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Comment by ValentineC | Hacker News Reader

> The story of getting it fixed is really why people love Apple and even Amazon.

> I've had the Wifi go unreliable on an iPad. I got a Genius appointment for later that day. They confirmed the Wifi module was shot and just gave me a new device on the spot. They even offered to do the transfer for me. This sort of convenience is what gives people confidence in buying Apple products.

I'm still using Apple hardware myself, but I daresay that if Apple corporate decides not to admit fault and fix something, users will be SOL too.

Apple has never admitted fault for their shoddy MagSafe charger cable insulation, which always end up disintegrating and spewing blue stuff all over my furniture.

I've had multiple cables flake over the years, and every time I bring the the charger to a Genius bar (so far: Australia, Japan, and Singapore), they've always fallen back to "policy" and blamed it on me for not taking care of it properly.

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Apple cables really are terrible. I've had teh cladding come off multiple Lightning cables to the point I never use the Apple cable anymore. I just buy Anker cables without thinking about it.

I honestly don't know how Apple cables can be this bad. More to the point, I don't understand how Apple leadership can tolerate this from a PR perspective.

Allegedly, one major reason is that Apple has been successfully pressured by Greenpeace to remove PVC from their cables, causing them to be more brittle and fail sooner. https://fee.org/articles/this-is-the-real-reason-your-iphone... is one source, but Apple and Greenpeace themselves tout this "achievement". It seems to me to be just like replacing nuclear power with coal and natural gas power: another casualty of ideological extremism at the expense of the actual environment.

Interesting. What about nylon clad cables? Anker makes these (as do others) and this is what I buy. Why couldn't Apple sell those?

I think the new imac has a braided coating like those fancy anker cables for it's main power cable.

Because they just didn't think about it. Poor engineering.

braided cables? Apple PR is just BS at best

I've heard this before and am still puzzled by it. I've been using Apple devices for over a decade, and only ever had one or two phone charger cables fray, but they were really heavily used and looked like they were used in a farm for months. The vast majority still looks perfectly fine. I guess there must be small habits that have a great effect on degradation. Like stowing away the charger after every use vs keeping it in place at a desk, for example.

that might be a thing, but chargers are supposed to be portable unless I'm buying a power supply for a computer. Apple's cables aren't good design, and planned obsolescence

same here. I had numerous technical problems with my rMacbook Pro, but having to pay Apple tax every year for the Magsafe 2 design/material defect was most infuriating. Having owned several Dell and Apple laptops over past two decades, I never had to call Dell for support, but Apple on the other hand...

And no, I didn't get a new Magsafe 2 charger or MacBook Pro on the spot.

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