Well, I broke down last week and took the belligerent laptop in for service after I backed everything up over wi-fi to another computer on the home network.

It’s difficult to prove that a computer is broken if it works whenever you take it in for service, so I was really hoping that it wouldn’t boot up when I took it in to the Halifax Mac Store (not to be confused with a real Apple Store, but they do handle warranty service, and they seem to be a bit speedier than the University. I’m sure that has something to do with the lack of a student body to clog up the system.

Luckily, when I walked in with the laptop, it misbehaved just like it was doing for me; it refused to start up.

I called today and found out that they’ve done a surprising amount of work so far for a tech shop. The tech was no luckier with booting it than I have been, and his first thought was hard drive as well. He popped out my hardware, mirrored the data to a new drive, and popped in the new drive.

Wait a minute; mirrored the data? I had to have him say that bit again. Oddly, he seemed as confused that I would expect anything less from service. Keep in mind that this is Halifax and we’ve become used to less than stellar support everywhere else we go, and add to this that we’re talking about a warranty service technician which is a world filled with horror stories.

A warranty service desk that takes out the old drive, copies the data to the new drive, and puts the new drive into the system? Backing up data; they must be new there. Service is supposed to install a new, blank HD, and throw the old one through a wood chipper, claiming that they don’t support the data on your drive.

Anyhow, in addition to the little faux pas of providing actual service to a warranty claim, they didn’t give up after replacing the HD. They proceeded to actually test the system and see if the new hard drive fixed the problem. It didn’t, so they’ve ordered a mainboard for the system and will be replacing that on Monday morning when the courier arrives with the part.

Now I’m torn. I was thinking of buying a new Mac workstation when we return to Vancouver, partly so that I could buy it at the brand new Apple Store opening there. I just don’t know… if you don’t reward good service here in Halifax, they’ll likely close up shop and move back to whichever Away they came from like the rest of us are planning.

I wonder if I can convince them to replace the screen while they’re at it, and then I’ll have a brand new computer with the exception of the battery, the keyboard, and the casing. Not bad for two months left on the warranty. Seriously, I’ll just be happy if I can reboot the computer without issue, so I’m not going to go fishing for everything before July.