Either TUAW readers have especially sweaty, acidic, bacteria-ridden palms, or they're being hit hard by the
MacBook discoloration issue so many have dreaded might strike their own smooth, plastic Apple laptops. Granted, you can't really take a poll with 1,556 votes to mean anything about a problem of this nature -- especially with so many haters and fanboys out there just waiting to bust out a script and tilt the scales -- but there's one company that knows just how many MacBooks have been seeing this issue, and until that one company issues a recall it's unlikely we're going to know just how severe this problem really is.
P.S. -If you're having
MacBook discoloration, don't be shy about sounding off in our comments. We're here for you, people, let it all out.
posted June 27th 2006 11:27PM
I think this is utterly hilarious! All of those people that buy macs for the svette look and coolness factor and they've got neither. Send the bloody things back. Is it just me or is there at least one major fault with every single Apple release in recnet memory. The workmanship seems to be getting shoddy and yet still people harp on and complain about PC's and microsoft. How long will it take people to realise that apple are no better and possibly, at the moment, even worse.
Burning power leads, overheating macbooks, scratching and screen cracking nanos, deteriorating batteries in ipods, poor audio jack connectors, monitor colour consistancy problems, discolouring products, short product lifetimes.... The list just goes on and on!
APPLE expesive crap...
Give me lenovo laptop with Ubuntu & Hackintosh
Fatass americans get swet so... here are the results...
I've had one about 4 weeks.
it's started to get the discoloring.
I also had to send one back for repair.. it ate a cd and wouldnt spit it back out..
The point here is NOT the discoloring , testing or anything else .
The point is that Apple builds with the lowest bidder and sells for the highest price usually to the same Apple lovers .
Thats why this sort of things happen and why Apple buyers are called fanboys vs. customers .
To all those who think that dells are so f*cking amazing are full of sh*t. I have had a 700m since last september, and the discoloration on it is exactly like the macbook's. Let's not get into a brand war and accept the downfall of using light plastics in electronics prone to wear. Laptop manufacturers have been using black in their laptops for reasons other than style, you know. ;-)
P.S. - Should someone not believe me, I could post pics of my 700m later today.
Blue or clear acetone free nail polish remover takes the stains away perfectly. The solution is so simple. Why are all you people complaining about an easily fixed problem, the solution might cost you three bucks. Everything has its problems, Macbooks get discoloured, Dells break, IBM looks like crap (not that Dell doesn't.) Everyone needs to stop bashing this first gen laptop. Besides which, its gutsy of Apple to have a white product, white is notorious for getting dirty. People focus on what Apple does wrong, why not look at what Apple has done right? They have revolutionized and brought MP3 players to a good chunk of the world that wouldn't have otherwise bought them. They have started the revolution of bringing media content to the internet. They have made a wonderful operating system, and they continue to make asthetically pleasing computers. Yeah, maybe the product is too expensive to deteriorate so quickly but maybe we are asking too much.
I doubt that it is chewing through the paint, that would be a problem, but sits on the surface just like it does on my silver PowerBook. Cleaning it is a pain, but the oils do come off. Black, and especially textured, laptops just hide it better. The problem is your sweaty hands!
Geez, this is about hardware discoloration not OS - why do people always go on about pc's being better for games - they aint you muppets, windows is a better os for games period - unfortunately you also have to take the spyware/malware/bus and viruses that come with the dominant OS :(
Personally I buy a laptop because it's small and light enough to carry, (X60 - Ubuntu - the biz)
I bought matching MacBooks for me and my wife (hey, it was the china anniversary; what better than something in china white and Made in China?) over a month ago.
Neither of us have the palmrest issue. Nothing even close to a discoloration, and I use mine at least 3 hours a day.
Now, of course, I am having plenty of issues with the MacBook not sleeping properly, not waking up from sleep properly (forcing a hard restart), or not requesting a password when it's brought from sleep. It's very annoying.
Dell's have this problem too... you should see some of the nasty looking Dell laptops at my office....
I do think it's probably more obvious on the macbooks because they are white. If I had a place to host it I'd post a picture of a gross dell so you can all see.
Buy Dell? Never again.
We outfitted our institute with Dells - about 200 of them. Within a year over 100 of them had some fault (mostly defect optical drives).
Dell's quality is miserable - there was a HUGE outpouring of grief on Dell's support website. Dell shut down the forum.
I had a talk with a service technician - according to him nearly 30% of Dell's are faulty straight out of the box!
No more Dell!
This is the story: Apple found the discoloration THEN made a black version more expensive. Now you know, below the white layer there is a black layer, so apple just saved money in the white layer, and charged you more for this. ;)
I would like to say a few words about this issue in relation to average PC laptops and other macs.
Computers get grimey. What can I say. If you wanted a clean computer get a metal cased one like a Pro model. I find it odd that people complain so much about the most miniscuel stuff. Oh my computer is slightly discoloured now. That stops it from working! I can't believe that happened after I used my unclean oily hands all over it. Oh and my iPod got scratched when I droped it face first on the pavement. That means it's a bad product because that never happens to other manufactures items. Now before I go forward I admit those are annoying problems. I know if I just droped a grand on a Lappy or $200 on an iPod I would be mad about discolouration or a scratch but it would be my fault and with the surfaces found on the Mac Book and on the iPod you will have things like that happen. Just like that would be on any other MP3 player or laptop. I know my friends Viao had a bit of finish come off on his after a month on his 2000 model. However did you buy the computer for it's looks or useability. You like the looks but like on anything they fade and one must accept this. I have accepted that my old PowerBook will never be the same after it's fall which it's hinge got cracked. I later replaced the faulty part but there were still scratches from the fall. However it was my fault for it to fall as far as it did but I just accepted the fault and spent time and fixed it. That same thing happened to a Latitude of mine but instead of a crack in a hinge the screen completely fall off. But anyway the guts of the PowerBook were excelent. It works speedy and great like the day I bought it. My old Toshiba laptop had the computer equivelent of a totaled accident however the accident wasn't physical it was an early version of Windows XP Media Centre which ruined the thing's Hard Drive and DVD Burner. A big bumer for a computer that still looked and smelt new. Hence why I'm now a Mac User. So in the end just remember all computers have faults not just macs. Whether it's a exploding Dell i.e.:"http://www.theage.com.au/news/laptops--desktops/exploding-laptop-probe/2006/06/28/1151174243468.html" or a slight discolouration on a Mac, Ahem. Everything has faults. Just don't install media centre it's not worth it.
I started to have discoloration on the palm rest areas of my Dell Inspiron in about 3 months and some keys started to get shiny (surprisingly not all the most frequently used keys-e.g. arrow keys). I have friends who also have the same problem. Anybody knows a cure for these?
About the quality of Dells; they sure suck and are very inferior in quality especially with their cases and screens, however they do hell of a job for your money (particularly if you bought it with a 45% off discount coupon). How many laptops are there that you can play Call of Duty 2 online with high quality sound -thanks to the dedicated sound card - and still cost you less than a grand?
Why does Engadget hate on Apple so much?
what i woud do if i were steve jobs is this:
white macbooks are probably selling more than black macbooks.
if they're not, then i would fix the problem and slow production of black macbooks. that way, people will still buy my white macbooks (no surplus, keeps the price high).
if they are, then i would not fix the problem, keep the supply of white macbooks low, and sell my surplus of expensive black macbooks. the supply and demand for white macbooks will both be low (without lowering the price) and there will be no surplus or deficit. just maximum profit on few unwanted white macbooks and many, more expensive and more desireable black macbooks. it's almost like they did this on purpose. wait...
I just got a macbok like yesterday. In my view, the best solution is this: Get a mighty mouse!!
Then you dont have to use the troublesome touchpad
No issues with mine. I have one black and one white. None have any color issues. Does get hot, but so did my dell and my IBM from years ago. The white one is used by my the wife and kids almost none stop and there is no discolor issues. Also, the Apple store has these running non stop with hundreds of poeple touching them. They look fine? I would assume apple would remove them if they started to discolor though...
Regardless, anything beats running Windows at this point!
ARGGGGGHH
THIS IS A COMPLETELY USELES POLL!!!!
Engadget should be embarassed for posting such useless information. Statistically this poll is absolutely meaningless because it was not a random sample! Who is to say that 20% of people in the poll don't represent 100% of the people with discoloration while the overall number who took the poll represent 1% of the MacBook owning population? If that were true (and i'm just pulling those numbers out of thin air) that would mean that the percent of owners with this problem are .2%! as in two people out of every 1,000.
I'm not trying to excuse Apple here if this really is a problem they should fix, I'm just saying that this post is the most irresponsible type of journalism and an example of fearmongering at its worst!
god bless black book
I have to agree with ST, my entire family has 6 inspiron laptops 700M and we have not had a single problem in the 1.5 years since purchsing them, to the guy that said vaios are the best, we had a family of vaios until one by one they all started developing problems with their graphics cards, keyboards, and mice. Sony makes an aesthetically pleasing machine much like apple but they are both built without duaribility in mind. I have two friends who have apple MBP's and they have both had to send them back for a laundry list of problems from the discoloration specified above as well as problems with the monitor and keyboards. These guys most definitely need to start going to the mat on product testing before wasting people time, or at least sell Gen 1 products at a discount as a reward for being product testers since they obviously have none in house.
I have not had any discoloration on my macbook. You dirty fingered fools.
Mine has gone TOTALLY black all over - my Macbook that is.
I bought my White MacBook Pro (mid model) on the Release Day from the Apple Store in San Francisco. I don't use hand creams (feh!), but I use it all the time. No discoloring at all. Just hate how SHARP the front edge is on my palms. I see a third party solution for MacWorld I hope?
i have the same discoloration with my iBook G4, so the problem is not limited to the new MacBooks...
Quote:
"Apple are like Jews in nazi Germany"
BRILLIANT!
I never post anything, I swear ...
But this ?
I CAN NOT resist!
Tran -- thanks. but it looks like my post got deleted. which is ironic, considering I am Jewish.
@Brian James: 667MHz DDR2 and SATA (5400/7200) disks, what are you talking about?
One 'vote' for "MacBook owner, no discoloration (yet)". Of course, I don't expect most people *without* a problem will bother to vote at all, thats why online polls (actually, any poll in which you can choose not to enter wihout that fact being recorded) are usually statistically invalid.
Well, if the discolor does not exist...those people that does says it is, might as well be apple's employees!? that rumors does makes the black ones with extra premium sells harder, thus much more profit margin! As I've noticed (in Australia) the white macbook is having such a booming demand, apple can't even deliver the goods ontime. Well, if it's just some dirty competitor's strategy (or people that dos not wash their hands after they wanked ;p, just kinding - or not? haha) , well Apple might as well say thanks to you. it adds apple's profit on the black ones. I think for such an 'indulging' gadget, the price point is not right. it can even sell that gadget with 10% higher price. this is just how the market works.
I guess wrong choice in choosing plastic material does not hurt apple's reputation that bad - it is also not nice for share price shoots too high while the actual is not - yet!?.
...and please don't comment on the indulging thing if you're not indulged ;p. I guess people got different tastes, preferences, budget, and lifestyle, and many more. So shooting down people's idea with harsh comment seems quite awkward to be honest since it's a living principle in everydays life to always consider other's preferences and learn from it.
cheers
i've had my macbook for about 2 months and i have purple stains and green ones on the bottom, if you know how to get them out email me kayleejean@mail2world.com. otherwise im just going to demand a new one.
I was having the problem with my ibook so I used the nail polish remover and it worked perfectly. I then tested it to see what was going on and basically what I would say is that it is clearly a chemical reaction and that it is an endothermic reaction. If you are using your macbook to do graphic design, video editing, or gaming you are vastly more likely to see the issue. If you are simply using your macbook for internet, music, and data entry you are unlikely to notice any discolorization because your laptop is much cooler preventing the chemical reaction from taking place. Since nobody other than apple is going to be able to test what the exact reaction taking place is (unless of course you want to destroy your case completely to test it) your best bet is to cover it for protection or to chemically rinse it periodically.