Getting my Laptop Fixed

[Scott Greczkowski]

As pub members know the screen on my Macbook Pro cracked just before CES. It was usuable but after CES and over the past few weeks the crack spidered out of control.

I went to the Apple store and they told me it would be $1,200 to fix it. So then I went online and searched and found a company called TechRestore.COM who could do the screen replacement for under $400.

I contacted them asking them if they could also replace my keyboard as some keys were hard to press and the keyboard wasnt lighting up anymore. They told me the could take care of this.

So yesterday I sent it to them via UPS Overnight Delivery, I insured it for $1,500...

and UPS lost the package....

I was angry at UPS that they lost my laptop, however a few minutes ago the following was posted at the UPS site for my tracking number...

INCORRECT ROUTING AT UPS FACILITY / THE PACKAGE WAS MISSORTED AT THE HUB. IT HAS BEEN REROUTED TO THE CORRECT DESTINATION SITE

At least they found it...

Although this UPS screwup delays the fixing of my unit. TechRestore.COM normally fixes and turns around repairs normally within 24 hours. I am hoping that I can get the laptop back by Friday.

I will keep you guys up to date on the progress and will also be reviewing how well the TechRestore repair is going.

I miss my Macbook Pro.... I can't wait to get it back.

 

[goaliebob99]

At least its insured so if it is lost for good, you can recover your money back.

 

[Pepper]

once the thief discovered it was broken, he put it back in the system.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Well the good news is that the folks at TechRestore.COM got my laptop today, they called me and told me it arrive and was well packaged.

They went over the costs of replacing the screen and the keyboard/trackpad which I approved.

In addition I opted for them to upgrade the hard drive for me to a 500 GB hard drive. This was not something I was thinking of doing, but it is worth it to me as I am always clearing stuff of my Macbook to make room. Whenever I edit video I need to basically remove everything so that I have enough room to edit.

My unit will be overnighted back to me tomorrow morning and I will have it in my hands on Friday morning.

If I didn't get the hard drive done they could have shipped it today, however because of the hard drive they need to transfer over the data from the old hard drive to the new hard drive, and that takes a few hours.

Overall the cost of getting the new screen, new keyboard / trackpad and new hard drive is around $900 which might sound like a lot but its cheaper then buying a new machine, and honestly I don't want a new machine. The new Macbook pros have a lot of differences over the model I have. For example there is no DVI connector on the new Mac Book Pros, it uses a different battery then my Macbook pro and I have two batteries which combined give me 8 hours of battery life, the new macbook pro only had a Firewire 800 connector on it while my HD video camera only has a Firewire 400 cable, so to upgrade I would need to buy an adapter. The new macbook pro has chicklet type keys while mine has a nice feeling keyboard.

In other words to upgrade to a new macbook would have cost me more to upgrade everything else to get the same usability and thats not worth it to me. In addition the new Macbook pros only come with a super Glossy screen, while my Macbook Pro has a great matte finish.

About the only upgrade I want for my Macbook pro is I would love to have a Bluray burner. But thats not an option even on the new Macbook Pros.

I can't wait to get my baby back.

So far the folks from TechRestore.COM have been great, they called me and were very friendly on the phone and were not trying to upsell me on anything. I just hope the quality of their work is as good as the service I have already gotten from them.

 

[TheForce]

Scott- If you are editing video on the MacBook Pro, I'd suggest getting a FW800 LaCie drive. They are rugged and work very well for HD editing with FCP. It's what I use here as HD does not play well with a internal drive. Of course if you have 8Gb of ram in your Mac that may be a different story. I only have 2 in mine.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I have 4 GB of ram in mine and have been using Final Cut Express to edit and it has been doing the job fine for me.

BTW good news... I just got an email that they finished my computer and I will have it back tomorrow! I am very impressed thus far with TechRestore.COM's service!

 

[JamesJ]

awesome I will keep them in mind, I have apple care till 2010 then I am on my own with my macbook and mac mini.

 

[lakebum431]

Sounds like a heck of a company Scott. Please update us on the results when you get it back.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Ok my package just arrived.

The screen replacement job done looks like OEM, you can't even tell where they cracked open the frame! (this was something I was worried about!)

A quick check of the screen shows zero dead pixels (this is good as my original screen was purchased with 2 bad pixels out of the box!)

The new keyboard, palm rest and trackpad have all been replaced and look great! And again no signs of cracking open the case, it looks like a totally OEM job. (Its not dark enough to see if the keyboard is lighting up correctly, but since its all new I assume it is working fine.)

Also my hard drive was replaced with a new 500 GB unit, all data was transfered and the old drive was returned. Again all looks great!

I got to admit I was VERY nervous sending these guys my laptop. I was never a Mac man until I got this laptop and now it is probably my favorite computer of all time.

I am very impressed with the job done by TechRestore.COM! I should note that this is not an ad for them in exchange for repairs. I am just reporting my findings.

Total cost to fix the broken screen, keyboard and upgrade the hard drive was $901. This is $400 less then what Apple wanted to fix the screen alone.

I am very satisfied! Thank you TechRepair.COM!

 

[lakebum431]

Very impressive Scott. Thanks for sharing with the rest of us.

 

[Ramy]

Sounds like a great place to do business with.

 

[JamesJ]

Ok my package just arrived.

The screen replacement job done looks like OEM, you can't even tell where they cracked open the frame! (this was something I was worried about!)

A quick check of the screen shows zero dead pixels (this is good as my original screen was purchased with 2 bad pixels out of the box!)

The new keyboard, palm rest and trackpad have all been replaced and look great! And again no signs of cracking open the case, it looks like a totally OEM job. (Its not dark enough to see if the keyboard is lighting up correctly, but since its all new I assume it is working fine.)

Also my hard drive was replaced with a new 500 GB unit, all data was transfered and the old drive was returned. Again all looks great!

I got to admit I was VERY nervous sending these guys my laptop. I was never a Mac man until I got this laptop and now it is probably my favorite computer of all time.

I am very impressed with the job done by TechRestore.COM! I should note that this is not an ad for them in exchange for repairs. I am just reporting my findings.

Total cost to fix the broken screen, keyboard and upgrade the hard drive was $901. This is $400 less then what Apple wanted to fix the screen alone.

I am very satisfied! Thank you TechRepair.COM!

What did they do with your old hard drive?

 

[Eva Greczkowski]

What did they do with your old hard drive?

all data was transfered and the old drive was returned.
I asked him that very same question.

 

[Smith P.]

What did they do with your old hard drive?

Also my hard drive was replaced with a new 500 GB unit, all data was transfered and the old drive was returned. Again all looks great!

 

[JamesJ]

ahh skipped that dont know how.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

What did they do with your old hard drive?

They sent it back and now its in my desk.

 

[navychop]

ahh skipped that don't know how.

Old age?

 

[LonghornXP]

Wow we still have companies left that believe in great customer service. Looks like a great company I've never heard about. If the need arrives I will without a doubt give them a try. Thanks for sharing your experience Scott and I can understand how hard the little things can be to move away from.

I'm also posting this on my nearly month old 20" iMac with an upgrade to 4GB of Ram running XP SP3 via Sun VirtualBox. One of my favorite new features is installing the OS X version of boxee along with a Dynex Mini-DVI to DVI adapter. I also got a DVI to HDMI adapter and hooked it up to my HDTV set. I've setup boxee to display only its interface on my HDTV set and keep the normal desktop on the iMac screen. Now I'm enjoying nearly complete and full netflix watch now features using the apple front row remote control using my HDTV set. I can start frontrow by pressing the Menu button on the remote. Once at the front row menu I select the boxee option which opens up the boxee interface. From that point on the apple remote controls everything.

I was using playon via virtualbox and I gotta tell ya this free boxee software just kills playon in about every way you can imagine. I know I went a bit off topic but I felt as a mac user you might be interested in this. It also supports much more internet content beyond Netflix such as YouTube, CBS, ABC, Comedy Central, MTV and Hulu to name a few.

 

[JIGGIEFLY]

Longhorn,

Were did you get the boxee software that sound like something i would like to check out myself?.

PS: Is this something for mac only

Anyways great to here about the good outcome with your laptop Scott i have 1 i may just send them to get fixed.

 

[kenny911]

I own a 2 year old imac and I'm kind of out of the whole computer tech loop so I've been pretty frustrated with IE and Vista freezing and running slow until I realized that my 1 gig of ram is not enough. Welcome to 2009