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MacBook Neo's Keyboard Can Be Replaced Individually
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klasma
macrumors G4
A whole keyboard to its success!
Mac people forgetting about yearly OS updates. 😂 In less than a year, no computer will be stuck on Tahoe.
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SilmarilFinder
macrumors regular
EugW
macrumors P6
I don’t think I’d ever buy renewed AirPods.
If the Neo is targeted to students and education, makes sense for Apple to reduce its own repair costs on the units.
WarmWinterHat
Suspended
EugW
macrumors P6
ProMotionPotato
macrumors member
This is the story that every review missed. Apple has published the MacBook Neo repair manual and confirmed what the teardown suggested. The keyboard replaces individually. No top case replacement. On a MacBook Air or Pro, a keyboard repair costs $400 to $600 because you're replacing the entire top case assembly. On the Neo, it's a standalone part. Hundreds of dollars cheaper. This wasn't an accident. The machine that costs $599 to buy was also designed to cost as little as possible to fix. That's not a coincidence. That's the whole architecture. And it's been there since the first teardown. Nobody in the mainstream review cycle talked about it. They were too busy counting missing features.
throAU
macrumors G4
Also good news for apple if they want to refurb, in case they say, release a new SOC board that fits in the same space.
WarmWinterHat
Suspended
I remember that being the case with the butterfly switches...can you not replace the keys individually on a more modern MacBook?
b.inazawa-fan
macrumors member
Happy_John
macrumors 65816
You can, but Apple won't do it and they won't sell the membrane + sensor/switch component to authorised repair centers. You can buy the part directly from a manufacturer online, but it's a horrible job, even worse than replacing glued in batteries.
While I agree it’s all good for a mainstream user, I don’t think any of those appeal to one. However, the market that absolutely will mark that as high on their list of pros will be schools.
The thing I see is that schools tend to be very very slow on upgrades, and tend to keep equipment until it’s truly dead. TT hat said, the only “miss” that could make schools put it it in a “skip” column is the lack of USB a ports. Schools tend to have a lot of old accessories, and replacing them in the thousands is costly (dell bundled my kids chrome book with a USb-A gamer headset during the pandemic, and still hand those out when they break) and logistics of adapters is a nightmare with kindergartners 🤣
The secure enclave does more than touch ID. It holds the keys for encryption and whatnot so it's still present on both models.
I think Louis Rossmann would need much more than just a replaceable keyboard and no tape on the battery. 😉
boswald
macrumors 68020
Yeah, he tends to be a little picky. That's about the nicest way to put it!
SilmarilFinder
macrumors regular
EugW
macrumors P6
I got battery replacements on my AirPods. Except that "battery replacement" meant getting new ones from Apple for a discounted price and Apple recycling the old ones.
Do you think Apple are that stupid? How would the bluetooth keyboard with touch ID work?
WilliApple
macrumors 65832
EugW
macrumors P6
Other MacBooks in the past have had similar designs.
While I wouldn’t want to do that work myself, I do appreciate it, because PowerBooks in the past with a removable keyboard but not such a reinforced design had a squishier feel to them. Having all those screws adds a ton of rigidity.