 16" butterfly
All the ARM ones are solid.
 
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Macbook 12 - 2015 owner here, some keys started to act weirdly, or needed to be pressed harder, I was actually quite surprised by how easy it is to remove these keys, clean them, and be good to go again.

I don't understand why so many websites say that the whole keyboard has to be replaced when it happens.
It depends on the situation. If you remove the space bar on at least some of the MBPs, you do have to replace the entire keyboard

And that means you also have to replace the entire top case including the battery

Just horrible design on so many fronts. Environmental, repairability, usability…
 
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I avoided those computers like the plague. I will say, it led me away from Mac keyboards in general and now I'm deep in the mechanical keyboard hobby, so thanks Apple. Of course, the new keyboards on everything they have are great actually. My M2 MBP keyboard is the best laptop keyboard I've ever used, right next to the Thinkpad keyboards in terms of typing experience. For desk use, I'm still going to rock a mechanical keyboard.
 
A keyboard shouldn’t work fine for most people, it should work for everyone. Maybe the last generation was more reliable?
I've had keys on scissor switch Mac keyboards and MacBook keyboards break.


Even apple aknowledged the issue, issued an apology, payed a settlement and dropped the design for good.

Loud minority would do that.
Hardly the thing apple would do if it affected only a few people.

Loud minority + media outrage would affect sales. Affecting sales will cause Apple to change their decisions.
 
As a user of gadgets throughout my life (usually, I barely have issues with something), I can say it definitelly wasn't a small percentage.
You'd need data from more than just yourself to prove that.

Otherwise, I can comfortably state that the MacBook Pro 2012 is the least reliable MacBook of all series considering the amount of Genius Bar visits I've had to do.
 
Apple totally leaves broken keys on display, right?

Literally have google maps location history data to prove my visits. Anyways.

In my case, they absolutely did. On launch day fall '16 I found 2 laptops on display at Apple Carlsbad in San Diego with issues. I noticed this after bringing back my own 13" I picked up that morning with a skipping key. Probably spent a good 30 minutes in the store to put those display devices through their paces as I was alarmed this was happening right out of the box.

One thing to note is it usually only impacted one key - at least to start - and it didn't always occur... sometimes it would be a missed key, sometimes it would double type. Sometimes it would happen like every fifth time you'd hit the key. Sometimes it would happen when the laptop was a bit hot, you could go hours before it would happen then all of a sudden during a meeting it starts happening. So if you're just casually inspecting a machine it could be easy to miss.

That replacement machine I picked up that day required a topcase replacement 6 months later, and yet another a year after that. During that period 2 other engineers in my 40 person startup required replacements for their machines as well. So many pairing sessions someone would be cursing their keyboard, it was ridiculous.

I do believe the 2nd rev greatly ameliorated the issue, the 3rd rev had all but solved it, but the 1st gen was pretty bad. I had a 15" Macbook Pro purchased in 2018 that experienced no issues at all.

Happy to get the settlement check for my hassles.

I've had keys on scissor switch Mac keyboards and MacBook keyboards break.

I've owned computers since '82 and can't recall having a keyswitch failure on any other keyboard. I've been a professional software developer since '98 and have typed 90+ WPM since '92. I have had a keyboard or two die outright from a controller failure but that's a different thing. This includes probably close to 20 laptops (first a Duo 280c in '94) and at least that many desktop keyboards.

I was also a system admin at a startup overseeing 120 machines, including about 20 blackbird Macbooks, in '96-'97 and don't recall any keyswitch failures.

I get that it happens, but IME it is truly a rare event. Unless you're a gamer slamming the living crap out of your keyboard. This was not a rare event in the least. For those keeping count above, that's 7 incidents of failure I personally witnessed vs. none (that I can recall) over a much, much wider set of touchpoints.
 
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Somehow, people in these forums claim they had 100 MBPs with these keyboards and all of them worked…But considering the back lash, this repair program, I highly doubt those stories are true. Heard so many people with the keyboard being replaced twice at least. Same thing with some of my colleagues. Made me buy a refurbished 2015MBP instead.

Plenty of them probably worked ok, also, I know people who had issues and just banged the thing upside down on the table to shake stuff out, etc. i.e., dealt with the problem (that shouldn't have been a problem).

A failure rate of even say 5% is huge. That's still 95% working properly, but hundreds of thousands or millions of machines needing repair.
 
In my case, they absolutely did. On launch day fall '16 I found 2 laptops on display at Apple Carlsbad in San Diego with issues. I noticed this after bringing back my own 13" I picked up that morning with a skipping key. Probably spent a good 30 minutes in the store to put those display devices through their paces as I was alarmed this was happening right out of the box.

One thing to note is it usually only impacted one key - at least to start - and it didn't always occur... sometimes it would be a missed key, sometimes it would double type. Sometimes it would happen like every fifth time you'd hit the key. Sometimes it would happen when the laptop was a bit hot, you could go hours before it would happen then all of a sudden during a meeting it starts happening. So if you're just casually inspecting a machine it could be easy to miss.

That replacement machine I picked up that day required a topcase replacement 6 months later, and yet another a year after that. During that period 2 other engineers in my 40 person startup required replacements for their machines as well. So many pairing sessions someone would be cursing their keyboard, it was ridiculous.

I do believe the 2nd rev greatly ameliorated the issue, the 3rd rev had all but solved it, but the 1st gen was pretty bad. I had a 15" Macbook Pro purchased in 2018 that experienced no issues at all.

Happy to get the settlement check for my hassles.



I've owned computers since '82 and can't recall having a keyswitch failure on any other keyboard. I've been a professional software developer since '98 and have typed 90+ WPM since '92. I have had a keyboard or two die outright from a controller failure but that's a different thing. This includes probably close to 20 laptops (first a Duo 280c in '94) and at least that many desktop keyboards.

I was also a system admin at a startup overseeing 120 machines, including about 20 blackbird Macbooks, in '96-'97 and don't recall any keyswitch failures.

I get that it happens, but IME it is truly a rare event. Unless you're a gamer slamming the living crap out of your keyboard. This was not a rare event in the least. For those keeping count above, that's 7 incidents of failure I personally witnessed vs. none (that I can recall) over a much, much wider set of touchpoints.

- 2 laptops with "issues" - vague.
- You were part of the minority that had issues
- I've had plenty of non-Apple (cherry switches, gateron switches, razor switches) and Apple scissor keyboard fail on me, meanwhile the three butterfly switch devices I've owned worked flawlessly (I still hate how it feels).
- I worked as an IT at a major health insurance company in 2017. zero issues with butterfly switch across the actuarial department.
- I founded a startup a year after that. >30 employees with butterfly switch devices. Zero issues during the entire life of the startup.

really, people who had problems are in the minority.
 
- 2 laptops with "issues" - vague.

One one time - "During that period 2 other engineers in my 40 person startup required replacements for their machines as well."

They were replaced under warranty. There is nothing vague about this. The topic of this thread was a warranty replacement program for this issue. I suggest you read what this program actually covers, because you seem willfully ignorant of what the actual issue is, and it throws all your claims out the window.

Good day.
 
One one time

What?


- "During that period 2 other engineers in my 40 person startup required replacements for their machines as well."

They were replaced under warranty. There is nothing vague about this.

literally vague issues. normally when an issue occurs, people describe the problem. you didn't. it's vague.

example: a key that's been faded (which my 2014 MBP has encountered) could be grounds for a replacement and that has absolutely nothing to do with the butterfly switch mechanism.

when someone fails to explain the issue, it's more than likely they're trying to use that as evidence to support their thesis when in fact, it's just used to inflate numbers which hurts your argument. sorry, I'm just not buying it.

anyways, my sample size seems to outweigh yours and you seem to be ignoring the plethora of issues for non-butterfly keyboards.


The topic of this thread was a warranty replacement program for this issue.

Topic is butterfly switch actually and what I'm talking about is clearly on topic. Maybe you don't want to talk about it anymore, that's fine. Just say so.

Good day. Onwards.
 
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My butterfly keyboard quickly became defective and was repaired for free under Apple's program. The "new" keyboard eventually had exactly the same problem and became unusable, even though I extended its life by becoming an expert on removing keycaps and cleaning the crappy switches. I finally gave in last week and purchased a new M3 MacBook Pro. So Apple ultimately benefitted from its defective keyboard design. Thanks, Apple.
 
I've had keys on scissor switch Mac keyboards and MacBook keyboards break.




Loud minority would do that.


Loud minority + media outrage would affect sales. Affecting sales will cause Apple to change their decisions.
Or maybe you’re wrong and said minority isn’t so minor. No, I don’t have numbers, only the fact that apple did several things they never do. Neither do you, unless you’re apple, which I suspect you’re not.
 
literally vague issues. normally when an issue occurs, people describe the problem. you didn't. it's vague.
"Describe the problem"? As encountered on a couple of floor-display keyboards at an Apple store from eight years ago?

For the record, the person you were responding to did describe the issue they ran into on their own laptops - perhaps you were just too worked up to actually read. I'll bold the important part for you to make it a bit easier:
One thing to note is it usually only impacted one key - at least to start - and it didn't always occur... sometimes it would be a missed key, sometimes it would double type. Sometimes it would happen like every fifth time you'd hit the key. Sometimes it would happen when the laptop was a bit hot, you could go hours before it would happen then all of a sudden during a meeting it starts happening. So if you're just casually inspecting a machine it could be easy to miss.



when someone fails to explain the issue, it's more than likely they're trying to use that as evidence to support their thesis when in fact, it's just used to inflate numbers which hurts your argument. sorry, I'm just not buying it.
"Pics or it didn't happen" - you right now.

I'm not sure why you are spending so much effort trying to discount the lived experience of other people in these comment forums, just to try to support your "it's only a small minority" argument, but this right here is an especially weak line of reasoning. You can "just not buy it" all you want - I don't think any reasonable person here really cares what you do or don't believe at this point.


anyways, my sample size seems to outweigh yours and you seem to be ignoring the plethora of issues for non-butterfly keyboards.

Topic is butterfly switch actually and what I'm talking about is clearly on topic. Maybe you don't want to talk about it anymore, that's fine. Just say so.
"Topic is butterfly switch, actually" - while at the same time, complaining about someone "ignoring the plethora of issues for non-butterfly keyboards". And also trying to turn this into a "my installed base is bigger than yours" style of dick-measuring contest. Really classy.

As Wayne from Letterkenny would say - "clean it up bud".
 
owned 5 butterfly switch devices. have had zero keyboard issues. I actually liked the butterfly switch after getting used to it.
 
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