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Average Life Span of a Macbook Pro

SandboxGeneral said:
I'm still using a 2012 cMBP. 16 GB RAM, Samsung SSD, I7 CPU and 15" screen.

It still runs as good as the day I bought it, if not better because of the SSD. I use it for all the usual purposes most people use a computer for, plus a lot VM playing in VMware Fusion. For instance, I'm inside of KDE Neon Linux VM writing this post.

As it is, I have no plans in the near future to replace it.

The last MBP I had was a 2006 MBP and I used that for 6 years until I sold it to a friend who I think is still using it today.
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This is why I went MBP. I know a lot of people who have used these things for 10+ years. A coworker is still using a MBP from 2008? - insane. I really hope to get similar usage out of my MBP 13' 2017 that I just got (saved up for awhile to get it). Really disheartening to read all the problem threads but seems to be a consistent theme here. :p

W10 in VirtualBox was slow and my MBP's fans were pretty high. Guess I should try VMWare ($80).
 
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BigMcGuire said:
This is why I went MBP. I know a lot of people who have used these things for 10+ years. A coworker is still using a MBP from 2008? - insane. I really hope to get similar usage out of my MBP 13' 2017 that I just got (saved up for awhile to get it). Really disheartening to read all the problem threads but seems to be a consistent theme here. :p

W10 in VirtualBox was slow and my MBP's fans were pretty high. Guess I should try VMWare ($80).
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If you're happy with VirtualBox, then don't spend your money on VMware unnecessarily.

I have Windows 10 in a VM with Fusion on my MBP and it runs very hot there too. It's not the platform of VMware or Virtualbox that's the problem- it's Windows.

I have a bunch of Linux VM's on here and my MBP runs cool to the touch with all of them.
 
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stickybuns said:
I have a 2007 aluminum unibody MacBook. I would love to find an excuse to upgrade to a new MBP or MBA, but the blasted thing refuses to die. It's had a few problems: the hard drive dying about a year after the warranty expired (thankfully, I was able to recover the files after much sweat and tears); the DVD drive recently stopped working (vibrates like crazy before spitting out the disk); and it's covered in dents from falling off of the couch (gosh, I wonder what caused the first two problems?). But it still works just fine.

In contrast, my old Dell laptop pretty much lost molecular cohesion literally two days after the warranty ran out: screen components cracked and separated (was able to keep it held together for a couple days longer by using a clothes pin, but eventually the screen died completely), DVD died as well, and keys went flying off when my cat walked across the keyboard! I've got it hooked up to an external monitor for watching Netflix videos.
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On the other hand, my Dell Inspiron 9100, released in 2004, has Windows 10 loaded onto it and works fine. It's a Pentium 4. Lolz....The power brick on it alone weighs like 2 pounds! I have a Dell XPS 13.3 that was released in 2006 that is still cherry (put an SSD in that one).

I had a 2007 unibody MBP... it was a tank. My wife dropped it through a plate glass table top onto a concrete patio and that thing had a huge dent in the corner, no cracks to the LCD, and still worked fine afterwards. It had the issue, though, common with that model, where the soldering on the logic board was cracking over time. Would have required a new logic board, which imo is basically a new computer, to keep going...So, all these people that are like "It will go as long as you want it to" are neglecting to mention that Apple like any company has issues in occasional models with their hardware. It kind of reminds me of people with 2016 models arguing the keyboards are fine...of course they are...till they break. I'm currently using a 2012 retina MBP, while my wife is using my old 2010 MBP (had to replace the logic board once for liquid damage...was able to do so cheaply by buying one on ebay with a busted screen and just swapping out the display).

That said, I too feel like there Apple offers a higher quality build...The Dells I mentioned are made out of plastic and feel cheap compared to a MBP...But, I recognize that it's pretty much a crap shoot (unless you are getting an older model that has been through the gauntlet and still received favorable reviews). If I was buying Apple now, I'd opt for the Apple care...this is something I wouldn't have done in the past.
 
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eltoslightfoot said:
I fully expect my maxed out 2014 MacBook Pro 15” to last me for years still.
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I was hoping for that too with my 2014 15” MBP until my USB 3.0 ports can no longer provide an active tether to my cameras, rendering it fairly useless as a studio laptop and only mildly useful as a travel laptop due to its weight. I’m considering to offload it soon and pick up a maxed out 2018 13” MBP once they become available.
 
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pixelatedscraps said:
rendering it fairly useless as a studio laptop and only mildly useful as a travel laptop due to its weight.
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I've gotten used to the weight of my 2016 and now I'm shocked at how heavy my old 2012 is when I have to move it. My old laptop became a hand me down to my wife and it comes with us on trips. I picked up her backpack and I said, "What on Earth do you have in this thing?"

It was her laptop... my old laptop. Owie.
 
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All three MBPs that I have bought are all still in daily use.

2008 17" Core 2 Duo MBP with 6GB RAM & 500GB SSD one of the fans in this is now very noisy & needs replacing. It won't run High Sierra without hacking but is perfectly usable for the uses it is put to & the 17" screen is still a joy
2012 15" Unibody MBP quad core i7 with 16GB RAM & 1TB SSD There has been little or no improvement in CPU performance since 2012 (thanks Intel) so the Unibody is still capable of running anything that is thrown at it. This is a great solid system although it does seem bulky now compared to the rMBP
2013 15" rMBP quad core i7 with 16GB RAM & 1TB SSD There has been no improvement in the Retina screens since their introduction & the 2013 has been upgraded with the newer faster SSUBX 1TB SSD so this system is as capable as any 2018 rMBP

I cannot see any reason for replacing the 2013 rMBP. I might be tempted when 6-core MBPs become available but would definitely purchase if a 17" rMBP was released.
 
SteveJobzniak said:
MBP 2010, 15", Core i7 2.66 Ghz, 6 GB RAM, 500 GB SSD (the most important part of any modern computer is an SSD).

CoconutBattery says 1135 discharge/charge-cycles so far, with "80% battery health". My battery is rated for 1000 cycles: http://www.idownloadblog.com/2015/06/18/how-to-macbook-battery-cycle-count/.

I get 2-3 hours of battery life on a charge (high brightness with intensive work; integrated GPU), and I use it every day as my main work computer. There is nothing it cannot do, it's fast, and I love its keyboard.

My computer is really beaten up. It has scratches on the bottom cover, and I've dropped it, bending the underside of the aluminum frame, and I've lost a bunch of screws from the underside, and I've had to glue the black feet back on... and I love it even more for all of that. It has character. My Ol' Betsy Apple.
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I have a 2010 15" MBP with a 2.40 GHz i5, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD. (Originally a 6,2 MBP.)

I've abused my battery, so right now, the battery has 1,064 cycles and 56.4% capacity. I pretty frequently ran it down to 0% charge.

I know I have an inferior processor, but I don't find this to be very fast. It's getting to be noticeably slow on some webpages. It's a full pound heavier than current-era 15" MBPs, and I definitely would have to bring a charger to work even at full battery health. It is definitely tolerable, though. And it is 8 years old, and it lasted this long with a couple upgrades. Can't dispute that!
 
Not a Pro but an Air. It's a basic model (i5, 4GB RAM, Inter Iris 3000, 128GB SSD) from 2011 and I have to say that it still works great. It's not snappy as before but it's more than usable. Never expected to last so long. I did buy a new MBP though as I started uni but that was more about battery life.
 
PBG4 Dude said:
Oh man, to push my late 2008 MBP beyond El Capitan or not. Hmmm.
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Was reluctant to do so on an early 2008 Penryn but El Capitan dropped the wifi sometimes. My try with Sierra was a heat machine and I rolled back.

Then I tried High Sierra as a test and after Sherlock got done indexing, it settled down quite nicely. Although it's not supported, DosDude has some lovely tools. You only need to run it again with an OS update to get the ambient light back and make sure recovery is available.

Would say High Sierra is smooth and better than El Capitan but YMMV.
Do it. You can always roll back if you want.

====
FWIW, here's where this machine has been. Upgraded to SSD Sandisk 480GB, 6GB RAM.
The optical drive is out with another HDD in. The logic board was replaced by Apple due to the video issue (They tried to get out of the extended warranty insisting on an undoable boot test. I took it back and tricked the machine to boot back on, took a photo with a newspaper that day and then dragged it back to saying, "You told me it was dead so how did I pull this startup off? The genius was angry I had been to two Apple stores and refused to help unless I paid over $300. Called customer relations and they honorably made the repair under the extended warranty for the Nvidia problem. Confirmed that issue in the notes on return. They also replaced the camera.)

Also, I replaced i/o board was replaced after Apple said they wouldn't fix it. (Apparently, some orange soda blew up and got in there unbeknownst to me.) After the little orange cleanup and new i/o board, all good.

The keyboard and top case have been replaced twice. There have been at least four battery changes with the latest last week. The entire display assembly (two lower end cracks) was replaced the other week back as I obtained one Grade A version on ebay for $35.

The machine is used daily and it's running better than ever, knock on wood.
IMHO, we'll never be so lucky as even without Retina, these machines could be fixed and you could educate yourself and do so much of it yourself. Luckily, I've not had to change the logic board myself.
 
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BigMcGuire said:
A coworker is still using a MBP from 2008? - insane. I really hope to get similar usage out of my MBP 13' 2017 that I just got (saved up for awhile to get it). Really disheartening to read all the problem threads but seems to be a consistent theme here. :p
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Yeah, my own is a mid-2009 and runs Sierra beautifully. I'm no fanboy, but gee, I gotta say that they really did know how to manufacture these things back in 2009. That said, I'm lucky to get 2 hours of battery life out of this thing. And that really does hamper me sometimes.

Like you said, I wonder about the longevity of newer MBPs, in light of all these problems. But, they've done some really great things - made these things lighter, more power-efficient, and with much better battery life (10 hours ?).

What is your battery life like ?

I guess there are just these inevitable tradeoffs - you lose the ability to upgrade hardware, but you get a lighter more portable machine with the batteries lasting 10-12 hours.
 
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maculateConception said:
Yeah, my own is a mid-2009 and runs Sierra beautifully. I'm no fanboy, but gee, I gotta say that they really did know how to manufacture these things back in 2009. That said, I'm lucky to get 2 hours of battery life out of this thing. And that really does hamper me sometimes.

Like you said, I wonder about the longevity of newer MBPs, in light of all these problems. But, they've done some really great things - made these things lighter, more power-efficient, and with much better battery life (10 hours ?).

What is your battery life like ?

I guess there are just these inevitable tradeoffs - you lose the ability to upgrade hardware, but you get a lighter more portable machine with the batteries lasting 10-12 hours.
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My MBP 13' TB 2017 gets 10+ hours with very light usage (reading - lots of idling), 8 hours with medium usage. I'm happy with it. :)
 
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maculateConception said:
Yeah, my own is a mid-2009 and runs Sierra beautifully. I'm no fanboy, but gee, I gotta say that they really did know how to manufacture these things back in 2009. That said, I'm lucky to get 2 hours of battery life out of this thing. And that really does hamper me sometimes.

Like you said, I wonder about the longevity of newer MBPs, in light of all these problems. But, they've done some really great things - made these things lighter, more power-efficient, and with much better battery life (10 hours ?).

What is your battery life like ?

I guess there are just these inevitable tradeoffs - you lose the ability to upgrade hardware, but you get a lighter more portable machine with the batteries lasting 10-12 hours.
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Yeah, my mid-2009 13" MacBookPro5,5 is still on its original battery, and battery life is quite short. :p It's running High Sierra fine though, with SSD and 8 GB RAM.

My 2017 12" MacBook lasts the workday with light usage. 16 GB RAM and also High Sierra.
 
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This is a very interesting and cool thread. First MBP I bought was one of the early 2008 models. The old, bulky one before they got sleek. I had a failed hard drive and spastic RAM which Apple replaced. I changed the keyboard on that one with an OEM replacement. With an SSD installed years later, it was fairly usable. Though I have Windows laptops from that era with SSDs that are equally usable. I bought the new MBP last year and I'm not sure how long it will last. If Apple comes out with a superior upgrade, I will sell this one and buy the new one. I'm not a huge fan of Apple like some, but between macOS and Windows 10, I like the lesser of two evils, which is MacOS. The NVME is super fast, and it's convinced me to build my next Windows workstation with a massive M.2 NVME drive.

I like to give Apple a lot of crap for their stupid stunts, but I gotta hand it to them for pushing certain things to become mainstream.
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BigMcGuire said:
My MBP 13' TB 2017 gets 10+ hours with very light usage (reading - lots of idling), 8 hours with medium usage. I'm happy with it. :)
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I use mine in conjunction with my Windows desktop at work and it's either on for a few hours at a time or connected and idling for weeks at a time. No battery issues except a small drop. I'm not a fan of the keyboard, though. I opted to purchase an external keyboard for it.

I am, however, a massive fan of the iPods, especially the iPod Classics. As society has moved on towards phones for music storage, so have I. However, if you still want a music only device, the iPod line of products cannot be beat for cost, value and quality!
 
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My late 2013 15" MBP is still going strong! 16GB RAM, 512 SSD, 2.3GHz Quad i7. A really nice, still somewhat powerful machine almost 5 years on.

Alas my mid 2010 15" MBP 2.4GHz Core i5 bit the dust a couple of months ago. The battery exploded [well expanded] deforming the body to a point where its all twisted and completely dead. Still, close to 8 years service wasn't too bad :)

As soon as a 6 core MBP comes out, ill likely go back to a MBP as my main machine, rather than my current iMac i7.
 
That said, I do have a black MacBook 13” 4Gb, 120Gb SSD from 2008 that’s running 10.6.8 strong and a 2011 MacBook Pro 17” 16Gb, 500Gb SSD that’s working fine with Sierra (touch wood the GPU stays alive for as long as possible!) so there is a fair amount of longevity traditionally built into the MacBook line.

With the 2016 model on and so many soldered components, I’m not sure that’s still the case though. Where we could once replace failing RAM or an SSD relatively inexpensively has now become an entire logic board repair which I’m sure is going to be very, very expensive in a couple of years...
 
I had a 2008 MBP 15" that died 2011 - because of the NVIDIA chip issue, just after Apple stopped the replacement program. I was extremely disappointed!

It was replaced by a late 2011 MBP 15" (upgraded later to 500 GB SSD and 8 GB RAM) that died about two weeks ago, otherwise it was fine and needed no other replacements. The problem, again, is the AMD GPU (there was a replacement program too...). Thanks to this more than brilliant post (https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/267581/gpu-problem-boot-hangs-on-grey-screen/295805#295805) I am again able to use it, but don't know for how long...

Between the two we're are at a 5-year average... Considering that I am NOT a heavy user I would have hoped for more though.

A little off topic but still related: what would you suggest? Should I - as a compromise - buy a new MacBookAir 13" 2,2Ghz, 8GB Ram, 512 GB - currently there are some offers that are ok-ish? I'm reluctant to spend money for a machine that - on paper - has the same specs as my 2011 MBP!? I don't trust the all soldered MBP and don't like the USB-C ports.
 
MissClaudia said:
I had a 2008 MBP 15" that died 2011 - because of the NVIDIA chip issue, just after Apple stopped the replacement program. I was extremely disappointed!

It was replaced by a late 2011 MBP 15" (upgraded later to 500 GB SSD and 8 GB RAM) that died about two weeks ago, otherwise it was fine and needed no other replacements. The problem, again, is the AMD GPU (there was a replacement program too...). Thanks to this more than brilliant post (https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/267581/gpu-problem-boot-hangs-on-grey-screen/295805#295805) I am again able to use it, but don't know for how long...

Between the two we're are at a 5-year average... Considering that I am NOT a heavy user I would have hoped for more though.

A little off topic but still related: what would you suggest? Should I - as a compromise - buy a new MacBookAir 13" 2,2Ghz, 8GB Ram, 512 GB - currently there are some offers that are ok-ish? I'm reluctant to spend money for a machine that - on paper - has the same specs as my 2011 MBP!? I don't trust the all soldered MBP and don't like the USB-C ports.
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I don't think so it's a good idea. The current MacBookAir's hardware is 3 years old, when Apple starting to dropping support for 2015 Mac's, the current MacBook Air is dropped too.
 
Czo said:
I don't think so it's a good idea. The current MacBookAir's hardware is 3 years old, when Apple starting to dropping support for 2015 Mac's, the current MacBook Air is dropped too.
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Agreed. Apple hasn't done very well the past few years... start looking at other computers if you are okay with moving from OSX
 
Czo said:
I don't think so it's a good idea. The current MacBookAir's hardware is 3 years old, when Apple starting to dropping support for 2015 Mac's, the current MacBook Air is dropped too.
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You mean selling them? I still get updates just fine on my Early 2011.
 
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