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Apple Buying Back Troubled PowerBooks
antihero writes "The PowerBook Zone has some information for owners of PowerBook 5300s and 190s. They'll take those models and sell you one of the current models for $1800, about $700 cheaper than MSRP. This is to get these often-problematic models off the streets so Apple doesn't have to continue supporting them. These 5 year old models aren't worth much." This offer goes to August 31st.
I also read yesterday that Apple is also doing a trade in for their Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh- a cool little machine release in'97. I can't find the article, but apparently Apple is not just giving a $700 credit towards a PowerBook like with the 5300c and 190, but are doing a total trade in- apparently for a G4/400. I recall ever hearing about anyone having troubles with these machines, but then again, they're fairly rare. Pretty good deal for TAM owners, if you ask me. Buy then again, they're pretty neet.
Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
Why do I get the feeling that PB 5300's and 190's are going to start going for more on Ebay? The article says that the units don't even need to function. SO if you were planning on buying a new PB anyway, it's a nice way to save yourself a bonus.
Yeah, but knowing eBay people will be buying them for $1000+.
Getting rid of tech support may only be one of the reasons Apple has decided to have this trad-in. It has been rumored that Apple will be announcing next gen powerbooks and ibooks at Seybold at the end of this month, and this program may be an attempt to flush the channel before the new models ship. The deadline for the trade-in coincides with seybold. Seybold Expo (Aug. 27-Sept. 1) Deadline (Aug. 31) just a thought.
--Tom
If one is truly a superior knackwurst chef, that fact is likely to become known without much effort. Or something
MAN SHOOTS ROVER!
Yah, like my 8 year old Ford Escort*. Ford identified a problem in the steering wheel system and issued a recall. They just fixed it, they should have replaced it with a new Explorer!!!
* I don't own a Ford Escort and I made up the steering wheel problem.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
I guess thats why all of Apple's G3 powerbooks are made by Quanta in Taiwan, the same plant that turns out Gateway, Dell, and IBM ThinkPads. iBooks are made by AlphaTop also of Taiwan. Apple closed their Cork Ireland plant that made PowerBook mainboards and assembled full PowerBooks to cut costs. So they could lower prices, to be more competitive.
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blinko - "the nail that sticks up gets hammered down"
Another Apple innovation: computers that GAIN value over time.
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See the "..for smart people" banners Wired runs here? Look elsewhere guys.
True story: I was fortunate enough to buy a 5300 in 1996 at the now-defunct ComputerCity. The sales guy managed to talk me into the extended warranty. Thank you sales guy!!!
Within 2 years, the display burned out 3 times, the motherboard & power manager once each, and it was all repaired for free. The last time I took it in for service (to a Tandy office, since ComputerCity was long gone), they officially threw in the towel and wrote me a check for the original purchase price. It was almost exactly enough to buy a Wallstreet (1998 Powerbook G3).
Try doing THAT with a junker from E-Machines or the other bottom-of-the-line PC makers. Even truly BAD Apples offer a competitive Total Cost of Ownership, thanks to buybacks. Funny, but true.
I guess what more all of us should say is that it just goes to show that Apple is so insular and 'face-inward-at-all-times' that they can't design hardware that can be outsourced.
They had to kill the cloners because they couldn't compete against them, after all.
sulli
sulli
RTFJ.
Piece of crap. But my current PB (1yr old G3) is fabulous.
sulli
sulli
RTFJ.
but anyways, i got rid of it a year ago under the exact same trade in as this post mentions, except for a then-current PBG3, which rocks and i also have no problems with it.
when apple did this last year, it was never clear why they were doing it, lots of speculation, but the one thing they did do was offer the discount on soon-to-be-discontinued models. perhaps something new is in the pipe for powerbooks.
...and Sony VAIOs are manufactured by... Toshiba.
I used to service Toshiba and Compaq laptops, and I have to say I was quite impressed by the aftermarket service both brands. We could get parts for 8+ years old laptops. OTOH, we couldn't even get a power supply for ACER or Texas Instruments laptops that were 2 months old. At the time, Dell had virtually no service over Europe (that's 3 years ago) and IBM was just restructuring its maintenance services.
Laptops are fragile, that's why one should always be aware of the kind of after-market service you get *after*. NEVER buy a "small brand", cause by the time they cash the check, the company usually has already filed for bankruptcy. I remember that USian asking us to fix his "unknown brand" laptop for which he had paid an extra $200 for a "worldwide warranty". Poor guy...
Apple has always taken care of its flaky hardware better than other manufacturers simply because they *admit* having bad series or defect.
Now, I'm considering buying a laptop fairly soon, and nobody in the PC world can offer me decent battery time (Crusoe is still far away and I need 4 hours on battery) , so an iBook or PB is the only solution for now. Most of the software I use (Macromedia stuff mostly) run on Mac so it won't be too painful for me to adapt. Considering the cost of a laptop, I'd rather go with a company that treats its customers better than the others.
-- It's always darker before it goes pitch black.
This is an excellent point. Rumors (stress the word rumor) have it that there will be upgrades to the PowerBook line in the near future. The time limit makes sure peole don't hold on to their 5400 until the new ones are out. Apple sued leaks because they were stuck with old machines that nobody wanted. Nobody wanted them because they knew of the new ones coming out. This way customers can't wait for the new ones, but instead forced to buy the PowerBooks Apple wants to get rid of anyway.
Sure, I just sent my old 5300 in for the above-mentioned repairs 3 months ago. I guess I was lucky in that mine hadn't exibited the problems until it was about 5 years old. I'm also lucky that it's now worth more to Apple than I paid for it (used) 2 years ago.
The 5300s used to, occasionaly, catch fire!! This was bad. This is like trading in a Pinto(also fire prone) for a ferrari(fast,sleek, cool, and uhmm, ris supported by NetBSD & LinuxPPC). Then again, of course it runs NetBSD!! Sorry about that last line. I just couldn't help myself.
I always thought the 5300 PB was fugly. Perhaps it was a love-child of office politics.
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blinko - "the nail that sticks up gets hammered down"
GPL trolling techniques.
GNU/troll
Yeah, and Apple should be required to sell us CPU boxes without their inferior keyboards and mice. Just like Compaq and Dell should be require to sell us laptops without an inferior Operating System.
Why should anybody be required to pay twice to get usable input devices?
So you know, be careful about putting force on the port for too long. Ive had one of those happen to an iBook at school, and eventually the port was dead (it had fully been broken off the mboard apperantly).
Another workaround if you have some electrical tool slying around (wire, electrical tape, plyers) you can just splice your power cable, put some end on them (like a bit of straigh wire) and plug them into the two metal ports on the underside of the laptop. If i remember properly, with the laptop upside down and the handle facing away from you, the white cable goes on the left, and the sheilding around the cable goes into the right socket. It doesnt seem to fry the machine if you reverse it. You know it works because the charge light around the power port lights up.
The quality-control issues in the 5300 were what made up my mind, though it took a while to get up the gumption to switch systems. I'm using a Sony VAIO running Linux now, and I'm pretty darned happy with it. I don't plan to go back.
I'd just like to note for the record that I'm both an anime freak, and a guy with coloured computer.
We are watching you!
http://www.xpurple.com
Eliminate the support costs and even turn a (if somewhat reduced) profit per unit. Whatever have other companies been thinking to replace defective products for FREE when they could just downplay the problem long enough for them to become all "old and worn out anyway"? :-P
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Where can the word be found, where can the word resound? Not here, there is not enough silence.
"Where shall the word be found, where will the word resound? Not here, there is not enough silence." -T.S. Eliot
i've had a used 5300cs for about a year now, and if you're looking for a cheap notebook to wordprocess, email, and (lightly) surf on, you can do worse than a 5300. I absolutely agree with this fellow, and in additioon to the above, it gets 2.5hrs battery life, plays Marathon and Escape Velocity very well, and since (before i owned it) it had been sent to Cupertino a few times, it's now rock-solid stable (under OS 9). i use it to play MP3s in my car when i'm stuck in traffic. If you find one of these for $200, it's a steal as a usable computer, and not just a means to a discount.
The Last time Apple did this (around a year or so ago) I took advantage of the offer and traded in my Powerbook 190cs, which I had originally purchased for $999, towards the purchase of a base model 1998 Wallstreet 292 MHz. After taking part in the trade-in, my purchase price was $2100 or $700 off (at the time, a steal considering the re-sell value of the 190 was dipping well below $450).
It's a shame, though, that Apple ran out of 292MHz machines. They called me one day at work to let me know that they wouldn't be able to send me the Powerbook I wanted. But, since I had already paid for it, they were going to send me a 1999 Wallstreet 300MHz DVD Powerbook instead (even though, I believe at that time they retailed for $3200).
Yeah, I was a little more than elated to get $1100 off a new Powerbook. The ol' beast proved to be a good machine too. I'm still using it right now.
DigiSquid Design.
If Mr. Bill would have taken this attitude for software, we would have the world's biggest bankrupt software company by now!!!
I used to repair these buggers, the main problem with them was the AC port where you would plug the adapter for power in... It was extremely fragile and broke with very little force. Apple had a special recall on these modles. If it broke, they would replace it.. Once, and once only. If it happened again, you were out of luck. We had found a way to solder in a new kind of connector that didn't have the same problem... Usually took about an hour of labor to do the modification. I've done it about three times. Worked like a charm after that. However, if you own one of these.. I'd get rid of it. Better yet, look for them at used computer stores if you're looking to buy a new laptop... You may just find one for less then what apple is giving for them. :)
Why do I get the feeling that PB 5300's and 190's are going to start going for more on Ebay? The article says that the units don't even need to function. SO if you were planning on buying a new PB anyway, it's a nice way to save yourself a bonus.
--------- Beware the dragon, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.
The PowerBook 5300 and 190 series are quite old. Did Apple *have* to do this? Are there *any* PB 5300s still under warranty or other support contract? Sounds more like marketing and positive PR... though with those kinds of savings, and considering the features of the PowerBook G3 series, I'm not gonna complain.
Considering the alternitives Macs not that bad...
and rember that Linux dosn't serve the idiot market yet....
Of course Linux IS working it's way down to the idiot user.. it's allready to the point where the avarage user can use it...
Disclamer: Macs are not idiot boxes but it and Windows are all idiots have...
Bitching about Apple really isn't going anyplace.
I don't actually exist.
>sell us laptops without an inferior Operating
>System.
Well, I can't speak for the compaq's online options 'cause I would never even consider owning such a colossal piece of shit. Hell, for that matter, the same goes for dell... if I ever own another x86 notebook it'll be an IBM or Sony... at least they put out decent hardware, even if their choice of primairy OS sucks.
But Linux on a dell? That's even MORE of a joke.
When
For starters, the Linux they offered as an option was obsolete anyway. They were offering Red Hat 5.2 when I already had RH 6.1 up and running on my IBM I was surfing on.
Oh, and here's a nifty exercise for ya: Try configuring two IDENTICAL dell boxen at their site; same hardware across the board. Look at the prices. Oops!!! where's that $100 saveings you should be seeing by omitting windoze??? Could it be? mikey is charging the same price for the hardware with the FREE OS as for the bloated overpriced trash from redmond?
Perish the thought... that CAN'T be! mikey dell's our FRIEND! He spoke at LinuxWorld and said nice stuff about us... he would *never* gouge US.... would he... WOULD HE???
john
Resistance is NOT futile!!!
Haiku:
I am not a drone.
Remove the collective if
Imagine all the people...
Well, Apple is going to offer the new keyboard and mouse for under sixty bucks each. The mouse is cool to look at, but still a single button model for those to whom that matters. The keyboard represents the real improvement, a full size keyboard with almost all the Apple trimmings with the trade of multimedia keys for a Power ON/OFF.
And unless you want to run linux on it via a serial port, it's not going to be of much use to you running Linux. Unless you want to use it to try to figure out how to get it's ADB keyboard to work with Linux m68K. That's been a major problem for a while(I would have loved to have Linux on a Duo ...oh well). That and the terrible SCSI performance. I have Debian 2.1 on my SE/30 and it works great (it even runs X on the 9" screen), but my only complaint is SCSI disk performance.
For more info check out http://www.mac.linux-m68k.org for more information. If you have programming experience on the Mac, they need developers.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Expensive? WTF? Maybe if you want the thin & light ultra-fast machines, but I just got a low-end notebook for travel only purposes, Toshiba 1675, dual scan, 550 MHz, 6GB, etc for 1K$. Pretty cheap, and does lcd projection just as well as a 3K$ 15" monstrosity.
1984 was supposed to be a warning, not an instruction manual.
it has served me quite unreliably for 4 years. Definitely a bad apple! :-)
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 is the magic number.
Regarding the buyback programs that Apple has instigated, I can only quote from Nelson from The Simpsons: "HA-Ha!"
We all know that many fruits fell from the Apple tree. It just so happens that some of those fruits were people like Steve Jobs.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
A month or two ago I dismantled it completely, took out the hard drive and played with the guts. That sure was an expensive 500 MB hard drive!
What is the robbing of a bank, compared to the founding of a bank? -- Bertolt Brecht
Just for the record, apparently the Eject button on the new keyboard also functions as a power button when there are no removable disks currently in the drives.
Russell Ahrens
I'm trying to find the machine that they're replacing it with on apple.com, but a search for Pismo on apple.com returns nothing.
http://youare.whyihate.com
You're not comparing like models.
*most* people that buy notebooks intend to use them for work, rather than for presentations. If it's just going to drive a LCD projector, then a dualscan display is indeed good enough. But for doing real work, outside of a command line, dualscan displays are just attrocious (says the owner of a rarely used Powerbook 1400cs).
Summer's not over yet. Just wait :)
...and never really had any problems with them. One has 40 MB RAM and is running Mac OS 8.6, the other has 24 and is running 7.6.1. The 5300 only has a 100 MHz PowerPC 603e and a 33.3 MHz bus, and is no speed demon, but runs MS Office 98 well, plays my MP3s, and even handles CodeWarrior fine in a pinch. I've heard horror stores about the power connector breaking off or the plastics falling apart... I don't baby my laptops, but I do use common sense, never really had any problems.
I'll probably strip one down and trade it in on a PB G3/400, can't pass up that great deal. Plus I'll finally be able to run Final Cut Pro on the road.
If I had anywhere near $1800 at the moment, I'd be sorely tempted to buy one of the old powerbooks used just so that I could get the $700 credit towards a new model. After all, in my city, the local paper has a Computers category in the classified which is usually populated with old P166 boxes and ancient Powerbooks... Sounds like a great deal, since you can sometimes find those things, at least around here, for less than half the price of the credit Apple is offering. [sound of paper rustling as thousands of geeks thumb through the classifieds for an antique Powerbook buying binge...]
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, *The Annals*
how do you post in all caps ?
no sig
How about giving those Powerbooks that they get back to needy students who need a computer. They are probably going to just junk those machines anyway, why not give it to someone who really needs it.
Furthermore, this will keep kids away from Windows**.
Yeah, compared to those afwul IBM and Toshiba laptops for $ 2999 (which are a much bigger ripoff) the Powerbooks are cheap compared with equal configured PC laptops.....
Apple is also offering a trade in program for a problem with buzzing in the Bose speaker system and power supply of the 20th Anniversary Macintosh
Personally, I believe this is partly to remove the units when they have gone down in value to the point where it is inexpensive enough for Apple, and most importantly, to remove the products that were not designed under the reign of Steve.
If you thought the TAMs were collectors items now...
Could someone enlighten me with her or his knowledge about the availability of this, let's call it, "promotion" in other parts of the world than the US of A.
In particular Europe: do we have to trip to the New World?
The new Apple needs to make an enormous effort in order to win back disappointed once Mac-sectarians from the PC (Linux and Windows) camp.
Personally I think they better succeed into keeping the public enthousiastic for their products in the US than elsewhere, in particular on the Old Continent.
Their sales and service network is comparable to the bunch of protectionists we, Europeans, were in the 70ies and 80ies. No competition and as a consequence no competitive prices either. Their service is bloody expensive and incompetent. In short: Apple Europe is rotten!
the lonely skunk
The nice thing about Windows is: it does not just crash; it displays a nice little dialog box and let's you press 'OK'
pismo == the 2000 series PowerBook G3 . Pismo was the development code name for the machine... the bas model is a 400 Mhz G3, 6gig HD, 64 Meg RAM with DVD & 14.1" TFT display. I've got one sitting right here. It's a nice machine.
And MacOS X is just vapor.... it will NOT be released (not even public beta) this year
Hmmmm, odd. Mac OS X appears to run just fine for me on my G3. Maybe it's all just done with mirrors?
- Scott
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Scott Stevenson
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
I'm sick of Apple stories on /. But here you is.
Instead of complaining, why don't you just turn the Apple topic off in your preferences?
- Scott
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Scott Stevenson
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Apple refers to this model as the "Firewire" PowerBook. Pismo was a (rumored) development name, and Apple rarely uses those names, or even acnologes them outside of the NDA'd Development community for that product. Usually Apple names their products after what they include that their previous product didn't have. Names such as: FireWire, Bronze (the color of the keyboard), Slot-Loading, Graphite (the 366 iBook), AGP (the former generation of G4's), Gigabit (the current generation of G4's including the MP boxes). The linup right now is: Gigabit (PowerMacintosh, AKA G4, also called Summer-2000) Firewire (PowerBook) Cube (new product line) Summer-2000 (iMac's, telling as there are no nuw features other than new colors, simply a speed-bump and marketing re-tool) Graphite (366 iBook, the other two are the same as origianally introduced with more memory) These are the names you would search for in the TIL's, or you would simply look at the main info pages. (PS, the FireWire's rock! that is from personal experience)
HE DOES IT LIKE THIS.
You're dumber than most trolls, arent you? If everyone dumb enough not to have known now starts using it, the code will be fixed to prevent it.