They seem to care more about getting children customers now. If they get children hooked to Apple products, when these kids grow up they will remain Apple customers. Those who grew up with Apple may not buy as much as these kids.
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Apple Launches Repair Program for Faulty MacBook and MacBook Pro Keyboards
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They seem to care more about getting children customers now. If they get children hooked to Apple products, when these kids grow up they will remain Apple customers. Those who grew up with Apple may not buy as much as these kids.
Not really. When you strip out the VAT (sales tax) of 20% which goes straight to the Government, the difference really isn't that huge.
UK consumer law gives protection up to 6 years, depending on a range of factors and what is deemed reasonable. A laptop wouldn't be covered for 6 years. It would however be reasonable to expect a £1200 laptop to last more than 1-2 years.
20% sales tax! Yikes!!! Well I guess on the bright side you all at least have decent health care. Lol. The sales tax rate here in Texas (United States) is 8.5%
Yes they have good service, but if I am to keep this machine beyond the 4 years Apple will cover keyboard repairs for, this will still leave me exposed for an expensive out of warranty repair. Even after this program announced by Apple, I will probably not keep this machine for longer than its AppleCare coverage. I'm still curious to see what they have in store for the Mac Pro. If they do that one right, I'll buy one of those for my office machine, and get a MacBook Adorable for home/travel.
Better grab a small vacuum just in case!
Don't hold your breath. I'm still waiting for a redesigned MacPro ;-).
If your keyboard blows out after the 4 year coverage period, you'd be out of your mind to want an out of warranty repair. On a 4 year old machine, I'm not sure if I'd even be willing to pay for a discounted repair. That's money I'd rather put toward a new machine and by that point, an entry level MacBook would basically have reached parity with your old MBP.
If a few keyboard switches is the only thing that blows out on you on a laptop after 4 years, life is pretty good. You can at least pull out an external keyboard and stretch out the life of your machine. I'm much more worried about the logic board frying or the screen developing a short because you're pretty much done if that happens to a 4 year old machine.
Mini vaccuums are quite popular amongst mechanical keyboard enthusiasts because "board chow" has shortened the life of many a fine keyboard.
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It's refreshing to find an optimist once in a while.
I'm secretly hoping that the keyboard on my 2016 utterly fails across the board a month before my AC runs out so I can get a new keyboard and battery.
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I know this was the state before the program. I thought it would make sense for them to wait with the repair program until they have a 2018 keyboard model ready.
I have a long-haired dog and cat. I never have to "blow out" my 2015 MBP keyboard.
Same thing happened to me, 2016 replaced with a 2017 top case. I'm guessing if the issues arise again, they will be replacing with a 2018 top case, which is even better, hopefully.
It'll remain to be seen what the fix in the 2018 would be. Apple have an excuse now to completely refresh as we've had 3 iterations of the Retina MacBook version of the keyboard. A third generation keyboard (with gaskets?) might be a fix going forward but Apple would still have to make the 2017 model parts if the 2018 model is sufficiently different to be incompatible.
If the 2018 MacBook Pro is a complete resign then Apple's solution to faulty 2017 keyboards would be... to fit another one and hope for the best
Hardly a fact, bud. My experience getting my keyboard fixed was a royal pain in the arse and incredibly drawn out. Without a doubt I've had much better experiences elsewhere.
My experience is directly the opposite, and they replaced the top without any hassle. They tried to replace a few keys first, I wasn’t satisfied so they just replaced the top. Perhaps you were just unlucky.
Hmm, is reverse true? If I replace the battery I will get new keyboard for free? I don't know if they will apply free keyboard replacement to my MacBook but I also need a new battery
I have a logetich keyboard that is over 10 years old. Still working as it should. I have 10 years laptop and the keyboard works fine. 3 years old laptop should not have wear and tear on keyboard, this is just ridiculous.
This is pure bad design and Apple denies it. This is effectively saying to customers, you are the one to blame when the keyboard stopped working. You have to pay up for the bad design, because guess what, warranty is gone.
I have never in 30 years of computing had a keyboard fail on me outside of spilling beer on it.
Ever.
Even cheap garbage $15 external keyboards. Over the period of many years. I still had an original IBM Model M that still worked back in the early 2000s. DIN plug and all. It never died. It just became irrelevant due to the wrong connectivity on it. I wish i'd kept it in hindsight.
Keyboards are expected to work, and keep working. We've been able to make reliable keyboards for 30 plus years, one that breaks this often is simply inexcusable.
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I work in an ASP and can throw in there, for what it's worth (as others have mentioned), that the part number for the 2017/2016 MBP top cases are the same, so if you have a 2016 MBP and you have this issue, at least, you'll be getting a 2017 top case. If you have a 2017 model, well...
Anecdotally, we haven't yet had a 2017 model come in with a keyboard issue. We also haven't had a MacBook come in for a while, so I could be wrong, but I think the top case for this guy is only the same for the 2016/2017, leaving the first-ten 2015 out of luck. Frankly, the first-gen MacBook is the most finicky out of the bunch.
There is actually a stop-gap measure before an entire top-case replacement, and that's to replace the keycap in question. However, if that doesn't work, or if the mechanism breaks, there's no choice but a top case replacement.
I honestly wonder if this might be the most costly repair program for Apple, followed by the "Staingate" LCDs. Replacing the LCD (clamshell) may not be that costly from Apple's perspective, but they designed themselves into a corner where the top case is concerned. The top case is pretty much the whole computer except the display (clamshell), logic board, and bottom case (the cover). So the top case includes the battery, keyboard, the trackpad, (taptic engine), speakers, and the touch bar/touch ID (on touch bar models). This may be 1/2 to 1/4 of the machine's cost.
You can't reuse batteries after you unglue them (safety concern), and even if you salvage all the other parts of the top case, how much time does it take to unfasten and fasten a new keyboard, with its hundreds of tiny, single use screws? It might be faster just to assemble a new shell and keyboard from scratch. But again, the problem is all these components that are glued down to the top case—namely the touch bar.
I highly doubt, at least for now, that those with 2016/2017 models will continue to only get 2017 top cases. I think there is a 2018 top case in the works that will be compatible with the 2016/2017 models and will eventually flow into the repair channel after the 2018 models are released. So, a rev 3. The way they're designed, the top case and the logic board are the most costly components of the Mac, so to have a replacement program that constantly replaces them with the same flaw doesn't seem financially viable to me.
As others have mentioned, this might also be why we haven't seen any 2018 models yet. However, 2018 models are almost a certainty IMO, given that most PCs are just now launching with the 8th Gen Intel processors. Quad-core processors on a 12" laptop? 6-core, i9 processors on a 14"+ laptop? PCs this year are going to leave Macs behind in the dust if they don't move to the newer Intel CPUs by the end of the year.
Anecdotally, we haven't yet had a 2017 model come in with a keyboard issue. We also haven't had a MacBook come in for a while, so I could be wrong, but I think the top case for this guy is only the same for the 2016/2017, leaving the first-ten 2015 out of luck. Frankly, the first-gen MacBook is the most finicky out of the bunch.
There is actually a stop-gap measure before an entire top-case replacement, and that's to replace the keycap in question. However, if that doesn't work, or if the mechanism breaks, there's no choice but a top case replacement.
I honestly wonder if this might be the most costly repair program for Apple, followed by the "Staingate" LCDs. Replacing the LCD (clamshell) may not be that costly from Apple's perspective, but they designed themselves into a corner where the top case is concerned. The top case is pretty much the whole computer except the display (clamshell), logic board, and bottom case (the cover). So the top case includes the battery, keyboard, the trackpad, (taptic engine), speakers, and the touch bar/touch ID (on touch bar models). This may be 1/2 to 1/4 of the machine's cost.
You can't reuse batteries after you unglue them (safety concern), and even if you salvage all the other parts of the top case, how much time does it take to unfasten and fasten a new keyboard, with its hundreds of tiny, single use screws? It might be faster just to assemble a new shell and keyboard from scratch. But again, the problem is all these components that are glued down to the top case—namely the touch bar.
I highly doubt, at least for now, that those with 2016/2017 models will continue to only get 2017 top cases. I think there is a 2018 top case in the works that will be compatible with the 2016/2017 models and will eventually flow into the repair channel after the 2018 models are released. So, a rev 3. The way they're designed, the top case and the logic board are the most costly components of the Mac, so to have a replacement program that constantly replaces them with the same flaw doesn't seem financially viable to me.
As others have mentioned, this might also be why we haven't seen any 2018 models yet. However, 2018 models are almost a certainty IMO, given that most PCs are just now launching with the 8th Gen Intel processors. Quad-core processors on a 12" laptop? 6-core, i9 processors on a 14"+ laptop? PCs this year are going to leave Macs behind in the dust if they don't move to the newer Intel CPUs by the end of the year.
You say that, but right now i have a 2015 machine that i don't want to "upgrade" from because
1. it performs just fine
2. the new machines are worse for my usage.
My machine is pretty similar to the models from 2013-2014 other than the slightly more efficient CPU. If i had a 2013-2014 model that still worked like this I'd also not want to replace it with new.
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Yup.
I have 2 cats. I've never had to blow out mine either.
If a keyboard can not deal with real world conditions without breaking when the status quo for every other machine on the market is that they can, it is defective.
It isn't people using it wrong, it isn't people treating the machine too roughly, it is a design flaw resulting in a device that is "not fit for purpose".
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It's definitely still a thing. A long term apple user friend (electrical engineer/programmer) bought a current model 15" touchbar in march 2018, and he's already had to have a replacement.
He doesn't eat in front of his machine, he doesn't use it in a particularly dirty environment, etc. His previous 2011 15" machine was still working after GPU repair.
He's been an Apple user for decades - also has a 2008 iMac that is still working fine. However this machine along with some other macOS changes have had him looking at Linux (on PC hardware) as an option for what he does (software development, with Windows in a VM if required), just last week.
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