O'Grady's PowerPage

Category: Take Apart

  • Apple announces plans to expand Self Service Repair Program to M3 Macs

    Apple announces plans to expand Self Service Repair Program to M3 Macs

    If you’re eager to repair your M3 Mac, you’re going to like this.

    Apple has announced that it will expand its self-service repair program to the M3 iMac, the M3 14-inch MacBook Pro, and the M3 16-inch MacBook Pro.

    Per a trio of support documents published on Thursday, the company will allow customers to purchase genuine Apple parts and tools. Apple also provides manuals so that customers can repair their devices without having to visit an Apple retail location or an Apple Authorized Service Provider. Repairs have been available for Apple’s notebooks and desktops since 2022, but repair components and instructions for the M3 models were just made available.

    The support document covering the repairs for M3 MacBook Pro notebooks details replacing the bottom casing of a MacBook, the parts needed to make a repair, and what tools are necessary to complete the repair. For the ‌iMac‌, Apple provides a detailed list of part numbers required for various repairs on the display, logic board, fans, housing, and more.

    Apple has also added parts for the 14-inch MacBook Pro, 16-inch MacBook Pro, and ‌iMac‌ with M3, M3 Pro, and/or M3 Max chips to its self-service repair store in the U.S. and select European countries. Apple has also published repair manuals for these MacBook Pro and iMac models on its website.

    In addition, Apple is making the System Configuration process easier for all Mac models in all countries where the self-service repair program is available:

    Where policies are concerned, Mac users will no longer need to contact the Self Service Repair support team to run the final step of a repair, although the team will still be available to assist as needed. The updated process will become available come early March in all countries where Self Service Repair is supported.

    Stay tuned for additional details ass they become available.

    Via MacRumors and hr.apple.com

  • Legendary Apple designer Bart Andre to retire, cost-cutting efforts leading to “unrest” inside design team

    Legendary Apple designer Bart Andre to retire, cost-cutting efforts leading to “unrest” inside design team

    Sometimes even the legends move on.

    Bloomberg has reported that Apple’s longest-running senior designer, Bart Andre, is retiring. Andre, who joined Apple in 1992, worked with Jony Ive and his team, his departure marking “the near-complete turnover” of Ive’s former design team.

    Andre announced his plans to retire this month. His departure is a significant shakeup to Apple’s industrial design team, but only the latest in a series of changes and departures.

    Andre, described as “one of Ive’s top lieutenants,” helped work on the iPhone’s multitouch screen, Touch ID, and other major innovations to Apple products. He is also known for holding an amazing number of Apple patents.

    Currently, Apple’s industrial design team is led by chief operating officer Jeff Williams. “Having an operations person oversee a division dedicated to design and innovation has rankled some staff,” Bloomberg says, according to “people close to the situation.”

    Cost-cutting measures have been cited as adding to a feeling of unrest among the team. ”Under I’ve, the team embarked on exploratory projects that didn’t necessarily have an immediate payoff – something that’s been reigned in,” said the source.

    Still, here’s to Mr. Andre, with 30+ great years of design, and some amazing projects under his belt. We hope he enjoys his retirement, and it’s extremely well-deserved.

    Via 9to5Mac and Bloomberg

  • iFixit analysis highlights Apple Vision Pro displays with 54x the pixel count of the first-gen Retina display, other technical details

    iFixit analysis highlights Apple Vision Pro displays with 54x the pixel count of the first-gen Retina display, other technical details

    You have to admit that a screen with 54 times the pixel count of the first-generation Retina screen is pretty impressive.

    Per iFixit’s in-depth teardown analysis, the company has reported that the Vision Pro has a pixel density of 3,368 ppi. While not technically 4K, the displays far surpass the first generation Retina display on the iPhone 4, which debuted in 2010. iFixit has also stated that this is “the highest-density display that we’ve ever seen,” besting the HTC Vive Pro (950 ppi) and Meta Quest 3 (1,218 ppi).

    As iFixit and Steve Jobs explained, pixel density has as much to do with pixels per inch as it does the distance the screen is from your eyes. Because the screens are so close to the user’s eyes, VR headsets measure displays in pixels per degree to generate “angular” resolution, which iFixit estimates at 34 ppd, about the same as a 65-inch television.

    Additional details of the updated teardown highlighted elements like the battery, which uses three iPhone-battery-sized packs stacked atop each other connected in series, sensors, and chips. Still when it comes to repairing and replacing broken parts, Vision Pro received a relatively low repairability score of 4 out of 10 due to its replaceable battery, and magnetic lenses and light seal.

    iFixit stated that there is much room for improvement: “Our hope is that, by the time these things get shrunken into a pair of eyeglasses, repairability won’t be something tacked on at the end, but a fundamental design tenet. If face goggles really are the future of computing, then we need to get this right from the very beginning.”

    Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.

    Via Macworld and iFixit

  • Initial tests show Vision Pro front glass is highly susceptible to scratch-based damage

    Initial tests show Vision Pro front glass is highly susceptible to scratch-based damage

    If you get your hands on an Apple Vision Pro headset, please be careful with it.

    The new device is now in the hands of streamers and testers, who have been exposing its expensive self to drop tests and intentional scratches. While the front glass of the wearable device has proven to be highly resistant to accidental damage, it seems that it’s entirely prone to scratches.

    JerryRigEverything, known for putting new products under extreme stress to test their durability, has shared a teardown of the Apple Vision Pro. Although this isn’t the first teardown of Apple’s headset on the web, the YouTuber has done some experiments with the glass on the front that covers the EyeSight’s cameras, sensors, and display.
    The results are not so exciting for some people. Typically, laminated glass has a plastic interlayer to make it more resistant and less susceptible to shattering. However, for some reason, the Vision Pro’s laminated glass has a plastic layer placed on top of it.

    As a result, the external display is extremely easy to scratch. The test based on the Mohs scale of mineral hardness shows that the front glass of the Vision Pro gets slightly scratched at level two, with deeper scratches at level three. The glass on most smartphones scratches at levels six and seven.

    This means that the Apple Vision Pro’s front glass can be permanently scratched by objects such as keys, coins, and dust. This also shows why Apple ships the Vision Pro with a special cover for the external display and a polishing cloth in the box. Apple charges $799 to replace the front glass of the Vision Pro.

    In a drop test shared by AppleTrack, Vision Pro had to be dropped on the floor multiple times before the glass broke. However, as shown by JerryRigEverything, the glass gets scratched quite easily.

    Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.

    Via 9to5Mac, JerryRigEverything, and Apple Track

  • iFixit publishes written and video teardowns of Vision Pro headset

    iFixit publishes written and video teardowns of Vision Pro headset

    Once again, the supremely cool cats at iFixit have torn into Apple’s newest hardware and have now published both a written as well as a video teardown of the new Apple Vision Pro headset, offering a list of the components to be found inside the mixed-reality headset.

    The teardown report reveals several internal components, including various cameras and sensors, fans, lens motors, and more. Unsurprisingly, it appears that opening and repairing the headset will be difficult.

    “The EyeSight seems like a repair Achilles’ heel—so many points of failure for a slightly creepy feature,” said iFixit, in an email. “But we’ll give Apple credit where it’s due: the easily replaceable speakers and battery are big repairability wins.”

    The report noted that the Vision Pro is powered by an M2 chip with an 8-core CPU, a 10-core GPU, a 16-core Neural Engine, and 16GB of unified memory. Other specs include up to 1TB of storage and an all-new R1 chip that “processes input from 12 cameras, five sensors, and six microphones to ensure that content feels like it is appearing right in front of the user’s eyes.”

    The Apple Vision Pro launched Friday in the U.S., and Apple said the headset will be available in additional countries later this year.

    If you’ve had a chance to get your hands on an Apple Vision Pro, please let us know about your experience in the comments.

    Via MacRumors, YouTube, and Wallpaper