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I had a drive problem in a 1st gen white MacBook as a result of a motherboard issue. The Apple Store ran software (which I was willing to buy for £80, but they saved me the trouble) which fixed the disk enough to recover 99% of everything (yes, I was backed up anyway), and the motherboard got replaced inside 3 days (Friday to Monday). They even let me hang on to the machine long enough to swap the HD out with a spare work MacBook so I could carry on working, and they ordered the parts while I was waiting. They thought the top plate was a bit loose too, so they replaced that as well. I couldn't have been treated better.
A common cause of the "blue screen of death" in Leopard is a haxie-- A old version of Unsanity's Application Enhancer. Unsanity broke the rule that you are not supposed to mess with the System folder. When Apple makes major changes to its operating system, as it did in leopard by introducing 64 bit Cocoa Intel API's, then the internals that the haxie relied on changed and problems occurred.
Any major upgrade holds the possibility of creating problems although Leopard's are rather minor. The more a person is a power user, as Robert Scoble apparently thinks he is, then the more likely that he has added something which will produce odd results.
Change is often disruptive, but often change is for the good. It helps no one to place false expectations on people and companies. Even if Apple is entirely sincere it can make mistakes that will have to be corrected. It helps no one for Robert Scoble to blame Apple when he does not know the cause of his problem.
The Mac does "just work" when compared with Microsoft Windows. But, Apple has it's own way of thinking and problem solving learned on Windows systems rarely applies to the Mac. The Mac operating system is not perfect and only a fool would think it was.
Louis, very true. What I'll be watching in the future is how apple deals with people's problems and fulfills their expectations. Personally, I think they've been doing a fine job - and when there is a failing the Apple Stores are there to provide customer service.
I have a feeling Apple will be contacting Scoble directly real soon now.
Apple has always produced bad models (lemons) as well as good models. Check out the 10 worst Macs ever article on lowendmac.com. They will no doubt continue to produce great Macs, with an occasional lemon thrown in. I don't see that their QC is any worse today than it's been in the past.
There's a simple thing called BACKING UP YOUR DATA.
If you're stupid enough to assume that a hard drive... ANY hard drive, from ANY manufacturer... will NOT fail or CANNOT fail, then you get what you deserve.
I had a non-backed up hard drive fail and it cost $1200 to recover my data. Luckily I lost very few files. It taught me a big lesson.
Now I use SuperDuper! to clone my MacBook Pro's hard drive to an external hard drive once or twice a week. It takes a few hours, late at night while I sleep. It's not the ideal, or perfect solution, but it works. It's been there when I needed it.
Trying to blame Apple for losing data because of a failed hard drive is like blaming McDonald's for spilling your coffee in your lap.
Who'll pay me for my stupidity? That sounds like a great job. Where do I apply?
Quality control at Apple has certainly slipped over the past seven years or so. But that's part of increasing your output. If you sell more Macs, more Macs are going to fail. And don't get me started on iPods. I have yet to own a new iPod model (and I've had close to a dozen at this point) that didn't fail on me the first time.
What matters to me, though, is not the rate of failure. That's a problem, for sure. But it's part of the cost of doing business. And it's not yet at the point where it's out of hand. What concerns me more is how Apple reacts to these failures. And while I've read hundreds of horror stories about Apple service, I can't say my own experience reflects that. I've had nothing but compliments for the way Apple has handled all of my customer service issues. I can get plenty negative about some of the sales staff at a few of the Apple stores I've visited, but I have yet to get anything but great service from a Genius.
I agree with you that Apple has set the bar for itself a little too high. But I still prefer that to setting it too low. And I still believe that the "fanboys" are Apple's worst enemy, because they give the Scobles of the world something to write about.
I think Scoble is probably a decent and thoughtful guy; it's just that the time he spent in the "Redmond Distortion Field" warped his perspective some. He's more open minded than all those IT Luddites in Enterprise who are afraid to try anything new because Macs "appeared" overpriced back in 1984.
I still maintain, whatever works best for you, is the one that's best. That doesn't mean it's the best for everyone, just for you.
Speaking of Windows vs. Mac... I've been using a Windows Mobile 5 (and now upgraded to 6) Smartphone for about a month. It's ok. I've been using an iPod Touch for about a day, and it's insanely awesome. I can only imagine how much better the iPhone is vs. WM6 Smartphones. If some of the Leopard dev was redirected to the iPhone, it shows.
I've had more system crashes since upgrading to Leopard than I did the entire time I used Tiger. I don't really care either, because I know perfectly well that they'll be fixed in an update soon enough.
Even if they release something great... Lately, all the good products are being announced 3 - 6 months before they are released! (iPhone, AppleTV, Intel)
Apple USED to do this a few years ago (announcing products before they are ready for shipping) but then they stopped for a long time and everything was being announced, then available almost immediately... This is where my dissapointment is coming from.
P.S. Just for the record, I've probably gone through about 15 iPods too... But not one of them has failed *touch wood* in fact, I've been able to on sell mine once new ones are available and loose minimal money...