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Apple's Growing Pains
Tyler Too writes "Is Apple having an unusually large number of quality control problems since its switch to Intel? Ars Technica runs down the litany of problems MacBook and MacBook Pro users have experienced since their launch. From the article: 'Is Apple's quality control slipping through the cracks with this Intel transition? Given the volume of available evidence that has appeared in such a short timeframe, it's simply impossible to say that Apple isn't having problems.'"
I do not think it is as much as an issue that Apples Quality Dropped but just the fact their entire Macintosh Product Line is now Generation 1, systems. Normally Apple Spaces out their system releases and refresh their product line in 3 year cycles. This time they did major changes internally to their entire product line. Normally the rule of thumb is to wait for Gen 2 but with all their products Gen 1 there is little to choose from. The MacBook Pros seem to get some minor fixes.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Is Apple having an unusually large number of quality control problems since its switch to Intel?
Sheesh. EVERY product of Apple's has unusually large number of quality control problems. From iPod batteries, to laptop fires, to cracks in the cubes, to motherboard defects, on and on and on.
Seriously, where does this idea come from that Apple never has problems? They have constant hardware problems.
Is it that there are so many problems per capita, or just that the company is so high-profile?
To me, it's arguable that these are no different than the other problems Dell or HP/Compaq have, there's just a somewhat higher profile when it's a Mac. Granted, no transition is seamless, and I know that there are a good number of people that are having issues, but I haven't spoken or interacted with anyone who's said that any issues they are having would make them rethink their buying decision.
Isn't Apple notorious for having issues with products that are "1st Generation"?
I thought it was pretty common amongst macheads to always wait until at least the 3rd iteration of a product so it becomes stable
... then they knock you down. Dvorakitis is spreading IMHO - Ars will get a lot of page-hits (and hence ad revenue) from people wanting to read about this. Sure, Apple have had problems, but not as many as Dell, and I doubt Dell are any worse than any other random manufacturer.
:-)
Apple actually have it worse than most - to an extent they sell on style, and "shiny goodness". People are *more* vocal when something goes wrong with something they like, rather than some random notebook work gave them to use at the weekend... I'm actually surprised the vocal minority haven't been louder. Perhaps Apple ought to release the figures for their return/repair rates - I seem to recall someone saying they were well below industry norms - even *with* all this hullaballoo.
Can I also just say I bought an MBP pro, and it hasn't exhibited any of the problems mentioned in the article... because normally you never hear about it when it works fine - only when it's broken in some way. As a software developer, I knew all about that
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Unlike Microsoft, which has a lot of customers that are concerned about legacy application support, Apple has a customer-base that generally uses newer software, and tends to be more forgiving to these kinds of problems. OS X updates have frequently broken all kinds of old applications, but their market share continues to go up.
By now most folks know that purchasing Revision A hardware is a gamble - to be honest I think that some of the fun that comes with living on the "bleeding edge" is the knowledge that if things work, you've really survived something.
The biggest problem I have with the apple transition was that they had a 32-bit intel architecture that now must be supported for years to come. I honestly am not quite sure why they did that, as there will undoubtably be some support headaches for apple developers for the next few years.
It's Apple's supplier that's having the quality problem's. Their CM (Contract Manufacturer) is like all other companies in the EMS industry and suffering under the demand for price concessions and supply fullfilment. Like all OEM's Apple wants their product now, perfectly built and cheap, and like all OEMs doesn't realise they can only have 2 of the proverbial 3.
Working in the industry I can tell you that as the OEM demands you meet shipments, units that should stay behind for debug or rework tend to float out the door to meet revenue/demand numbers. Apple's resurgence in popularity probably has everyone in the supply line getting every possible unit out the door to meet demand.
I work in an operation where we service about 300 new Mac computers per month (and, of course, many more PC computers). At this time, about one-third of our service involves brand new Intel-based Mac computers. I can say that the amount of problems coming through related to these brand new machines is no different from the amount of the problems we have had over time with PowerPC-based Macs. My personal experience is that there is no basis for any claim of any increase in problems. I have, however, observed Apple being more responsive to problems than ever before in their history. Our PC's are generally Dells and it looks like Apple is taking on the leader of the Windows makers. I can only expect good things from vigorous competition.
One of the original and most widely covered issues with the MacBook Pro was the mysterious "whining" noise.
That's weird. I thought that problem went away when you let the design department buy the macs in the first place?
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Yeah, as if Dell doesn't have massive quality problems. Several Optiplex models have horrendously bad motherboards that fail within 2-3 years, Dell's warranty support is a real pain to deal with, and they never acknowledge quality problems. At least with Apple, you don't have to speak to Indian tech support who really doesn't give a shit.
*shrug*
Apple is the most closely scrutinized hardware company *ever*. If my MacBook appears to make an elusive noise beyond the hearing range of the average dog, it makes the cover of Time. If my Packard Bell shitbox releases its magic smoke and dies, it doesn't even get on Digg.
It's just the story of the month, and people will get bored of it eventually. The alternative conspiracy theory, of course, is that it could keep being fuelled by Microsoft's astroturf budget.
"Be nice, veer left, and never stop thinking" Iain Banks - Walking On Glass
It's more apt to compare Apple systems to those low-to-midrange workstations from Sun and IBM.
Price or performance?
paintball
No "Could this be the end for Apple?" question at the end of the description?
(See subject.)
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
I bought a MacBook almost two weeks ago (this is the first OS X Mac that I've ever owned; I have an old Mac SE and Performa 6220 that I received 2 years ago from a teacher's friend). I've dreamed of owning a Mac for over two years now, and when the MacBook came out, it was the Mac notebook that I've always wanted. It had OS X, was the right screen size for me, and did everything that I wanted. I was a bit worried about the purchase, due to some of the problems that I've continued to hear about on the Internet (heat so much that it can cook an egg, discoloration within a few days, mooing noises, etc). I was also a bit worried with some technical details (integrated graphics and OS X performance, plus glossy screen).
However, once I bought the machine, I couldn't be happier. I have no problems with my Mac. I've never heard the fan (it is silent), I see no discoloration occurring at all (although I should clean it often in order for it to continue looking new), and the heat is warm enough for me to feel confortable on a cold day (it's even confortable on a lap), but not hot enough to burn myself. The glossy screen is never an annoyance for me (I forget that it is glossy whenever I am working in a non-floursecent environment), and the integrated graphics do a great job handling OS X's graphics and video playback; quite better than the Voodoo 3 in my old PC. Since buying my Mac, I haven't turned on my desktop PC (an old 950MHz Duron with 384MB RAM, running Windows XP and FreeBSD; a generally trouble free computer) once.
Now, it is less than 2 weeks old, so it is probably too early to tell. However, I advise people looking into getting a MacBook or MacBook Pro to just buy one (unless they want to hold out for a Core 2 Duo Mac). Everybody that I know who has one has a wonderful experience with them. They are wicked fast, quite elegant, and comes with all of that OS X goodness. Plus, since these are of a later generation of the first generation, all of the problems should be generally fixed.
And, no, I do not work at Apple, nor do I get paid by Apple to make this. This is my personal experience. I'm just a computer science student, that's all.
We've had a lot of problems with certain Dell Optiplex models, like leaking motherboard capacitors and bad hard drives. Dell never acknowledged a defect with them even after every single computer from one order died with the same problem. However, they were fast about shipping out new parts or an on-site service tech next day when we did have a problem. So no problem getting hardware warranty support. Don't bother calling for any software support, though.
No, these are not growing pains or any other phenomenon with a common unusual cause. They are all unrelated QC issues that could've happened and do happen with all products of such complexity. The only correlation due to a common cause related to Apple the company is the fact that these are all first generation products with radically new engineering compared to the old Macs all released within a short period of time.
Most of this apparent correlation is due to the fact that the Intel macs are getting unprecidented attention. The attention and scrutany is also amplified by the fact that forums and things like flickr are more popular now then they were during the previous launches of Apple's producs such as the original iMac and iBook lines - both of which had their share of QC issues. I would argue that Apple's Intel Macs have received orders of magnitude more publicity and attention then any of their previous products, as well as their competitors. I mean when was the last time a Dell product was featured in /. WITHOUT it having to first explode or something...
So, no, ars technica - your article is a non-story about a non-issue.
PS: Not that this is suprising - /. has been featuring many of these lately...
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As a designer I tend to question Apple's practice of prototyping and testing hardware and software.
It would seem that time constraints and secrecy overshadow the cycle of design > prototype > data collection > design (repeat).
I can't imagine they're able to get enough real world data under such a vale of secrecy. They seem to test products in the market place... which means rev 1 Apple products are almost always questionable.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
I work for a major, major, Australia Apple authorised Reseller with a service center that services many, many Macs.
Is Apple having problems? Nope. They did with the first batch of MacBook Pros, but since then, it's been smooth sailing.
Apple's biggest problems are the iBooks.
You also have to remember Apple are selling, a lot more Laptops then they have ever done in the past. Sales in Australia have skyrocketed so high that almost no-one can keep up with demand.
Here's my experience with my MacBook...
I bought it.
It works.
I know that it's in vogue to criticize Apple now, and I know that Apple is high profile, but their QC issues are no different than they've usually been. The first-gen products have a higher lemon rate.
Woohoo.
Anyone remember the first-gen TiBooks, where the antenna design sucked so much that getting beyond 50 feet of Airport range was a miracle? Or the cubes with the power button that was so sensitive it would sometimes trigger itself? Or the cube's cracking acryllic? What about the PB 5200's Lion battey?
Moral of the story: first-gen products have high failure rates. Courtesy of the architecture switch, most of Apple's product line is first-gen. Therefore, much of Apple's product line has a higher than normal failure rate. Apple's not suffering, they're not dying, and they haven't decided that "Hey, why don't we take our reputation for quality, and flush it down the toilet? Let's shaft all our customers just because!" To Dvorak, and indeed pundits all around the world (like the author of TFA, for example) I have this message: grow the fuck up.
The real litigious bastards...
(emphasis mine)
It's pretty funny to read a sentence about quality control followed up by something spellcheck could catch. Then again, this is Slashdot.
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
I'm not saying that all the problems people are having are made up, but I'm just not seeing any of them. Then again, I custom ordered my MacBook from Apple and I did not buy one from the Apple Store.
:-)
;-)
I bought mine at the beginning of July. It arrived on the 17th. I have been using it non-stop since then for software development, and I haven't seen any problems at all. No yellowing. No heat issues. No scuff issues (although I'm not tossing it in a backpack--I have a satchel I use with all sorts of nice padding). It works fine. As a matter of fact, I love it
Does it run pretty hot? Sure. But no worse than my PowerBook (same really). Battery life? Same. Screen? Soooooo much more beautiful
My understanding from talking with one of the store guys is that they had some assembly issues at first with the MBPs in terms of heat. They were apparently leaving the plastic on the parts even when they were put together--thus blocking the vents. But that was apparently resolved.
I have seen scuttle butt around about not getting machines direct from the Apple store and getting a custom build through Apple. The idea is that they have to assemble one fresh from China for you (well, that is where they ship from--I can dig up my shipping label from around here somewhere). I guess the thinking is that there were some kinks in the assembly line/supply chain, and that "fresh" systems don't suffer as bad.
In my case, that seems to have worked--no issues here.
"Doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs." -- Switchfoot, Ode to Chin
It's pretty obvious why you shouldn't get the first-gen machine out of the gate. When Apple announces a new machine they are flooded with orders and they care far more about filling them than quality control. Hell, you should expect to take it back at least once or even swap it out and consider yourself lucky if your computer is problem free.
Wait a few months and get a refurb. I've found their refurbished products to be rock-soild, and from what I've heard from a few, ahem, "genius" friends they go through an extensive check up (including repairing any known defect.)
Have you read the latest stuff on the new Intel chips? Those Core 2 Duo's are running faster and MUCH cooler clock for clock than anything AMD can contemplate. i'm sure the technology from the Conroe and Merom chips will traverse to the Xeon family (at least it would be logical)...and these will be nice in future Apple products. What would be dreamy is if Apple gained all that market that Microsoft has in the OS department...and sell OS' on the x86 arch, of course we know who will win in terms of reliability :P
Of course, it's always a back and forth battle.
"In the kingdom where everything dies, the sky is mortal."
I recall reading on digg (I'd go and get it to give you a link, but the way the site works makes it hard to find older stuff) a month or 6 weeks ago about how Dell have had this exploding laptop thing going on for a couple of years, but have just carried on selling them, and replacing them when customers complained. As soon as the Apple one went up in flames, it all came out of the woodwork that there'd been a couple of hundred cases over 2 (maybe 3, can't recall exactly) years...
I don't have a problem with Dell - I have one of their servers too, and I think it's well engineered. I just think Apple come in for more-than-their-fair-share of criticism. If you disagree, fine - it's a big world, plenty of space for multiple opinions.
Apple do push the limits, I think. More than most (not all) manufacturers, anyway. It hasn't stopped me from ordering a Mac Pro though (4x3GHz will *really* help on those FPGA place-and-route calculations. I've had them run for 2 weeks before now). Of course, I chose it on price as well as it being a Mac - the equivalent Dell was ~$2400 more expensive ($6638 vs $4249).
And I'm very, very rarely scary. I have to try *really* hard, and even then it doesn't really happen [sigh]. I don't put words in people's mouths then say "what a load of crud", though, either.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Internals, yes, but externals no. I've noticed that practically every MacBook Pro I've seen has fit and finish issues, most noticably a "bent" lid that curves up at the corners in sort of a "U" shape, the bottom of the U at the latches. This means the lid rocks and compresses when it's closed and you pick up the MBP. Is it so hard to make a flat lid?
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
We've purchased 18 Intel-based Macs at work over the past couple of months and haven't had any hardware issues. Most software works fine, too. At first we had a few issues with PowerPC software (MS Office, naturally) but recent system updates seem to have fixed 'em. We do have one custom OS X app that flat-out refuses to run through Rosetta.
We bought 16 Mac Minis, a MacBook and a 15" MacBook Pro (2 GHz). All are great machines, 'specially the MacBook Pro. The Minis are perfectly happy with Dell Ultrasharp monitors (15", 19" or 20" widescreen) and Microsoft mice (5-pack is $60!).
Performance is outstanding. I ran XBench and the MacBook Pro is slightly faster than a full-size dual 2.0 GHz G5 desktop in most categories (aside from hard disk speed, of course).
This is probably one reason they upgrade so much, although in reality it is either to show off, and/or just part of their addiction.
More on topic, I have a 2Ghz White Macbook and it is the best machine I have ever owned. In the last month the only issue I had was waiting for my 2GB of RAM to arrive and dealing with slowness. After the upgrade all has been good. Technically I may have the moo, very occasionally, typically on battery, I hear the fans pulsing. It is very quiet though, and I would never try to get the machine replaced just for that.
I also have two friends with Macbook Pros, one has had his for several months, and the other for less than two months. The later is a switcher and bought it on my recommendation, so if anything goes wrong I'm certain to hear about it. So far neither has had any serious issue other than installing old software drivers or startup apps that caused lag or flakiness in specific applications.
From what I can tell, having researched the Macbook for a while before i bought mine, and reading up everything I can, the Macbook and Macbook Pro both have failure/defect rates similar or lower than other companies, and even other Apple products historically. The issue at hand has more to do with the vocal users, and a lot more switchers at this time who are also vocal as to their disappointment. For some reference, Macintouch recently did a survey on these machines. Just take that info with a grain of salt, as the vocal elite and a number of vocal switchers are involved, and many people not having any problems have a tendency not to respond to these sorts of things.
Shawn's Tech Articles
Actually if match product specs (including brands..) you'll see they are around the same price of other computers now. if you looked at the keynote you'd see their high end MacPro is cheaper than a same spec Dell.
But if what the know is what you know, then no one really knows.
The problem is plain and simply coil buzz.
Laptops use switching power supplies, because linear ones aren't efficient enough. Switching power supplies use wire wound inductors to store energy while converted it from one voltage to another. These switching power supplies are constantly filled and emptied of energy. This often causes the coils to vibrate slightly. It's the same thing you hear from a power substation, only in a power substation it is at a fixed 60Hz as the coils in the transformers constantly empty and fill as the AC voltage dips above and below 0V.
In a laptop, the frequency depends on the switching power supply design. There are fixed-frequency switching power supplies, but these are not efficient across a wide range of power draws. So they have to use a variable frequency switching power supply. The problem is that the frequency ranges the power supply uses include the range 300Hz-3KHz, where the ear is very sensitive to the buzz.
When the power draw is high, the frequency is high, when it goes down, the frequency drops. If the frequency sweeps through the audible range, you hear chirps, like the G5 towers exhibited or moos (although the moos are often a 2nd order effect). If the frequency stops in the audible range, you hear a whine, like the laptops can show.
If you modify the power settings to keep the power supply outside the audible range, then you either limit your CPU speed (by going single core) or significantly increased your power draw (by turning off CPU napping). There is another whine which comes from the backlight power supply, it will also change frequency (to often be inaudible) if you change the backlight to be higher or lower.
Apple didn't pick the wrong mode, they need to go to that mode to save power and reduce heat.
Apple should do everything the can to reduce the whines. But it's not practical to remove it completely.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
I have to second that.
The Agency I work for bought 100 Dells in 2000 - all GX-240s. Before the first year was over, we had the following failures:
7 failed HDD
2 failed mobo
2 failed power supplies
2 failed cd readers
2 failed floppies
over 5 failed mice
In all, over a 20% failure rate in the first 12 months. Of course, Dell replaced everything with overnight replacements, but putting up with it all was a pain, especially the failed hard drives. We lost a lot of data, since this was a transition period where we still had a lot of people using the HD for storage of data instead of the newer server storage online. Things settled down a bit after the first year, but we still saw failures in those machines.
Now, I work for a different org within that same Agency, and now we use Thinkpads (IBM outbid Dell!). In the last year, in a group with fewer than 30 Thinkpads, we have seen over 5 Thinkpads, either T-23s or T-30s, experience sudden catastrophic hard drive failure. One lost the mobo and had to be sent back twice before it came back fixed. Took over a month!
I think that a lot of what we're seeing is that Apple gets a lot of press because of the Apple slogan It Just Works. Writing about Apple failures sure gets the attention, doesn't it?
I mean, jeeze! If you're gonna claim that kind of thing, people are certainly going to notice when they don't...
"Money is truthful. If a man speaks of his honor, make him pay cash." Notebooks of Lazarus Long, Robert A. Heinlein