Are Apple products pretty poor or is it just my luck?

thenashlegend · 09-05-2012 12:11AM #1

Well, as the title said. I've gone through two iPods in the last 5 years. They were Classics, last one was 160GB and the one before was 30GB as far as I remember. They've really just given up with no real cause of a fault. Not quiet as solid as Apple would lead us to believe. They hadn't got regular use, just some evenings and odd days in the car. The battery would last me a week if not more sometimes but right now I'm pretty p155ed off that this one has given up on me.

I'm looking for a replacement but for each part of me that says to buy another iPod, a second part of me says "Stay away!"

After getting rid of an iPhone and now this I'm reluctant to fork out the €230 for another Classic.

Any opinions?

Gone West · 09-05-2012 12:14AM

Most consumer electronics contain components that are designed to have a limited life span. This includes almost all mobile phones since the good Nokias.
Apple got you to pay twice for essentially the same thing, no?

kyle123 · 09-05-2012 12:22AM

its not just you apple products in my opinion arent that great. iv had alot of bad experience with them breaking and battery problems. laptops and all seem good but ipods and iphones have been nothing but bad for me. A good few people i know have the same problems but others swear by them. In my opinion there not worth the price tag and now stick to samsung and sony.

strandroad · 09-05-2012 12:28AM

A friend has her iPhone exchanged due to a fault a couple of weeks ago and the new one has now developed a different fault. In fairness, this can happen to any phone, but I don't think Apple is any better than any other higher end brand.
Cowon/iAudio would be my choice for music players, we've had about 5 models over the years between me and my OH, all working fine even after we passed them on to family members when we got upgrades. They don't have great distribution here though, so I'm not sure what happens if a fault actually appears!

cnocbui · 09-05-2012 07:14AM

Apple are no worse than any other brand. However, when things go wrong within warranty, no other company can match them.

I bought a 3rd gen classic in 2003. Within a year the HD went. Apple sent a courier to deliver a box to pack it in then sent them back to pick it up and cart it off to the Netherlands. Then the courier came back and dropped off a new one. Guess what? It is still working and I still use it regularly nine years later. The battery life became miserable, but that is inherent in Li-ion technology and isn't Apple's fault. I bought a replacement off ebay for very little and fixed it.

I had an Apple Powerbook that saw many hours of use every day for 8 years before the GPU came unstuck.

My current Macbook came with a fault where it would not read double layer DVDs. Took it in for warranty repair one day and picked it up fixed the next. It has seen 4 years of heavy daily use and has more air miles than a lot of people. It is very well built and looks as good as new. I suspect it would have another six years in it easy.

You want brands that really make rubbish that breaks - try Sony and Philips. I stopped buying junk made by those two years ago.

zinzan · 09-05-2012 07:31AM

Can't say I've had any outstanding issues with apple - have had 2nd gen 20Gb ipod for years and it's still going, ipod classic 160GB since they first came out and it's still going, I've had a 13" macbook for 6-7 years now without major issue (charger replaced free by apple (great customer service), and replaced worn out battery myself). Also have a couple of iphone 3GS in the house and they've been fine!

Often it is a case of 'your mileage may vary', and with the volume of products apple are shifting now there is always going to be a certain failure rate... unfortunately you've been hit twice!

thenashlegend · 09-05-2012 12:54PM

Fuzzy wrote: »

Apple got you to pay twice for essentially the same thing, no?

Well the first iPod became faulty and it was in bad shape over all so I bought a new Classic for €230 in Xtra-Vision around 2 years ago. I had hoped it would last me for a while but even with the best of care it died 2 weeks ago.

A lot of people seem to swear by Apple but as it stands I'd be reluctant to pay another €230 for a second 160GB Classic.

Has there been any announcements regarding new iPods? To me, paying the same price as two years ago for the same old model doesn't make much sense. Having said that, paying over €400 for a new Touch doesn't appeal to me either, especially after my luck!:rolleyes:

pleasant Co. · 09-05-2012 01:35PM

In general I wouldn't rate apple any better or any worse than other brands, I've had 2 ipod touch's fail (both replaced by apple), 1 ipod classic (returned to store), a nano (replaced by apple)....then outside of mp3 players, 1 macbook (apple repaired), 1 mbp (apple repaired), 1 imac fail (multiple times, eventual write off and refund)

On the plus side I have a 6 yr old gen5 ipod (classic) that's broken, come back to life and is still working now despite taking one hell of a beating (as it was relegated to backup/backup/backup player so my care of it was lax when it was excess to requirements, it now sits in my car fulltime) At the moment I have an iphone 4s that's 7mths in and running fine overall, and a mbp that's 9ths old running rock solid.

With that said, if you are looking for a new HIGH CAPACITY mp3 player, the Classic is your only choice.
EDIT: I'd forgotten about the MicroSDXC option (mentioned by glasso below), so the classic isn't your only option.

09-05-2012 01:50PM

thenashlegend wrote: »

Well, as the title said. I've gone through two iPods in the last 5 years. They were Classics, last one was 160GB and the one before was 30GB as far as I remember. They've really just given up with no real cause of a fault. Not quiet as solid as Apple would lead us to believe. They hadn't got regular use, just some evenings and odd days in the car. The battery would last me a week if not more sometimes but right now I'm pretty p155ed off that this one has given up on me.

I'm looking for a replacement but for each part of me that says to buy another iPod, a second part of me says "Stay away!"

After getting rid of an iPhone and now this I'm reluctant to fork out the €230 for another Classic.

Any opinions?

you can get good quality 72gb of mp3 player (if that's enough for you) but getting a sansa clip + (or newer sansa zip) and a 64gb micro sd card
(like this one - cheaper ones on ebay I'm sure http://www.amazon.co.uk/SanDisk-Mobile-MicroSDXC-Memory-Adapter/dp/B005LFT40G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1336567676&sr=8-1).
Battery life could be extended by a car usb charger like a satnav cable or just buy it seperately.

Ste- · 09-05-2012 02:42PM

Or get the 16gb Sansa fuze+ with the 64gb microsd card for 80gb of flash player goodness.

Morf · 09-05-2012 05:44PM

Mactard wrote: »

With that said, if you are looking for a new HIGH CAPACITY mp3 player, the Classic is your only choice.
EDIT: I'd forgotten about the MicroSDXC option (mentioned by glasso below), so the classic isn't your only option.

I'm looking for a high capacity mp3 at some point but was erring towards a Cowon X7. Any thoughts on that?

pleasant Co. · 09-05-2012 05:51PM

It's rather large, has a cumbersome UI and can brick randomly...a very disappointing addition to the X-series from cowon.

waraf · 09-05-2012 05:55PM

Why not just ditch the music player altogether and buy a smart phone with a micro SD card slot. Now that the Samsung Galaxy S3 has been announced you should start to see good deals for the S2.

thenashlegend · 09-05-2012 06:45PM

waraf wrote: »

Why not just ditch the music player altogether and buy a smart phone with a micro SD card slot. Now that the Samsung Galaxy S3 has been announced you should start to see good deals for the S2.

I have an S2 already, but in my past experience, using the phone for music used the battery at lightning speed. Having said that, it was an iPhone!:o

Gone West · 09-05-2012 06:58PM

Mactard wrote: »

In general I wouldn't rate apple any better or any worse than other brands, I've had 2 ipod touch's fail (both replaced by apple), 1 ipod classic (returned to store), a nano (replaced by apple)....then outside of mp3 players, 1 macbook (apple repaired), 1 mbp (apple repaired), 1 imac fail (multiple times, eventual write off and refund)

On the plus side I have a 6 yr old gen5 ipod (classic) that's broken, come back to life and is still working now despite taking one hell of a beating (as it was relegated to backup/backup/backup player so my care of it was lax when it was excess to requirements, it now sits in my car fulltime) At the moment I have an iphone 4s that's 7mths in and running fine overall, and a mbp that's 9ths old running rock solid.

With that said, if you are looking for a new HIGH CAPACITY mp3 player, the Classic is your only choice.
EDIT: I'd forgotten about the MicroSDXC option (mentioned by glasso below), so the classic isn't your only option.

You still buy apple products after having 8 separate apple devices fail on you?
I'm not a hater, I have some apple stuff myself, and I do understand that its all made in the same similar chinese factories by the same economic slaves as dell uses, etc...

But seriously? 8 devices failed, more than once on average... I'd be using another brand where there is value for money.

Anytime I would have to put time into anything that fails, I'd chalk it up and mentally bill myself for it.
Each hour spent replacing devices (or similar), I'd be saying thats €50 extra per hour that the devices have cost me.
Tot that up (with whatever figure you want to put on your time) and add that probable expense to the cost of something...
Hardly seems worth it.

- posted from one of my iPads

pleasant Co. · 09-05-2012 07:08PM

I've owned a lot of tech (many different brands), and like I said - and you highlighted in your quote - I wouldn't rate apple any better or any worse than other brands

Doesn't that sum it up for you? seriously?

DubDJ · 11-05-2012 03:58PM

I've never had one Apple product fail on me. Still have a 1st ten iTouch lying around the house that get's used by my brother regularly. All comes down to personal experience I think.

Are Apple products pretty poor or is it just my luck?

Comments