Comments on: AppleCare Protection Plans: To Buy or Not To Buy?

By: Fergus

Fergus — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 12:29:45 +0000

I too purchased my AppleCare under the higher education discount – to be honest I probably wouldn’t have got it if I’d had to pay the full £279… with something like a MacBook Pro I’m pretty certain you can add it onto your household contents insurance. At least then you are covered for accidental damage and theft etc.. I suppose if you don’t get it, and you need a massive repair just out of warranty, £279 would seem like a bargain in retrospect. 🙂

By: Adam

Adam — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 05:14:41 +0000

The Applecare Plan is one insurance all Apple users should not do without. If you hang around an Apple reseller outlet long enough you know what I mean. The lucky one will get a machine that will work flawlessly but…

Apple products are good but not infallible. If the machine failed within the warranty period you get the parts replaced free but when out of warranty it’s another story.

This is my experience – the LCD screen and HDD of my powerbook was replaced. my ipod was replaced.

BTW I am not employee of Apple but a user and their Plan gave me peace of mind for a couple of years.

By: Jeff (iMac G5)

Jeff (iMac G5) — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 04:51:16 +0000

Had I not purchased the extended warranty, my iMac G5 (Rev “A” from 2004) repairs – just a month away from the expiration of the extended 3-year warranty period – would have cost me almost $1,000!

Symptoms included inability to sleep, the CD drive would spit the disc onto the floor when ejecting it, and one horrible day, it simply wouldn’t boot up. The $1,000 fix included a new motherboard, internatl power supply and a new CD drive.

The CD drive still spits the discs out (won’t hold onto them half way out as it should) but the unit is at least operational once more. The alarming part of this story; had this been a PC (as opposed to an Apple computer), the same repairs would have cost only a third of the Mac’s repairs – partly because I could have done them myself and saved the cost of labor.

By: detroit

detroit — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 00:52:35 +0000

In the U.S. most credit cards will double the factory warranty for products purchased with the credit card. I had a CD burner break a few months out of the factory warranty and my credit card company reimbursed me for the purchase price of a new unit. All I had to do was submit a note from the repair shop that it couldn’t be fixed and the bill for the new burner. A friend at work had her laptop LCD screen replaced under the extended warranty coverage provided by her credit card company.