I visited the genius bar a year or so back. They actually did teach me that in short I was short circuting my IPod but that's besides the point. My iPod (to this day) shows up in my computer and not in iTunes. They gave me the low down on what to do but nothing helped. I COULD bring in my computer (super tower so it's bit hefty) but I've got other computers in the house so I just put the music on a thumbstick and drag it onto my connected iPod.
Also I am getting a new laptop for college soon so hopefully that will work well with my iPod!
I had to make a visit to the genius bar last week too. My iPod had failed several times and I was still under warranty so I figured I would just be able to switch it out. I didn’t know about the genius bar so I didn’t make an appointment. After being told by a really passive aggressive employee that they couldn’t see anyone without an appointment all that day, I just had to leave. Coming back with an appointment the next day wasn’t bad at all though, and I had a new iPod in about five minutes. It was just frustrating to be completely turned away from the store initially.
Oops, not three hours; but still, my point still stands, the appointment is a queue management system to try to prevent you from waiting several hours if there is a crowd.
Wtf? I thought Macs never locked up or had any problems.
Actually, I have one of my own stories to contribute.
I wanted a Mac case to mod, and I asked around how much they costed. It was a nice $800 figure, the same one you got. This is wierd, but it seems that all of their crap is a nice $800 bucks.
So when I was in San Fransisco for the G70 launch, I decided to get my iPod looked at. I had some issues with songs that wouldn't play, and I could hear the hard drive grinding it's gears while trying to access them. I figured it would be a fairly quick thing to run in, move my audio over to a new one, and get on the road. Unfortunately, I had not made an appointment and the SF Apple Store was pretty busy, so it was about a 2 hour wait to see someone. The guy I talked to was very nice, and fairly knowledgable. We went through all the standards, which I had done allready, and then he offered to give me a fresh iPod mini. That was pretty freakin cool. However, there was no way to move my music off onto the new one. I told him, give me about 5 minutes with a terminal, and I'll do it, but it was a no go. Needless to say, I was not about to fly back to NC without my music, so it didn't get fixed.
The only regret I have about the process was the inability to keep my music and the very long wait. Other than that, it was pretty pleasant, and I learned a lot about Garageband, iPhoto, and iMovie in the process of waiting.
I'd like to see some benchmarks of the new dual core Pentium D 805 (2.66ghz). I know it's not going to be super fast but hey...IT'S $145 at newegg. How about some comparisons with its faster siblings ( pD 820, 830, 840) or its distant cousins (Athlon X2) ?
I've owned various Macs since 1988 and not experienced hardware problems with any of them. (I even have an SE/30 in a closet that still works!) Apple hardware tends to keep on ticking even into obsolescence.
My first trip to the Genius Bar happened last week when one of two Airport Express base stations that I purchased a year ago stopped working. I think its power supply might be fried.
There were two "geniuses" on duty at the Bar when I arrived late in the afternoon. My wait was under five minutes. I provided a quick description of the problem. The genius inquired when I purchased the Airport but did not request to see the receipt that I had in my hand. He filled out a repair request form on his iMac G5, printed me a copy, and explained that a "repair part" would arrive in three to five business days. I thought this was an odd approach since the Airport Express is essentially a self-contained unit with no apparent openings to access the inside. Why not simply give me a new unit from the 50 or so that were sitting on a store shelf?
I received a voicemail two business days later saying that the part was in. I returned to the Apple Store with the defective product. Although there were several people ahead of me in line, one of the geniuses invited anyone picking up hardware to come forward. He opened a plain brown carton that contained a new Airport Express minus its little AC power plug. This was the "part," apparently. Then, he transplanted the AC plug from my defective Airport to the new one, placed the newly assembled unit inside my original box, and sent me on my way in under a few minutes.
So, this was a positive customer service experience -- perhaps a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10 -- and certainly much better than how I've been treated by most other companies.
Coincidentally, I made my first visit to an apple genius bar this week as well, but just went with a friend who wanted to upgrade the memory on his 15" Powerbook G4, and to fix an erratic trackpad.
We had got a stick of DDR2 ram (non-apple) from bestbuy, and took it to the guy (genius?) at the counter. He immediately said that he would not be able to lend any advice or even tools to change/upgrade the ram. We asked him to ensure that the machine was at least compatible with DDR2, and he assured us several times, after checking both the RAM and the machine, that it was indeed compatible. We decided to get him to look at the trackpad, and after making sure it was not a software issue (netboot), he said that they would be able to repair the machine in 24hrs. So we leave the machine there...
We come back in 2 days, and pick up the machine. I try to upgrade the memory, and guess what? The machine has DDR PC2700 ram inside. So the RAM was a no-go, even after all those assurances from the "genius". To cap it all off, the trackpad has been having the same problems again.
Sorry about the long post but visiting the genius bar did not leave a very good aftertaste.
The reason many (not all) Mac users are leery of 1st-revision Apple hardware isn't who makes it, but because Apple will often have a relatively experimental design that, however neat it is, has quirks that Apple couldn't/didn't detect in testing. For example, the first 12" PowerBook G4 model in 2003 had a left palmrest that got overly hot, and it turned out that Apple needed to rethink the internal cooling to solve that problem. They did, and Rev B onwards was great.
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16 Comments
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kristof007 - Tuesday, March 7, 2006 - link
I visited the genius bar a year or so back. They actually did teach me that in short I was short circuting my IPod but that's besides the point. My iPod (to this day) shows up in my computer and not in iTunes. They gave me the low down on what to do but nothing helped. I COULD bring in my computer (super tower so it's bit hefty) but I've got other computers in the house so I just put the music on a thumbstick and drag it onto my connected iPod.Also I am getting a new laptop for college soon so hopefully that will work well with my iPod!
e4te - Friday, March 3, 2006 - link
I had to make a visit to the genius bar last week too. My iPod had failed several times and I was still under warranty so I figured I would just be able to switch it out. I didn’t know about the genius bar so I didn’t make an appointment. After being told by a really passive aggressive employee that they couldn’t see anyone without an appointment all that day, I just had to leave. Coming back with an appointment the next day wasn’t bad at all though, and I had a new iPod in about five minutes. It was just frustrating to be completely turned away from the store initially.michael2k - Friday, March 3, 2006 - link
I think the idea isn't to turn you away; it's to make sure you aren't stuck at the store waiting for three hours (like Anand).Make the appointment, figure out when to drop by, and drop by later.
Unless you would rather wait several hours?
michael2k - Friday, March 3, 2006 - link
Oops, not three hours; but still, my point still stands, the appointment is a queue management system to try to prevent you from waiting several hours if there is a crowd.Runiteshark - Monday, February 27, 2006 - link
Wtf? I thought Macs never locked up or had any problems.Actually, I have one of my own stories to contribute.
I wanted a Mac case to mod, and I asked around how much they costed. It was a nice $800 figure, the same one you got. This is wierd, but it seems that all of their crap is a nice $800 bucks.
xype - Thursday, March 2, 2006 - link
It's their way of saying "Ever tried eBay?"LanceVance - Friday, February 24, 2006 - link
You must have really liked the term "genius". You kept quoting it in quotes.overclockingoodness - Saturday, February 25, 2006 - link
LOL, sounds like he was mocking on Apple's terminology. :)michael2k - Monday, February 27, 2006 - link
Except that he likes it enough to recommend people using it as a non-self tech support.I wouldn't call it mocking... amused probably.
nordicpc - Friday, February 24, 2006 - link
So when I was in San Fransisco for the G70 launch, I decided to get my iPod looked at. I had some issues with songs that wouldn't play, and I could hear the hard drive grinding it's gears while trying to access them. I figured it would be a fairly quick thing to run in, move my audio over to a new one, and get on the road. Unfortunately, I had not made an appointment and the SF Apple Store was pretty busy, so it was about a 2 hour wait to see someone. The guy I talked to was very nice, and fairly knowledgable. We went through all the standards, which I had done allready, and then he offered to give me a fresh iPod mini. That was pretty freakin cool. However, there was no way to move my music off onto the new one. I told him, give me about 5 minutes with a terminal, and I'll do it, but it was a no go. Needless to say, I was not about to fly back to NC without my music, so it didn't get fixed.The only regret I have about the process was the inability to keep my music and the very long wait. Other than that, it was pretty pleasant, and I learned a lot about Garageband, iPhoto, and iMovie in the process of waiting.
aggie02 - Friday, February 24, 2006 - link
I'd like to see some benchmarks of the new dual core Pentium D 805 (2.66ghz). I know it's not going to be super fast but hey...IT'S $145 at newegg. How about some comparisons with its faster siblings ( pD 820, 830, 840) or its distant cousins (Athlon X2) ?mlittl3 - Friday, February 24, 2006 - link
Uh, what!?JAS - Friday, February 24, 2006 - link
I've owned various Macs since 1988 and not experienced hardware problems with any of them. (I even have an SE/30 in a closet that still works!) Apple hardware tends to keep on ticking even into obsolescence.My first trip to the Genius Bar happened last week when one of two Airport Express base stations that I purchased a year ago stopped working. I think its power supply might be fried.
There were two "geniuses" on duty at the Bar when I arrived late in the afternoon. My wait was under five minutes. I provided a quick description of the problem. The genius inquired when I purchased the Airport but did not request to see the receipt that I had in my hand. He filled out a repair request form on his iMac G5, printed me a copy, and explained that a "repair part" would arrive in three to five business days. I thought this was an odd approach since the Airport Express is essentially a self-contained unit with no apparent openings to access the inside. Why not simply give me a new unit from the 50 or so that were sitting on a store shelf?
I received a voicemail two business days later saying that the part was in. I returned to the Apple Store with the defective product. Although there were several people ahead of me in line, one of the geniuses invited anyone picking up hardware to come forward. He opened a plain brown carton that contained a new Airport Express minus its little AC power plug. This was the "part," apparently. Then, he transplanted the AC plug from my defective Airport to the new one, placed the newly assembled unit inside my original box, and sent me on my way in under a few minutes.
So, this was a positive customer service experience -- perhaps a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10 -- and certainly much better than how I've been treated by most other companies.
UlricT - Thursday, February 23, 2006 - link
Coincidentally, I made my first visit to an apple genius bar this week as well, but just went with a friend who wanted to upgrade the memory on his 15" Powerbook G4, and to fix an erratic trackpad.We had got a stick of DDR2 ram (non-apple) from bestbuy, and took it to the guy (genius?) at the counter. He immediately said that he would not be able to lend any advice or even tools to change/upgrade the ram. We asked him to ensure that the machine was at least compatible with DDR2, and he assured us several times, after checking both the RAM and the machine, that it was indeed compatible. We decided to get him to look at the trackpad, and after making sure it was not a software issue (netboot), he said that they would be able to repair the machine in 24hrs. So we leave the machine there...
We come back in 2 days, and pick up the machine. I try to upgrade the memory, and guess what? The machine has DDR PC2700 ram inside. So the RAM was a no-go, even after all those assurances from the "genius". To cap it all off, the trackpad has been having the same problems again.
Sorry about the long post but visiting the genius bar did not leave a very good aftertaste.
Commodus - Thursday, February 23, 2006 - link
The reason many (not all) Mac users are leery of 1st-revision Apple hardware isn't who makes it, but because Apple will often have a relatively experimental design that, however neat it is, has quirks that Apple couldn't/didn't detect in testing. For example, the first 12" PowerBook G4 model in 2003 had a left palmrest that got overly hot, and it turned out that Apple needed to rethink the internal cooling to solve that problem. They did, and Rev B onwards was great.Ecmaster76 - Thursday, February 23, 2006 - link
And I thought PC notebook repairs were lucrative...