On the 30th, I started a support call, she said she would call me back in 24 hours to follow up. Next day around noon, I decided to go to the apple store. They said come back in 30 min for a Genius Bar appointment, and then they took the watch for repair. The following day my device was received, and a replacement was sent out. Today it's out for delivery. Better be a brand new one and not a refurb since it was their screw up
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
watchOS 5.1 - I think my watch is bricked
- Thread starter Bazooka-joe
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
If you're expecting a retail box like what you got at the apple store, it's not going to happen. It'll be a white box replacement (which from what I understand is still new).
After realizing that the watchOS 5.1 update bricked my watch on Tuesday, I commenced phone support. After an Advisor spent 20 minutes talking me through the same steps I had already tried, he interrupted the conversation to talk to another affected customer. After resuming the conversation a few minutes later, he passed me to a Senior Advisor, who took my shipping address and said I should receive a return box within 2 to 3 days. The box arrived by Fedex Wednesday morning, and I returned it with the watch that day.
Apple acknowledged receipt of the package on Thursday, and today I received an email stating "Your product arrived at our repair center, but our technicians weren't able to process your repair request. We’re sending the product to you along with a letter that provides more information. If you have questions about the letter, feel free to Contact Apple Support to review your options. Be sure to use the same Repair ID. We apologize for any inconvenience." Included in the email is the Fedex tracking number with delivery expected Monday.
According to the Repair Status Web page, they couldn't duplicate the issue. I wonder what the "letter that provides more information" says. Would the watch have been okay if I had just left it until the battery died?
Apple acknowledged receipt of the package on Thursday, and today I received an email stating "Your product arrived at our repair center, but our technicians weren't able to process your repair request. We’re sending the product to you along with a letter that provides more information. If you have questions about the letter, feel free to Contact Apple Support to review your options. Be sure to use the same Repair ID. We apologize for any inconvenience." Included in the email is the Fedex tracking number with delivery expected Monday.
According to the Repair Status Web page, they couldn't duplicate the issue. I wonder what the "letter that provides more information" says. Would the watch have been okay if I had just left it until the battery died?
At this point it has to be. There hasn't been enough time to process and refurb returns and repairs. I'd bet it's in a retail box, too, but you can let us know. Very annoying...
[doublepost=1541190675][/doublepost]
Whiskey tango foxtrot?
I was amazed that apart from the tech sites nobody was reporting the fact that Apple had killed perhaps thousands of its own watches - none of them more than a few weeks old - by a routine update.
I emailed the BBC using the link on their main news page and was happy to see a few hours later that they actually were actually asking Apple the hard questions even though the reply was that a small number of watch owners were having problems. I thought it was my bricked watch having the problem rather than me but obviously Apple knows best.
I haven’t seen any other major news outlet chasing Apple on this but maybe a dead Apple Watch is less photogenic than a bent or burnt-out iPhone?
I’m currently in Portugal with no access to an Apple Store and a frighteningly unreliable postage system so need to wait a few weeks before I get back to the UK when I can get into a store and hopefully get a swift repair or replacement.
This is definitely the worst Apple experience I have had and I’ve been a massive fanboy for 30 years. It isn’t just that it went wrong, it’s Apple’s reluctance to admit they have a problem and get on with solving it in a transparent and effective manner.
I agree that it’s really weird that this isn’t making major headlines like any other Apple fail. Bendgate and antennagate were all that the tech media talked about when they happened, and they didn’t even render the product entirely useless like this update has. Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is the first time (that I recall) that Apple has actually completely bricked a product with its own software.
I believe a WatchOS beta, maybe 3-ish, bricked some gen 2 watches IIRC (and I may not lol).
Be glad it doesn’t run on Windows 10
[doublepost=1541194447][/doublepost]Maybe Apple doesn’t fully understand the problem well enough yet to make a statement. I think that when they do know, there will be a statement and hopefully some perks for the ‘small number’ of adversely affected folks. This should not happen of course, but unfortunately does when dealing with complex hardware and software.
There will be corrections for sure - this kind of an event is a nightmare for Apple too, especially with such a new product.
Be glad it doesn’t run on Windows 10
[doublepost=1541194447][/doublepost]Maybe Apple doesn’t fully understand the problem well enough yet to make a statement. I think that when they do know, there will be a statement and hopefully some perks for the ‘small number’ of adversely affected folks. This should not happen of course, but unfortunately does when dealing with complex hardware and software.
There will be corrections for sure - this kind of an event is a nightmare for Apple too, especially with such a new product.
https://www.macrumors.com/2016/12/13/watchos-3-1-1-pulled-bricking-complaints/amp/
This happened also with S2/OS3.x
Briked my watch tuesday morning, talked to support of the phone and they invited me to book an appointment at the local apple store. I waited to see if the watch was recovering and called them back to book an appointment, that I managed to get the same day. There they tried to restart it, and then just sent it back for repair. On Wednesday the repair status said they were going to replace it and send me a new one. Got an email Thursday afternoon that it was ready to pickup at apple store. Picked it today (Friday), it's a brand new watch in a apple-care box (not the retail one, just the watch with no power adapter). It was on 5.0 version of watchos.
Well my replacement arrived just now. From bricked to back on my wrist in under 72hrs with minimal time spent on the phone. Pretty happy with the way the handled it overall. And if the replacement I got is refurbished, I’d never know it because it’s perfect in every way.
I never thought their customer service also worked with the Mac team but it’s suddenly making sense
I’ve had as good or better customer service from Apple than anyone else. Ideal? No, but reasonable and understandable, and have to agree, fair. So far.
How did they contact you to let you know your replacement was on its way? Did they just send an email notification with a tracking number?
This is undoubtedly a huge cockup and shouldn’t have happened, but to be fair they are solving it: they are replacing people’s watches, pretty speedily too in most cases given by the posts on here. It’s not their fault you are in a location where you can’t access / aren’t willing to use the only two possible methods they have for getting a new watch to you.
Yeah so nice of them to replace watches they bricked by there actions. And not all are getting replacements. I have to wait a couple of weeks while my watch is shipped off to get repaired. I asked for a loaner watch and was told no. I asked if they were going to do something for me to make up for this and was also told no. A small gift card would have gone a long way. I wasted a lot of time, endured a lot of frustration and inconvenience (spent an hour at Apple store in the middle of my busy workday) over this. Apple is handling this piss poorly.
It may not be big news because the number of units involved is small - we don't know how many people had this experience.
This is the same response you get back from Apple when you send your watch in to have the developer beta removed and have the shipping version of WatchOS put back on. The repair system doesn’t have an actual choice for “removed beta” and that must be how they are handling this as well.
So, what you’re going to receive back is the same watch you shipped out, but with WatchOS 5.0.1 on it.
Factory reset wouldn’t have helped because it was probably in the process of installing 5.1 when the watches were bricked.
Only thing that would have helped is a way to put the watch in DFU mode and re-install 5.0.1. That requires a user serviceable port.
My watch is still in the first post sorting depot. Here, they have chosen the slowest carrier of the whole world (Hermes, Germany). 3 days and the watch only moved 30km of 800 to the repair center. This will be fun: 5-7days shipping, 10 days repair, 5-7 days shipping.