Apple Computer Repair

[mikebike]

At the suggestion of samuijimmy I will relate my Apple computer repair story here for Surat and Nakhon folks.

Got back from a wee vacay to Sri Lanka to discover my late 2010 MacBook Air would not start up. Dead. No nothing. After trying some DIY diagnosing including opening up the laptop to try powering up without the battery installed and trying to jump-start the Air using the jump pads on the motherboard, some web research revealed that my closest (I live in Khanom) Apple service centre was in Nakhon Si Thammarat. iService near the bus station. The tech there is a South African named Aaron. He checked out my Air and diagnosed: water damaged motherboard. iService repair price 23,000 baht for new motherboard installed. YIKES!! I can buy another used MBA late 2010 for way less than that!! But what about all my data, photos and music? My MBAs memory is 250gb solid state... how the heck do I recover my data and all?

Well research revealed that you can buy external USB enclosures for Apple SSDs. They are model-specific so you must take care that you order the correct enclosure for your SSD. Cheap as chips from China - 650 baht pop the drive off the motherboard, pop it into the enclosure and voila I have all my data back!

So as a replacement for the 5 yr old MBA I bought a less than 1 yr old Mac Mini (still under Apple warranty) for 13,500 baht. So not bad so far... I had reduced the repair bill from 23,000 to 14,150 baht and got a much newer computer in the deal.

Finally I ordered a new motherboard for my 2010 MBA off eBay for 7,500 baht and installed that. Bingo it worked again!! Now I have sold the MBA for 14,000 baht and reduced my overall expenditure to 7,650 baht!!

Moral of the story? If you have some DIY knowhow and are willing to do some research, you can often save yourself a bundle on hideously expensive Apple repairs!! I know I could have just bought the MBA motherboard for 7,500 and replaced it and kept the 5 yr old Air but I felt there was significant value in upgrading to a 2014 mini.

If anyone in Nakhon or Surat wants to ask any questions I will do my best to respond in a timely manner!!

Happy New Year all!!

[petertucker48]

Nice one !!!