The Entroporium

A major reason that The Entroporium went on an unintentional 15-week hiatus was the untimely demise of my iBook 1.33, pictured at left. One moment it was burning a copy of an Optimo mix, the next it’s screen was dead and an acrid battery smell was rising off of it. This was especially bittersweet given that I had touted this iBook to all my friends as the best & only non-buggy Apple product I’ve owned out of the… many. I think this was my sixth Mac since the first one in 1984. I’m on my third iPod, too, with the first two dying pretty horrible self-inflicted deaths. So why exactly am I so loyal? (…he typed on his new work-issued MacBook Pro, which has already proven itself buggy, too).Just for fun, let’s run down the fates of the last batch of Apple products we’ve owned:

• iMac G3: Sold it to a friend while still under Applecare warranty. Hard drive went bad.
• Susie’s iBook 800: Major issues with the touchpad. CD stuck in the CD drive.
• Shawn’s iBook 1.33: Self-immolation.
• Shawn’s last iPod: At different times, replaced the battery, screen and hard drive. Frankenstein iPod! Then the screen died again… (I should mention that my current iPod, purchased a year ago, is still in fine shape.)

The moral of the story, dear readers, is if you have to have the Apple gear, go for the Applecare warranty. Which is another way of saying, the price on a new Apple laptop is really $169 higher than is posted.Another thing I learned is that there is a lively ebay market for Apple parts for dead machines. I’ve already scored $265 for the screen. Since the assembled working machine was worth $700, that means by the time I’m done selling off the bits that I’m going to get tantalizingly close to its full market value. Don’t trash that Apple! Sell it for parts!