My nearly 4-year-old iBook has 4 times died the same death in that time, - a logic board failure that, thanks to the magic of AppleCare extended warranty, has been replaced swiftly and at no charge every time. The most recent time, approximately one year ago, I asked about Apple's lemon policy - since the same problem 4 times in under three years seems pretty silly. Their response was that the incidents had been too widely spaced to qualify, but one more in the next year, even after the end of my warranty, would get my laptop replaced with the in-production-at-the-time equivalent.

So, earlier this week, when my laptop died in a familiar fashion, I celebrated a bit - but quietly, and under a veneer of frustration, as I was in the middle of taking notes for a Historic District Commission meeting at the time. I called up AppleCare, ready to demand my replacement, but, as I was being transferred to a tech, rebooted once more and found the problem gone! The tech sympathized, and, after reviewing my file, said that I was a few days past my alloted year, but that, if the problem came back within 30 days, he could offer a free repair as in the past. I was given an e-mail address and phone extension for direct connection in that case.

A few more work/not work cycles over the past few days led to an apparently stable non-functional state, so, today, I took the cursed thing to the Apple store in Twelve Oaks. (I also made a trip to Adventures in Homebrewing, off Telegraph in Dearborn - after all, all things in suburbia are at roughly the same non-place, right?) My intent was to demand some sort of replacement in person, so that they couldn't get rid of me easily. I was prepared to settle for credit towards a shiny, new, (big) desktop, since I'm not that much in a laptop place anymore.

However, the tech took a look, said, "Oh! Your RAM is loose!" (click, pop, nudge, snap) ... and fixed it. Not at all the same problem. Foiled again. Grrrr.

But, hey, my laptop works.