I hate computers,

Sometimes.
I spent hours yesterday looking at what was wrong with my computer, it would boot, then shut down, then it would not even post and when it did, The bios screen looked corrupted.

i stripped the machine apart from CPU, and noticed that the USB 3 connector was iffy, one of the pins fell out, I can't see that being the problem, but it explains why one of the front panel usb sockets was intermittent.
I reset the bios and still no go. I was ready to buy another motherboard, I don't want to at the moment. Anyway, after a coffee and some food, I turned it on again, and it worked fine.

Flipping computers and people wonder why I am thinking of getting a nice simple Apple Mac mini.

CPU not overheating is it?

I thought that, but nope, done a ten-minute test with cinebench and the CPU got to 61 Celsius max and no throttling, so certainly not that, even the CPU fan did not increase in speed that much.
I restored a back-up of windows, and it seems to be better, but still strange why the UEFI corrupted. I know the machine is over 4 years old, but that is not that old compared to some.
I reset the bios, I would update it, but the later updates are not recommended with my CPU.

Oh well, I am going to go for a walk into town and meet a friend for a coffee or something stronger.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

Flipping computers and people wonder why I am thinking of getting a nice simple Apple Mac mini.

Yeah, a sealed unit using laptop parts so if anything goes wrong there isn't anything you can do except pay Apple to fix.

I built PCs myself for years, but no longer see the point when you can go to PC Specialist, Chillblast, Scan, or others, and even the mass market Dell and Lenovo PCs are good for the majority.

Edited by jchamier (Sun 28-Nov-21 13:52:26)

Posted this in the Apple part of the forum last week. New announcement on self service repair:

https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2021/11/apple-anno...

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

New announcement on self service repair:

Saw that, good news for the small independent phone shops. Will watch to see if it comes to Mac. I remember watching someone taking the glass out of a 27" iMac to change a failed HDD, insane amount of delicate work to replace a consumable component!

The press release reads as though it will be recent iPhones that will have it rolled out first, then eventually followed by M1 based Macs. Doesn’t appear to indicate whether they’ll make it retrospective beyond that. Apparently this will launch first in the states in the first part of the new year, then to other countries, with a view to a third party running it on behalf of Apple, so the leaks say…

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Yeah, a sealed unit using laptop parts so if anything goes wrong there isn't anything you can do except pay Apple to fix.

I built PCs myself for years, but no longer see the point when you can go to PC Specialist, Chillblast, Scan, or others, and even the mass market Dell and Lenovo PCs are good for the majority.

If I went for a PC update, I would certainly still go for the build my own way, add things to it inside and not void any warranty.
if i go for a Mac mini, then I know what it is and it is a machine that can not be updated internally. How often do Macs fail? I know someone who has a fair few of them and some are years old and still work.

How often do Macs fail? I know someone who has a fair few of them and some are years old and still work.

Some personal MacBook anecdotes:

1. Still have a 2010 MacBook Pro with factory SSD in pretty much perfect running order. I ran this one for almost 7 years straight. A few weeks ago I charged and spun it up and it was perfectly operational. SSD was fine.

2. Sold its predecessor, a 2007 17" MBP (2.4 GHz, 4G RAM, 160 GB mechanical HD) for £775 on eBay

3. Wife's 2016 13" MBP still running sweet

4. My mothers old 2012 MacBook Air was doing active service until last year, when my daughter who had inherited it after my mum passed, was gifted an M1 MBP. The front camera on the MBA had failed, everything else was fine.

5. Had a dead key / keyboard fail on my 2016 MBP earlier this year - 3 years out of standard warranty - Apple replaced the keyboard but also out of necessity the mainboard & CPU. What was an c.£669 retail repair they did as a free goodwill gesture.

6. I'm trading the MBP above now for £410 back ito Apple.

Avoid the old iMacs with mechanical hard drives and you should be fine.

Unless you get a faulty component e.g power supply then first year warranty should catch that.