Requardless of if Apple should repair it or not, or if LTT understands the repair process or not, or the reason for why it broke. I still feel this was a bad customer service experience. Apple should have explained the situation or something other than just “go find someone else to help you”. If this whole article is about how LTT don’t know anything, then I would say that Apple should have explained it. Maybe Apple is right, but I agree with LTT that that wasn’t a good experience.
You got to love how biased this article is. It first tries to discredit the youtube channel and under estimates its accomplishments and credibility.
Ya...I guess 5.6 million subscribers IS more then a million subscribers however clearly it is worded to make it sound like it was barely a million.
Two: This is linus tech tips and anyone in the technology field is aware of them. They are very respected for their honesty and their skills. Yes there are running jokes but through and through it is clear the COMPANY ((Not channel they are a full fledge company with a legal department so again trying to discredit their worth)) has the skills and resources to handle what they where doing. How do we know this? Well lets see what they have been doing from being flown out to do reviews on all the latest techs to helping build the largest super computer in canada. Let me resay that: He was trusted in helping assemble the largest super computer in Canada. That is the level his skill is on. You might say oh well it was just plugging in ram and blah blah blah however if he screwed something up it would take a long while to discover WHERE the issue was which would result in thousands of dollars in man hours and lost revenue. That means it is clear that company trusts him to be good and not damage anything.
Three: It was damaged not by them trying to do "lolz i do stuff" like this suggests. No. It was damaged while they where taking it apart for a review on the product. Showing the components and how it looks. You know much like the Ifixit picture that is posted in this article.
Four: It is funny the article is adding in more damage to the computer then is revealed. Even going as far as to claim the motherboard COULD be damage in the beginning and by the end of the article talking as if it is a fact the motherboard is broken and listing crazy pricing for repairs. 5600 dollars on a 4999 computer. I dont by that for a minute and I will explain why right now: The only reason repairs start costing more then a new product is when the parts are so hard to come by AND there is an extreme shortage of people who can do the repair. This is one of the latest products which means parts are being mass producted actively and a responsible company would be reserving a portion of components for this exact reason.
Next: The claim that by the end of it they are losing that much on repairs...No. I dont buy it lets say they DID have to repair it and ALL that was true. Do you know what apple would do? Give a new computer and do a free software/memory transfer. Seriously it costs them at most 4.2k to make the product so by giving them a new computer would save them 1.4k a repair. And no computer company would make it cheaper to give out a brand new computer product then to do basic repairs and frankly that is what this is. A basic repair. Replace the screen. IF by some chance the motherboard was completely broken ((I find unlikely)) that is still easy and frankly not that bad. At most ((and again at most)) 600 dollars for the motherboard ((asus rampage one of the most expensive motherboards at the moment and remember thats buying 3rd party apple isnt going to charge themselves customer price)). Lets say 200 for the screen that is only 800 dollars for the whole repair for parts. Why? Because most of apples cost comes from the mark up of 1: Paying for their Research and Development Department and 2: Paying for the name brand. 3: One of the most expensive components ((the CPU)) couldnt have been damaged as it had its cooler on.
Pair this up with the fact they asked ok. If you cant do the repair can we get the parts so WE can do the repair? This means the argument that even the fast technician would cost them money is voided. They are now being asked "Hey I screwed up my computer can i please buy stuff from you so I can repair it?". And the answer is no. No you may not. The only option out there is to buy a brand new one. Do not argue we are Apple. The article made fun of his analogy about driving a car into a pole saying it is not the same but really it is. In both situation something happened to the product the manufactorers would not recommend. In both situations the product is not able to work. In both situations there is no solution on how to proceed with the product other then buying brand new.
And finally: This ties perfectly into their fight against right to repair. They do not want anyone to have the ability to repair their products. They will not sell parts to anyone and not have licensed 3rd party repair technicians anymore. Imagine again your car. You only option is to go to the dealership for everything and pay their price with no negotiation. From tire rotations to oil changes. That is what apple wants.
Welcome to AI, LTT fan! People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. I'm not expecting you to come back and read the response, but here it is anyway.
Not sure if it was you or another Admin/Mod that mentioned all the new accounts, like myself they are probably all LTT forum members brought here by the news topic posted over there. It's rather interesting to compare the difference in general consensus and viewpoints between here and the LTT forum.
As you suspect though I won't be sticking around for long, not a big Mac person myself so don't have any compelling reason to stick around. Will keep an eye out for any interesting comments/replies for a day or so though.
I do find the hoo-ha generated by the video in question a bit much though, as a whole not the content piece here. It sucks that repair was denied and I don't necessarily agree that the motherboard is dead, the full and complete details over the exact events isn't actually that clear and I don't trust the 3rd party repair agent's evaluation of the damage but this is the risk you play as a reviewer. You know you will be opening the device and voiding warranty, you also know you will not be subject to normal customer warranty repair so I think it was poor planning to not have gotten all the required footage of all planned content pieces BEFORE opening the iMac Pro. Assume the worst.
You got to love how biased this article is. It first tries to discredit the youtube channel and under estimates its accomplishments and credibility.
Ya...I guess 5.6 million subscribers IS more then a million subscribers however clearly it is worded to make it sound like it was barely a million.
Two: This is linus tech tips and anyone in the technology field is aware of them. They are very respected for their honesty and their skills. Yes there are running jokes but through and through it is clear the COMPANY ((Not channel they are a full fledge company with a legal department so again trying to discredit their worth)) has the skills and resources to handle what they where doing. How do we know this? Well lets see what they have been doing from being flown out to do reviews on all the latest techs to helping build the largest super computer in canada. Let me resay that: He was trusted in helping assemble the largest super computer in Canada. That is the level his skill is on. You might say oh well it was just plugging in ram and blah blah blah however if he screwed something up it would take a long while to discover WHERE the issue was which would result in thousands of dollars in man hours and lost revenue. That means it is clear that company trusts him to be good and not damage anything.
Three: It was damaged not by them trying to do "lolz i do stuff" like this suggests. No. It was damaged while they where taking it apart for a review on the product. Showing the components and how it looks. You know much like the Ifixit picture that is posted in this article.
Four: It is funny the article is adding in more damage to the computer then is revealed. Even going as far as to claim the motherboard COULD be damage in the beginning and by the end of the article talking as if it is a fact the motherboard is broken and listing crazy pricing for repairs. 5600 dollars on a 4999 computer. I dont by that for a minute and I will explain why right now: The only reason repairs start costing more then a new product is when the parts are so hard to come by AND there is an extreme shortage of people who can do the repair. This is one of the latest products which means parts are being mass producted actively and a responsible company would be reserving a portion of components for this exact reason.
Next: The claim that by the end of it they are losing that much on repairs...No. I dont buy it lets say they DID have to repair it and ALL that was true. Do you know what apple would do? Give a new computer and do a free software/memory transfer. Seriously it costs them at most 4.2k to make the product so by giving them a new computer would save them 1.4k a repair. And no computer company would make it cheaper to give out a brand new computer product then to do basic repairs and frankly that is what this is. A basic repair. Replace the screen. IF by some chance the motherboard was completely broken ((I find unlikely)) that is still easy and frankly not that bad. At most ((and again at most)) 600 dollars for the motherboard ((asus rampage one of the most expensive motherboards at the moment and remember thats buying 3rd party apple isnt going to charge themselves customer price)). Lets say 200 for the screen that is only 800 dollars for the whole repair for parts. Why? Because most of apples cost comes from the mark up of 1: Paying for their Research and Development Department and 2: Paying for the name brand. 3: One of the most expensive components ((the CPU)) couldnt have been damaged as it had its cooler on.
Pair this up with the fact they asked ok. If you cant do the repair can we get the parts so WE can do the repair? This means the argument that even the fast technician would cost them money is voided. They are now being asked "Hey I screwed up my computer can i please buy stuff from you so I can repair it?". And the answer is no. No you may not. The only option out there is to buy a brand new one. Do not argue we are Apple. The article made fun of his analogy about driving a car into a pole saying it is not the same but really it is. In both situation something happened to the product the manufactorers would not recommend. In both situations the product is not able to work. In both situations there is no solution on how to proceed with the product other then buying brand new.
And finally: This ties perfectly into their fight against right to repair. They do not want anyone to have the ability to repair their products. They will not sell parts to anyone and not have licensed 3rd party repair technicians anymore. Imagine again your car. You only option is to go to the dealership for everything and pay their price with no negotiation. From tire rotations to oil changes. That is what apple wants.
Welcome to AI, LTT fan! People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. I'm not expecting you to come back and read the response, but here it is anyway.
Not sure if it was you or another Admin/Mod that mentioned all the new accounts, like myself they are probably all LTT forum members brought here by the news topic posted over there. It's rather interesting to compare the difference in general consensus and viewpoints between here and the LTT forum.
As you suspect though I won't be sticking around for long, not a big Mac person myself so don't have any compelling reason to stick around. Will keep an eye out for any interesting comments/replies for a day or so though.
I do find the hoo-ha generated by the video in question a bit much though, as a whole not the content piece here. It sucks that repair was denied and I don't necessarily agree that the motherboard is dead, the full and complete details over the exact events isn't actually that clear and I don't trust the 3rd party repair agent's evaluation of the damage but this is the risk you play as a reviewer. You know you will be opening the device and voiding warranty, you also know you will not be subject to normal customer warranty repair so I think it was poor planning to not have gotten all the required footage of all planned content pieces BEFORE opening the iMac Pro. Assume the worst.
1) I made a passing comment about it -- but it was one of our regulars who mentioned it first!
2) Appreciate your coming by. We're always good with reasonable disagreement and discussion.
3) I think that LTT knows the risks. As a general rule, I'm good with their tech assessments on things, as well as their methodology. I've been accused of being one-sided in this article, and maybe that's the case if you turn your head a certain direction and maybe squint a little. But, LTT didn't bother to even nod in this direction, so...
linustech is willing to pay 100% of the costs and apple refuses to even send a apple tech a screen ..he isnt asking for a free item or anything special
It's not just business. Just sell the dang parts. Who cares who installs it, unless the person is trying to get it warrantied. If trying for warranty, you are outta luck. If you just want to buy the part, sell it to him. All the stupid "Need to be Apple pro Certified to handle our parts" is idiotic.
So you have an accident in your car, break its windshield and go to your dealer and say please repair it and he says we can't, we don't know what else is broken please buy a new car ?? How is this a fair world? Writing something in terms and condition dose not make it morally right.
I've read some poor analogy using an auto but this the worst one yet.
The cost of a windshield of a new car is less than 1/100 the cost of the rest of the car. It would make sense to repair the windshield even if labor was $1,000. It would even make sense if the car was a $500,000 used Lamborghini and it cost $10,000 because of the cost to custom make the windshield in Italy and have it shipped to the US. It would make sense even if there was a chance that the new windshield might crack again, while running over a pothole, due to the stress from a slight bent in the windshield frame.
Here we are talking about replacing parts that can easily be 80% of the value of a new iMac. And that's without adding the cost of labor. Neither Apple or an authorize tech know why the logic board fried after the iMac was taken apart and put back together. What if the iMac was not put back together right, after it was taken apart, and they didn't detect the problem until after they fried a new logic board? What if the power supply was damaged during the taking apart and putting back together process, in such a way that it tested OK but ended up frying the logic board again, after a week of use? The logic board alone could be over 1/3 the cost of a new iMac, not including the cost of labor to replace it.
Show me where replacing the windshield on a new car can cost over 75% of the value of the car.
A better analogy is when I wanted to replace my blown engine in my use mini van. The van was only worth about $3,500. But because it had a transmission that I had rebuilt about year and half ago, at $2200, I felt it was worth rebuilding or putting in an already rebuilt engine, if it was cost effective. After all, I would end up with a 12 year old van (body in good condition) with basically a good engine and transmission and buying another use van would cost $3,500 for one with close to 180,000 miles and a more banged up body and other unknowns. A low mileage van would cost closer to $5,000
Of the half a dozen mechanic shop in my area, not one of them recommended rebuilding the engine as they knew the cost for the labor it takes to find out all that is wrong, parts and labor to repair, way exceeded the value of the van. The other option was to drop in a complete rebuilt engine. And not one of these places would do it unless I bought the rebuilt engine from them and they were going to charge over $2,500 for just the rebuilt engine and labor would be another $2,000. One place would only drop in a factory new engine at over $8,000.
But I can get a used engine (not rebuilt) for $650 including shipping on eBay from a reputable scavenger yard. But I could not find a mechanic shop willing to test the engine before installation and to change out the engine, even if I was willing to pay for the labor. Their excuse was that since they didn't know where the engine came from, they can not guarantee that the use engine I bought will be problem free, after they install it. There was no way they were evening going to give me a quote because once they do that, I can accept the quote and they would have to install the engine. And they don't want to deal with the hassle of the engine having problems after they install it because they didn't detect the problem before they installed it. Not even if they took that into account in their quote.
BTW- I ended up buying the used engine from a reputable eBay scavenger yard and paying a friend of a family member, $1200 to remove the old engine, look over the used engine and install it. And that includes replacing the water pump, all the belts, all the fuel ejectors and the alternator (as the bearings were going). He worked as a mechanic, had all his own tools and was doing work on the side, in his home garage or the garage of the owner of the car he's working on. But only for friends and family members. It took him and another friend about 5 days. Working only about 3-4 hours a day. But it was actually more like 6 weeks as they could only work on weekends, only when they had time. In the end they made decent money, but not if they were actually running a business. And it cost me less than $2000, as the used engine, with less than 120,000 miles, cost me $650 shipped. That was 2 years ago and the van is still running without any problems, so far.
Its pretty obvious that nearly anyone from LTT is going to side with Linus on this one so there's no sense in arguing with them. They don't understand Apple and never will and were not going to convince them that Apple is different (not stupid, just different) from DIY tinkerer PC boxes. I would find it hard to believe that if he had done something similar to say a Microsoft Surface Studio the same result would have most likely happened.
Honestly, I think he just wanted to make a stir about Apple and I know he contemplated even making a video about the lack of getting his severely damaged iMac Pro repaired. He's really never been an Apple person and pretty much bad mouths anything with an Apple logo from what I see and hear so I'm not surprised by this video at all. While I certainly don't doubt his talents, he's very well known for being lets say a "bull in a china shop" when it comes to things. He's very known for dropping things and breaking them, taking things apart and breaking them, etc. Sure, maybe he can build a kickass PC and tell you all about the CPU, GPU, etc, but I certainly wouldn't trust him with my stuff.
I seriously doubt this will have any effect what so ever on Apple's sales of iMac Pros, nor will it have any impact on Mac Pro sales. Anyone buying one isn't going to purposely severely damage one. They buy it because they need to get shit done, not taking play expert technician and try to take it apart and not put it back together properly. Unless a fan dies, there's more than likely never a reason to take it apart. Everything else is static and far less prone to failure. I would think most anyone looking to buy one of these and saw Linus' video would just say he's a dipshit!
What i found rather funny is that shortly before i'd seen Linus post this video i had been having my morning coffee with a co-worker and for whatever reason i had been telling him about Linus' original video reviewing the IMac Pro (Which obviously lead to it's damage).
1 of the points he made, was that there is no video in. So down the line when you want to upgrade you can't even get extra use out of the machine by using is as a 2nd monitor. This is a rather deliberate choice by Apple to create Forced Obsolescence. It's rather shady and definitely Anti-Consumer.
This issue he's now having has the same smell of even more Forced Obsolescence.
Another load of BS, go back to PC land, you never owned a Mac in your own damn life and just spouting to hear yourself talk.
Just because you don't like what i said, doesn't make it BS. It was the truth and a very good point that Linus originally made about the product.
Attacking someones credentials as opposed to the content of what was said is a terribly weak way to try and put forth an argument. I assume you have never made a single comment about any product on earth that you have never owned, that seems just a little unlikely.
You are correct. It's not BS because he didn't like you said, it's BS because you're claiming that including a display in a product is "shady and definitely Anti-Consumer." Not liking what you said is a result of you writing a bunch of BS.
You tried to compare an extremely pricey desktop PC to an apple watch, apples to oranges, to try and make a point that fits your own narrative. Sooooo who's talking BS? haha
Oh, so this is now an issue about price? So you think the $10k gold Apple Watch (which far exceeds the base price of the iMac) should have a removable display but not he $350 Apple Watch Sport? Is that the narrative you now want to press about which CE products should be required to have certain components removable so they can be placed onto other products in the future they're above some price ceiling that you decide on a whim? Where would a MacBook Pro fall since they start and stop within the range of an iMac?
You keep saying 'removable'. Please re-read my comment before making inaccurate assertions. And the apple watch stuff is just sillyness and you know it.
Linus' critique was that a display input would allow you to use it as a standalone monitor once you've moved from from the current internals. You could use it as a 2nd monitor to go with your new IMac for example.
Oh, I think I got it now. You think it's "shady and definitely Anti-Consumer" that Apple isn't building inputs on all their devices. So, I should be able to say, plug in an otherwise defunct PowerBook from 1995 into my MacBook Pro and use it as an external display? Well that sure seems useful and easy to engineer¡ What could go wrong? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You do realise that people can have differing opinions right? I get that you disagree and that's fine. But trying to make false analogies and misquotations to try and discredit someone else's opinion is really silly. Linus' original video was actually pretty fair and in general he doesn't play favourites, he's ripped a number of manufacturers on all sides of the fence. No one is without sin, fair critiques is how things get better for everyone.
My comments have nothing to do with Linus. My comments are about your ridiculous claims.
As for your "do realise that people can have differing opinions" comment, I'll let Patton Oswalt explain that to you…
You didn't even read what i originally said properly since you went off on a wild goose chase about removable displays. So perhaps try and have an adult conversation with someone before calling them ridiculous
Oh, I read it, and I've addressed it. I tried to give you an out on your ridiculous statements about it being "shady and definitely anti-consumer" that Apple doesn't have display inout ports on all their devices that have embedded displays, but you just keep knocking on that door. Of course, you'll want to say you're only talking about the iMac, but that misses the point of your odd declaration that Apple is shady for building devices that do specific things.
Standard iMacs can be used in Target Display Mode which is nice when you want an extra monitor or a larger one for a MacBook/MacBook Pro or when the iMac becomes performance obsolete and you get a newer faster one. The iMac Pro does not support this, I think this is a valid complaint about the iMac Pro.
More BS. Even your link gives you away as it shows that TDM hasn't been supportable on any 5K iMac. That's 4 years and yet you've framed as being specific to the iMac Pro and without mentioning the display interconnect issue for TDM. Shameful. And that's not even considering the purpose of TDM.
You got to love how biased this article is. It first tries to discredit the youtube channel and under estimates its accomplishments and credibility.
Ya...I guess 5.6 million subscribers IS more then a million subscribers however clearly it is worded to make it sound like it was barely a million.
Two: This is linus tech tips and anyone in the technology field is aware of them. They are very respected for their honesty and their skills. Yes there are running jokes but through and through it is clear the COMPANY ((Not channel they are a full fledge company with a legal department so again trying to discredit their worth)) has the skills and resources to handle what they where doing. How do we know this? Well lets see what they have been doing from being flown out to do reviews on all the latest techs to helping build the largest super computer in canada. Let me resay that: He was trusted in helping assemble the largest super computer in Canada. That is the level his skill is on. You might say oh well it was just plugging in ram and blah blah blah however if he screwed something up it would take a long while to discover WHERE the issue was which would result in thousands of dollars in man hours and lost revenue. That means it is clear that company trusts him to be good and not damage anything.
Three: It was damaged not by them trying to do "lolz i do stuff" like this suggests. No. It was damaged while they where taking it apart for a review on the product. Showing the components and how it looks. You know much like the Ifixit picture that is posted in this article.
Four: It is funny the article is adding in more damage to the computer then is revealed. Even going as far as to claim the motherboard COULD be damage in the beginning and by the end of the article talking as if it is a fact the motherboard is broken and listing crazy pricing for repairs. 5600 dollars on a 4999 computer. I dont by that for a minute and I will explain why right now: The only reason repairs start costing more then a new product is when the parts are so hard to come by AND there is an extreme shortage of people who can do the repair. This is one of the latest products which means parts are being mass producted actively and a responsible company would be reserving a portion of components for this exact reason.
Next: The claim that by the end of it they are losing that much on repairs...No. I dont buy it lets say they DID have to repair it and ALL that was true. Do you know what apple would do? Give a new computer and do a free software/memory transfer. Seriously it costs them at most 4.2k to make the product so by giving them a new computer would save them 1.4k a repair. And no computer company would make it cheaper to give out a brand new computer product then to do basic repairs and frankly that is what this is. A basic repair. Replace the screen. IF by some chance the motherboard was completely broken ((I find unlikely)) that is still easy and frankly not that bad. At most ((and again at most)) 600 dollars for the motherboard ((asus rampage one of the most expensive motherboards at the moment and remember thats buying 3rd party apple isnt going to charge themselves customer price)). Lets say 200 for the screen that is only 800 dollars for the whole repair for parts. Why? Because most of apples cost comes from the mark up of 1: Paying for their Research and Development Department and 2: Paying for the name brand. 3: One of the most expensive components ((the CPU)) couldnt have been damaged as it had its cooler on.
Pair this up with the fact they asked ok. If you cant do the repair can we get the parts so WE can do the repair? This means the argument that even the fast technician would cost them money is voided. They are now being asked "Hey I screwed up my computer can i please buy stuff from you so I can repair it?". And the answer is no. No you may not. The only option out there is to buy a brand new one. Do not argue we are Apple. The article made fun of his analogy about driving a car into a pole saying it is not the same but really it is. In both situation something happened to the product the manufactorers would not recommend. In both situations the product is not able to work. In both situations there is no solution on how to proceed with the product other then buying brand new.
And finally: This ties perfectly into their fight against right to repair. They do not want anyone to have the ability to repair their products. They will not sell parts to anyone and not have licensed 3rd party repair technicians anymore. Imagine again your car. You only option is to go to the dealership for everything and pay their price with no negotiation. From tire rotations to oil changes. That is what apple wants.
I enjoyed reading this post. I also enjoyed reading Wizard's posts. His post seem more rational and thought out than ever before (I hope that doesn't sound back handed.). But as Apple have bumped up the prices of Pro Towers and iMacs he seems to make more and more sense. (They haven't made the the Mac Pro and Mini more capable for less money in the last 5 years! Under Jobs, hardware would generally offer more for the SAME price, not MORE!). They could have dropped the Mac Pro case into the mini tower range and sold it as a more powerful mini. But their ego won't allow them to do it. It has to be 'their way' or the 'highway.' They can't see it because they're locked into a sales guy and marketing holding pattern. The Mac line has been stale since 2013. They didn't follow up the Mac Pro with even ram, SSD bumps or price reductions or re-fashion it into a more prosumer tower which it would be nicely purposed for with its thermal envelope.
My problem with Apple is the one of 'irony.' Something they appear not to understand. They very same thinking that got them locked into a great design for the wrong market. It's the lower end to mid-tier of pros. But it didn't have the thermal elasticity for the High end Pro or higher end pro. Didn't they learn from the Cube which had the same vertigo in the 'pro' market. Boutique. Not something you could accuse the original G3 Tower of.
Back to the article. But isn't this stench of hubris all the same thing?!
This, the 'pants down' admission that they don't know their core base anymore, the Apple Park monument to Steve (it's very nice...) being completed in the time it took them to realise that and the current PR nightmare with Linus are all linked. The flurry of 'Mac Pro' articles at Applesinsider (yes, typo, but I left it in...heh. Pun not intended...) makes this even more ironic and po-faced.
Linus has done well for himself. Great channel. They cover the plethora of choice's that PC owners have. Not many Mac fans have asked for this confusion of choice as they know it leads to M$ syndrome. But Apple Tower owners enjoy less choice now than when Job's returned! There isn't even a tower, really. (Can we really call the 'Can' a Tower?). They cover Macs and have the same barking dog complaints about 'Macs' that most Mac Pro or Former Mac Pro (now PC?) owning tower users have. Linking or not is the editorial's prerogative. But it's not in the spirit of internet journalism and somewhat churlish. Besides, Barbara Streisand syndrome? Don't draw attention to it if you don't like it. Well done to Linus on his 2 million hits.
Apple could have played the game and avoided a PR nightmare by agreeing to fix this. It's Linus' money, right? Sure, they broke the warranty. But they didn't claim otherwise. Sure. It's a bit of an 'accident' that they 'broke' it. There is a bit of showmanship to this. As is the slightly veiled tongue in cheek way they review Apple products. But they gave the iMac Pro a fair shake with a decent review and even did a gamer's follow up review. (5k for a gaming set up...again. Ironic. Apple used to have £1500 towers that you could upgrade to a decent NV or ATI card for this purpose! Memories...). So they're not out to really click bait Apple. But Apple, as a 250$ Billion company are fair game for scrutiny. From the lack of choice, to the weak points of their hardware, pricing and their back up service to pricey kit. Especially in light of the iPhone slowdown PR nightmare. It didn't look good regardless of the arguments. The word on the street is that Apple slows your kit down after you pay a fortune mark up for a phone that is made cheaply in China.
In this instance, it's Apple won't fix your rig you paid £5000 for a sealed unit. And they won't even let you upgrade your ram as a minimum of upgradability.
As the poster above notes. They've sealed off all avenues of user repair or 3rd party repair pretty much so you 'buy once' (expensively and even more expensively to upgrade at point of sale because it's pretty damn impossible for Johnny average or even skilled repair people to do affordably.)
The G3 tower wasn't really cpu upgradable as such. But you could do the ram, hard drive, cpu and pick the monitor of your choice... And you could add components as you could afford them. Not everyone is a lawyer or doctor. Most public sector workers in the UK haven't had a pay rise worthy of the name in the last ten years. But that hasn't stopped Apple bumping up prices in the UK.
But all this highlights the market Apple are trying to capture with this market. Funny that they won't fix it. They won't give them a Mac they can fix themselves. They won't compromise. They don't even listen. (It took them 5 years to admit something needed fixing with the Mac Pro and then admitted they don't know their core base...because they weren't listening in the first instance and took them five further years after punishing PR forced them to come out with their tail in-between their legs...not once...but twice(!)...but most Pro's at the time just wanted an updated Mac Pro Tower with 'just new specs', it was fine bar a bit of trimming to reflect SSDs rather than HDDs... I'm sure many would take the Bauhaus now in Space Grey with an SSD trim. Why over think it? They've had great tower designs from the Quadra, G3, G4, G5, Intel... Not only don't they listen they don't follow through on their core base.). Because this market WANTS to fix their 'Macs' if they could buy the Mac they WANTED.
An unassuming, stylish tower with industry standard parts for a fair price. Funny. That's what Jobs was touting with the G3 blue tower keynote. Proprietary stops you being current, it's harder to keep up with the market! That's what he said. Yet we got the 'Can' which is proprietary industry parts. Just enough to force you to expensively upgrade at the point of purchase. iMac Pro. Nice as it is. Same thing.
Jobs returned to Apple. He made things quick. Affordable. Value engineering. And? Open. That's how they were able to put the tanks on M$'s lawn. Proprietary is great when you're ahead (see iPhone...) but when you're behind (and it seems like Macs have always been behind too often...) it's a difficult sell to people who aren't on a lot of disposable income. I'm not talking about Google craptops or M$ £399 Dell towers or £300 laptops. I could get an Apple desktop, mid-tier model for £1999 inc VAT in 1997. Now I have to pay £2999 for an entry model in 2018. That's not progress.
Now? It's going more proprietary, difficult to upgrade. (Remember iMacs, G3 Towers and Mac Mini's that Apple and Jobs boasted the user could open up themselves? Distant memories.). No screws and masking tape and glue (Prit stick?) holding everything together on cheap labour. But when companies get bigger they close things off in the quest to nickel and dime even more money for shareholders. £100 per hour service charges? It shouldn't cost that if the machines were self serviceable. That's Kinda the point. No one wants to go the car dealer and pay 100% more because it says Citroen or Ford on the parts and service. or even 200% more. Sealing everything off is doing so that all avenues are closed off and £££££ when it goes wrong. If Apple had such conviction about their best in class hardware, why not offer a 3 year warranty? :P
Apple have given the finger to the very enthusiast market they've treated with contempt over the last 5 years. The very one they're trying to design for. Irony. Or better still, point Linus to a 16 core AMD thread ripper CPU with SLI Nvidia 1080Tis that could probably be had for the same price.
Steve Jobs gave the G3 Tower (Blue and White) 7 addressable pro'/prosumer markets. Accessibility. EXPANDABILITY. The latest components. The latest GPUs. The latest games. What happened?
He had it simple. An iMac for the consumer. £595-£1000+. A Pro tower for Prosumer/Pro. £1495-£2995. Dual options came the G4 and G5. Affordable engineering. Consumer and Pro friendly.
All this gnashing and wailing at what a pro is? Apple decides it is £3k for a crappy quad core and you're not a pro is you can't afford that? What kind of partisan thinking is that? A pro could be someone who uses his mini, iMac or Tower. But at least offer the latest specs at sane price points. The G3 Tower had 4 addressable price points. Low, medium, high and higher. Now it's high, higher, insane and ludicrous. iMac 'Pro' starting at £5k. iMac consumer 27 inch pretty much 2k to start. £1,749.00 inc VAT for an i5 with mediocre GPU and 8 stingy gigs of ram....Yes. No SSD included. Take away the screen and you have a mediocre PC. You could pretty much get an 8 core Ryzen and 1070 GPU for that. No screen granted. But with a choice of screen you wouldn't pay the £1k apple would want for a 4k screen.
Apple, you act like your core's friend, reach out...then kick them in the nuts when you have a new consumer friend to play with. I never grudged Apple their iPhone mini Mac success....but I'm not the fan of their products now that I was in 1997-2000-ish.
THT's timeline was interesting reading. But it was damning.
What's getting lost in this conversation, and I should have been more forceful about it in the article is the iMac Pro is a workstation. Xeon processors. ECC RAM. The works. This isn't an ATX case, with a standard motherboard.
You know who else makes workstations with custom motherboards? HP, Dell, and Lenovo. You know what else they all reserve the right to do? Not provide their motherboards and RAM to end-users. Is this somehow not an issue, for some reason?
The 5K panel itself can be had on assorted Chinese marketplaces for about $900 without video interconnects. It is the same panel as in the LG 5K display, and the regular 5K iMac. The cabling is a little different than in the iMac 5K -- but Apple in no way has a stranglehold on the LG-produced panel, so LTT could in theory source one themselves -- and Apple won't care.
"But, complaining that Apple wouldn't pave the way for the repair even at the channel's cost makes no sense, and demonstrates a clear lack of knowledge about not just Apple's repair terms and conditions, but how the service system works."
Agreed. Anyone with any experience of Apple know their t+c's mean they are incredibly tightly controlled. You don't really own it, think of it as more of a rental administrated by Apple. If you want a product that you own and you have the freedom to do whatever you want with it, then Apple is not for you.
At those prices? Give me 16 gigs of Ram. SSD as standard (500 gig ones are much cheaper now...). i7 (folks, it's an old cpu now. OLD!). What about i7 standard with option for an i9? (Well, that would cut off the avenue for the iMac Pro creamium...). And at least a consumer 56 Vega on the mid-tier with the choice of the consumer 64 Vega to upgrade. The high end iMac should have a Vega 64. This is the kind of choice we USED to have with the G3/4/5 towers.
linustech is willing to pay 100% of the costs and apple refuses to even send a apple tech a screen ..he isnt asking for a free item or anything special
On the contrary, two idiots on YouTube took a computer apart while it was plugged in. They also showed no care in regard to disassembly of the unit so it should serve as a good lesson for these young Youtubers. Apple should be applauded in my opinion.
You don't really own it, think of it as more of a rental administrated by Apple. If you want a product that you own and you have the freedom to do whatever you want with it, then Apple is not for you.
And yet you watched people who own an iMac Pro use their freedom to dismantle and damage their iMac Pro.
What you meant to say is that you don't believe Apple should have any freedoms.
What i found rather funny is that shortly before i'd seen Linus post this video i had been having my morning coffee with a co-worker and for whatever reason i had been telling him about Linus' original video reviewing the IMac Pro (Which obviously lead to it's damage).
1 of the points he made, was that there is no video in. So down the line when you want to upgrade you can't even get extra use out of the machine by using is as a 2nd monitor. This is a rather deliberate choice by Apple to create Forced Obsolescence. It's rather shady and definitely Anti-Consumer.
This issue he's now having has the same smell of even more Forced Obsolescence.
Gotta love these low post count folks swarming here. Blah blah blah.
The resale value of an iMac is enough to buy an equivalent screen and someone else get to use the machine as a machine as opposed to an energy sucking waste. This is a complete non-issue.
But in short, consumer have the right to hold his warranty if he or 3rd party opened up or repaired his device. Also companies should provide service if consumer is out of warranty. So Apple's repair terms and conditions will be invalid under this federal law. The only way to go forward is to court apple or any other company who refuse to fix your devices ( that's why there are stickers that say void your warranty if removed)
LTT didn't discuss this because his audience knew about those laws. People should watch this guy videos about fixing electronic and how companies try to scum consumers. louis rossmann
Comments
As you suspect though I won't be sticking around for long, not a big Mac person myself so don't have any compelling reason to stick around. Will keep an eye out for any interesting comments/replies for a day or so though.
I do find the hoo-ha generated by the video in question a bit much though, as a whole not the content piece here. It sucks that repair was denied and I don't necessarily agree that the motherboard is dead, the full and complete details over the exact events isn't actually that clear and I don't trust the 3rd party repair agent's evaluation of the damage but this is the risk you play as a reviewer. You know you will be opening the device and voiding warranty, you also know you will not be subject to normal customer warranty repair so I think it was poor planning to not have gotten all the required footage of all planned content pieces BEFORE opening the iMac Pro. Assume the worst.
2) Appreciate your coming by. We're always good with reasonable disagreement and discussion.
3) I think that LTT knows the risks. As a general rule, I'm good with their tech assessments on things, as well as their methodology. I've been accused of being one-sided in this article, and maybe that's the case if you turn your head a certain direction and maybe squint a little. But, LTT didn't bother to even nod in this direction, so...
That is the idiotic thinking some are supporting.
I've read some poor analogy using an auto but this the worst one yet.
The cost of a windshield of a new car is less than 1/100 the cost of the rest of the car. It would make sense to repair the windshield even if labor was $1,000. It would even make sense if the car was a $500,000 used Lamborghini and it cost $10,000 because of the cost to custom make the windshield in Italy and have it shipped to the US. It would make sense even if there was a chance that the new windshield might crack again, while running over a pothole, due to the stress from a slight bent in the windshield frame.
Here we are talking about replacing parts that can easily be 80% of the value of a new iMac. And that's without adding the cost of labor. Neither Apple or an authorize tech know why the logic board fried after the iMac was taken apart and put back together. What if the iMac was not put back together right, after it was taken apart, and they didn't detect the problem until after they fried a new logic board? What if the power supply was damaged during the taking apart and putting back together process, in such a way that it tested OK but ended up frying the logic board again, after a week of use? The logic board alone could be over 1/3 the cost of a new iMac, not including the cost of labor to replace it.
Show me where replacing the windshield on a new car can cost over 75% of the value of the car.
A better analogy is when I wanted to replace my blown engine in my use mini van. The van was only worth about $3,500. But because it had a transmission that I had rebuilt about year and half ago, at $2200, I felt it was worth rebuilding or putting in an already rebuilt engine, if it was cost effective. After all, I would end up with a 12 year old van (body in good condition) with basically a good engine and transmission and buying another use van would cost $3,500 for one with close to 180,000 miles and a more banged up body and other unknowns. A low mileage van would cost closer to $5,000
Of the half a dozen mechanic shop in my area, not one of them recommended rebuilding the engine as they knew the cost for the labor it takes to find out all that is wrong, parts and labor to repair, way exceeded the value of the van. The other option was to drop in a complete rebuilt engine. And not one of these places would do it unless I bought the rebuilt engine from them and they were going to charge over $2,500 for just the rebuilt engine and labor would be another $2,000. One place would only drop in a factory new engine at over $8,000.
But I can get a used engine (not rebuilt) for $650 including shipping on eBay from a reputable scavenger yard. But I could not find a mechanic shop willing to test the engine before installation and to change out the engine, even if I was willing to pay for the labor. Their excuse was that since they didn't know where the engine came from, they can not guarantee that the use engine I bought will be problem free, after they install it. There was no way they were evening going to give me a quote because once they do that, I can accept the quote and they would have to install the engine. And they don't want to deal with the hassle of the engine having problems after they install it because they didn't detect the problem before they installed it. Not even if they took that into account in their quote.
BTW- I ended up buying the used engine from a reputable eBay scavenger yard and paying a friend of a family member, $1200 to remove the old engine, look over the used engine and install it. And that includes replacing the water pump, all the belts, all the fuel ejectors and the alternator (as the bearings were going). He worked as a mechanic, had all his own tools and was doing work on the side, in his home garage or the garage of the owner of the car he's working on. But only for friends and family members. It took him and another friend about 5 days. Working only about 3-4 hours a day. But it was actually more like 6 weeks as they could only work on weekends, only when they had time. In the end they made decent money, but not if they were actually running a business. And it cost me less than $2000, as the used engine, with less than 120,000 miles, cost me $650 shipped. That was 2 years ago and the van is still running without any problems, so far.
Honestly, I think he just wanted to make a stir about Apple and I know he contemplated even making a video about the lack of getting his severely damaged iMac Pro repaired. He's really never been an Apple person and pretty much bad mouths anything with an Apple logo from what I see and hear so I'm not surprised by this video at all. While I certainly don't doubt his talents, he's very well known for being lets say a "bull in a china shop" when it comes to things. He's very known for dropping things and breaking them, taking things apart and breaking them, etc. Sure, maybe he can build a kickass PC and tell you all about the CPU, GPU, etc, but I certainly wouldn't trust him with my stuff.
I seriously doubt this will have any effect what so ever on Apple's sales of iMac Pros, nor will it have any impact on Mac Pro sales. Anyone buying one isn't going to purposely severely damage one. They buy it because they need to get shit done, not taking play expert technician and try to take it apart and not put it back together properly. Unless a fan dies, there's more than likely never a reason to take it apart. Everything else is static and far less prone to failure. I would think most anyone looking to buy one of these and saw Linus' video would just say he's a dipshit!
My problem with Apple is the one of 'irony.' Something they appear not to understand. They very same thinking that got them locked into a great design for the wrong market. It's the lower end to mid-tier of pros. But it didn't have the thermal elasticity for the High end Pro or higher end pro. Didn't they learn from the Cube which had the same vertigo in the 'pro' market. Boutique. Not something you could accuse the original G3 Tower of.
Back to the article. But isn't this stench of hubris all the same thing?!
This, the 'pants down' admission that they don't know their core base anymore, the Apple Park monument to Steve (it's very nice...) being completed in the time it took them to realise that and the current PR nightmare with Linus are all linked. The flurry of 'Mac Pro' articles at Applesinsider (yes, typo, but I left it in...heh. Pun not intended...) makes this even more ironic and po-faced.
Linus has done well for himself. Great channel. They cover the plethora of choice's that PC owners have. Not many Mac fans have asked for this confusion of choice as they know it leads to M$ syndrome. But Apple Tower owners enjoy less choice now than when Job's returned! There isn't even a tower, really. (Can we really call the 'Can' a Tower?). They cover Macs and have the same barking dog complaints about 'Macs' that most Mac Pro or Former Mac Pro (now PC?) owning tower users have. Linking or not is the editorial's prerogative. But it's not in the spirit of internet journalism and somewhat churlish. Besides, Barbara Streisand syndrome? Don't draw attention to it if you don't like it. Well done to Linus on his 2 million hits.
Apple could have played the game and avoided a PR nightmare by agreeing to fix this. It's Linus' money, right? Sure, they broke the warranty. But they didn't claim otherwise. Sure. It's a bit of an 'accident' that they 'broke' it. There is a bit of showmanship to this. As is the slightly veiled tongue in cheek way they review Apple products. But they gave the iMac Pro a fair shake with a decent review and even did a gamer's follow up review. (5k for a gaming set up...again. Ironic. Apple used to have £1500 towers that you could upgrade to a decent NV or ATI card for this purpose! Memories...). So they're not out to really click bait Apple. But Apple, as a 250$ Billion company are fair game for scrutiny. From the lack of choice, to the weak points of their hardware, pricing and their back up service to pricey kit. Especially in light of the iPhone slowdown PR nightmare. It didn't look good regardless of the arguments. The word on the street is that Apple slows your kit down after you pay a fortune mark up for a phone that is made cheaply in China.
In this instance, it's Apple won't fix your rig you paid £5000 for a sealed unit. And they won't even let you upgrade your ram as a minimum of upgradability.
As the poster above notes. They've sealed off all avenues of user repair or 3rd party repair pretty much so you 'buy once' (expensively and even more expensively to upgrade at point of sale because it's pretty damn impossible for Johnny average or even skilled repair people to do affordably.)
The G3 tower wasn't really cpu upgradable as such. But you could do the ram, hard drive, cpu and pick the monitor of your choice... And you could add components as you could afford them. Not everyone is a lawyer or doctor. Most public sector workers in the UK haven't had a pay rise worthy of the name in the last ten years. But that hasn't stopped Apple bumping up prices in the UK.
But all this highlights the market Apple are trying to capture with this market. Funny that they won't fix it. They won't give them a Mac they can fix themselves. They won't compromise. They don't even listen. (It took them 5 years to admit something needed fixing with the Mac Pro and then admitted they don't know their core base...because they weren't listening in the first instance and took them five further years after punishing PR forced them to come out with their tail in-between their legs...not once...but twice(!)...but most Pro's at the time just wanted an updated Mac Pro Tower with 'just new specs', it was fine bar a bit of trimming to reflect SSDs rather than HDDs... I'm sure many would take the Bauhaus now in Space Grey with an SSD trim. Why over think it? They've had great tower designs from the Quadra, G3, G4, G5, Intel... Not only don't they listen they don't follow through on their core base.). Because this market WANTS to fix their 'Macs' if they could buy the Mac they WANTED.
An unassuming, stylish tower with industry standard parts for a fair price. Funny. That's what Jobs was touting with the G3 blue tower keynote. Proprietary stops you being current, it's harder to keep up with the market! That's what he said. Yet we got the 'Can' which is proprietary industry parts. Just enough to force you to expensively upgrade at the point of purchase. iMac Pro. Nice as it is. Same thing.
Jobs returned to Apple. He made things quick. Affordable. Value engineering. And? Open. That's how they were able to put the tanks on M$'s lawn. Proprietary is great when you're ahead (see iPhone...) but when you're behind (and it seems like Macs have always been behind too often...) it's a difficult sell to people who aren't on a lot of disposable income. I'm not talking about Google craptops or M$ £399 Dell towers or £300 laptops. I could get an Apple desktop, mid-tier model for £1999 inc VAT in 1997. Now I have to pay £2999 for an entry model in 2018. That's not progress.
Now? It's going more proprietary, difficult to upgrade. (Remember iMacs, G3 Towers and Mac Mini's that Apple and Jobs boasted the user could open up themselves? Distant memories.). No screws and masking tape and glue (Prit stick?) holding everything together on cheap labour. But when companies get bigger they close things off in the quest to nickel and dime even more money for shareholders. £100 per hour service charges? It shouldn't cost that if the machines were self serviceable. That's Kinda the point. No one wants to go the car dealer and pay 100% more because it says Citroen or Ford on the parts and service. or even 200% more. Sealing everything off is doing so that all avenues are closed off and £££££ when it goes wrong. If Apple had such conviction about their best in class hardware, why not offer a 3 year warranty? :P
Apple have given the finger to the very enthusiast market they've treated with contempt over the last 5 years. The very one they're trying to design for. Irony. Or better still, point Linus to a 16 core AMD thread ripper CPU with SLI Nvidia 1080Tis that could probably be had for the same price.
Steve Jobs gave the G3 Tower (Blue and White) 7 addressable pro'/prosumer markets. Accessibility. EXPANDABILITY. The latest components. The latest GPUs. The latest games. What happened?
He had it simple. An iMac for the consumer. £595-£1000+. A Pro tower for Prosumer/Pro. £1495-£2995. Dual options came the G4 and G5. Affordable engineering. Consumer and Pro friendly.
All this gnashing and wailing at what a pro is? Apple decides it is £3k for a crappy quad core and you're not a pro is you can't afford that? What kind of partisan thinking is that? A pro could be someone who uses his mini, iMac or Tower. But at least offer the latest specs at sane price points. The G3 Tower had 4 addressable price points. Low, medium, high and higher. Now it's high, higher, insane and ludicrous. iMac 'Pro' starting at £5k. iMac consumer 27 inch pretty much 2k to start. £1,749.00 inc VAT for an i5 with mediocre GPU and 8 stingy gigs of ram....Yes. No SSD included. Take away the screen and you have a mediocre PC. You could pretty much get an 8 core Ryzen and 1070 GPU for that. No screen granted. But with a choice of screen you wouldn't pay the £1k apple would want for a 4k screen.
Apple, you act like your core's friend, reach out...then kick them in the nuts when you have a new consumer friend to play with. I never grudged Apple their iPhone mini Mac success....but I'm not the fan of their products now that I was in 1997-2000-ish.
THT's timeline was interesting reading. But it was damning.
Lemon Bon Bon.
(Short version of post.)
Lemon Bon Bon.
You know who else makes workstations with custom motherboards? HP, Dell, and Lenovo. You know what else they all reserve the right to do? Not provide their motherboards and RAM to end-users. Is this somehow not an issue, for some reason?
The 5K panel itself can be had on assorted Chinese marketplaces for about $900 without video interconnects. It is the same panel as in the LG 5K display, and the regular 5K iMac. The cabling is a little different than in the iMac 5K -- but Apple in no way has a stranglehold on the LG-produced panel, so LTT could in theory source one themselves -- and Apple won't care.
Agreed. Anyone with any experience of Apple know their t+c's mean they are incredibly tightly controlled. You don't really own it, think of it as more of a rental administrated by Apple.
If you want a product that you own and you have the freedom to do whatever you want with it, then Apple is not for you.
At those prices? Give me 16 gigs of Ram. SSD as standard (500 gig ones are much cheaper now...). i7 (folks, it's an old cpu now. OLD!). What about i7 standard with option for an i9? (Well, that would cut off the avenue for the iMac Pro creamium...). And at least a consumer 56 Vega on the mid-tier with the choice of the consumer 64 Vega to upgrade. The high end iMac should have a Vega 64. This is the kind of choice we USED to have with the G3/4/5 towers.
Lemon Bon Bon.
Apple should be applauded in my opinion.
What you meant to say is that you don't believe Apple should have any freedoms.
The resale value of an iMac is enough to buy an equivalent screen and someone else get to use the machine as a machine as opposed to an energy sucking waste. This is a complete non-issue.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/chapter-50
But in short, consumer have the right to hold his warranty if he or 3rd party opened up or repaired his device.
Also companies should provide service if consumer is out of warranty.
So Apple's repair terms and conditions will be invalid under this federal law. The only way to go forward is to court apple or any other company who refuse to fix your devices ( that's why there are stickers that say void your warranty if removed)
LTT didn't discuss this because his audience knew about those laws.
People should watch this guy videos about fixing electronic and how companies try to scum consumers. louis rossmann