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Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

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Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#51

Post by setquk »

vardump wrote: post #42
stunt wrote: post #6

There are many examples of Apple never admitting design issues! Beside what they are doing with their reputation and customers loyalty, I’m wondering how is it going to affect their engineering culture within the company itself. They are very biased with their strategies in everything and they hardly change them. Same situation Microsoft was in some years ago.

I don't know about others, but I don't dare to buy Apple products anymore. My 2012 MacBook Pro is still going strong, but newer MacBooks don't have anywhere near the same build quality and durability. When you have an issue, and complain about it or even ask advice what to do, I've often encountered toxic behavior from Apple fans. Denying the problem's existence and such. The problem is of course what to heck to buy.…

Wise choice. I bought a 2018 MBA with a “fixed butterfly keyboard”. Keyboard was useless after two weeks so it went back.

Back on the thinkpad now.

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#52

Post by blhack »

titanix2 wrote: post #35
andrei_says_ wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got a nice used 2015 model. Absolutely love it. Great keyboard, MagSafe, SD card slot, hdmi. Physical keys instead of a touchbar. The other day I walked through the cord while it was charging on the table and my laptop did not get destroyed. how could Apple f that up so badly is beyond me.

Yes, the various ports were also a big selling point. By the time USB-C will be democratized we will have (I hope) a total revision that will solve the current issues.

I hope USB-C (the connector at least) never becomes the standard. I have a MBP with these god awful ports and it's really frustrating how bad the connector is.

There are DJs for whom the macbook pro is required equipment for their performances. They're performing in front of 10s and sometimes >100 thousand people. Their midi controllers, and their SOUND CARDS (really a DJ mixer, most likely) are connected by: USB A.

USB-C doesn't have the sort of retention that USB A does, at least the ports on my super expensive laptop don't. At this point, they cable would likely just fall out if I tipped the laptop sideways.

Thing is: there are LOTS of things for which this type of thing is true. I've done lighting shows where this MBP was running a large lighting element on a large stage, and it was all dependent on that crappy USB-C connector, and a chain of dongles (!!!). Same thing is going to be true for interactive art installations, (some) large lighting shows. All sorts of stuff. So annoying.

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#53

Post by andr »

stunt wrote: post #6

There are many examples of Apple never admitting design issues! Beside what they are doing with their reputation and customers loyalty, I’m wondering how is it going to affect their engineering culture within the company itself. They are very biased with their strategies in everything and they hardly change them. Same situation Microsoft was in some years ago.

On the flipside, Apple has a lot more data on what components fail than we do. They can detect issues before they become a "-gate" and I imagine slight improvements like this one happen fairly often. Which, I'd say, is a good engineering practice and culture.

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#54

Post by wlesieutre »

regecks wrote: post #30
zuron7 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, I do know a few (mid-size) companies who tend to replace the entire system, then send the faulty piece back to a centralized repair facility which repairs the boards, and then they're used to repair another faulty piece. Don't know whether the large companies do this though.

Apple do this and call it "remanufacturing".

That's a pretty good gig for them, charge you $700 for a display replacement and then take your old display and remanufacture it for $10 to reuse somewhere else

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#55

Post by _Codemonkeyism »

devwastaken wrote: post #36
CoolGuySteve wrote: post #12

A bigger problem imo is the $700 display replacement. I have a similar problem with my wife’s broken MacBook, where replacing the display costs almost as much as the computer itself. The problem with the MacBook is that the display is bonded to the glass and the aluminum back so that you have to replace the entire top assembly to fix the display. It’s even more depressing to know that the ribbon connecting the displa…

Yep, Louis rossman, a popular apple repair guy on YouTube talks similiar about this a lot. The overwhelming majority of problems are fixable for 10 minutes or less and less than a dollar in components. But apple will just tell you to buy a new board and purposefully makes it harder for repair. The whole 'sustainability' is a marketing act.

And Louis has several Apple store stories in his videos where the idea is "This display replacement is so expensive, just get a new Apple laptop". So it seems Apple strategy is to no longer repair but push people into buying new stuff - I guess this looks much better in their P&L and KPIs (new sales vs. repairs). But my accounting knowledge is limited.

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#57

Post by saagarjha »

scottydelta wrote: post #46
vietvu wrote: post #41

A classic Apple move. Then a year later, they will offer to "fix" the affected model with "reasonable price", and people still have no choice but to go along with it.

just like their generous $30 battery replacements on iPhones after they were caught slowing down the iphones.

> they were caught slowing down the iphones

This is a mischaracterization of the issue. They communicated battery throttling poorly; they weren't "caught slowing down" iPhones.

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#58

Post by eridius »

l1feh4ck wrote: post #25

The one thing that caught my attention is that "they keep deleting the issue we post". That is an evil thing to do.

Question: do they delete any other posts, or just ones alleging design flaws? Do they give any reason for deletion?

Re: Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pros Attempt to Solve Flexgate, Without Admitting It Exists

#60

Post by WA »

The display in my MacBook Pro 2017 just died recently. It was flickering for a week and then went all black (almost), except for a small line of pixels.

Together with the double-insert problem when hitting the space key, it’s really total garbage.

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