Great! You'll love the machine. Just be sure that in the event you do get a dud...know your rights.
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Concerned about buying a MBP.
- Thread starter The Flashing Fi
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Great! You'll love the machine. Just be sure that in the event you do get a dud...know your rights.
I'll probably open it in the store if they allow me to or in my car. That way if I notice anything wrong, I will take it back.
A few days ago, I looked at a MBP in my school store. I didn't see a thing wrong with it. It was the same model I planned on buying (2.2 ghz, 15", 2 Gigs of RAM, 120 Gig HDD (I plan on getting a 160 Gig though)), and it was just beautiful.
Another question though, if I go to an Apple store, will I have to wait a few days for them to put in the 160 Gig HDD, or is it something that they can do quickly?
A few days ago, I looked at a MBP in my school store. I didn't see a thing wrong with it. It was the same model I planned on buying (2.2 ghz, 15", 2 Gigs of RAM, 120 Gig HDD (I plan on getting a 160 Gig though)), and it was just beautiful.
Another question though, if I go to an Apple store, will I have to wait a few days for them to put in the 160 Gig HDD, or is it something that they can do quickly?
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong - but I don't believe they can upgrade the HD in store - you'd have to order from apple online and have it built to order. The apple store I believe only carries the stock model w/ the 120 GB.
Tell me about it.
No, I don't have a blog anywhere about it, but I can tell you exactly what was wrong with each one:#1 (15" CoreDuo) - SuperDrive DOA. Returned next day for #2.
#2 (15" CoreDuo) - Extreme screen flicker, loud CPU whine, random shutdowns from overheating, LCD inverter hum. Returned for refund, waited for Core2Duo which was coming soon.
#3 (15" Core2Duo) - Required logic board replacement after two weeks. Actually, I still have this one and use it as a secondary laptop, even though it also has the horribly grainy screen that I can hardly stand to look at.
#4 (17" 2.33 C2D) - Battery exploded after 12 days. I just asked for a new battery, but the store wanted to replace the machine, citing concerns about the SMC. Traded for #5.
#5 (17" 2.33 C2D) - Significantly warped bottom casing. This one wouldn't sit flat on any desktop surface and would wobble when typing. Extremely uneven LCD backlighting. Exchanged for #6.
#6 (17" 2.4 SR hi-res) - Required logic board and AirPort card replacement after one month. Replacement logic board failed upon initial boot, they tell me. There were also some minor backlighting issues, but I wasn't concerned about that. Given the trouble, the store offered me a refund even though I was out of the 14-day period. Took a refund and sat on the money for about a month. Then used some of it to buy #7.
#7 (15" 2.2 SR) - Samsung LED-backlit panel with significant yellowing. Took back to store to exchange for #8.
#8 (15" 2.2 SR) - Opened IN-STORE. Samsung LED-backlit panel with significant yellowing. Exchanged on the spot for #9.
#9 (15" 2.2 SR) - Opened IN-STORE. LG LED-backlit panel with extreme backlight bleed (bottom HALF of the screen). Asked the manager what he thought about it, he said I shouldn't accept that. Exchanged on the spot for #10.
#10 (17" 2.4 SR standard res) - Paid the difference from #9 and took this one home. Uneven backlighting immediately noticeable but was willing to live with it. SLIGHTLY warped bottom casing prevented the laptop from sitting flat on my desktop surface. Frequent kernel panics, system hangs, application crashes (iPhoto, Safari, Finder, ...), to the tune of several times each day. These problems persisted even after two clean re-installs (erase & install option) of OS X. Intermittent trackpad malfunction & a few significantly misaligned keys. Might have lived with all this, except that the frequency of the crashes made the machine basically unusable and pointed to possible hardware defects. Exchanged (after having to fight the manager on this) for #11.
#11 (17" 2.4 SR standard res) - Have had this one for two weeks now, no problems so far. The screen is slightly more grainy than my past 17" units, but it's about like a last-generation iMac or many 23" Apple Cinema Displays I've seen in terms of grain. Only noticeable very close to the screen, otherwise perfectly acceptable. Nice, even backlighting (still a slight ~1mm bleed at the bottom, nothing to get upset about on a MBP). No problems that I'm aware of.
There you have it. Statistically unlikely though it may be, that's my MBP history. All of these were purchased at my local Apple brick & mortar retail store.
I think with your problems, you have me covered for a long time. I suppose I can just live with a 120 gig HDD.
Thanks for running through those problems xpovos! That's just astounding. It's almost funny (if you weren't having to deal with it!)
Only thing missing is you should have gotten one that gave you electric shocks too, or that crashed while alt tabbing. Then I think you'd be complete
The one I had for a week seemed like it was fine-perfectly built. I kind of hate getting rid of it. But then ya never know, since some of yours died after just a couple of weeks.
Only thing missing is you should have gotten one that gave you electric shocks too, or that crashed while alt tabbing. Then I think you'd be complete
The one I had for a week seemed like it was fine-perfectly built. I kind of hate getting rid of it. But then ya never know, since some of yours died after just a couple of weeks.
Wow, looks like you had a pretty bad experience! At least they didnt give you too much trouble getting the replacements. So far my new iPod touch appears to have a stuck pixel or two...wonder how many swaps I'll have to so to get a perfect one - under 5 I hope...
Tell me about it.
#1 (15" CoreDuo) - SuperDrive DOA. Returned next day for #2.
#2 (15" CoreDuo) - Extreme screen flicker, loud CPU whine, random shutdowns from overheating, LCD inverter hum. Returned for refund, waited for Core2Duo which was coming soon.
#3 (15" Core2Duo) - Required logic board replacement after two weeks. Actually, I still have this one and use it as a secondary laptop, even though it also has the horribly grainy screen that I can hardly stand to look at.
#4 (17" 2.33 C2D) - Battery exploded after 12 days. I just asked for a new battery, but the store wanted to replace the machine, citing concerns about the SMC. Traded for #5.
#5 (17" 2.33 C2D) - Significantly warped bottom casing. This one wouldn't sit flat on any desktop surface and would wobble when typing. Extremely uneven LCD backlighting. Exchanged for #6.
#6 (17" 2.4 SR hi-res) - Required logic board and AirPort card replacement after one month. Replacement logic board failed upon initial boot, they tell me. There were also some minor backlighting issues, but I wasn't concerned about that. Given the trouble, the store offered me a refund even though I was out of the 14-day period. Took a refund and sat on the money for about a month. Then used some of it to buy #7.
#7 (15" 2.2 SR) - Samsung LED-backlit panel with significant yellowing. Took back to store to exchange for #8.
#8 (15" 2.2 SR) - Opened IN-STORE. Samsung LED-backlit panel with significant yellowing. Exchanged on the spot for #9.
#9 (15" 2.2 SR) - Opened IN-STORE. LG LED-backlit panel with extreme backlight bleed (bottom HALF of the screen). Asked the manager what he thought about it, he said I shouldn't accept that. Exchanged on the spot for #10.
#10 (17" 2.4 SR standard res) - Paid the difference from #9 and took this one home. Uneven backlighting immediately noticeable but was willing to live with it. SLIGHTLY warped bottom casing prevented the laptop from sitting flat on my desktop surface. Frequent kernel panics, system hangs, application crashes (iPhoto, Safari, Finder, ...), to the tune of several times each day. These problems persisted even after two clean re-installs (erase & install option) of OS X. Intermittent trackpad malfunction & a few significantly misaligned keys. Might have lived with all this, except that the frequency of the crashes made the machine basically unusable and pointed to possible hardware defects. Exchanged (after having to fight the manager on this) for #11.
#11 (17" 2.4 SR standard res) - Have had this one for two weeks now, no problems so far. The screen is slightly more grainy than my past 17" units, but it's about like a last-generation iMac or many 23" Apple Cinema Displays I've seen in terms of grain. Only noticeable very close to the screen, otherwise perfectly acceptable. Nice, even backlighting (still a slight ~1mm bleed at the bottom, nothing to get upset about on a MBP). No problems that I'm aware of.
There you have it. Statistically unlikely though it may be, that's my MBP history. All of these were purchased at my local Apple brick & mortar retail store.
I bought my MBP the day it came out on the Apple Store online and I don't any issues with it...no warping, no yellowish, no nothing.
Buy with confidence !
Buy with confidence !
To the store's credit, they made the exchanges/refunds extremely hassle-free in all but one instance. The exchange from #10 to #11 was a real hassle, because that particular manager (one I hadn't dealt with before) tried to have me make a Genius bar appointment without even so much as opening the box I brought back. The bar was booked for three days, and I told him it was unacceptable to force a customer to make an appointment to return a defective product, especially while still within the 14-day period, and that I would appreciate at least the courtesy of the five minutes it would take to open the box and verify at least one issue (the backlighting). He still didn't want to budge, so I reminded him that I had spent about $20,000 in his store in the last year alone and that I had always gotten top-notch service from the OTHER managers there, including his superior (the lead manager).
He changed his tone quickly, and I left with #11.
It is true that the vast majority of MPB's are without "defects".
However, as for the yellowing issue in particular, truly it's a major problem, not that it is a huge issue when you have it, but it is major in term of frequency.
I've bought a MBP last August, it had the yellowing issue, the Apple Store then repaired it by ordering a new screen and changing it. The first they received had it, so they ordered another one, and this one had the yellowing. So right now they will be replacing the MBP for a new-one.
My last MBP had three different screens, all of them had the yellowing at the bottom. Lot's of unit in stores have it. (The three of them were Samsungs) I saw good ones too in stores.
No matter what, chances are quite good for getting a screen with the yellowing issue.
However, the question is also if you can live with it, because it is really possible for someone to use the computer for a long time and never notice it. As for me, I am not a professionnal but I use photoshop a lot since digital drawing is a big hobby for me. When you are making a "serious" graphical use of the screen, it is a clear problem. When you need to draw some white in a dark area at the bottom, it is clear.
If you are mainly using it for sciences application and everything that do not need color accuracy (like movies, games, ...) it will not be a major problem even if you get a computer that have the issue.
Apart from this particular problem, the Macbook Pro is really an awesome computer, great power, great portability, great battery life, great hardware fonctions, etc...
However, as for the yellowing issue in particular, truly it's a major problem, not that it is a huge issue when you have it, but it is major in term of frequency.
I've bought a MBP last August, it had the yellowing issue, the Apple Store then repaired it by ordering a new screen and changing it. The first they received had it, so they ordered another one, and this one had the yellowing. So right now they will be replacing the MBP for a new-one.
My last MBP had three different screens, all of them had the yellowing at the bottom. Lot's of unit in stores have it. (The three of them were Samsungs) I saw good ones too in stores.
No matter what, chances are quite good for getting a screen with the yellowing issue.
However, the question is also if you can live with it, because it is really possible for someone to use the computer for a long time and never notice it. As for me, I am not a professionnal but I use photoshop a lot since digital drawing is a big hobby for me. When you are making a "serious" graphical use of the screen, it is a clear problem. When you need to draw some white in a dark area at the bottom, it is clear.
If you are mainly using it for sciences application and everything that do not need color accuracy (like movies, games, ...) it will not be a major problem even if you get a computer that have the issue.
Apart from this particular problem, the Macbook Pro is really an awesome computer, great power, great portability, great battery life, great hardware fonctions, etc...
I'm a little confused by this:
If running windows apps is the most important thing, wouldn't it make more sense to buy a PC?
Yeah yeah I know, heresy here.
There are other options besides Acer and Apple.
The October PC mag rates Fujitsu notebooks highly as well as Lenovo/IBM and Sony.
Btw, Acer scores near the bottom in everything, especially on notebooks less than a year old.
My advice would be to try to test all of your windows-based software prior to purchasing it and see how you like how it runs on the mac.
If it does what you like, Apple notebooks come in rated higher than the others and would be an excellent choice.
High ratings don't mean much, however, if you can't run your software the way you'd like.
If running windows apps is the most important thing, wouldn't it make more sense to buy a PC?
Yeah yeah I know, heresy here.
There are other options besides Acer and Apple.
The October PC mag rates Fujitsu notebooks highly as well as Lenovo/IBM and Sony.
Btw, Acer scores near the bottom in everything, especially on notebooks less than a year old.
My advice would be to try to test all of your windows-based software prior to purchasing it and see how you like how it runs on the mac.
If it does what you like, Apple notebooks come in rated higher than the others and would be an excellent choice.
High ratings don't mean much, however, if you can't run your software the way you'd like.
Intel Macs run Windows just fine though, so that's really not an issue. It was ridiculously easy getting XP on the one I had. Just updated the video driver to Nvidia's newest reference driver, grabbed the Bioshock demo from Steam, and it ran flawlessly, and that's about as demanding of a Windows "program" as you're going to find.
Why are you confused?
Bootcamp runs on Apples fine. I've seen it myself, even though I don't have a Mac yet. It runs Windows without having to do any emulation or anything like wine.
I also have an unused key for Windows XP Pro (32 and 64 bit), a key for Windows Vista and a key for pretty much every version of Windows Server 2003. My school participates in the Microsoft Developer's Network Academic Alliance. It's kind of like being in the Apple Developer's thing, except, there is a lot more free software, such as Windows XP/Windows Vista/Windows Server 2003 and a lot of other software that's particularly aimed at developers that comes at no cost to me.
So, I'm going to uninstall Vista from my laptop (I'm dual booting to Vista on my laptop as of now), and then dual boot with Mac OS X and Vista using bootcamp.
I want Mac OS X for the underlying Unix compatability. Being able to remote connect to the school's virtual computer lab is pretty important, and it's a real pain the tail to remote connect using Windows, because I need a program called Xwin32, which the school only gives us a license of about 6 months to use before we have to get a new license. Well, because it appears to emulate the X-server of Linux/Unix, applications are pretty sluggish. Heck, even when I used a simple text editor called nedit, it was still slow.
Being that Mac OS X comes with X11 already installed, there is no emulation, which makes everything a lot simplier and easier, since I don't have to deal with keys and crap. I also want the simple interface of Mac OS X, as Linux can be a bit of a hassle at times.
you also have to realize that the people posting here represent a very small slice of mac owners, mainly those who are really into mac stuff/are developers, and those having problems and seeking solutions. so you probably will run into more people with problems here than among most mac owners.
personally, i have had no problems at all with my SR MBP (except bugs in MS office for mac which really frustrate me, but its not apple's fault...).
i would buy online and go for the HD upgrade to 160gb, as that is a really important upgrade esp if you want to keep the mbp for 3-4 years. you can still take it to an apple store for help, but chances are you won't need any until the apple care is expired anyway. i would suggest buying the extended care.
personally, i have had no problems at all with my SR MBP (except bugs in MS office for mac which really frustrate me, but its not apple's fault...).
i would buy online and go for the HD upgrade to 160gb, as that is a really important upgrade esp if you want to keep the mbp for 3-4 years. you can still take it to an apple store for help, but chances are you won't need any until the apple care is expired anyway. i would suggest buying the extended care.
the point is that you mentioned that running windows apps was the most important thing.
Seems prudent to me that if you're going to buy a computer with running windows apps as your priority then I'd want more of an assurance than simply that other people say XP runs great in bootcamp.
I'm not saying that a macbook pro won't run the windows apps you want.
What I am saying is I would want to know for sure how they ran by seeing it and using them on windows in bootcamp for myself.
If windows apps is not as big a deal as I inferred, well then who cares =D
Seems prudent to me that if you're going to buy a computer with running windows apps as your priority then I'd want more of an assurance than simply that other people say XP runs great in bootcamp.
I'm not saying that a macbook pro won't run the windows apps you want.
What I am saying is I would want to know for sure how they ran by seeing it and using them on windows in bootcamp for myself.
If windows apps is not as big a deal as I inferred, well then who cares =D
I got my MBP at the Apple Store almost a year ago. No complaints, great machine -- best purchase I ever made.
u must be kidding! i had the exact opposite expeirence, that's why i am here now. 4+ vaios and they are all dead now. see my recent post on topic for more...
Well my brother bought the SR MBP the moment it came out (15" 2.4) and for the few months so far, its been excellent.
He normally runs windows on it, and with the latest Boot Camp drivers its almost perfect. Gaming performance is right up there, and he shows it off with Medieval Total War 2.
Only complaints I have is that it gets quite warm under heavy CPU+GPU load (i.e. gaming with the latest games). Its normally silent, but fans spin up a lot when gaming.
Otherwise though, it makes my chunky dell 9300 feel insecure about itself.
He normally runs windows on it, and with the latest Boot Camp drivers its almost perfect. Gaming performance is right up there, and he shows it off with Medieval Total War 2.
Only complaints I have is that it gets quite warm under heavy CPU+GPU load (i.e. gaming with the latest games). Its normally silent, but fans spin up a lot when gaming.
Otherwise though, it makes my chunky dell 9300 feel insecure about itself.