Thane, I think your opinion is an interesting one, because, no one on the list is saying "your service is not up to par"; but rather the "general" service at other pc (wintel) outlets is always below from what you can get for an Apple. The toughest part for anyone I recommend an Apple for is that they generally are looking at the $500 laptops and expecting the +$1000 performance. At the company I work for, I have assimilated the apple support, people jokingly will call my line and ask for AppleCare :). I was a very anti-Apple PC pro guy, up until 2007 when I won an iPod Touch at a computer conference. Initially I considered selling it on ebay but then I wouldn't be the geek I am. I decided to instead look into this phenomenon. Why did our marketing department prefer Apple. How the heck did OSX change the landscape. Eventually I was too far down the rabbit hole and I turned up now owning an iPhone 4, iPads (1 and 2) Macbook Pro and will be picking up an iMac soon. After working on these devices over the last few years I have found more pleasure, easier manageability than my Windows helpdesk brethren. Just like my windows helpdesk guys, I end up getting people coming to me initially for mac software problems, many things I've never experienced in my own usage, but I am able to quickly find solutions, fixes and thanks to a non-nonsense simple backup solution that is dead easy and included in your OS, all my users have extra USB drives that they run a regular backup against to help protect their data.
You are right that they don't just willy nilly replace your laptop should something fail. My macbook pro had the mainboard replaced when the videocard went out, as it turned out my video card was not the nvidia reported problem that they had documented so I couldn't just get a replacement and since I had never purchased applecare I didn't get the extra treatment I paid 350 for a replacement mainboard, about $50 more than what the board was listed on ebay and they replaced it professionally, they didn't even balk at the hdd that I upgraded on my own (though maybe that's why I had to pay for the replacement rather than getting a replacement outright). in the end I was happy with my macbook pro before and afterwards and I have not had a single issue since then. my co-worker on the other hand with a core duo laptop HAD purchased applecare and her dvd drive started to give her problems, they replaced the drive 3 times, each time they provided her with service with a smile and helped her feel that everything was going to be just fine, after all she couldn't bear the thought of not being able to use her mac to iChat with her grandchildren. On the 4th return to the store after the drive failed agian they told her that the dvd rom part was now permanently out of stock, though she was out of warranty (and not paying for the cd rom fixes) they told her that they would replace her Core Duo laptop with a fresh 2011 15" macbook pro (the one with Thunderbolt). so it's not just a quick and easy replacement, but if you could hear her talk about the experience, you would swear that they did everything bending over backwards to get her computer fixed. contrast that by our service guy who took his acer in to bestbuy's geek squard who reformatted his drive w/o asking if he had performed a backup and took no precautions to warn him. The hard drive failed a few months afterwards and even though he purchased the warranty through bestbuy they still made him return it and they determined that he had not kept the machine in a clean enough environment to prevent failure and thus the warranty would not cover for a replacement. the PC stories are generally about people who go to typical outlets to get service. I know dell generally performs satisfactory service and I always advice people to buy Dell if they want a PC, but if they want better service I advice them to go Mac. just my 2cents -Francisco http://bit.ly/sqlthis | Tsql and More... <http://db.tt/JeXURAx> On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 06:36, Thane Sherrington < [email protected]> wrote: > At 09:57 AM 09/12/2011, Anthony Q. Martin wrote: > > BTW, I'm not arguing they their computers are better than anyone >> elses....heck, I have PC/laptops they are lasting years and years....I'm >> just talking about how they treat people AFTER the sale and how EASY it is >> to get service...something which they have created, mind you..... I think >> the best way to know is to get an apple product and turn up at a genius >> bar...you can witness first-hand how others are getting treated. It's an >> open environment. Better than hearsay, IMO. >> > > BTW, you keep suggesting I'm spreading hearsay. I'm not. A friend of > mine was a manager at an Apple call centre. The orders came down from > Apple. Maybe he was lying, but I'm not sure why he would. Heck, look at > the response Apple had to the MacDefender infections, or the dropped calls > on the iPhone. Not everything is rainbows and unicorns in the Apple world. > > Link: http://i.zdnet.com/blogs/**apple-support-instructions.** > png?tag=content;siu-container<http://i.zdnet.com/blogs/apple-support-instructions.png?tag=content;siu-container> > > BTW, I'm not sure where you guys are buying PCs, but at my shop, we go to > a great effort to treat people well - no we don't hand people brand new PCs > to replace their old ones, but we do try. So the idea that only Apple > offers great service isn't accurate. Surely we can't be the only PC shop > on the planet that treats people well. > > T > > > >
