My Apple MacBook Pro is once again proving itself to be more lemon than Apple.
On Sunday night, I was working on finishing off a couple of reviews that were going online later this week when I noticed about three or four inches in from the right edge of the screen that there was a multi colored vertical line that would appear and disappear. At first, I thought I was seeing things. But it eventually started to stick around for longer periods of time. I quickly finished what I was doing, backed up my MacBook Pro and then went into troubleshooting mode.
I first started by putting the MacBook Pro on a table and I then started to press on various parts of it. When that didn’t change the behavior, I started to tap on it with a bit of pressure. That did change the behavior as the line would sometimes appear and disappear when I did that. That implied to me a couple of causes:
- A loose or bad connection of some sort. Such as the cable that connects the display to the logic board (main system board in Apple speak) or the connector on the logic board. That would require the replacement of the display or the logic board.
- Seeing as this MacBook Pro has an Nvidia chip in it and they have a well documented history of failing with these symptoms due to the fact that the solder points fail, that is another possibility. That would require the replacement of the logic board.
To try and isolate it further, I plugged an external monitor into the MacBook Pro and repeated the same experiment. The display issue only appeared on the built in display. That implies that it’s a problem with a panel. but it could still be a logic board issue if there’s a bad connection.
With that information in mind, I used the Apple Store App to book an appointment with the Genius Bar. Because as I’ve been told before by Apple themselves, taking my Mac to a dealer that they authorize is not the same as taking it to the Apple Store. Fortunately, I had a much easier time booking an appointment. I could have gotten in as early as Tuesday (as Monday was a holiday in most parts of Canada), but I chose Wednesday as I had less client facing activities that day. The last time I had to do this, they were booking 7 to 10 days out which of course is insane. Clearly Apple have improved on that front, at least this time.
Fast forward to Wednesday night. I arrived at the Apple Store, check in and wait for about 10 minutes. I then was attended to by one of the Apple Geniuses, which by the way is an insanely pretentious job title. In any case, I explained to him what the issues was, showed the steps to replicate it and explained my troubleshooting. He agreed with my diagnosis that it was either a screen or logic board. He then used his iPad to check to see if my MacBook was under warranty (it has AppleCare and as an aside, you should always by AppleCare when you buy an Apple product. Click here to find out why I feel so strongly about that), and if he had a display and a logic board in stock (he did on both counts). He then created a repair order, had me sign it and said this:
“It may take up to 7 to 10 days, but we have the parts in stock. So assuming that we can pinpoint the exact cause of this as we don’t want you coming back with the same issue, we should be able to get this back to you sooner.”
Now, seeing as one of the things that I do is to train people to deliver stellar customer service, let me dissect this sentence. It clearly gives a timeline, but also says to the customer that they will not only do what they can to get the product back to them quicker, but it gives them an understanding why it may take a bit of time to fix it. Plus they are reassuring the customer that they will not have to come back because they will fix it right.
Score: 10/10
So, as I type this on a Windows 8 computer that I have set up to get me by until my MacBook Pro gets repaired, I have a bit of a different feeling versus the last few repairs that I have had. So far, the Apple Store has handed this well. The only thing that changes that is if it takes longer to repair my MacBook Pro or if they don’t repair it correctly the first time. But at the same time, I’ve had three hard drive failures with this Mac as well as this display issue. Of all the Macs I’ve owned, this is the most unreliable Mac that I have ever had (if you’re interested in the complete history, click here and scroll down to “My MacBook Pro Has Repeated Hard Drive Failures” ). That’s very disappointing as I expect better from Apple and it has spurred me to replace this MacBook Pro. So, by the end of the month I will be investing in one of the 15″ MacBook Pros with a Retina display, and AppleCare of course. But hopefully the Apple Store gets my current MacBook Pro back to me quickly so that I can get back up and running in an environment that I am comfortable in.
Updates to come.
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This entry was posted on August 6, 2015 at 9:11 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Apple. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Guess What? My MacBook Pro Is In For Repairs AGAIN
My Apple MacBook Pro is once again proving itself to be more lemon than Apple.
On Sunday night, I was working on finishing off a couple of reviews that were going online later this week when I noticed about three or four inches in from the right edge of the screen that there was a multi colored vertical line that would appear and disappear. At first, I thought I was seeing things. But it eventually started to stick around for longer periods of time. I quickly finished what I was doing, backed up my MacBook Pro and then went into troubleshooting mode.
I first started by putting the MacBook Pro on a table and I then started to press on various parts of it. When that didn’t change the behavior, I started to tap on it with a bit of pressure. That did change the behavior as the line would sometimes appear and disappear when I did that. That implied to me a couple of causes:
To try and isolate it further, I plugged an external monitor into the MacBook Pro and repeated the same experiment. The display issue only appeared on the built in display. That implies that it’s a problem with a panel. but it could still be a logic board issue if there’s a bad connection.
With that information in mind, I used the Apple Store App to book an appointment with the Genius Bar. Because as I’ve been told before by Apple themselves, taking my Mac to a dealer that they authorize is not the same as taking it to the Apple Store. Fortunately, I had a much easier time booking an appointment. I could have gotten in as early as Tuesday (as Monday was a holiday in most parts of Canada), but I chose Wednesday as I had less client facing activities that day. The last time I had to do this, they were booking 7 to 10 days out which of course is insane. Clearly Apple have improved on that front, at least this time.
Fast forward to Wednesday night. I arrived at the Apple Store, check in and wait for about 10 minutes. I then was attended to by one of the Apple Geniuses, which by the way is an insanely pretentious job title. In any case, I explained to him what the issues was, showed the steps to replicate it and explained my troubleshooting. He agreed with my diagnosis that it was either a screen or logic board. He then used his iPad to check to see if my MacBook was under warranty (it has AppleCare and as an aside, you should always by AppleCare when you buy an Apple product. Click here to find out why I feel so strongly about that), and if he had a display and a logic board in stock (he did on both counts). He then created a repair order, had me sign it and said this:
“It may take up to 7 to 10 days, but we have the parts in stock. So assuming that we can pinpoint the exact cause of this as we don’t want you coming back with the same issue, we should be able to get this back to you sooner.”
Now, seeing as one of the things that I do is to train people to deliver stellar customer service, let me dissect this sentence. It clearly gives a timeline, but also says to the customer that they will not only do what they can to get the product back to them quicker, but it gives them an understanding why it may take a bit of time to fix it. Plus they are reassuring the customer that they will not have to come back because they will fix it right.
Score: 10/10
So, as I type this on a Windows 8 computer that I have set up to get me by until my MacBook Pro gets repaired, I have a bit of a different feeling versus the last few repairs that I have had. So far, the Apple Store has handed this well. The only thing that changes that is if it takes longer to repair my MacBook Pro or if they don’t repair it correctly the first time. But at the same time, I’ve had three hard drive failures with this Mac as well as this display issue. Of all the Macs I’ve owned, this is the most unreliable Mac that I have ever had (if you’re interested in the complete history, click here and scroll down to “My MacBook Pro Has Repeated Hard Drive Failures” ). That’s very disappointing as I expect better from Apple and it has spurred me to replace this MacBook Pro. So, by the end of the month I will be investing in one of the 15″ MacBook Pros with a Retina display, and AppleCare of course. But hopefully the Apple Store gets my current MacBook Pro back to me quickly so that I can get back up and running in an environment that I am comfortable in.
Updates to come.
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This entry was posted on August 6, 2015 at 9:11 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Apple. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.