My Apple equipment has never gone wrong, but was brought before they started to head for the mainstream again.

I may be buying a new Mac soon, and this lack of quality is really worrying me.

Or, alternatively, and far more likely, someone that worked for Apple wrote down the phone number of a customer with a nice sounding girly voice.

You can argue that it is all Apple’s fault. Yes they could’ve gone with hardware that is more open, but 1. You would not get the same OS X Mac experience, and you would moan about that. 2. What other good totally open hardware is there that will do everything the current hardware will do?

Don’t take this the wrong way because I have a lot of respect for you, but you speaketh the shite of bull.

1: LOL. Step away from the reality distortion field, fanboy Moving to hardware that has decent open support does not alter the “OS X experience”. A wifi card with open drivers and a wifi card with closed drivers do exactly the same thing. Open source friendly does not mean poor.

2: There is _loads_ of well supported open-source friendly hardware. Wifi, for example: Intel chips have decent open drivers (because Intel publish specs). Atheros is deliberatly unhelpful to the open source community.

Atheros chips are cheaper than Intel chips. Go figure.

Well apple sent you a new laptop and a better one. the os you want to install on it is your problem. Apple does not sell them to have another ox installed. That problem is your fault not apples.

I’ll bite. You speaketh the bull of shite too.

Nobody expects Apple to provide Linux drivers for their machines. But considering a chunk of MacBook users actually do run Linux people expect Apple to take it in to consideration.

Dell does it, and they do it well. They don’t officially support Linux, but they do have a team of dedicated guys who test their hardware with Linux and make sure it works well. These guys do a alot of work and contribute a lot of stuff back to the Linux community to make Dell PCs work really well with Linux. They do it because they know that a lot of Dell customers run Linux. In this case, it is usually large corporates running call centers etc as opposed to developers who need to run different platforms.

Apple have shat all over open source for years, I don’t expect to see them contributing patches to the Kernel to make something as important as fans work properly with their Laptops

The Linux Thing - I actually said that even though it sucks, its something that will get sorted in time - for which dave used as a basis for his defense of apple.

The Phone nuber: Gareth, in not one point in the post did I say that Apple sol my number on to anyone else. I pointed out that the phone calls started literally within the hour after talking with Apple reps in multiple Asian call centres, and that after speaking with several of the managers they told me that there was a major malaysian call centre… and yet after I filed a complaint, i get a random phone call saying there was no malaysian call centre? - even though i actually got through to one. What was to stop some sicko in this call centre to write down our phone number because he heard a womans voice, and pop it in his pocket?

Anyway Jimbo, chances are you’re sick of reading my point of view and want to get back to your own - thats fair enough.

—- Great, thanks for the assumption.

And in regards to the quote you quoted from Andy… Moaning? Ive got every right to… and just relaying my experience with them. Whats the alternative.. say “oh thats life” and let companies continue to treat people this way? No.

Jim - we need to talk. I have a few points here.

1) prove to me without reasonable doubt that these malicious phone calls were in any way related to Apple? We had a period (in our old house) where we had nuisance calls, pretty bad ones too and since then took up the initiative to not disclose our number to anyone - at all. I cant see any reason how or why Apple would disclose your telephone number to:
a) Anyone
b) A malasian nuisance caller, who will be paying international rates to call you
without very good reason.

I worked in a call centre for long enough to know, that if we need to disclose numbers to anyone, there is at least a 7day paper trail to go through. You need the consent of the data subject (you - this is usually given when you give them your number) then you need to justify the disclosure of information to your information commissioner and data protection people. My experience with large companies tells me this would take Apple upwards of 2 weeks to do properly. I cant see a member of staff having the time, or incentive to give your number out to any old Malasian because these guys - like all call centre staff usually cant make outgoing calls unless they are listed and as soon as they close one call, another pops through.

I feel it is just a massive coincidence that Apple and Malasian Super Idiot are related in any way - think of how many people hold your phone number…who could have sold it on?

Regards the mac problems, thats life. Personally I’m skeptical as to how the aluminium got discoloured, even though I did see it myself. I’d love to know how they explain that one.

In closing, I’d like to echo iAndy’s comments -

Yes, maybe it would be good if the world did work in a completely nice opensource way, but moaning isn’t always going to get you noticed for the right reasons and rally people to support you, instead can make a lot of people very pissed off at you.

Anyway Jimbo, chances are you’re sick of reading my point of view and want to get back to your own - thats fair enough.

I have an Acer laptop….running OSX…..its bloody ace!

G

The nano is a good point, I’d forgotten that the newer nano had come out in the mean time. I hope the good person you spoke to at Apple pulls through for you, they kinda need someone to change their bad reputation at the minute.

Personally I’ve never had a bad experience with Apple. I’ve never had to phone their support lines up or anything in the 3 years I’ve had Apple stuff. However I too had to wait for AGES (about 6 months) before I got my rebate back for an iPod mini when they did that student offer last time (I brought my Grandad’s iBook at the time).

I know James has unfortunately had nothing but upsets along the way and that it seems to be as they push more and more mainstream and start to rush things, which they didn’t do when I brought my equipment, hence why I’ve never had a problem. I know a lot of people who have had problems now that Apple are cutting more and more costs and expanding more and more, they’re starting to loose that glossy edge at times. A dam shame, and I hope they bring it back before I buy my next product! I don’t want these problems too!

The manager of the Apple Store said to James in person that “Apple’s don’t usually go wrong, but when they do they go wrong massively and everyone knows about it”, which is true. I’m usually the first to brag about Apple and how good they are, but I can’t deny the stuff that James has gone through with them.

As I said above, see through the moaning that a lot of you see. Forget that it’s Apple and read it again, if you’re a big Apple fan, would you want to be treated like that by anyone?

I have had this arguement many a time with my good friend here, and you can in part understand what he means, but unfortunately the world doesn’t work like this. You can argue that it is all Apple’s fault. Yes they could’ve gone with hardware that is more open, but 1. You would not get the same OS X Mac experience, and you would moan about that. 2. What other good totally open hardware is there that will do everything the current hardware will do? (Expecting James to post a long list at this point!!). There’s always too many parties and players for you to place blame on one thing. Yes, maybe it would be good if the world did work in a completely nice opensource way, but moaning isn’t always going to get you noticed for the right reasons and rally people to support you, instead can make a lot of people very pissed off at you.

I remember him telling me about the harrassing phone calls when it was happening, this was a total disgrace. Yes it was sorted, but some sicko still made James’ family feel very unsecure, threatened and uncomfortable in their own home and I can only imagine what he was thinking and feeling. Thankfully they have stopped, but the amount of phone calls etc with the police, Apple and many more etc.

To be honest a lot of what James has said all has foundation. If I went through all this I’d feel the same. Let me tell you this post doesn’t get across all of the upsets and frustrations he went through.

I agree with James when it comes to choosing Apple Online or the retail stores. James will agree with me when I say that the staff at the Bullring Apple Store were fantastic to him. The manager delt with him swiftly and he did leave very happy and full of faith in the competance and understanding of the retail store staff, this is something I have always known, as my grandad often pops up to the Sheffield Meadowhall store with his iBook I got him and they help him no end (and he can be very hard to teach!).

Bad stuff always happens with large corporations, despite there best efforts. You always get someone who has just had some bad family news so is horrible on the phones when you ring up, some sicko out of Apple’s immediate control decides to torment your family or you just get unlucky with a product. I always think that its how the companies handle themselves after this to see you right is how they should be measured. Now in this case theres good and bad points. When dealing with people face to face, I’m sure James would agree he was more than adequetly dealt with. However over the phones away from the personal stores things went downhill. Communication was terrible and it all resulted in disturbance and distress. I’m sorry to anyone who disagrees wtih me here but this IS something Apple can improve on, and should, FAST. It’s too easy to turn a blind eye, say its just bad luck, to shut up moaning and get on with it, and its too easy for people to slack at their jobs at Apple (and others).

One reason why Apple retail stores are so good is the people who are there realy know their stuff, their personal, friendly, and dam passionate about Apple and it’s products and services, so do all they can to see it done right, and it just works! Other places in Apple don’t seem to have this magical spark, which is a dam shame.

Apple should learn a lot of this and will hopefully take note. There is some healthy critisism in this post, despite all the moaning and whinging a lot of you see. See through the emotional stuff and there is definate lessons to be learnt for Apple here.

(Sorry for the long and winding post!..it’s kinda late!)

Here are a list of my 2 words which I feel sum up things I have said:

Listen, Apple
Quit moaning
Retail Store
Not Dell
Treated right
Communicated with