You have got to be kidding right? Consumer reports puts Apple at the top for customer service. I have always had helpful and quick response from Apple. The Macbook is a 1G machine so expect a few quirks. Mine had the RSS but after repair is now near perfect.

It's amazing how much higher of a standard Apple is held to, even by people who should know better (technology "journalists"). This treatment is par for the course for Dell and HP (try taking an HP computer back to Best Buy for a squeaky spacebar, see how quickly you're laughed at), but I guess it's become so common that it gets no coverage now.

What I find particularly interesting is that these two diatribes about Apple's consumer products come just scant weeks after a pretty glowing feature in the print magazine of Apple's potential in the enterprise. Is it really that important to you to see to it that Apple look bad, Mr. Rosenberg?

I ordered a new macbook on 12/11/2006. The website said it would be available in 4 working days. It was 'shipped' on the 16th - to a shipper in Ireland. No tracking information was posted on Apple's site till yesterday (23/11/2006), and that information is useless other than it is in the hands of an Irish shipper. Apparently when it arrives in the UK they then transfer to another courier.... Are they swimming across the Irish sea with the order! There also seems to be no way to contact Apple. This is not customer service, and it is certainly sharp practice

You could make these same comments about Sony, HP, or Dell. I am the IT Manager for a law firm in Portland, Oregon and we have 55 desktop Macs, 25 mobile Macs and 4 Xserves. How many customer service issues have we had in the past 4-5 years? None. Every issue was taken care of promptly. Less than 3% of our Macs ever has an issue that is caused by a defect. 4 years ago I worked for a company that was about the same size but all PC and we used HP and Sony computers, but more laptops than desktops. The service from HP was equal to what Apple provides. Sony was notch below Apple and HP. However, the defect rate was over 10%.

It should also be noted that last Christmas everyone in the company was given an iPod and I don't think anyone considers their iPod disposable. In fact my 3G iPod is still in use today and has nearly its full battery capacity intact.