Live data from Hacker News

My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

tobiasberg.net

151–160 of 554 posts

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a great example of their point, all I got was a mechanically inferior connector (putting the most important piece of the female connector on a floating sliver of plastic was a choice) and the cable hell attached to USB C. If USB C had been so important to me I wouldn't have bought iPhones all those years.

I have tried to explain this so many times to people. You could just scrape out the lint from the lighting port with a tooth pick. The fragile part was the easily replaceable cable. Now the fragile part is in the iPhone itself.

Lightning had the contact springs in the phone, USB-C has the contact springs on the cable. This is the part that wears out, and USB-C moving to the cable is an improvement.

Throughout its life, Lightning suffered from "black pin plague" where when springs in the port wore out, the power pin would start arcing. Now you have a cable with poor connectivity on the power pin, and you use this cable in another Apple device and it starts arcing on that device as well, causing that device to start transmitting this disease. It was a terrible design and USB-C does not have it.

https://ioshacker.com/iphone/why-the-fourth-pin-on-your-ligh...

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Decades of HN users finger wagging and suggesting FOSS hardware has progressed society nowhere. 12 months from EU mandatory replaceable batteries and products across the industry are being redesigned with repairability, usb-c, and user friendly designs. It’s time to accept regulation actually does work when you have a competent government.

That's a great example of their point, all I got was a mechanically inferior connector (putting the most important piece of the female connector on a floating sliver of plastic was a choice) and the cable hell attached to USB C. If USB C had been so important to me I wouldn't have bought iPhones all those years.

If Lightning is so important to you then you can still use Lightning-based iPhones. Nobody took away the hardware they sold you, they just mandated that the new ones adopt a common standard.

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#155

>Here’s hoping governments regulate laptop manufacturers to actually make repairable machines in the future. No, this is a bad solution. If you want a repairable machine, buy one. They exist. Others have already mentioned Framework, but there are other options that aren't that far down the spectrum either. One of the things macbook users praise the most is "build quality", which often means the solidity of the device…

>One of the things macbook users praise the most is "build quality", which often means the solidity of the device, lack of flex, etc. These quality features are, in part, achieved by the same choices that make it hard to repair.

Lol what.

Nothing about apple design is a sacrifice to repairability. The only reason they make it hard to repair is because when your Mac breaks, you go buy another one. Can't afford it? Then you are not "classy" enough to own a Mac.

I swear, there must be some epidemic where Mac fans are losing their marbles even more so today.

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The government mandates that cars get safer every year and fatalities are down 78% from the 1960s. Whenever government regulates things to benefit people, people tend to benefit. On some metrics. On affordability, new cars are considerably more expensive. Whether that's a worthwhile tradeoff is beside the point. The GP's point is that there's no free lunch, and your example doesn't address that.

I never said the lunch was free only that it should be nutritious.

Amd for the diner, new cars are much less nutritious due to the regulation. They're like some sort of bland protein-shake lunch.

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#157
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is mostly because Americans keep electing total morons.

I would actually suggest this is symptomatic of the real problem: money in politics. Elected officials (and some appointed, like SCOTUS) keep changing laws and precedents to allow more and more money in politics. They can't quit all that dark money - without a lot of funding, you don't get elected. Usually the best funded candidate wins. There was an anonymous oped from a congressman some years back which bemoaned th…

When one party will violate every norm and law to the greatest extent that they can get away with it, it's pretty much impossible to compete with them. I want good things for people. I can't compete with fascists because they will cheat and lie and employ violence. My positive intent is almost impossible to out thwart their dirty deeds if they are willing to break laws / change laws and I won't.

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#158

>Here’s hoping governments regulate laptop manufacturers to actually make repairable machines in the future. No, this is a bad solution. If you want a repairable machine, buy one. They exist. Others have already mentioned Framework, but there are other options that aren't that far down the spectrum either. One of the things macbook users praise the most is "build quality", which often means the solidity of the device…

Decades of HN users finger wagging and suggesting FOSS hardware has progressed society nowhere. 12 months from EU mandatory replaceable batteries and products across the industry are being redesigned with repairability, usb-c, and user friendly designs. It’s time to accept regulation actually does work when you have a competent government.

Gigachad writing there <3

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#159

>Here’s hoping governments regulate laptop manufacturers to actually make repairable machines in the future. No, this is a bad solution. If you want a repairable machine, buy one. They exist. Others have already mentioned Framework, but there are other options that aren't that far down the spectrum either. One of the things macbook users praise the most is "build quality", which often means the solidity of the device…

The Macbook Neo is just as high-quality as any other Apple product. Apple has some of the most brilliant engineers in the industry, they can absolutely design a repairable device to their own standards.

>Apple has some of the most brilliant engineers in the industry,

Did they fire the guy who designed the magic mouse? What about the one who designed the iPhone 4 antenna? Are they still working there? The butterfly keyboard? The class action Apple lost over the Macbook 2011 design flaws? Should I go on?

Re: My MacBook keyboard is broken and it's insanely expensive to fix

#160
Over a decade ago, my father would fix washing machine controllers, replacing mechanical timers, buttons, panels, or other parts; Now, for the same problem, we just need to replace a control circuit board; the circuit board itself is sealed with adhesive for waterproofing, which also means the circuit board is not repairable.

Maintainability is actually not a mandatory standard, but a design trade-off; the biggest problem with the MacBook is not this, but rather that Apple does not allow other means of repairing the MacBook, such as various certification chips, etc.;

Post reply on HN