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Resolved Are MBP's usually this awesome?!

a-m-k

a-m-k

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Sep 3, 2009
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I've got a mid-2012 that I'm going to have for 6 years in December. As of right now, the only thing I have had to replace was my hard drive bracket and a charging cord. Yes, it does act up once in awhile, but it's getting older, however, it's nothing I can't fix either on my own or with help from :apple:'s tech support. I've got a few apps that keep things uncluttered.

Has anyone else have a Mac anything last longer than five years? I've I think my iPod is at least 7 years old, maybe older.
 
If you exclude a few models plagued by known issues that will eventually lead to failure (like the 2011s with an AMD GPU), it's not really uncommon for a unibody MBP to last well over 5 years.

I used my mid-2009 for 7-8 years, and I replaced it only because it was no longer powerful enough for my needs.
 
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I’d say that around half of premium laptops will reach the 5 year mark. This is regardless of the brand. Overall, it’s about luck. Look around these forums. There are people like you with laptops that live firewer and then there are users who accuse Apple of planned obsolescence since their laptop broke down few months out of warranty...

Anyway, Apple is top tier on the market in regards reliability, I doubt that you’ll get a better chance anywhere else.
 
I think the 2012 year is the pinnacle of apple's design, and quality. Sadly I'm not so sure about how things are currently. My 2012 rMBP is still going strong, but I needed some extra muscle and a newer machine, but the MBP is stil being used by my kids.
 
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I have a rMBP 2012 that is still without any issues whatsoever (nothing had to be replaced or repaired). It's my secondary machine and constantly on.

My old Mac Pro is probably my absolute favourite machine. It's a 1.1 I bought back in 2007, so well over a decade now and it's still running superbly. I use it as my tertiary machine.
 
2008, 2011 & 2012 15" MBP's that still run, 2014 13" MBP & 2015 12" are still good, but Air's always died, and still have a couple of junk ones lying around.

Same applies on the Windows side with the more premium notebooks fairing better.

By far prefer Apple stood by it's premium line with AC included and AC+ being an additional product. Last Windows notebook came with 3 years national and 2 years international cover, and I one before 2 years international cover...

Q-6
 
Five years isn't much.

I'm still using my 2007 (actually, the 2006 design) white Intel iMac 24".
It still runs, and is still used for audio recording.
My demands upon it aren't great, but again, it still does the job.
 
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My MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Late 2013) is still running smoothly five-years later. I have it hooked up to a 4K monitor, it's a joy to use. The lack of RAM lets it down now as my uses have changed over the years and I'm more demanding of it, so I'm going to upgrade this year, and hand this one down.

I just hope the 2018 model is as reliable as this workhorse has been. It travels with me daily and takes pretty much everything I throw at it. It's the 2.8GHz i7 with 1TB SSD. A bargain at the £1,900 it cost me, when I see some of my friends who refresh their Windows machines every couple of years.
 
My 2013 iMac turns 5 this year. I maxed it pretty much when I bought it.
Plan to have it a couple of more years, as it seems.
Don't ever feel slow this far.
See when Apple comes out with some new interesting iMac's?
 
My family has two 2010 13' base models that's still going strong. Of course they both have SSDs and are used for web-browsing, youtube, and plex, but they work just as well.
 
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I'm typing this on my low-end mid-2009 13" MBP. I can't kill this thing. I once spilled a glass of red wine into the keyboard. It was out of warranty at the time and I took it to the Genius Bar just to see what it would cost me to repair it. I was expecting I'd end up buying a new MacBook Air. But instead, Apple replaced the motherboard and screen for free — "because you were honest about what happened," they said. Holy ship. Anyway I've never had any other problems with it. I use it constantly, but not for anything super-intensive. I still use it for Photoshop because it has an old copy of CS4 installed and I don't want to pay Adobe for a subscription on my much faster iMac.
 
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I've considered upgrading once, but the problem wasn't with software... it was because of certain things that find their way into my MBP. I have a few apps that will remove anything that may have found their way into my system, but its all good and what finds its way into my system is not my fault. All is still good. If you remember me saying something about my charger going bad, I am trying an experiment, rather than use my cord on its own, I insert the extension part to the block.
 
I have the same model MBP, mid-2012 non Retina 13" that's still used in the family daily. I swapped the 5400 RPM hard drive for a 500 GB SSD, and I max'd the RAM from 4 GB to 16 GB. It's still running El Cap. We've considered upgrading the OS, but for now it does everything we need with still-compatible software. The battery isn't great anymore, but that's really the only hindrance in our usage.

Also, I have a 2012 Mac Mini that I use a few times per week. I used to use it daily. It has an SSD and 8 GB of RAM, but I don't hold it to the same standard as the MBP, because I bought the MBP new. I got the Mac Mini used from its original owner, but to his credit he kept it in pristine condition. As of now those are the oldest Macs I have, and they're still working nicely.
 
I don't know what I have done to keep my HDD in the low to mid four-hundred range all this time. I do run apps that eliminate the unneeded garbage from my MBP and run the disk utility weekly. (I don't think that doing this has any effect of my luck, I'm just saying.)

Yes, I have had a few issues, and because of them (and because of the advice from Apple technician) the apps I mentioned were installed and used daily. I am looking forward to hopefully reaching ten years with this MBP. I look forward to the advances of technology of the MBA (yes, MBA, I want to replace this MBP with an MBA once this MBP has gone past its use.)
 
The answer is HELL NO!

My MacBook Pro is anything but "awesome".

I spent countless hours yelling on the phone at Apple Support and at the Apple Store yelling at the "Apple Genius".

Getting Apple to replace the logic board on my 2011 MacBook Pro is like getting blood out of a stone.
 
tubeexperience said:
The answer is HELL NO!

My MacBook Pro is anything but "awesome".

I spent countless hours yelling on the phone at Apple Support and at the Apple Store yelling at the "Apple Genius".

Getting Apple to replace the logic board on my 2011 MacBook Pro is like getting blood out of a stone.
Click to expand...

Did they say why they won't replace it? I mean assuming they have the parts and that you're paying for it yourself.
 
At Xmas 2009, I won a Compaq laptop from Future Shop (which was a sister store to Best Buy Canada,) traded it at the store for a 2010 15" MBP with 1TB SSD, 8GB ram & a iPod touch...
MBP still works great;
but can't update past High Sierra now, I guess...
traded the iPod for a 5th gen a few years ago...
:)
 
My 2012 13" MBP with 8GB RAM and a SSD is still going strong. My wife is using it now. I have several PPC Macs still going strong as well. I use my 12" PowerBook daily still and that one is 12 years old. Macs last a long time, so do Windows business notebooks. I have several Thinkpad's from 2007-2012 still in daily use as well.
 
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a-m-k said:
I've got a mid-2012 that I'm going to have for 6 years in December. As of right now, the only thing I have had to replace was my hard drive bracket and a charging cord. Yes, it does act up once in awhile, but it's getting older, however, it's nothing I can't fix either on my own or with help from :apple:'s tech support. I've got a few apps that keep things uncluttered.


Has anyone else have a Mac anything last longer than five years? I've I think my iPod is at least 7 years old, maybe older.
Click to expand...


I am typing this on my trusted 2010 MBP 17'. During those 8 years of usage, I changed and upgraded the HDD to a SSD and later on to a SSHD 2TB because the SSD did go into my MP 5.1 tower project. I did pay for one original battery replacement three years ago because Apple shut down the original battery production and I wanted to catch an original Apple battery in the last possible moment. Its still 94% healthy with 327 cycles. Two years ago I had one Nvidia 330 gpu replacement because it started to get artifacts from heavy gaming use in the earlier years. Other then that, a really really great machine to this day. I am extremely satisfied being in the 8th year of usage with a machine that basically looks like brand new aside from applied stickers and a modified backplate for improved cooling. The hassle free integration with the charging hub on the Apple 27' display is genius to this day. I couldn't be happier with this machine, and it will for sure serve me very well for at least another 3 years. Who can complain about that? Overall a great machine compare to a super bad lemon toshiba quosmio laptop I used to have that didn't last 3 years with three mainboard replacements and a load of other Windows Vista hassles back in 2008. I' will never ever go back to windows, thats for sure. There is just no better hardware out there other then Apple.
 
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My 2011 15" with the AMD GPU is still kickin' - runs pretty darn fast w/SSD, but it gets pretty hot.

Thinking about picking up a new 13" Space Gray MBP though...

EDIT: I legit picked up a 13" Space Gray MBP nTB yesterday for $200 off at Best Buy and I love it so far...but I'm keeping the 2011 because it's still perfectly good.
 
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The first-generation MacBook Air (64 GB SSD) that I bought in 2008 is still in use nearly daily -- not by me now, but by a friend, and it has traveled with him and functioned beautifully (although the battery life isn't much these days and he does need to be sure he's near a power source). Another friend is rocking the 2012 iMac and the 2013 MBP that were originally part of this household, and they're both perking right along, too. Here at home, my 2015 13" MBP and 2015 15" MBP are both just fine and dandy (did need to have the 13" at the Genius Bar for the lamination issue about a year or so ago, but fine ever since). I am fully expecting to keep these guys around for another two or three years at least!

Oh.....and I've got a 5G iPod that I bought in late 2005 that is still working nicely, too.
 
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