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MacBook Buyer Beware

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Stunned by the Touch Bar on the new MacBook Pro? Thinking about buying one for yourself or a loved one? Don’t rely on the only hit to your wallet being just the exorbitant one upfront.

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iFixit, a website known for their “teardowns” of new electronics, just released their dismantling of the 15″ MacBook Pro. This model, along with the 13″, scored a 1 out of 10 on their scale of “repairability.” Issues brought up included direct soldering of the RAM to the logic board and the proprietary solid-state drive. Upgrading your performance or storage is practically impossible, so you’ll want to be sure to buy the model with the optimum specs for your daily use. Also, the newfangled Touch Bar is stunningly easy to break during repair, being held down by a ridiculous amount of glue (iFixit’s experienced teardown techs accidentally destroyed it on both builds). The power button also doubles as a Touch ID sensor, and is thus connected directly to the logic board; this might mean that swapping out a faulty power button will require replacing the logic board (!).

repairability

If a MacBook Pro is in your buying future, we strongly recommend purchasing an AppleCare plan with it. While it seems pricey ($349 for the 15″ MBP) it’ll definitely pay off if something goes wrong. iFixYouri is currently in talks with suppliers about parts for the new models, but we can tell you right now that they won’t be cheap to repair. Save yourself a lot of money and a huge headache by thinking ahead of time. The total price goes up to $2,750 (before dongles) but if you can comfortably pass the $2,000 mark for a laptop, you shouldn’t be worrying much.

If you own a current or older model of MacBook Pro, and your screen is giving you issues or battery life isn’t what it used to be, give us a call. iFixYouri does all sort of repairs for Apple laptops, from one Air to seventy Retina MacBooks for corporate clients, with quick turnaround and excellent customer service.

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The New MacBook Pro’s Pros and Cons

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The 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro is a gorgeous device and has already won ear-splitting applause from users. Nevertheless, there are hitches and for a laptop costing as much as this does, you could not be blamed for being disappointed with technical problems.

Potential MacBook Issues

As great of a device as Apple has developed with its latest MacBook Pro, it seems almost inevitable that some glitches should accompany such a product.

Note: For those that may have more severe issues than a mere glitch and may require actual MacBook repair, seeking out experts such as iFixYouri is always a sound decision.

So without any further ado, let’s take a look some of the issues:

Usage

The Retina screen is gorgeous. You cannot help but fall in love with it. However, there aren’t many websites that take advantage of Retina at this point.

Graphic Performance

Testing the graphic performance of four different laptops with a heavy effect video file uncovered that the 15-inch Pro takes an average 20 seconds less than the 13-inch to render the file, whereas the 13-inch Air takes an average 10 seconds more than the 13-inch Pro to render the same file. Now when we consider that the Retina 13 costs $850 more than the 13-inch Air and around $200 less than the Pro 15, it does raise a few uneasy questions about the wisdom of investing in a Retina 13.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro does come with a wonderful visual design, awesome trackpad and keyboard, a compressed unibody design, and yet its graphic performance is not too superior to the MacBook Air. You also experience a minor slowdown when you use a hi-res setting.

The laptop is a bit smaller than the 15-inch Pro and way thicker than the 13-inch Air.

Battery Life and Sound

The battery life, which is around 3 hrs 15 mins, is good enough and the sound is excellent, too. However, there seems to be a soft echo to the sound, especially when you are listening to dialogue. The keyboard and the trackpad are still the best you are going to find in a laptop.

Should One Buy the New MacBook Pro?

Clearly, it’s hard to say that the new MacBook Pro is not a good investment. The laptop is still so much better that other laptops, performance-wise. And since it costs only fractionally more than its 13-inch counterpart, it is hard to see why you would not invest in the 15-inch if you are comfortable with its slightly-bigger size.

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Mac Keyboard Shortcuts Made Easy

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Some people may not be on intimate terms with their Mac keyboard. The buttons do a lot more than simply type letters and numbers onto the screen, or move the cursor around.  With certain key combinations, there are many opportunities to perform steps that would otherwise have to be accessed from a menu.

Special Keys of a Mac Keyboard

Whether it is built-in like on a laptop or arrives with a desktop, Mac always uses a traditional QWERTY keyboard layout in the United States. The function keys or F keys make the Mac perform tricks. They can make the Mac screen brighter and the sound louder. Near the bottom of the keyboard, next to the space bar, are modifier keys.  When pressed, the modifier keys change the behavior of other keys that are pressed at the same time. When using one modifier key with another key, you can issue a keyboard shortcut.

Classic Layout

On the Macbook Pro of today, the FN key is on the bottom row. On older keyboards it may not be present. When pressing the FN key and pushing one of the top keys on the board, specific operations can be achieved by default. If you press the F12 key by itself, audio volume amplifies. Press FN together with F12 on a Mac with Mountain Lion and the display shifts to the Dashboard environment.

The Versitility of a Command Key

Appearing to the right and left of the space bar is the Command key. If used frequently, it can save the user lots of time.  For instance, when saving a document, instead of going to the File menu, you can just press Command+S.  Or, when quitting the document, you can press Command+Q.

The Control key is mainly used to call up contextual menus. Windows users recognize these as menus that appear when you right-click. On a Mac, nothing happens with the right-click, you must hold down the Control key and right-click to get the menu commands. To get rid of it, click outside of it and do not hold down the Control key.

Option Keys

An Option key is to the right of the Control key. Pressing the Option key causes optional or alternative actions to happen. These common key commands are used with most all applications.

Like all great products, the reality of repair and sometimes replacement is inevitable. If your Mac keyboard ever experiences problems with its functionality and is in need of computer repair services, pros at iFixYouri can help restore your Mac back to its former glory.

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Issues with Retina Displays on MacBook Pro

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If an extensive discussion thread in forums on Apple Support is any indication, then there is seemingly a problem with a number of MacBook Pros that are outfitted with Retina displays. The affected Retina displays show burn-in and image retention.

LG Manufactured Displays

John K, who is a member on the Apple Support forums, contributes to the discussion by pointing out that the problem seems to be taking place primarily with MacBook Pros that are outfitted with LG manufactured Retina displays. It has been found that other displays that are manufactured by Samsung seemingly display the colors more accurately, they are brighter and they do not have the same issues with burn-in and image retention.

Terminal Command

This helpful terminal command:

ioreg -lw0 | grep \”EDID\” | sed “/[^<]*xxd -p -r | strings -6

will assist you in determining the manufacturer of the display that has been installed in your own MacBook Pro.

This terminal command is used to check whether an LG Screen is on a MacBook Air. If the display code starts with “LP,” then it is an LG display. It has been verified that users of the LG panel see a faint ghosting of the Finder windows whenever they access any PowerPoint slideshow that has a gray background.

Individuals who have a MacBook Pro outfitted with a Retina display and have been experiencing this problem can contact iFixYouri to perform the necessary repairs.