The Saga Continues: 4th MacBook Air in 34 days

The third time was not the charm for me. Roughly 24 hours later, after receiving a brand new MacBook Air from the Beverly Center Apple Store and reconfiguring the computer to my personal preferences, MacBook Air #3 froze and wouldn't reboot.

I quickly jumped on my Mac Mini to search to see if forums or Apple's support website could shed some light on this problem. I tried everything I could think of to breathe life into MacBook #3: holding down the power button for 5 seconds, selecting a startup disk, resetting the notebook's PRAM…nothing worked. An hour later, I was out of options and headed to the Genius Bar at The Grove's Apple Store.

The Genius Bar staff at this Apple Store is fantastic. Friendly, smart, patient – exactly the type of support I needed since my problematic experiences with the MacBook Air had quadrupled. By far, this was the best customer service I've received at the Apple Store (and I have had many customer service experiences to which I could compare this, obviously). The Genius plugged in an external USB hard drive, booted up the Air, and without missing a beat, reported my hard drive had crashed and that all data was lost. Concerned about the security and confidentiality of my data, I asked what would happen to the hard drive. I was told that computers whose hard drives had crashed are sent away and placed next to a huge magnet to wipe out any data before being disposed. Is this how it really works? Seems a little fishy to me. Perhaps I'm just jaded by my recent troubles.

The genius gave me two options. One, walk out of the store with a brand new MacBook Air. Two, receive a brand new MacBook Air and spend an extra $1000+ dollars to upgrade it to the faster processor and 64GB solid-state drive. While option #2 was tempting, I decided not to put anymore money into my Air. The last thing I need is another inoperable MacBook Air, much less one in which I had sunk additional money. I have decided, however, that this 4th Air will be my last. If it works, great. If the notebook experiences another product quality defect, I'll return the Air for another product, perhaps a cheaper MacBook. I'll join the crowd waiting for the second-generation Airs to hit the market.

Perhaps most surprising, I asked the Genius Bar staff if they had seen a lot of issues with the Airs and was told that they hadn't. I was one of the first owners they had seen come in with an issue (much less the three issues I had experienced). If you've had any issues with your Air, I'd love to hear about them. Feel free to comment below.