Apple Says Some 2018 iPad Pros Ship Bent, But It's Normal and Not a Defect

[Shiro_Simba]

if some *but not all* are bent, then, by definition, it's not normal.-

Cook is right now working out how much to charge for this “optional feature” £50 for WiFi only, £100 for 4G model .....

As you implied , clearly there is a fault with the process , though instead of pulling the defect units , Cook has decided to ship them, hoping the customer does not return them - very poor customer experience, but a gamble to satisfy the shareholders - sad - Sadly it’s comments like these that cause companies to take a hit brand reputation wise
[doublepost=1545292016][/doublepost]With statements like these - and seeing the lengths Cook will take Apple to maximise profits, throttle Gate seems more and more like a money saving exercise with upgrade benefits for Apple .

As consumers, everyone with a bend iPad, should return it, is the only way these companies learn, when they see an impact of thier decisions on a financial excel doc

 

[chatin]

The mid-2017 iPad Pro 13 is a work of art. Get the older. better model for a lower price.

 

[ThatGuyInLa]

#$%! you Apple.

 

[Piggie]

every product has tolerances...

Indeed, you are totally correct, I work partly in quality/calibration and myself have to create gauges and other things to specified/official tolerances.

However, the tolerances one would have would be far smaller than anything one could ever detect with the naked eye.
Variations such as this should only be noticeable with some form of checking equipment or extremely close visual examination.

Not something that's easy to notice.

 

[YaBe]

This might be Apple testing foldable iPads in order to beat Samsung

 

[one more]

So they WON'T replace a bent iPad? Are they for real?

The article says they will, within a return window (first 14 days or longer over the holidays).

 

[michelb76]

Imagine your same-price macbook having this and then hearing it's not a defect..lol

 

[MacFather]

Deleted.

 

[44267547]

They’d have been better off saying nothing

This is not the correct answer. Obviously Apple is receiving a lot of feedback on the bent iPad issue, otherwise why would they were respond to the matter ? The point is, if they don’t respond, then it makes it look like they might be hiding something, and if they do respond, it has to be for either (A.)Damage control and (B) Cost savings to slow down the return process by them saying it’s ‘normal’.

The problem is, by Apple saying that this is normal, customers are not going to believe them, because no other iPad has ever exhibited a slight bend in the past. But I think by them saying it’s ‘normal’, is only going to draw way more negative feedback.

 

[Schizoid]

I’m sure the bend will therefore be showing up in Apple’s beautiful marketing videos...

 

[Lone Deranger]

Tim Cook's era where Apple has reached 1 trillion dollars in market valuation, and is the most successful it's ever been by a large margin.
[doublepost=1545289827][/doublepost]
Tim Cook needs to be fired for making Apple break records in financial success?

Bent iPads considered normal. 5 years willful neglect of Mac Pro hardware. ****** laptop keyboards that now have a life-span shorter than the device itself. Cancellation of Time Capsule/Airport Express. Removal of user upgradable/repairable hardware. Apple Cinema Display abandonment. Price hikes across the board..... etc. But hey... Trillion dollar market valuation! A select few very rich people were made even richer! Woohoo!!

 

[Shiro_Simba]

Indeed, you are totally correct, I work partly in quality/calibration and myself have to create gauges and other things to specified/official tolerances.

However, the tolerances one would have would be far smaller than anything one could ever detect with the naked eye.
Variations such as this should only be noticeable with some form of checking equipment or extremely close visual examination.

Not something that's easy to notice.

Well said . After a significant % started to fail the tolerances, management , would have decided to raise them significantly, looking at some of the images, im not sure tolerance testing is any longer part of the process

 

[giffut]

It´s not a manufactoring defect.

The new iPad is structurally ill designed. The aluminium alloy used seems to be too weak compared to its applied thinness for supporting the internals - logic board and battery - and the screen. Any bending has the potential to put stress on those components which may lead to potentially pressure and electrical damage and total loss fast.

Those severe design compromisses are now part of every recent Apple product, consciously obsoleting their longevity while havin exorbitant prices.

It´s a feature, not an error.

 

[WatchFromAfar]

Normally, the Apple Store — online and retail — offers a 14-day return policy on any item sold. For the holidays, the company has expanded this window: If an item was purchased between November 14 and December 25, 2018 you have until January 8, 2019 to return or exchange it.

I can't agree that the return policy is a good thing in this case:

1) It puts the responsibility on the customer to seek out a solution in a constrained time period for Apple's mistake
2) If it comes out of the box bent it was put into the box bent; where's the Quality Control before shipping?
3) The statement implies Apple are willing and knowingly shipping "faulty" products

Doesn't look good.

 

[Malus120]

A bend out of the box is definitely a defect. That's why you get 2 weeks to return the product after you created your click bait YouTube videos and get your money back. No drama!

I mostly agree with what you're saying here .The issue however is that Apple isn't saying "it's a minor defect occurring in a small number of units as a result of the manufacturing process and we'll replace the affected units." they're essentially saying it's normal and that Apple does not consider it to be a defect. I can understand the tension between Apple's desire to mitigate bad PR vs other's desire to hype it, but that doesn't excuse Apple's attempt to sweep it under the rug and shortchange less savvy users.

iPad Pro 2018 are thin products, which is one of the things I love about them. Now I get it that people are thick enough to *dump* them in rucksacks with a heavy load and stuff. Laws of physics do apply here (iPad pro are not exempt) Breakable things do break, bendable things do bend.

This is where we diverge. I've been using Apple laptops since 2005 and iOS devices since 2010. While I too appreciate the size and weight savings Apple has made (particularly to the MacBook line) over the last decade, I've become concerned about basic durability over the last few years. Apple products should be able to maintain structural integrity and not suffer adverse effects under a normal use case. A phone in a pocket, or a laptop/tablet in a packed backpack (rucksack) is not unreasonable, in fact it's how Apple advertises them being used.

As an example, most people I know have put the pre 2016 MacBooks in fairly packed backpacks with no averse effects whatsoever. My 2016 (and now 2018) rMBPs however are designed in such a way that the keys can damage the screen when closed in a backpack in spite of it being a backpack with protective laptop padding and being in a padded case. This is unacceptable (I'm in the process of working with Apple to get this addressed but it's frustrating to see this issue again.)

Thin and light is all fine and good (great even), but not when it comes with defects out of the box or is so fragile that I can't treat it like the tool that it is.

 

[aaronhead14]

It's ridiculous for them to claim this is normal. They need to refund or replace all products that are bent upon arrival. Goodness.

 

[akbarali.ch]

Whoever replied from Apple, is now in deep trouble. You just cannot tell the customers that some of our devices are bent, so what, swallow it. You just can't. Good, i didn't buy this, instead bought ipad6, just needed pencil support.

Now, on second thought : Was this 'bending' going to be feature in the future devices which accidentally got released in this iPad ?! I mean, the after the camera wars, bending is the next killer feature. Isn't it?

 

[crsh1976]

Tim Cook's Apple in a nutshell; 25% more expensive, 25% less quality.

 

[Naraxus]

This is about a big an Eff You as you can get. How on Earth anyone can defend this company is beyond me.
[doublepost=1545294153][/doublepost]

It'll just be another juvenile whine-fest. No surprises.

Just stop before you make a fool of yourself any further. Apple admits to a major manufacturing & design screw up (yet another one to add to the pile btw) and you rush to defend them?

 

[Mildredop]

You don’t get to a trillion-dollar valuation replacing bent devices.

Maybe that's one of the reasons they're now a $760bn company and worth less than Microsoft

 

[aevan]

Wow. Every day we reach new levels of Apple Speak. It’s now normal to ship a defective Apple product? Apple is in full revenue emergency management mode. Once again, it’s time for Tim to resign.

When Microsoft shipped Surface Pros with screens that became unusable due to flicker after they got warm and people put their devices in freezers to get them working again - I remember Microsoft's answer was that it happens to only a small number of units and that people should just replace them if they had issues. Still, I considered Satya Nadella an excelent CEO then (and do now).

A small number of iPads (and it is small, don't let the forum cognitive bias fool you) getting slightly bent out of the box is a much more benign issue, and yet the hyperbolic MRF is, once again, asking for Cook's resignation. And in a time when they literally make the best iPhone, iPad and iMac in their history, their audio team is the best it has ever been, their chip team is literally leading the industry and iCloud is finally - you know - working for the first time since Jobs introduced it.

 

[AlexiTQ]

Seems like it's time to take your business elsewhere, unless Apple retracts that statement. They keep asking for more money but fail completely to take responsibility for their products. That's not the kind of company I want to do business with.

 

[Jsameds]

What the actual F, Tim?

 

[Bustycat]

"You're not bending it the right way" - Steve rolling in his grave

Just avoid seeing it in that way!

 

[WatchFromAfar]

Maybe that's one of the reasons they're now a $760bn company and worth less than Microsoft

They're third now behind 1. Amazon 2. Microsoft 3. Apple

Maybe that's why Apple Music is now available through Amazon Echos?