I'm going to keep this short and sweet. I'm a new Mac owner, just purchased a brand new 17" BTO, which I've owned for less than 6 days. Everything was working beautifully until about 3 days ago, when I noticed a few horizontal lines appear across the screen as I was watching a video. (this is on the 9400). I closed the lid and opened it again, and the lines were gone. I continued using the MBP normally.
Later on that night, the scan lines made a return suddenly as I was doing work, and the screen flickered and flashed before finally going black. I knew this wasn't supposed to happen.
The next day I called up Apple and told them about my problem. We went through a couple of steps such as resetting PRAM/etc. At this point the display was completely black and unusable. It would occasionally flash the desktop for a second before going out. We figured out that it was a display issue, and that the display cable or something similar was definitely loose or damaged(since the MBP output fine to an external monitor).
Anyway, the phone support rep told me to back everything up and take the unit to the Apple Store, and exchange it for a new one since I've barely owned this for a couple of days. He scheduled an appointment at the Genius Bar for July 2nd, which was 2 days later. I tried to get an earlier appointment but with no luck. I sucked it up and backed up my MBP.
So, July 2nd(Today) comes along. I took my MBP in the original box with all accessories to the Apple Store Genius Bar. After waiting almost half an hour, I finally had a Genius address my issue, only to be told that since my unit was BTO (I had a 7200 RPM drive selected), I had no choice but to mail it back to Apple. I explained to the Genius that I needed this laptop for business-related purposes and couldn't afford to waste any more time. He said he could get Apple to send me a new unit first, and then I could send back the defective MBP so I wouldn't be without a laptop for god-knows-how-long.
I drove back home, pissed that I wasted my time driving to the Apple store and waiting for my appointment, only to have them tell me they can't do anything. I called up the support line to initiate the RMA/etc, only to be told that unfortunately they can't mail me a new unit without me sending back the old one first. What?! So now I'd have to wait for my faulty unit to reach Apple and get checked out, then wait another week or so for a new unit from Shanghai?! Wtf?!
ON TOP OF THAT, I was told that the department that handles RMA's had taken off on an "early" vacation.
"What vacation?!", I asked.
"Sir, it's the 4th of July".
"NO IT'S NOT, IT'S JULY 2ND'"
"Well, I'm sorry but the department has taken off early and won't be available to assist you until Monday."
Great, just GREAT. Now I have to wait some more. This is absolutely ridiculous and I don't know what to do. I can't afford to go any longer without a fully functioning laptop. Should I call again on Monday and try to convince them to do a forward-RMA and send me a replacement unit first?
Before anyone begins flaming, I'd just like to say that I have the right to be pissed - I just bought a $2700 laptop, only to have it screw up in less than 4 days, and best of all, the downtime's interrupted some of my critical work, and now it looks like it's going to be 2 weeks before I get a new working MBP.
I'm already writing to Apple to express my dissatisfaction. They need better quality control and many users don't have time to waste and play games. As a first-time Mac owner, I'm not at all happy - I'm pretty sure I paid money for a computer that's actually supposed to WORK.
Anyway, just for wasting my time I think I'm going to ask Apple nicely for something as compensation. I think the 8GB RAM upgrade might be stretching it, but realistically what do you think I should ask for?
um, you hadn't paid for it yet and were having "bank card" issues... for all the retail employee knew you set that up and could have been trying to scam the store... not saying you were but it could have looked fishy to the employee...