Beyond relieved that my 2017 MacBook Pro isn’t included in this. I’m a college student and can’t do without my computer and I’m glad I don’t need to worry about losing my files and pictures.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Launches SSD Service Program for 13-Inch Non-Touch Bar MacBook Pro Sold Between June 2017 and June 2018
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
It is just greenwashing.I new Apple was trying to boost its TV offering but I have to tell them this is the wrong kind of program
Seems to be every week a new program, screen here, ssd there, keyboard here,batteries there...
Must be a bitch for Apple to have to replace the whole motherboard just to change an SSD. What a waste. Apple touts its green credentials yet look at this debacle.
[doublepost=1541826636][/doublepost]
And little bit of background:
https://www.macworld.com/article/1164533/apples_purchase_of_anobit_would_give_it_a_leg_up_on_rivals.html
"Anobit has produced two generations of its Genesis SSD technology . The intellectual property that sets it apart from other SSD manufacturers is its controller, which uses firmware it calls Memory Signal Processing (MSP), a type of ECC.
Anobit’s MSP technology increases the signal-to-noise ratio, making it possible to continue reading data even as electrical interference rises. The MSP controller technology also extends the endurance of standard consumer-grade multilevel cell (MLC) flash from about 3,000 write/erase cycles to more than 50,000 cycles—making MLC technology suitable for heavy-duty cycle applications, such as relational databases."
Thank goodness its not the touchbar version, because my brother would have a lot of trouble on his hands. This is probably another reason to stay away from the cheap entry level versions of Apple products; Apple never seems to put their heart and soul into it.
Imagine if there was some way of just making that drive user replaceable? That would be something. 
Well, considering the SSD is soldered, I would highly recommend literally nuking (i.e., 7-pass security erase) your SSD before handing it over to Apple. Unless, of course, you don't mind the Geniuses or something else making a backup of your SSD beforehand.... (Sorry, I just don't trust "repair" services, whether from Apple or anyone else.)
What's this going to be called? SSD gate? And the iPhone X with its display problems.
The problems seem to keep piling up. From the speakers to overheating to breathe wrongly and your laptop/phone will probably give up on you. Keyboard is well documented.
At least Apple is owning up and addressing some of the problems.
The problems seem to keep piling up. From the speakers to overheating to breathe wrongly and your laptop/phone will probably give up on you. Keyboard is well documented.
At least Apple is owning up and addressing some of the problems.
The only thing a multi-pass “security erase” will do for an SSD is shorten its lifespan quicker. Those multi-pass erasure techniques only apply to magnetic media such as HDDs, not SSDs. Writing a bunch of random 1’s and 0’s to an SSD will count toward its TBW spec. Probably not an issue with drives these days having a guarantee of 300+ TBWs, but that’s all you’ll be doing to the SSD with that erase method, after the 1st pass.
An ATA Secure Erase utility will be good enough for an SSD, and is the recommended way to erase them, because you aren’t filing up the cells with 1’s and 0’s (which is still treated as data by the controller.) One command to SSD controller, and *poof* ... the data is usually gone within 10 seconds. There was a time, like 5 or so years ago, where it was not guaranteed with all SSDs, because not every SSD controller out then would respond to the erase command. Those days are long gone now, afaik.
Last edited:
That's only for magnetic media. For NAND, the industry standard way is via physical destruction such as drilling holes through the chips. Another advantage for using replaceable M.2 SSD instead so it doesn't overly complicate the warranty process while having the peace of mind that your data remains private.
The direction that Apple takes is one of cash return. It doesn't matter to Apple that a customer has to pay over a $1000 to have a motherboard replaced when a $100 replacement will do.
Every Apple product is faulty these days. What happened to their QC? Shame on you Apple. I know that Apple fix it for 3-4 years after the buying, but still sucks.
And/or have many degrees of physical backups. Internal RAID, external rolling backup, local-network backup (possibly in a fire proof safe), cloud clone of absolutely irreplicable data, an off-site physical copy swapped weekly or sooner on a major break through.They get the darwin award instead
In all seriousness, anyone doing research will have the data stored on a backed up network drive. Your measly SSD won't hold much research data.
Too bad Apple makes the first difficulty.
Well, Apple could, but the Apple Genius' read the comments in the MacRumors Forums and have decided that allowing users to perform a firmware update would be far too risky.
Apple makes a lot of things easier, but that doesn't negate that Apple makes a lot of things more difficult. Especially when that thing is related to repair. I guess Apple isn't very good at design.
It doesn't matter if you loose that or just a personal photo, it's data and it's always a disaster.
IOW, what you say is nonsense.
...and why isn't this just a user-installable firmware upgrade??????
I get it, a downloadable upgrade that might wipe the SSD is a bit of a danger, but I imagine Apple could get their considerable UX experts on the task of ensuring anyone who's running the update must jump through some real hoops to acknowledge that their data will be wiped...
In systems as complex as modern PCs, mistakes can happen. I'm not upset at Apple (or their SSD suppliers) for this (although admittedly when it comes to user data, QC should be paramount) but I do think it's pretty crappy to require you to haul yourself to an Apple store just so some drone can install a firmware update.
But hey, in some alternate universe, Apple is shipping out replacement SSDs to their customers, along with tools, instructions and a Thunderbolt-to-SSD enclosure to make the replacement process painless. Oh, and they're giving you the firmware update anyway and letting you keep the Thunderbolt enclosure and the original SSD as compensation for the inconvenience. (I can dream, I guess...)
I get it, a downloadable upgrade that might wipe the SSD is a bit of a danger, but I imagine Apple could get their considerable UX experts on the task of ensuring anyone who's running the update must jump through some real hoops to acknowledge that their data will be wiped...
In systems as complex as modern PCs, mistakes can happen. I'm not upset at Apple (or their SSD suppliers) for this (although admittedly when it comes to user data, QC should be paramount) but I do think it's pretty crappy to require you to haul yourself to an Apple store just so some drone can install a firmware update.
But hey, in some alternate universe, Apple is shipping out replacement SSDs to their customers, along with tools, instructions and a Thunderbolt-to-SSD enclosure to make the replacement process painless. Oh, and they're giving you the firmware update anyway and letting you keep the Thunderbolt enclosure and the original SSD as compensation for the inconvenience. (I can dream, I guess...)
There's probably more to this than a simple Firmware update.
I bought my ntb in Jan 2017 and the SSD/logic board failed and had to be replaced in Feb 2017 (thankfully Best Buy covered the repairs). I wonder how accurate June actually is.
You should always be worried about losing data and backup regularly. An SSD or HDD can fail at any time.
Apple hardware really is starting to become a lottey.
#sadtimes
#sadtimes
my drive already failed while updating to Mojave. They ended up replacing the SSD but also the logic board! The guy said even though the SSD was separate that it might be paired to the logic board (some sort of software lock possibly I have no idea maybe he didn't know what he was talking about)
Sorry but this is horrible advice. If you can’t trust a manufacturer to put out products that work consistently across the board, then you can’t trust that manufacturer, period. It seems you’re trying to justify something else.
And I don’t know where you’re coming from with “cheap entry level versions” - this is the MacBook Pro, I.e. their best, most premium line of computers. Using your metrics the iPhone X, w-high had a recall issued just yesterday, is a cheap entry level version, and so are all versions of the MacBook Pro Retina since 2013, since those were recalled as well.
If anything, the “cheap entry versions” of Apple products are the most reliable since they use tried and true technology (see iPhone SE, old MacBook Air).
Damn, my MBP is eligible for this. A bit crazy having data loss is the worst that can happen although I back up my important files..
