back to article Man buys new MacBooks, pulls them to bits, takes pics

Hardware hackers have already got their mitts on Apple's latest MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops - and taken the new notebooks to bits. Inside the new MacBook Inside the new MacBook Top: Flip up the catch (highlighted) to reveal the battery and HDD Then the innards... Pictures courtesy iFixit.com Actually, it looks …

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  1. Jamie Edwards
    Jobs Horns

    32bit?

    Anyone noticed that this guy (who took apart the MBP) said:

    "Apple is sticking with 32-bit chipsets for their portables, so you'll be stuck at 4GB RAM forever with this machine."

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    Huh?

    Hasn't Jobsworth made taking pictures of Apple kit (other than the airbrushed shite that appears on the billboards) illegal? I can't imagine a control freak like him will be letting any old tom, dick or harry take apart one of his machines.

    All your istuff are belong to Steve.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    SATA Drives aren't new...

    The fact the MB/MBP use SATA drives shouldn't come as a surprise, they've been using SATA drives for quite some time. My original MacBook Pro (Core Duo) uses a SATA drive.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    @anon

    Read again, SATA *optical* drives are new to the MacBooks. Have a look at your system profiler!

  5. Richard
    Jobs Horns

    SATA *HD* Drives aren't new...

    @Anonymous Coward

    SATA DVD/CD Drives in Apple portables is new, that's what the comment was about.

  6. Giles Jones Gold badge

    @32-bit

    Discussion on it here:

    http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=6431823

    Conclusion is people have got early 2008 MBP's to run up to 8GB in Linux, 6GB in OSX. So a newer laptop should be even better.

    I very much doubt a newer chipset would be inferior. Don't forget these are standard off the shelf chipsets, not Apple designed chipsets.

  7. Mick Sheppard
    Flame

    Re: SATA Drives aren't new...

    Posted as an AC to save embarrassment? The article states that the optical drive is a SATA rather than PATA part. My original MacBook Pro (Core Duo) has a PATA optical drive, albeit a SATA HDD.

  8. Jamie Swithenbank
    Jobs Horns

    @ SATA Drives aren't new...

    The key here is SATA for the OPTICAL drives is new: Previous MB/MBP revisions may have had SATA HDDs but were lumbered with PATA Optical Drives...

    They now use SATA for the Optical drives too... small revision should have been done a long time ago - so I understand your confusion.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Boffin

    @SATA Drives aren't new...

    they have used sata HDD's for a while, eg my 1st gen black macbook core duo, these are the first with sata *optical* drives.

  10. Rory Wilson
    Jobs Horns

    Jobs giveth and jobs taketh away

    Good news that it's easier to get at the hard drive for ease of replacement, but now it's trickier to get at the memory...

    Stil, it's an improvement...

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: Huh?

    No, Jobs hasn't made taking pictures of Apple kit 'illegal'.

    Perhaps you're being facetious. At least I hope you are.

  12. Webster Phreaky
    Jobs Horns

    ALL the "new" MacBooks will be taken apart SOON ENOUGH...

    many times over and over by Apple trying to fix the USUAL crop of Flaws and Bugs that ALL crApple notebooks have a renowned reputation for.

    Just my personal experience?

    G3 500 iBook - Apple had to repair 3 times during 1 year warranty, finally died.

    G3 700 iBook - " " 4 times during 32 months - 2 LogicBoards, 1 LCD and 1 Optical Drive (AppleCare), and then after, I HAD TO replace the dead AC/DC charging board.

    G4 1.2G iBook - Apple had to repair 2 times during warranty, both times Logic Boards), but at 38 months old the Firewire port is DEAD and the LCD flickers.

    G4 1G PowerBook - TWICE back to Apple for LogicBoards in the first 12 months, now it's a DOOR STOP (at 26 months old) because of a DEAD LCD that costs $899 to replace!

    I will NEVER BUY another Apple. Apple products are $HIT.

  13. soaklord
    Thumb Down

    32B

    Every time I start to dig Apple, they do something stupid. Why would you bring out an entirely new line of hardware and put it on 32b hardware? It's not like the 64b versions are so VERY expensive. I didn't even know Intel was producing core 2 32b chips. Deal breaker. Especially since I had visions of a triple boot VUltimate/Ubuntu/OSX machine.

  14. Mike Moyle

    @ Webster Phreaky

    Hunh...

    My experience with Apple hardware has been totally different:

    PowerPC laptop (Wall Street) no problems except for weakening battery. Passed it off to my mother for web-surfing, etc., some years ago. She finally retired it a month ago.

    500 MHz iBook G3 (Snow, Dual USB) Again, the battery is old and needs replkacement, but still used for travel (web surfing, writing, photo editing, etc.)

    875 MHz PowerBook G3 had to replace the power brick when the wire frayed.

    ...and on a side-note: 875 MHz G3 tower, dual 1 GHz G4 tower and quad 2.5 GHz G5 tower, all working fine with the only repair needed on any of them being replacement of a dead HD on the G3 three or four years into service -- which was, of course, trivial to do myself.

    Now, I will agree that (while you don't say what problems you had w/the first iBook) six logic board replacements and three bad screens is not a good record but the CONSISTENCY of the same repairs being needed repeatedly raises one question:

    Have you considered the possibility that -- just maybe -- it's YOU?

    No; of course Apple's product isn't perfect, but for the vast majority of us it works as advertised, right out of the box.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I agree with Webbo, all Apple laptops are crap

    particularly the Rev.1 Powerbook G4 12" I'm typing this on that has never needed any attention for any sort of failure, works exactly the same as it did the day it came out of the store and is giving every indication of making it in this state to its 6th birthday next February.

    What a piece of shit.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Webster Failtard

    Here's my Apple notebook experience, just for the sake of comparison.

    PowerBook 100 (purchased 1993) - No problems, still operational

    Clamshell G3 iBook (purchased 2000) - No problems, still operational

    White G3 iBook (purchased 2003) - No problems, still operational

    Black MacBook (purchased 2006) - No problems, still operational.

  17. Matt

    @Webster

    I see you've had a bad experience or three. I don't own an Apple, but a quick survey of 10 or so mates who have, reveals zero faults over the last five years.

    Of course they could just be lucky but it looks to me like Apple is no better or worse at hardware faults than what you get with your average PC.

    Of course there may be other reasons to hate Apple.

  18. Farai

    @ Webster Phreaky

    Webster, i honestly don't know why you're so unlucky with the machines - and i dread to ask if the way you use them may have anything to do with it... Logic board death on every machine you've had? You managing the heat issues well enough man?

    I'd suggest something like a Panasonic Toughbook if you're getting no joy with the Macs. They however are not $hit for the rest of us who have had minimal or no problems with them.. They're by and large great machines, designed well and working well into much older age than the average non-mac equivalent, while retaining superior value.

    Maybe you ought to try one of these new machines with the stronger chassis and much more advanced cooling systems - i'd buy you one if i could but i'm saving for one of my own :D

  19. The Other Steve

    @Webster Phreaky

    Maybe you should stop dribbling into them ?

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    @ Webster losertard

    ...and here's another:

    5 x apple laptops dating back to the 5300c

    2 x Apple Pro's starting with a G5.

    Guess what? NO PROBLEMS with any of them.

    Here's a thought; has it occurred to you that perhaps - just perhaps - it's YOU that's frying your boards and power supplies? Maybe you're wearing tastless trainers who's only sole purpose is to convey as much static as possible to anything you touch? Maybe you're getting 300V at home instead of 240V?

    No, you're right - it must be Apple's fault. Sheesh.

  21. ceebee
    Thumb Down

    nice but where is the Firewire

    Apple's decision to remove Firewire from the new MacBooks is a deal killer for me. Target disk mode, audio and video equipment that uses Firewire ...etc all mean the MacBook is off the purchase list.

    And judging by the huge number of complaints on Apple's own discussion forum Apple has made a big mistake!

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    @ Farai

    Quote: "They're by and large great machines, designed well and working well into much older age than the average non-mac equivalent,"

    Oh really? How about you post some actual evidence to back up this claim.

    No, I thought not.

  23. Jacob Reid
    Jobs Horns

    Nothing new then

    All parts that have been in real computers for years, for a lower price and with a better OS and not embedded in a lump of nasty white plastic.

  24. Henry Wertz Gold badge

    Mac reliability

    I *also* agree with Webster. I work on surplus computers from the university. Dells? Low failure rate, I got some GX260s with blown caps for a while but even counting them the failure rate's been well under 10%. Macs? It's around 75% failure rate -- that's being generous. The LCD Imacs are fairly reliable. B&W G3s are reliable, but too old for many to want. The G4s that are like a G3 case except grey are reliable. Oddly given the high heat, the few Cubes I saw were reliable. Laptops? Awful reliability. Desktops? I've gotten over a dozen "dual" processor G4s, without exception the second CPU was burned up. On some the first CPU also burned up rendering the whole system inoperative. Sound failures. Power supplies. Motherboard failures. We practically had a party when we got Ubuntu network installers working, on SO MANY models the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM will read a burned disk for maybe 5 minutes, then just start returning corrupted data (it doesn't properly indicate a CD read failure, so OSX seems to sometimes just install corrupted files, and Ubuntu will stop with various errors about corrupted packages). (After wiping the hard disk to meet security requirements, we cannot put OS X back on due to licensing problems.)

    Some models just last and last. But it really seems to be a crapshoot, and there's simply no way to pretend Apple is some paragon of reliability. Well, I mean, there IS a way, but it involves Steve Job's reality distortion field.

  25. Charley

    The big question

    of course is: Will it blend?

  26. Tim Croydon
    Stop

    Note to self...

    Don't lend Webster any electronic stuff.

  27. Ron Eve
    Flame

    PEBKAS

    @Webster Phreaky Well Webby, my old mucker, if it was as bad as you say why the fcuk did you keep buying them after the first couple of Macs? I reckon you should check your computing environment. Maybe it's because you get so hot under the collar...

    @Mac reliability . You say 'surplus' , any surplus I've ever seen in those situations usually means fcuked, that's why they're surplus! Otherwise you can't prise them out peoples hands.... So stands to reason they're going to have problems.

    I've worked on Macs since around 1994 and the real only bastard child was the 5300 laptop, which really was a POS. The odd manufacturing fault can happen to anyone (batteries, for example??) and most computer manufacturers farm out production to a small number of the same factories. It's the QC that comes into play and that's where Macs tend be be better.

    Here's report about the leading reliable computers being IBM and Mac (by some margin).

    http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?RSS&NewsID=16183

    (I tried to find other references to this other than Macworld but failed...)

    I can't be bothered to find other refs but I know they're out there.

    Didn't PC World vote the MacBook Pro best PC?

    /Flame on!!

  28. Paul
    Boffin

    @ Webster pREkTARD

    One & time again young man, you simply reinforce the fact you are a mentally retarded numbskull. Perhaps you need your nappies changed more often?

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