MacBook Keys Wrecked by Single Grain of Sand

Megalith

Megalith

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The co-founder and CEO of iFixit has published an article describing how the latest MacBook keyboards fail and why they are so “magnificently prone to failure.” According to his testing, a single grain of sand wedged underneath the butterfly lever is all it takes to make a key unusable. With the keyboard being a permanent part of the upper case, repairs are both impractical and costly.

The keyboard itself can’t simply be swapped out. You can’t even swap out the upper case containing the keyboard on its own. You also have to replace the glued-in battery, trackpad, and speakers at the same time. For Apple’s service team, the entire upper half of the laptop is a single component. That’s why Apple has been charging through the nose and taking forever on these repairs.
 
Meanwhile the keyboard that came with my IIGS circa 30 years ago works just beautifully.

Gotta love that there advancing technology
 
Guarana [BAWLS] said:
Okay, for a company as good at tech as apple is, this level of fuckup is BEYOND the pale. Where was their Q&A testing done? In a god damned clean room?
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Apple is about form over fuction first a formost. Everything is made with plan obsolescence and to sell accessories. Apple knew about this flaw before they ship. I guarantee it.
 
fuh-buh-jebus
I just replaced an a-1278 frame keyboard (failure caused by dark beer, not a single grain of sand). Even ifixit recommended total top replacement, but at least this older style did not have everything "glued" in. 50 #00 Phillips screws held the keyboard in place, almost would have preferred glue;).
 
vegeta535 said:
Apple is about form over fuction first a formost. Everything is made with plan obsolescence and to sell accessories. Apple knew about this flaw before they ship. I guarantee it.
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This.
Apple hasn't been known for good tech for many years. By good tech I mean reliable, repairable and upgradable.

Maybe it's because I've been working on computers and other tech for over 30 years, but I've always hated products that seem intentionally designed to make it difficult or impossible to repair.
 
and the sheep will just keep buying their products.

IF you don't think they don't have entire design teams creating their products, and this was intentional, then you'd be wrong.
 
I went into an Apple store the other day. They had 15 people working, 20 customers in the store, some of whom were together, and I still had to wait 15 minutes to make a simple purchase requiring nothing more than me telling them what I wanted, paying for it, and leaving. They have taken something that mankind spent the last 100 years making fast and easy (checking out) and made it hard and slow.... This might be okay if it was otherwise a positive experience. E.g. I will take a slow experience at a nice restaurant for superior food and service. But no, the also made it an awkward experience. You walk in and look for the checkout-line... nope none to be found. Then you get suddenly confronted by an employee who you now realize is "Checking you in". This person asks you to stay nearby so he can find you when it is your turn, so you end up awkwardly standing around with nothing to do, no ability to browse the store, and generally feeling like a dweeb.... And all this to make a simple purchase that any other store would let you make without all this rigmarole.

These people have no clue how to provide a good experience, yet in their mind that is the entire reason they do this stupid stuff.
 
I have this 11 year old Macbook Pro that was given to me a year or so ago. Thing is in near mint condition and works great.
Shame that the newer ones probably won't last this long.

IMG_1307.JPG
 
Zepher said:
I have this 11 year old Macbook Pro that was given to me a year or so ago.
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Hi fellow donated silver-key MBP 15" buddy ^^ . Mine's still going strong and hey, still plays full-screen Youtubes fine.

I got a 2016 MacBook as a gift and a few months into ownership the space bar got mushy. Apple replaced the top case under warranty. Few months later.. Starting to do it again! Woohoo!
Oh, and my 2016 MBP has a "not responsive/double registers" key. Time to get that fixed too. Tho the non-certainty they fixed the problem vs. just replacing bad keyboards with other potentially bad keyboards bothers me.
 
What they don't tell you is that other laptop keyboards can also fail from sand.



stop using your fucking macbook at the beach.

and use a vacuum instead of a blower.
 
SuperSubZero said:
Hi fellow donated silver-key MBP 15" buddy ^^ . Mine's still going strong and hey, still plays full-screen Youtubes fine.

I got a 2016 MacBook as a gift and a few months into ownership the space bar got mushy. Apple replaced the top case under warranty. Few months later.. Starting to do it again! Woohoo!
Oh, and my 2016 MBP has a "not responsive/double registers" key. Time to get that fixed too. Tho the non-certainty they fixed the problem vs. just replacing bad keyboards with other potentially bad keyboards bothers me.
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I have this 2014 model as well. I am not really a Mac person, just happen to have a couple of MacBook Pros. I do like the integration with the Apple stuff though.
I've been using this MacBook Pro to stream the Overwatch League on Twitch to my Apple TV via Air Play which is pretty cool.
IMG_1128.JPG
 
Kdawg said:
What they don't tell you is that other laptop keyboards can also fail from sand.



stop using your fucking macbook at the beach.

and use a vacuum instead of a blower.
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It has nothing to do with that. Sand can come from anything other than the beach though. They used sand as an example of how minuscule an object can stop the butterfly keyboard from functioning correctly. Have you actually looked at the problems of the butterfly keyboard? Other laptops, you unscrew a couple screws and the keyboard pops out. The MBP? They riveted it into the body. The issue is that a simple piece of dirt stops an extremely expensive laptop's keyboard from functioning. You have to pay hundreds of dollars in Applecare to ensure that the keyboard functions which it is a common recurrence. In a lot of these cases, the keyboard doesn't even work right out of the box.


Replacing a competitor's keyboard? Less than 10 minutes
Replacing an Apple butterfly keyboard? Hours since you have remove EVERYTHING like the motherboard, batteries, to pry that keyboard off AND remove all the 50 to 100 rivets AND thread new holes then you put every single component back.
 
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Kaitian said:
Replacing a competitor's keyboard? Less than 10 minutes
Replacing an Apple butterfly keyboard? Hours since you have remove EVERYTHING like the motherboard, batteries, to pry that keyboard off AND remove all the 50 to 100 rivets AND thread new holes then you put every single component back.
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more and more windows laptops have riveted keyboards. My cheap Asus laptop has non removable keyboard.
 
Mut1ny said:
Why is Apple charging and who is paying thinking it's OK? This would be a big NOPE from me! You fix your keyboard.
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Apple will service eligible MacBook and MacBook Pro keyboards, free of charge.
For anyone that was already had the problem and had to pay for servicing through Apple, the company will be refunding customers the cost of the repair.
https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-for-macbook-and-macbook-pro/
https://9to5mac.com/2018/06/22/apple-macbook-pro-keyboard-sticky-repair-refund/
 
Kdawg said:
more and more windows laptops have riveted keyboards. My cheap Asus laptop has non removable keyboard.
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Found the most important part for you. Apple was charging Applecare that probably cost more than your ASUS laptop to fix a keyboard issue for years before they finally fessed up.
 
Kdawg said:
more and more windows laptops have riveted keyboards. My cheap Asus laptop has non removable keyboard.
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Just like the soldiered in memory, no thanks.
If Dell starts doing this on their business laptops, I'll start buying something else for work.

When it comes to reusing older laptops at the office I need the following:
1. Replaceable drive. Usually replacing the old spinner with an SSD.
2. Replaceable memory. Upgrading the memory adds to the useful life.
3. Replaceable keyboard. Keyboard is the most likely item to fail or need to be replaced because some people are just gross. I've gotten laptops back that looked like a cat slept on it, or looked like someone used it to catch their lunch crumbs for 3 years.

Take a 5 year old high end laptop, upgrade the ram, add a SSD, and if needed replace the $20 keyboard. You now have a perfectly usable laptop for an office user.
 
nutzo said:
Just like the soldiered in memory, no thanks.
If Dell starts doing this on their business laptops, I'll start buying something else for work.

When it comes to reusing older laptops at the office I need the following:
1. Replaceable drive. Usually replacing the old spinner with an SSD.
2. Replaceable memory. Upgrading the memory adds to the useful life.
3. Replaceable keyboard. Keyboard is the most likely item to fail or need to be replaced because some people are just gross. I've gotten laptops back that looked like a cat slept on it, or looked like someone used it to catch their lunch crumbs for 3 years.

Take a 5 year old high end laptop, upgrade the ram, add a SSD, and if needed replace the $20 keyboard. You now have a perfectly usable laptop for an office user.
Click to expand...


Exactly this.

I'm a strong believer that the best buy in laptops is a mid range business model something like the Probook, Thinkpad, or Latitude lines. With those machines there is publicly available documentation: service (not just user) manuals, parts lists, and an actual means of ordering legit replacement parts. The markup over slightly cheaper consumer models is well worth the increased durability and serviceability.

On the high end however things often get stupid. Overprice nonsense marketed to "executives" or "creators" that seem to be largely style over substance. Milled aluminum bodies of future lithium ion, mercury, and epoxy e-waste all for the sake of a sexy few millimeters.

I actually like computers, a lot, so I want a reliable workhorse not an expensive delicate show pony.
 
unholythree said:
I'm a strong believer that the best buy in laptops is a mid range business model something like the Probook, Thinkpad, or Latitude lines. With those machines there is publicly available documentation: service (not just user) manuals, parts lists, and an actual means of ordering legit replacement parts. The markup over slightly cheaper consumer models is well worth the increased durability and serviceability.

On the high end however things often get stupid. Overprice nonsense marketed to "executives" or "creators" that seem to be largely style over substance. Milled aluminum bodies of future lithium ion, mercury, and epoxy e-waste all for the sake of a sexy few millimeters.

I actually like computers, a lot, so I want a reliable workhorse not an expensive delicate show pony.
Click to expand...

I have a Latitude 7480 for work. But I actually prefer the Dell XPS line for home. IMO, the XPS is just as reliable, smaller in size, better screen quality, and better overall build quality (with better aesthetics). Well worth it in exchange for soldered memory and no Ethernet port.
 
I dunno. Apple have been doing this shit for years.
Didn't jobs want the iPhone to be as awkward as fuck to repair, his attitude was "If they buy one of our products and break it, then buy another"

So fuck them. They are out to not only screw the customer in terms of pricing, but also screw them over the short lifetime of the product
 
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