Okay, my love. It's 8 after 11, and we're on our way from ass out of meet at the we couldn't make it at 8:30. I felt so awful. Dude morning, but I just even as bad as I'm feeling now. I really feel compelled to go to Madison. The kids are excited too. So and lunch is ready, because it's damps left over from last night and part of that of children's choir so I'll be able to do so. Anyway, I hope you get to see you at some point. The well, we're out here. I love you bye.
July 31, 2010
WWGS?: I hope you get to see you
Dude morning to you to. You're on your way from where? And yes, I did see myself today, so all is well in that regard.
July 18, 2010
Why you pay more for an Apple Mac
"You pay for what you get" in the words of Dave Matthews. I always liked that phrase. I don't remember the context in the lyrics, but it always reminded me that when we buy things, we often pay a price in blood, sweat, and tears well beyond whatever bargain we thought we were getting. If your time is money like mine is, you are very familiar with the hidden cost of products in terms of the time that gets wasted when they do not work as expected. This factor can make it worth spending much more on a product if it will save you more time or last a lot longer than a cheaper competing product. However, it can become quite galling when you pay more for a product expecting to reduce the wasted time only to end up with a lemon that blows this strategy up in your face.
Those of you who talk computers with me or have folllowed my previous posts know that this is exactly what happened to me with the purchase of a MacBook Pro as my work computer. At the time of the purchase, I was still very much the Apple fanboy. This MacBook Pro was the first straw on this camel's back which sent me on my exodus outside the land of Apple.
It was the first MacBook Pro with an LED backlit screen, and it was a lemon right out of the box. To make a long story short, there were build quality issues like I had not previously seen in any Apple machine I had owned. Then there were the bugs. I chalked it up to OS X bugs for 2 years and my friend kept claiming his machine didn't have the same problems. I did not listen to his theory that my machine had issues because I knew that the quality of OS X had begun declining rapidly anyway late in the 10.4 life cycle.
When the dreaded nVidia graphics chip death hit me just prior to the 2.5 year mark, though, I began to consider that perhaps it was the case that this could have been the source of some of my previous woes. Graphics cards get hot and this could have been overheating nearby components.
I had not purchased AppleCare with the machine because I had not anticipated needing it. I knew that Apple tends to be good about extending coverage of known build or design flaws, and, aside from such flaws, their machines tended to last a long time. I was right and Apple did own up to this and cover the nVidia problem for 3 years, which meant this would get fixed for free. When I got the newly repaired MacBook back, I began to experience a lot of the same problems I'd had before, especially with USB drives. I thought this proved my theories about the bugginess of OS X and moved on to using Ubuntu on the machine full time. I had already been using it a little less than half time, but this was a clean break. I only booted into OS X when I really had to after that. This was fine for a few months, then I began having a lot of weird bugs. At first I assumed it was just poor linux drivers for the Apple components, but after a few complete lockups caused when using USB drives, I realized there was a common thread with what happened in OS X on this machine.
I then started doing some cross reference testing and realized the same problem occured in OS X, Ubuntu, and Windows 7. Now I knew it had to be hardware. Runnnig Apple Hardware Test on it confirmed that there was a problem with the temp sensor on the graphics chip. Research showed that others with this problem also experienced weird issues with USB. I haven't researched this further but I assume that the USB chipset must be in the near vicinity of the graphics chip and was getting overheated as well.
I contacted Apple and explained the situation and they were very helpful and sent me a box to send it back to them. They say they replaced the logic board, temp sensor, and fans. When I got it back, I ran the Apple Hardware Quick Test on it. At first I thought all was finally well, but I decided to run the extended test. Then I got the same error again. I then ran the quick test to see if it would show there now. It did. I shut down, waited a few minutes, turned it back on, and ran the quick test again. It tested clean. I let it sit there idle for a few minutes, then ran it again. Clean. I waited a few more minutes and ran it a third time. Now it showed the error. This confirmed that when the chip gets to a certain heat, it must be causing the temp sensor to malfunction.
I called Apple and talked them through the scenario. The guy said that though they were puzzled as to how this could still be happening, this was the third strike and they would simply replace it with a brand new MacBook Pro of the current model that was as nearly equivalent as possible to the old one.
I have been fairly critical of Apple lately, but that, folks, is how you do customer support and I can only give them praise for this. Granted, my work originally paid $2000 for a machine that ended up being a piece of crap by design, and it took three years of pain, but at least we are finally getting the machine we paid for.
And that is the moral of this story... that with Apple you do pay more for hardware than you would pay for similar PC hardware and you are not getting hardware that is necessarily better since they are all made in China by the same few manufacturers, but what you are getting for that premium is pretty good support and some assurance that the company you are dealing with generally makes an honest effort to take care of problems when it is proven that they produced a defective design.
So, you pay for what you get, and boy have I ever paid for this one. I am appreciative, though, that Apple was willing to make good on the purchase in the long run, even though this machine was within 1 month of the 3 year cutoff for coverge on this issue. I will be buying 3 year Apple Care on the new machine as soon as it arrives now that I have a better hands-on experience of what level of support to expect for the investment. Hopefully, this machine will be rock solid enough that I will be able to use it without all the problems I was having in OS X. So, yes, this will get me to give OS X one last chance and I can finally confirm whether the USB drive problems I was experiencing are bugs in OS X or were just caused by the hardware in the other machine.
If the hardware ends up not being properly supported by Ubuntu and Windows 7, I may have to pass it on to a coworker and get me a new PC laptop anway, but I'm at least willing to try after seeing Apple's support in action.
To further prove my point, contrast this to HP. Someone brought me an HP laptop at work that was showing the beginnings of the nVidia graphics failure. It was already known that several brands were affected by this, so I was not surprised. The machine was just over 1 year old, and just out of warranty. I had heard that HP was covering this issue responsibly, so I called them expecting to get this fixed for free on nVidia's dime. Imagine my surprise when the tech support rep told me this model was not covered. Other models in the same series were covered, but he insisted this model "was not affected by the nVidia problem". After getting off the phone and doing some further testing, the graphics died completely. Hoping to have better chances with a different rep, I called again. I was told the same story. "Now let me get this straight. This machine has the same graphics chip, the same symptoms, and is even in the same series as some of the machines you are covering, but you are claiming this model is not affected?" "Yes, this model is not affected." Unbelievable.
HP had a web page that listed the covered models, which I kept open in a browser tab for several months hoping HP would eventually own up to this one. They never did. This was a $1300 laptop and if only lasted for 1 year. For the Apple, we paid $2000 and it had slightly better specs but lacked many of the cool features of this laptop. One could argue that the HP was better hardware for $700 less. Even though the Apple cost us $700 more, we actually got our money's worth in the end as Apple was willing to replace the machine at the eleventh hour, just before the 3 year extended coverage expired. HP wasn't even willing to cover their laptop beyond the 1 year warranty.
In the past, you paid more for a better machine when you bought an Apple. These days, when you pay more for an Apple, you don't necessarily get more reliable hardware or more features, but you do get better support. The "time is money" value equation could go either way depending on whether it is more inconvenient for you to just buy a new machine and move on or whether it is more inconvenient to make a trip to a local Apple Store and possibly be without your machine for a few days. At least you know now what you are in for and can decide how you will "pay for what you get".
Todd Russell
July 17, 2010
Those of you who talk computers with me or have folllowed my previous posts know that this is exactly what happened to me with the purchase of a MacBook Pro as my work computer. At the time of the purchase, I was still very much the Apple fanboy. This MacBook Pro was the first straw on this camel's back which sent me on my exodus outside the land of Apple.
It was the first MacBook Pro with an LED backlit screen, and it was a lemon right out of the box. To make a long story short, there were build quality issues like I had not previously seen in any Apple machine I had owned. Then there were the bugs. I chalked it up to OS X bugs for 2 years and my friend kept claiming his machine didn't have the same problems. I did not listen to his theory that my machine had issues because I knew that the quality of OS X had begun declining rapidly anyway late in the 10.4 life cycle.
When the dreaded nVidia graphics chip death hit me just prior to the 2.5 year mark, though, I began to consider that perhaps it was the case that this could have been the source of some of my previous woes. Graphics cards get hot and this could have been overheating nearby components.
I had not purchased AppleCare with the machine because I had not anticipated needing it. I knew that Apple tends to be good about extending coverage of known build or design flaws, and, aside from such flaws, their machines tended to last a long time. I was right and Apple did own up to this and cover the nVidia problem for 3 years, which meant this would get fixed for free. When I got the newly repaired MacBook back, I began to experience a lot of the same problems I'd had before, especially with USB drives. I thought this proved my theories about the bugginess of OS X and moved on to using Ubuntu on the machine full time. I had already been using it a little less than half time, but this was a clean break. I only booted into OS X when I really had to after that. This was fine for a few months, then I began having a lot of weird bugs. At first I assumed it was just poor linux drivers for the Apple components, but after a few complete lockups caused when using USB drives, I realized there was a common thread with what happened in OS X on this machine.
I then started doing some cross reference testing and realized the same problem occured in OS X, Ubuntu, and Windows 7. Now I knew it had to be hardware. Runnnig Apple Hardware Test on it confirmed that there was a problem with the temp sensor on the graphics chip. Research showed that others with this problem also experienced weird issues with USB. I haven't researched this further but I assume that the USB chipset must be in the near vicinity of the graphics chip and was getting overheated as well.
I contacted Apple and explained the situation and they were very helpful and sent me a box to send it back to them. They say they replaced the logic board, temp sensor, and fans. When I got it back, I ran the Apple Hardware Quick Test on it. At first I thought all was finally well, but I decided to run the extended test. Then I got the same error again. I then ran the quick test to see if it would show there now. It did. I shut down, waited a few minutes, turned it back on, and ran the quick test again. It tested clean. I let it sit there idle for a few minutes, then ran it again. Clean. I waited a few more minutes and ran it a third time. Now it showed the error. This confirmed that when the chip gets to a certain heat, it must be causing the temp sensor to malfunction.
I called Apple and talked them through the scenario. The guy said that though they were puzzled as to how this could still be happening, this was the third strike and they would simply replace it with a brand new MacBook Pro of the current model that was as nearly equivalent as possible to the old one.
I have been fairly critical of Apple lately, but that, folks, is how you do customer support and I can only give them praise for this. Granted, my work originally paid $2000 for a machine that ended up being a piece of crap by design, and it took three years of pain, but at least we are finally getting the machine we paid for.
And that is the moral of this story... that with Apple you do pay more for hardware than you would pay for similar PC hardware and you are not getting hardware that is necessarily better since they are all made in China by the same few manufacturers, but what you are getting for that premium is pretty good support and some assurance that the company you are dealing with generally makes an honest effort to take care of problems when it is proven that they produced a defective design.
So, you pay for what you get, and boy have I ever paid for this one. I am appreciative, though, that Apple was willing to make good on the purchase in the long run, even though this machine was within 1 month of the 3 year cutoff for coverge on this issue. I will be buying 3 year Apple Care on the new machine as soon as it arrives now that I have a better hands-on experience of what level of support to expect for the investment. Hopefully, this machine will be rock solid enough that I will be able to use it without all the problems I was having in OS X. So, yes, this will get me to give OS X one last chance and I can finally confirm whether the USB drive problems I was experiencing are bugs in OS X or were just caused by the hardware in the other machine.
If the hardware ends up not being properly supported by Ubuntu and Windows 7, I may have to pass it on to a coworker and get me a new PC laptop anway, but I'm at least willing to try after seeing Apple's support in action.
To further prove my point, contrast this to HP. Someone brought me an HP laptop at work that was showing the beginnings of the nVidia graphics failure. It was already known that several brands were affected by this, so I was not surprised. The machine was just over 1 year old, and just out of warranty. I had heard that HP was covering this issue responsibly, so I called them expecting to get this fixed for free on nVidia's dime. Imagine my surprise when the tech support rep told me this model was not covered. Other models in the same series were covered, but he insisted this model "was not affected by the nVidia problem". After getting off the phone and doing some further testing, the graphics died completely. Hoping to have better chances with a different rep, I called again. I was told the same story. "Now let me get this straight. This machine has the same graphics chip, the same symptoms, and is even in the same series as some of the machines you are covering, but you are claiming this model is not affected?" "Yes, this model is not affected." Unbelievable.
HP had a web page that listed the covered models, which I kept open in a browser tab for several months hoping HP would eventually own up to this one. They never did. This was a $1300 laptop and if only lasted for 1 year. For the Apple, we paid $2000 and it had slightly better specs but lacked many of the cool features of this laptop. One could argue that the HP was better hardware for $700 less. Even though the Apple cost us $700 more, we actually got our money's worth in the end as Apple was willing to replace the machine at the eleventh hour, just before the 3 year extended coverage expired. HP wasn't even willing to cover their laptop beyond the 1 year warranty.
In the past, you paid more for a better machine when you bought an Apple. These days, when you pay more for an Apple, you don't necessarily get more reliable hardware or more features, but you do get better support. The "time is money" value equation could go either way depending on whether it is more inconvenient for you to just buy a new machine and move on or whether it is more inconvenient to make a trip to a local Apple Store and possibly be without your machine for a few days. At least you know now what you are in for and can decide how you will "pay for what you get".
Todd Russell
July 17, 2010
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