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You can talk all about warranty and Apple policy, but the issue here as I see it is the following:

If I drop my camera, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I crash my car, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I drop my iPhone, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I drop my Macbook Pro, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I damage my iMac Pro, I can't pay to get it fixed.


For all of you saying that Apple is doing the right thing here, imagine if you dropped your phone on the ground and cracked the screen, and Apple tried to pull this same BS, and there was no 3rd party screen options available?
 
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It seems that nobody actually watched the video and understands what the story is...

The main point is that Apple refused to ship the replacement parts to an authorized third-party reseller because working on the iMac Pro requires a special certification that doesn't even exist yet, and it sounds like no repair instructions have been written either. Assuming this is actually true, that's quite unimpressive of Apple to release a product that they themselves don't even know how to fix.
Which leads to more landfill because they love to just nuke stuff when problem arises.
 
Apple computers are not full of "a lot of fragile and unconventional" internal features. Just like almost all computers, it consists of a power supply, a motherboard, some RAM (literally standard), some storage devices, some cooling, some speakers, a display, and a case.

OK, you have to take the glass panel off the device to access these things, but once you do, it's literally a case of disconnecting some cable connectors, and disconnecting some screws, and then *lifting these parts out*.

This is not brain surgery. The ignorance on this forum to how simple parts replacement on these machines are is insane. Macs, just like your washing machine, or your car, or your TV, are just machines made of modular parts. These modular parts can be visually inspected and electrically tested to ensure that they are working correctly, and they can be replaced at the customer's cost where they are not.


Its always amusing to see people complaining about ignorance as they demonstrate it. Yes, they are modular parts that can be replaced. What you aren't allowing for is that first you need to know which parts to replace. Even Apple Stores don't have access to board schematics and they certainly don't have the expertise to make use of them anyway. That costs way more than they pay a genius. So you need either the specific test rigs for each part that you won't find outside the factory in China, or you need an exact part match to swap out parts until you find the bad one(s). Virtually every model of Mac has a unique logic board and they aren't often interchangeable. They even make changes mid production so Apple techs have to order not only the right part number, it has to match a batch code too.

Some of these parts are a massive PITA to swap out. Simple on paper, disconnect, unscrew, remove and replace. In practice, not so much. iMacs in particular are a pain. The boards are huge and weirdly shaped and they fit tight. Its easy to damage one when you know what you're doing.

Now you may be adept at following manuals and swapping parts, but most people get frustrated 30 minutes into a 4 hour dashboard disassembley and start breaking things.

I bought an iPhone SE with a smashed screen from FB marketplace the other week. I assumed the owner had replaced it and was just after whatever cash she could get.

When I went to replace the screen, the battery was chewed up, two brackets and a dozen screws were missing and someone had tried to replace the lightning connector board. The replacement had an attached antenna cable with the connector broken off and the installer had failed to even remove the plastic from the adhesive parts on the new board. Also, it had the wrong colour ports for the phone. Those are the people Apple has to legislate for.
 
This is a horrible policy from Apple. Even if damage is the user’s fault, they should be willing to repair their products as long as the customer pays for it. Imagine if your car dealership refused to fix your car simply because you had opened the hood to replace an air filter and somehow caused damage. With this policy Apple is saying ‘screw you. enjoy your $5,000 paperweight’. Ridiculous...
And Apple uses “100%” renewable energy. Ironic.
 
Wouldn’t it be easier to repair it and charge him, rather than experience all this negative publicity.
 
I agree with aapl on this one. Though mac hardware should be designed more user upgradable friendly
 
Wouldn’t it be easier to repair it and charge him, rather than experience all this negative publicity.

I personally am not that bothered. When my Apple products needed servicing, Apple support has always come through. I believe Apple likely has their own valid reason for not wanting to service the iMac Pro and we are just not seeing the whole picture.

I suspect it’s not so much the costs of repairing, but the precedent it might set. It goes beyond just appeasing one (admittedly fairly influential) YouTuber.
 
Here’s a question: is Apple hardware your property? Or are you just buying a license to run macOS but it only runs on hardware purchased from Apple.

Ha, I see your perspective. But I'm not fond of a leased-hardware interpretation of the Apple ecosystem. If that's the case, then I'm out. What do you think?
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You have to be a massive douche to take apart a $5k computer just to get views on YouTube

In Linus's case, his reviews are on Youtube, as are a lot of media these days. In the old days, you only had HTML-based sites that provided static reviews that many found less engaging, hence dynamic reviews like Youtube channels. I enjoy both. In a similar spirit, Anandtech frequently buys or gets sent very expensive gear to review, that they then sometimes take apart to show the construction. This is not at all out of the norm in the tech-review industry.
 
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Heres another example of how people seem to be missing the point.

Bob walks into an Apple store and tells them his mid 2016 MacBook Pro needs a new logic board. Luckily they won't sell him one without having the serial number because otherwise he would likely have them order the wrong model.
They happily charge him $900 and tell him to come back tomorrow. If he brings back the old board, they'll give him $250 back.
He collects the part and takes it home where he should have prepared a clean, ESD safe work area with an ESD mat, ESD strap and the correct tools to hand. He should have this, but he almost certainly won't, so when he takes the new board out and handles it by the chips and connectors instead of the edges, and rests it on top of its ESD bag (the static lives on the outside), he has likely damaged the part and shortened its lifespan already.
He swaps the parts out but there is a good chance he will break a connector, bend a pin, loosen a chip or crack a solder joint, as well as deliver some more ESD from his shagpile carpet. He'll probably apply the thermal paste incorrectly too which may cause overheating issues down the line. Hopefully he doesn't ingest any of it and poison himself (The 2006 Mac Pros came with gloves and big scary warnings about the thermal paste their CPUs came with).
He goes back to the store and hands back the old board but tells the salesperson the new board hasn't fixed the issue so now he wants a full refund, despite breaking off a RAM slot clip and a temp sensor connector getting the old board out. He may even have the gall to expect Apple to repair the original fault that he misdiagnosed in the first place. (Trust me, people think like this these days)

After a protracted and labour intensive investigation, it turns out his display was faulty in the first place, not the logic board but the display has now shorted out the new board so he needs another one as well as a display. He might claim the short happened the other way around so now Apple is being asked to supply two $900 boards and a $350 display for $900 assuming he doesn't want some or all of that back as well. So now you see why Apple doesn't supply parts.


For those looking to be outraged about something, you need to ask why these machines aren't built in an even more modular way, and made cheaper and easier to repair. Cars can justify being awkward (a bit) because they get parked on the street and if your engine could be removed with half a dozen large bolts, it would be. Often. But these devices are kept in your home or office. Parts could be designed to be regular shapes, maybe in sealed metal boxes with interconnects and fewer parts per box so each box is only $100-200 to replace instead of one big logic box that has everything in it and costs 75% of the price of the whole computer.
 
They're not a charity. They are not obliged to offer repairs to anyone other than to repair in-warranty failures.

Then they should offer parts. No one is asking Apple to be a "charity". Linus is paying for his repairs and/or parts - he's willing to hand over a blank check and be done with it.
 
I believe Apple has the right to decide any policy he wants but he has to clearly disclose, before selling his products, that after the warranty time he cannot repair them and that spare parts are not available. Maybe he does that already but it looks to me that the message is not very acknowledged by the customers. In that case is press and media task to strongly spread the message to people. People have the right to chose and if they know that Apple ships stuff impossible to repair and they buy them anyway, this means they want Apple does in this way.
However I believe that Apple should also stop adverticing how "ECO" he is it, it's just ridicolous to say that they care a lot about envirnment but de facto they refuse to make possible the most ecological thing on earth that is just reparing devices. I hate hypocricy and beside the fact I own a lot of Apple product I also believe that Tim Cook is one of the most disgusting CEO on earth, he just looks so fake and he also make Apple the greediest company in the world.
 
Heres another example of how people seem to be missing the point.

Bob walks into an Apple store and tells them his mid 2016 MacBook Pro needs a new logic board. Luckily they won't sell him one without having the serial number because otherwise he would likely have them order the wrong model.
They happily charge him $900 and tell him to come back tomorrow. If he brings back the old board, they'll give him $250 back.
He collects the part and takes it home where he should have prepared a clean, ESD safe work area with an ESD mat, ESD strap and the correct tools to hand. He should have this, but he almost certainly won't, so when he takes the new board out and handles it by the chips and connectors instead of the edges, and rests it on top of its ESD bag (the static lives on the outside), he has likely damaged the part and shortened its lifespan already.
He swaps the parts out but there is a good chance he will break a connector, bend a pin, loosen a chip or crack a solder joint, as well as deliver some more ESD from his shagpile carpet. He'll probably apply the thermal paste incorrectly too which may cause overheating issues down the line. Hopefully he doesn't ingest any of it and poison himself (The 2006 Mac Pros came with gloves and big scary warnings about the thermal paste their CPUs came with).
He goes back to the store and hands back the old board but tells the salesperson the new board hasn't fixed the issue so now he wants a full refund, despite breaking off a RAM slot clip and a temp sensor connector getting the old board out. He may even have the gall to expect Apple to repair the original fault that he misdiagnosed in the first place. (Trust me, people think like this these days)

After a protracted and labour intensive investigation, it turns out his display was faulty in the first place, not the logic board but the display has now shorted out the new board so he needs another one as well as a display. He might claim the short happened the other way around so now Apple is being asked to supply two $900 boards and a $350 display for $900 assuming he doesn't want some or all of that back as well. So now you see why Apple doesn't supply parts.


For those looking to be outraged about something, you need to ask why these machines aren't built in an even more modular way, and made cheaper and easier to repair. Cars can justify being awkward (a bit) because they get parked on the street and if your engine could be removed with half a dozen large bolts, it would be. Often. But these devices are kept in your home or office. Parts could be designed to be regular shapes, maybe in sealed metal boxes with interconnects and fewer parts per box so each box is only $100-200 to replace instead of one big logic box that has everything in it and costs 75% of the price of the whole computer.

Thats all good, if there wasn't a history of decades of people being able to repair or replace Apple components.

I really don't understand where you are coming from. For my G5 Apple sold me a graphics card and an airport card. Both required doing what you descried above. I also didn't eat the crystals that came in the box to remove moisture.

I send in a MacBook Pro for GPU repair. I had replaced the DVD with an SSD, Apple didn't care as the GPU was a manufacturing fault and not related to the SSD. It was also 4 years out of warranty.

What Apple is doing is building machines that cannot be repaired easily or economically. Like having to buy a new enclosure when the keyboard fails.

And you lap it up and defend it.

Its called a PRO machine, it was aimed at professionals.
 
You have to be a massive douche to take apart a $5k computer just to get views on YouTube


Well, he makes a lot of money for making these videos (this one has 1.8 million views and counting!!). And they took it apart when they had a review on the iMac Pro and had a plan showing the possible upgradability of the iMac Pro in a later video. And a lot of people is actually interested in these things. Not everyone has the possibility to let´s say shell out $5200 for maxed out ram and storage at the time of purchase and therefore wants to know if and how something like this could be done further down the road. Most won't do it but some will do it rather than buying an expensive new Mac in two years.

And the thing is that if you break the front of the screen like Linus´s former tech guy that is a thing that just as easily could have happened if you just where to move it and lost it on the floor and really haven´t got anything to do with what you did with the machine. I was an accident that just as well could have happened in an Apple repair shop. Accidents happen you know. :) It´s just idiotic that you can´t have a screen replacement that you pay for just cause you opened the machine.
And if this has to be done by a 3rd. party Apple certified repair shop fine. It really isn´t harder than having a disclaimer saying if you opened your machine we will fix your screen etc. at your cost but cannot be sure that no other parts were not broken by the opening of your Mac, therefore, we can not guarantee that the replacement will work. We a not responsible for future errors and warranty is broken...etc (This is lawyer stuff).

If that the reason is that they really can´t get the spare parts is true then this opens up a whole new set of problems environment and so on.
 
This is akin to buying a car, servicing it yourself, creating and issue, and having the car manufacturer refuse to sell you the parts required to fix the issue.
 
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Contrary to this whole "right-to-repair" believe, Apple's repair service is not a monopoly. They license out the right to repair to several shops across the US and in every other country they are represented in (and in even in ones they are not). If you don't want to go to Apple to have your product fixed, there are several other options you can go to and they will likely be cheaper than Apple. However, each shop has to qualify to become an authorized service partner in order to ensure that there is adequate support and the repair is done properly. Given the complex build of Apple products, this is not something any technician can or should facilitate, let alone an end-user. Hence, a certification has to be completed before you are allowed to repair an Apple device. Once certified, the shop has to order parts directly from Apple. Why? Because these are specialized parts you can't buy off the shelf. It's not like your average PC despite having the same basic function. Parts are so specialized that this even applies to different models within Apple's product line, the machine may just not boot if you ordered a part for the wrong model.

How do I know? I used to work as a certified technician at such a shop doing repairs. I've also worked for Apple directly as a Mac Genius doing service & repairs, so I'm intimately familiar with the type of work involved. And no, any layman should not be able to repair an Apple device. If you want to go ahead and do it anyway, no one is stopping you. You just cannot expect any concessions from Apple if things go south. Just man up and take responsibility for your actions. If you want a computer to tinker with and easily replace parts, buy a PC. No one is forcing you to buy an Apple. So no, no monopoly there either.

So Apple has final say in who can order parts and who can do repairs? Once certified, can Apple say no to the 3rd party? If so they have sufficient control over the market to ensure they retain a monopoly.
 
I put my iPhone in a blender. Apple won't fix it. I'm gonna make a You Tube video and try to get rich. Stupid people will whine and say that Apple is corrupt.

that's exactly how stupid this seems.

LoL this is one of the most ridiculous things I've read. How old are you to be able to create such a fascinating premise?

On a more serious note Linus just needs 3 parts to be replaced. His iMac is totally fixable.
 
You can talk all about warranty and Apple policy, but the issue here as I see it is the following:

If I drop my camera, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I crash my car, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I drop my iPhone, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I drop my Macbook Pro, I can pay to get it fixed.

If I damage my iMac Pro, I can't pay to get it fixed.


For all of you saying that Apple is doing the right thing here, imagine if you dropped your phone on the ground and cracked the screen, and Apple tried to pull this same BS, and there was no 3rd party screen options available?

Not the same. He opened the thing up and voided the warranty.
They do not have to repair something you void the warranty on.
And there is no law that says that they have to supply parts to a third party to fix a machine they sell.
They might be making machines out of some weird material sourced from the moon and can only make 100 of them and do not have the spare parts for fixes, who knows? Does that mean they cant sell those 100 machines?

Was the machine sold with a contract that states we must sell you or a third party any part this machine contains in the eventuality you do something that breaks our agreement with you (the warranty)?

I don't see how Apple's stance here is anti-consumer as in reality most consumers who have a problem and adhere to the terms of the warranty will walk out with a brand new machine rather than wait weeks or months for a repair as happens a lot with third part repair companies.

Ultimately people want total freedom with the machines they own. And this is the cost of total freedom. You cant do what you want to do and expect the other party to just suck it up. That is not a contract, that is not how anything is done.
 
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His choice was to run the risk of breaking it and having Apple refuse to repair it. He assumed that risk voluntarily; Apple is well within its rights to refuse. And it should.
 
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If I damage my iMac Pro, I can't pay to get it fixed.


For all of you saying that Apple is doing the right thing here, imagine if you dropped your phone on the ground and cracked the screen, and Apple tried to pull this same BS, and there was no 3rd party screen options available?

Apple knows the types of accidental damage that occur to devices. Phones get dropped down stairs, off balconies, into toilets. Apple will fix this, and it's even covered under their accidental damage incidents for Apple Care +. Same with MacBooks, they fall out of bags, off tables, have water spilled on them, etc. In these instances, in what would be considered normal accidental damage -- or even abnormal like my iPhone stopped a bullet -- if someone couldn't get it fixed, I could see some outrage. I've seen some instances of Apple wanting to charge money for fixing the new MacBook keyboards because they thought someone took it apart to try and fix the space bar. So clearly Apple is repairing some DIY mishaps.

That said, there is a huge difference between "my dog's bouncy ball took a bad bounce and cracked the screen on my iMac Pro" and someone disassembling the entire computer and messing it up putting it back together. In this case, Apple's policy -- which Linus states in the beginning -- is if you open the device to try and fix it, we may not want to help put it back together. In this specific instance, -- where Linus took the entire computer apart down to the component level --I don't have a problem with Apple going, "You're on your own buddy."
 
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