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General discussion

Will these things void the warranty?

May 29, 2007 4:51AM PDT

I hope to soon acquire a Macbook with a 3 year AppleCare Protection Plan (APP). With the notebook, protection plan, and a backpack to carry it in, plus state taxes, the total comes to just under $1,300.

I was thinking of maybe doing a few things to the laptop, and I was wondering if any of them would void the warranty.

*Dual/triple boot - putting windows and/or linux on there
I do have a valid license for Windows, and I was wondering; does anyone know if Fedora linux will work on the Macbook? Its processor is Intel, so it should, right? Would drivers be difficult? Or, if not Fedora, what's the best distro for Macbooks, especially considering wireless (wifi & bluetooth)?
*Adding RAM - maybe another gig
I probably won't need any more RAM than a gig (my desktop PC only has 512, which I'm mostly happy with), but if I decide to upgrade, and go with a third party set of RAM, will that void my warranty?
*Accidental breakage - is it covered?
If I accidentally drop the notebook, will the APP cover it? Or does it only cover defects?

If I feel that the laptop still has use after three years (which, with today's technology moving at its rate, I'd say probably not), could I purchase additional years of the APP?

Discussion is locked

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Warranty Issues
May 29, 2007 6:18AM PDT

Dual/Triple Boot will not void the warranty. Apple provides the means to Dual Boot into Windows.

Adding RAM is a user upgrade. Check to see if your particular MacBook requires the RAM in each slot to be the same size and type.

There is some debate as to whether AppleCare will cover for an accidentally damaged MacBook. Sometimes it is and other times is does not appear to be. Check the fine print.

AppleCare appears to be only available out to three years. Contrary to what you believe now, you will still be using that MacBook after 3 years.

On the subject of Linux, I will bow to others for the answers.

P

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One more thing
May 29, 2007 6:19AM PDT

The core of OS X is UNIX, would you need Linux?

Just a thought

P

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My thought exactly.
May 29, 2007 6:32AM PDT

You are here already...

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"you are here already"
May 29, 2007 6:56AM PDT

"you are here already"
um, say what? Sorry, a bit confused

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oops
May 29, 2007 6:58AM PDT

sorry, premature "enter" for that last one - the "(NT) you..."
and then it let me edit it, and I didn't notice it had entered the no text thing.

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apple, unix, and ra-de-a-de-O
May 29, 2007 6:55AM PDT

Yeah, at a site a friend linked, I saw two sticks of 1GB RAM for a little less than one gig at apple's store.
Which, if I read right, the gig it comes with right now is two 512 sticks, so I'd probably need to get rid of those (anyone want some RAM? Grin ).
I guess I can find some more details about AppleCare.

So, there's no way to extend the warranty? Awww ... yeah, I know I'll be using it for more than three years, but I just meant that it seems people think that tech goes obsolete every day, and such. Which I know that's definitely not true, but yah ... I guess Apple doesn't think so. Or something.

Yes, OSX is Unix at heart, but hey, who can beat Beryl's cubed window manager? Silly
That, and there's a few things in linux that perhaps I couldn't get in Mac, or something ... I don't know.

Hey, so curious - do Macbooks have line in ports? I like recording the radio & such sometimes, but the mic port wouldn't work, as it's monaural - or is it stereo on a mac?

yeah, and besides, it'd be nifty to have three OSes hangin around. Though hard drive consuming ... and I think the one I'm looking at has an eighty gig hard drive.

eh, would it void the warranty to install a new hard drive myself?

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eh, would it void the warranty to install a new hard drive m
May 29, 2007 9:02AM PDT

Absolutely, positively, definitely, sure & of course.

Cracking open the case, and I mean cracking, will void the warranty faster than you can say "ooops"

No need to crack the case for extra memory though.

P

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replacing the hard drive
May 29, 2007 12:16PM PDT

well, I guess I didn't realize there was need for cracking. Then again, I've not gotten much chance to examine any macs for any extended period of time.

My friend's Dell, as well as other PCs, has a screw that when removed, releases the hard drive. I know that's notebooks/laptops of the PC variant, but I thought it might be slightly similar with macs.

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Replacing the HDD
Jun 4, 2007 5:59AM PDT
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I stand corrected
Jun 4, 2007 6:41AM PDT

the method of accessing the drive on the MacBook is completely different to any of the previous white machines.

Bear in mind that there is a disclaimer at the beginning of the document which warns about voiding the warranty.

Thanks for the information

P

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awesome!
Jun 4, 2007 7:08AM PDT

that's cool, I may get a new hard drive after a while, woo!
curious, it doesn't mention in apple's store whether the SATA is 1.5GB/s or 3GB/s - or is it something else special to apple?
and, I don't think apple hard drives are anything special, so I can probably just get a 2.5 inch SATA hard drive from newegg whenever I'm ready, right?

If I ever need to ship the mac in for repairs, I guess it might be best to put in the original RAM & hard drive before shipping it back, eh?

Anyway, that's cool stuff.
Thanks for the info & link, doughboy!
I shall use the pdf if ever needing to replace the drive, though I can see it's a fairly easy process from reading it already.

Thanks again, have a great day.

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I got a reply notification ... but no reply?
Jun 12, 2007 2:33AM PDT

CNET Forums tracked thread notification for: Will these things void the warranty?
Jun 12, 2007 3:39 AM

Hello Ck87.JF,

A new posting has been made on the discussion you are tracking:

Will these things void the warranty?

Please click the link below to be taken to the message:

nicholaskirk11
http://forums.cnet.com/5208-4_102-0.html?forumID=10&threadID=249936&messageID=2512063#2512063


I clicked the link, and got
"We're sorry, but the page you requested could not be found.

Message 2512063 could not be loaded from the database. "

So, I went here from forums>mac>this_thread, and found no reply. What's up with that?

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I can make that happen.
Jun 12, 2007 3:33AM PDT

As a mod I can write one reply, say "oops" and delete it, then create a new reply. However the old reply is now gone.

Not a bug.

Bob

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okay, gotcha
Jun 12, 2007 4:46AM PDT

okay, that sounds good ... if you'd like, I suppose you can delete these three posts, since they're not really on-topic

curious, though, why regular users can't delete/modify their own posts - it'd keep things cleaner, I think, than re-posting corrections.
perhaps a new feature in the works?