Hooray for Apple Customer Service!

We finally got another 17" PowerBook G4, a replacement for the one we left with an offspring as a birthday gift during the WWDC. We know, there are impending rumors of a speed bump but we never pay attention to the rumors--a speed bump usually doesn't matter much anyway.

Unfortunately for the first time in dozens, maybe even hundreds, of new Apple Computers we've purchased or been involved with purchasing stretching back to the late '70's and the Apple IIe, we got one that was DOA.

Well, it wasn't completely dead. It kind of worked but applications, including the System Preferences, kept unexpectedly quitting. We ran the Apple Hardware Tests located on the single DVD that now comes with Macs, a decided improvement over a raft of CDs, and it reported a clean bill of health. Then we ran Disk First Aid and DiskWarrior, repaired permissions and reset PRAM/NVRAM. Nothing worked, including three reinstalls.

Sunday morning we took it back to the Apple Store near Macs Only!'s global headquarters. Apple has a 10-day replacement policy for Macs bought directly from Apple with confirmed hardware problems. The policy does not apply to purchases from other retailers like CompUSA or MacWarehouse. We walked out with a new replacement.

The replacement works perfectly. We did today's page on it and couldn't be happier. It really pays to shop directly with Apple.