This is precisely why I like Apple. The fact that I got 5 years out of my last MBP was totally amazing. I used that computer at least 10 hours a day, every single day!
I don't care about saving $1k or $2k when it comes to a device I use that much. We're talking about a dollar an hour here. I've literally spent more money on coffee over that time.
I buy Apple computers precisely because I want a machine I can use for that long. I used my last Macbook Air for 11 years without having to replace anything, so was less wasteful than a person swapping out components every year. Its screen is toast so it's a headless server now.
I'm now on 7 years since the first MBP provided to me by an employer.
It's just as terrible as ever. I would not use an Apple product outside of work, despite some thousands of hours using one over the last several years. Everything about using a Mac feels patronizing and intended to make me work harder than I should to do the most simple tasks.
I work full time for an IT company that supports Apple products and we are in the same position. Its hard for us to recommend upgrades unless there is an hardware failure that's beyond the replacement cost. I still rock a 2012 MBP that has RAM, HDD, ODD, and ports. It can be service by removing 8 screws. IMHO it is the peak Apple Laptop. After 2012 they started being anti-consumer, anti-repair in laptop design.
This is another great reason for serious power users to never buy the first generation of Apple equipment. Historically a quick refresh comes out, and it sometimes takes two gens to get it right.
Glad right now I timed my last Macbook pro purchase to have a year of applecare left on it, and it could easily last me another 2 years thanks to being maxed out when I bought it.
Apple is a company looking to maximize it profit as well as build good products. A lot of laptop manufacturers are starting to catch up on the hardware side (the new Zenbook).. it's just the MacOS experience that someone has left to create an equivalent to.
Here is some more anecdata: have had the same Macbook for 6 years with absolutely no issues, stellar reliability and battery life. Same at work. Only recently switched after 5 years at work because we had some new employee turnover and it made sense for me to get a slightly nicer machine for a new project.
MacBooks are great laptops that last 5+ years. With a windows laptop I never got more than 2 years out of them. Maybe that was because I used Dell mostly but it was a stark difference. The Dell was cheaper though by at least 50% so maybe that would explain it.
This is also a testament to how the web won and now mobile/smart devices are eating the web. Before it was about where the eyeballs where. The web democratized access to these eyeballs.
Ditto.
Macs are surprisingly long lasting. I have
- a 2011 MacBook Pro that is used for midi and piano classes. One battery change in 2018 and that’s it. It’s used every other day by kids for 2 hours.
- a 2013 MacBook air. Workhorse for the kids homeschooling. Used every day for 8 hours or so. One battery change and a MagSafe adapter change.
- a 16” 2016 MacBook Pro. My daily work device for the past 5 years. One battery change and 2 MagSafe adapters.
- a 13” 2019 MacBook air for the wife. It’s been puked on till the screen is a bit messed but it still works. No hardware updates.
So we are talking about ~ 30 years cumulative ownership with 3 battery changes and 3 MagSafes. Not bad in my book. If you want to nuke e waste, buy a Mac and hope it’s not a lemon. They rarely are
- in 2019 spent more than €3K to buy the best macbook 15' available (> 2 months of average salary in my Europe country)
- 2 weeks before the warranty (1y) the spacebar broke, the SPACEBAR!!!. It was a design issue and it got replaced in a few days by the local service under warranty.
- 1 year later, the battery starts dying out. Go to the authorized repairer and it was going to cost me ~€750 to replace the battery since I had to replace the entire keyboard and trackpad to do that.
- I found a PC repair shop that said he can do it for a couple hundred €, and it worked fine
- 3 months later the laptop shut down unexpectedly. The apple refused to fix it (even paying) because I used a battery not official. The Mac is now a brick
So 2.5y of personal use (not professional) cost me €3.5K. More expensive than a cheap car.
edit: the battery replacement with all top case cost me ~€750. Confirmed looking back at the emails
I have a similar experience. Every mac I've had has died (basically my last 4 computers). 2 screen deaths, one overheat, and one coffee incident.
I blame all of these on myself. Even paying 3k for a top of the line laptop, I really dont expect the computer to last more than 1.5 years at the way I use the computer. Pounding away on the computer for 60 hours a week on average, and working out of lots of coffee shops, I'm hardly the typical use case for a computer user.
Just like a consumer coffee machine cant be expected to stay functional for long if it were in use in a restaurant, I dont expect my consumer laptop to work for the same time period as an average consumer would.
However, if you're using a laptop for commercial purposes, and at such a high capacity, you should probably expect to be investing at least yearly in your equipment.
I've had problems with so many Apple products over the years that I've stopped buying them. The last thing I bought was a 2011 MBP (hefty top line i7). Total waste of money. It was an insurance replacement for the 2010 one that literally caught fire when a drink was spilled under the edge of it. No product should fail in that manor. Current MBP periodically white screens and hangs and you have to turn it off for an hour (nvidia GPU problem).
On my third magsafe adapter. The first one just stopped working. The second one burned out about five inches from the magsafe connector. The second one resulted in a fairly large argument at the genius (idiot) bar because it was out of the limited warranty. After explaining how dangerous this is (I'm a qualified EE) loudly in front of other customers they replaced it.
Oh and the amount of shit I've had to deal with when incompetent Apple store staff decide the only option is to nuke the machine for even the simplest software problem. Fortunately within my circle of contacts they've learned to come to me first rather than start again every time.
Back to the original point though: one exploding MBP, two dead magsafe adapters, a dead logic board in a 2006 iMac, several frayed 30 pin cables, mac mini external power supply blew up and a dead cinema display panel, file system corruption in 2 OSX releases, £200/pop repair bill for iPhones if you drop them, the joke that was the iPhone 4, iOS constant upselling, iWork being a total piece of stink, iCloud periodic data loss. Ugh.
No more. Paying a premium for this is illogical.
Buying refurb Lenovo kit and bottom end windows phones. With the leftover cash I'm throwing it at my mortgage instead. Better investment.
Edi: to add insult to injury, the alloy they use for MBP and Air machines contains nickel so any unfortunate people with a nickel sensitivity come up in blisters using these machines.
Apple computers are reliable for 5 plus years. The additional few hundred dollars to upgrade the memory or storage is peanuts once amortised over the life of a computer.
I have never gotten this mindset. A macbook is meant to be used, no matter what you paid for it. It's not some piece of jewelry you have to do touch with velvet gloves. At least from my experience with (modern) thinkpads, the mac last way longer anyway.
My 15 inch MBP is still kicking ass four years later and I haven't had to replace much of anything yet. For me, honestly, when I get home from a long day of fighting with software dev on Windows and *Nix, I kind of want something that holds my hand. I don't want to think about anything. I also side load Windows to tinker when I want. I find that I may just be a lover of ecosystems.
In my daily home life outside of work, having an i7 over an i5 doesn't add value for me because I'm just messing around. I think it all comes down to need. I didn't get a MBP as a status symbol, I got one because I wanted a machine that ran macOS alongside Windows without building a Hackintosh. I do think plenty of college students get MBP's because everyone else has them when in reality, they won't need something like a MBP for their coursework likely ever.
That said, this is my last MBP. The changes Apple are making aren't exactly things I align with. I can only buy the pioneer argument so much. I think my next purchase is going to be a Thinkpad or a Surface Book Pro.
I've always wondered why this doesn't come up more in the mac/pc cost debate. The HP I was issued at my last job needed to be replaced three times in the eight months I was there. Current company issued me a MacBook air that I've used 50 hours a week for three years.
It's amazing that people keep supporting Apple despite it being so obvious that they are not doing it in the best interest of the customers. Think why wouldn't Apple keep a pro lineup that offers upgradable parts for the cost of little more weight and size(that theory itself is bs but anyway)? My MacBook Pro would work perfectly fine for another 5 years if I can upgrade the ram and replace my battery(which I can but have to give to service centre or risk myself with a complex diy procedure). The retina MBP have reached a pinnacle of laptop if you ask me with very minimal upgrades happening over the years. The CPU performance have improved but for most of the tasks I do it's going good and probably will hold itself for another 4-5 years provided I can upgrade the ram so that it can accommodate apps built by developers with modern computers with lavish ram.
My MacBook Pro from 2012 (the one without Retina display and had an optical drive too which I replaced with a secondary SSD) lasted me over 8 years. It finally overheated during summer (my house was very hot and fans were probably clogged). I do iOS and Android app development, so that $1000 device made me tons of money in return.
I don't care about saving $1k or $2k when it comes to a device I use that much. We're talking about a dollar an hour here. I've literally spent more money on coffee over that time.
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