Dear Listas/essas, I have been lurking mostly, but recent events warrant some verbage. I apologize right away, if (when) this gets lengthy.
On my annual vacation this year my Powerbook G4 died (with some 500 not-yet-backed-up photos on it). Here is my story to this point and my request for help: 1. Powerbook died and won't go beyond a grey backlit screen on startup 2. took it to "Gravis" in Cologne, Germany (great place!, competent, helpful 'Apple Service Provider' like we used to have here). They put in a system disk and confirmed my suspicion that the Hard Drive has died (it had been getting progressively slower on startup). 3. After return home this week I went to the local Apple Store and they informed me I needed to get an appointment to speak to a "genius" and that the genius bar was closed for the day (this was Friday night). 4. I called 1-800-APL-CARE on Saturday morning (one: it hung up on me after about 5 mins of the 8 mins announced (max) wait time; two: after 15 minutes waittime of 10 mins announced (max) I got Eric, who requested I insert a system disk and wouldn't believe the description of above No. 2.) - I could not find my system disk other than an old X.1 which he deemed not an option since I was last running X.3.9 ... After my request was denied to connect me to a repair dispatch to determine whether there is a way to obtain the damaged Hard Drive for Data recovery, I gave up and decided to go back to the Apple Store. 5. Went to the Apple Store on Saturday AM, signed up for an appointment with a genius, got a pager (this alone took 10 to 15 minutes, although the genius bar was not apparently busy) - the appointment was showing 11:30 (about 1 hour after my arrival), but I got buzzed at 11:10 (most people are probably not patient enough to wait too long and I was to find out immediately why: 6. The genius I spoke with mentioned that my only option for data recovery would be to pay them 150 USD to remove and replace the damaged drive after a week where I could have it for data recovery and then send it in to Apple for replacement. Asked whether they could not put a new drive in at that point he informed me that it needed to be an Apple certified part and they could not obtain that. This is where the story ends (for now). Some additional information: 12" PB G4 (bought from Apple refurb), 1 Ghz, 768 MB RAM, Superdrive, Airport Extreme, unit has been in my possession for about 1.5 years, I do have Applecare 3 year extension Some general venting: If Apple wants to get out of their low market share they need to improve their service to what it used to be. Don't hire arrogant, half-wits as geniusses, and phone line support (the 'genius' actually told me he had gotten yelled at over his comments before - not that it helped, and I couldn't waste more time or energy with him ;-). Don't design otherwise beautiful hardware with components that fail within 2 years (while I was at the 'genius' bar there were 2 other people with powerbook hard drive failure experience (and there were not very many people to begin with). If I want this kind of lack of performance I can buy a Dell or another Sony (office experience with Sony support on Vaio laptops is about on-par with current Apple). Will we ever get another Powerbook G3 Kanga quality from Apple again? (my 1998 one is still going strong - now has a self-installed 20 Gig HD, although I may need to solder the power connector for a short soon). Any help, comments, different opinions/experiences, etc. are very welcome, tobias -- G-Books is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- Check our web site for refurbished PowerBooks | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-Books list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-books.html> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:" Send list messages to: <mailto:G-Books@mail.maclaunch.com> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-books%40mail.maclaunch.com/> --------------------------------------------------------------- iPod Accessories for Less at 1-800-iPOD.COM Fast Delivery, Low Price, Good Deal www.1800ipod.com ---------------------------------------------------------------