1241 For me, two cardinal virtues of consumer products are ease of owner servicing and the availability of inexpensive spare parts -- particularly maintenance and consumable items like lamp bulbs and batteries, which ideally should be standardized items. Banefully, the trend seems to be moving away from these virtues in our era.

Take automobile headlamps as a prima facie case in point. Until the mid-'70s, virtually every vehicle on the road, from the tiniest subcompacts to eighteen-wheel tractor-trailers use standard, round, sealed-beam headlamp units. There were only three distinct models, for two-lamp and four-lamp systems. If you had a burned-out or broken headlamp, you could walk into any corner service station, auto-parts store, and many department stores and pick up a new one for about $5. In most cases, replacing the sealed-beam unit on the car or truck was a 5-10 minute screwdriver job.

Not so today. The rot began setting in around the mid-'70s, when rectangular variants of sealed beams started appearing on automobiles, purely for styling reasons. However, at first these were still standardized units, and while more expensive than the traditional round headlamps, they were still fairly reasonably priced and no more difficult to replace.

Then in the early '80s things shifted again when every separate vehicle model with few exceptions began using proprietary style headlamp units, with distinct left and right hand versions of course. Now, instead of a few dollars, it costs several hundred dollars to replace a broken headlamp unit, which of course had to be ordered from a dealer for your make of automobile. Furthermore, it's a lot more than a few minutes' work with a screwdriver to replace one of these babies.

And headlamps, being at the front corners of the vehicle, are very vulnerable to damage even a minor fender-benders, susceptible to flying rocks, and so on. The non-standardized headlamp stupidity has to be a substantial factor in skyrocketing auto insurance rates.

In the computer orbit, a prime offender is batteries. Oddly, while major components like hard drives and RAM are more and more standardized these days (with the attendant price reductions), batteries are perversely diverse. For example, Apple has used a variety of PRAM batteries in its desktop units over the years, including several types of similar capacity and voltage. Even more egregious is the sometime practice of actually soldering the PRAM battery to the motherboard, and/or burying it (especially in laptops) in a location making it difficult or impossible for user service.

There is simply no excuse for not using standardized PRAM batteries, in making them easily user replaceable in an convenient to access compartment a la the old compact desktop Macs.

The main batteries in laptops are more analogous to the proprietary headlamp units in cars, their size and shape determined to a considerable degree by styling, which inhibits standardization. However they are at least in most instances admirably easy to change or replace.

Then there is the iPod, whose internal lithium ion battery is neither easy to replace nor inexpensive.

Last week, the Washington Post's Hank Stuever posted a column entitled "Pushing The Envelope Of Just What's Disposable," noting that:

"The iPod, by its irresistible design, is sealed tight like an alien spaceship, with no visible seams or openings.) Laptop computers, meanwhile, almost seem born with a genetic disposition to chronic fatigue syndrome when it comes to the life span of their rechargeable batteries. To own one is to immediately suspect that something is wrong with the spark in the relationship; indeed, things are petering out faster and faster."

However, he also quotes Stan Ng, director of worldwide marketing for the iPod, affirming that Apple never envisioned the iPod as a disposable item. True enough, Apple does offer a battery replacement program for the iPod. Send your iPod off and Apple will replace the battery for $99. However, that's a mighty stiff tariff for what should be a maintenance item. Several third parties that offer replacement batteries for the iPod for as little as $49.95, although even that's pretty steep for a battery by my lights.

In my estimation, Apple should have used some sort of a reasonably standard easily user-replaceable batteries in the iPod, even if it meant that the machine had to be a little larger. I'm inclined to be a form follows function guy, and IMHO, a consumer product value inheres just as much in ruggedness and ease/cheapness of service, maintenance, and repair, as it does in design coolness.

Which brings us to the painful matter of the iBook logic board failure epidemic, which Apple is doggedly refusing to acknowledge other than by deleting complaints from their on-line discussion boards, and having their service reps recommend purchasing and the AppleCare extended warranty.

There has thus been no authoritative analysis of the specific nature of the problems afflicting the iBook, but a body of anecdotal evidence is growing that there are several issues, all of which affect video one way or another.

One is is a mechanical design flaw at the display lid hinge. Apparently there isn't enough room for the wires to pass through and handle the friction they receive by opening and closing the lid.

Another is electrical shorting of the logic board

Yet another is the ATI video accelerator card coming unsoldered from the logic board, due to excessive heat buildup, poor quality assembly, or both.

MacFixIt reader Peter H did a take-apart analysis, and determined:

Display Hinges - "The edges are sharp and they cramp the wires. As the display is opened and closed the wires are forced to bend and twist repeatedly about too small a radius. As the lid is opened they are also put into tension. The wires, such as the backlight cable, are only 7 strand and will not tolerate this repeated physical stress and will fail from fatigue / strain hardening."

Logic Board - "Did a thorough examination of the motherboard with a stereo inspection microscope and I see a problem with high voltage arcing across to the RF shield. The characteristic pitting was quite obvious under the microscope. (no wonder you may be exposed to an electric shock from the bare metal on the underside of the iBook). I imagine the shorting would also not help battery life. Also I noted that many of the cables are RF shielded with a finely woven metallic sheath. This is OK but I observed at the cut ends - stray fine metallic fibers which in some cases were making inappropriate contact potentially shorting out some electronic components."

For more information, visit:
http://www.macfixit.com/

And MacInTouch reader David Shanahan observed:

"The video chip on the motherboard comes loose when its solder gives way leading to video failures, usually with no warning. This may be triggered by flexing of the case putting strain on the chip until it eventually comes loose (some have suggested never picking up your iBook by the left-hand side alone as this is where the video chip is)"

Models affected seem to be especially the 600 MHz through 900 MHz G3 iBooks.

It is yet to be determined whether the logic board failure problem has been addressed with the new, G4 iBooks, which use an entirely different logic board design (adapted from the 12" G4 PowerBook), but reportedly, the hinge design has not been fixed.

I love the iBook. I love my 700 MHz G3 iBook, which is just a year old this week, and has been completely trouble-free so far. However, my iBook is used almost exclusively as a desktop substitute computer, spending 99 +% of its time perched on a Road Tools CoolPad with a ventilation fan sucking hot air away from it. It rarely gets picked up--almost never when it's hot, and I doubt if the lid has been closed and opened more than half a dozen times in the past 12 months.

In other words, my iBook doesn't get typical use, something I hope will help it continue its reliable ways, but most iBook users demand more conventional service from their machines, which involves actual laptop use, carriage, and lid opening and closing on a frequent basis, and it has become apparent that the iBook often doesn't stand up well to that sort of normal use.

I have now let the deadline pass for purchasing AppleCare coverage for my iBook. I object strongly to being obliged to shell out more than one-quarter of the price of a new machine ($400 plus Canadian including taxes) to extend my warranty for another two years on the strong statistical probability that my computer could suffer catastrophic major component failure. I may regret not buying AppleCare, but the combination of particular factors outlined above combined with stubbornness inclined me not to do so.

I further reasoned that if I did cough up the $400 for AppleCare, and the iBook failed and was repaired, all I would have to show for it would be a machine worth maybe Canadian $1,000 used, if I could find anyone willing to take it off my hands given the bad publicity iBooks have been getting. Then there is the ethical issue of selling a machine you know is likely to fail again, even if the prospective buyer is unaware of the probabilities that I obtain. That wouldn't set well with me.

So in my case at least, my iBook has become a de facto disposable computer. It if it keeps running as nicely as it has been, great! If it croaks, there is no way I would throw good money after bad to fix it, especially at the ridiculous prices Apple charges for replacement parts and service. One user reported: "They (Apple) told me it was the logic board and that the repair would be $920." This, on a machine that sold brand new for as little as $999, is patently absurd. Unhappily, the iBook is also a nightmare to work on, so user-replacement of the logic board is not likely a job I would be inclined to take on myself. I've stripped Wall Street and 5300 PowerBooks, but there are limits to my bravery and/or foolishness.

And since there is no way I would buy another G3 Dual USB iBook given what I know now, my hypothetical broken machine would be useless to me as a parts mule as well. As I said -- a disposable computer.

I don't suppose the prospect of several hundred dollar headlamp replacements factors into very many automobile purchasers buying decisions. Of course, even if it did, there isn't much alternative anyway these days. Hardly any cars use standard headlamps anymore. Even my '89 Corolla and '90 Camry have proprietary headlamp units. My '90 Dodge Dakota pickup does have standard sealed beams.

By the same token, I expect that few computer purchasers consider ease of service, repair, and maintenance, or the price and availability of spare parts, as important factors in their purchasing decisions, even though these issues can be of critical importance to the total cost of ownership and overall value.

We as consumers need to exert more pressure on manufacturers in these areas. Even if my iBook continues to work well, its resale value has been substantially diminished by this issue. Consequently, in my opinion, even iBook owners who have not (yet) suffered logic board failures have a stake in Apple pro-actively addressing this problem.

In a blog entitled "Shattered iDreams," Bill Owen of the Ottawa - based eyestir site says:

"My Apple iBook is dead. Thousands of iBooks just like it lie dead all over the world, their logic boards decayed, burned, rotted into a non-functioning state. What has happened we cry? Nothing, says Apple, nothing at all. Logic board problems? Wow! Really? No, sorry, we can't fix that out of warranty, you must have damaged it."

CNET News.com reports that Michael Johnson, of the "Blackcider" site, is gathering names for a possible class-action suit. Johnson told CNET he will be meeting with an unspecified Philadelphia law firm about the claims next week.

Johnson also offers T-shirts with his site logo on front and "Ask me about my logic board" on back.

Brendan Carolan at PetitionOnline.com, has collected, as of yesterday, 1143 signatures on an online petition calling for Apple "to admit there is a recurring and endemic problem with their Dual USB iBook computers, namely, the frequent and repeated failure of the logic boards in these machines."

"We petition that Apple provide recourse to this problem by either extending the warranty on the logic boards to cover all purchasers of said machines, or by offering reasonable replacement options other than the current replacement logic board, which has been proven faulty."

With publicity like that....

Remy Davison of Insanely Great Mac observed in an excellent essay on Apple quality control this week:

"[Even if the machine survives the initial warranty period] ...hardware problems after12 months means customers get angry. Very angry. Angry enough to buy a Dell and never come back to Apple, because Dell assure them that they'll come 'round to their place, pick up their Wintel slab, and fix it for them in record time."

Reportedly, members of the "Dead iBook Society" are planning to stage a protest at Macworld Expo next week over the iBook logic board fiasco. I'll be there with them in spirit.

Charles W. Moore

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