Should I go to the Genius Bar?

[Mr. Monsieur]

EDIT: In particular, does anyone know if the diagnostic tools available to the Genius Bar are superior to those offered through the diagnostic tool available on my iMac?

Howdy folks!

I just received my "new" iMac (2013 27", huge upgrade from my 2009 13" MBP!)), which I purchased through eBay. It's immaculate and looks essentially brand new.

I've checked out most of the ports, everything looks great. I ran the Apple Diagnostic Tool and got "ADP000" ("no errors") as well as Disk Utility's First Aid.

Here's the question: I have 14 days to return the computer, if there's an issue, and I'm really tempted to bring it into the Genius Bar to get a full diagnostic. Is this kosher? A terrible idea? Overkill?

Thoughts appreciated!

Thanks in advance,

MrM

 

[TiggrToo]

TBH if there's any issue in that window I'd personally return it immediately.

No sense delaying the inevitable. Granted any diagnosis work a 'genius' would do would (should) be free, that said, quite often the 'genius' is no genius; It maybe that they run the same diagnostics you could run and you'd be nowhere fast. And even if they do find an issue then you'd have to pay for repairs and even after that may find more problems.

That's my personal opinion, anyway!

 

[Mr. Monsieur]

EDIT: In particular, does anyone know if the diagnostic tools available to the Genius Bar are superior to those offered through the diagnostic tool available on my iMac?

 

[Fishrrman]

If it runs fine without errors, why are you concerned about "returning it"?

 

[Mr. Monsieur]

I want to make sure that there are no hidden issues with it before the 14 day return window closes, which is why I was thinking of bringing it to the Genius Bar to get it looked at. I'm just wondering if they actually have diagnostic tools that are not already available on my iMac...

 

[kohlson]

EDIT: In particular, does anyone know if the diagnostic tools available to the Genius Bar are superior to those offered through the diagnostic tool available on my iMac?

In my experience with a 2013 15-MBP and a 2016-tbMBP, the answer is the diagnostics tools at the genius bars are are worse than no value. That is, in 2 instances the diagnostics said there were no issues. For the 2013, the rep is chuckling, because while the diagnostics said no issues at all, the display is blinking in and out, and he had trouble getting it to boot. The fix was a new top case, logic board, display, and SSD. In the case of the 2016, despite several pleas from my daughter that the system rebooted every time the lid was opened, they refused to do anything because the diagnostics said it was fine. A few days later a key started to go, and *that* required depot repair, which discovered bent pins on the logo board.

 

[LorenK]

If you have the time, then why not? Yes, the tools that the Apple Genius uses may be no better than what you already have and certainly not better than what you can buy yourself, but if you have the time to take it in and have it double checked, the transport alone might jar something that wasn't properly connected, it would seem to be a question of no harm no foul.

I've owned electronics for a very long time, and they tend to reliable. That being said, there are usually only two ways they don't work, they weren't built correctly in the first place, but those are discovered within the first 90 days of use, or they are either overused or weren't built with a normal level of use in mind, but those are only revealed over time, so a return window is of no use anyway.

Good luck.