#Satire

But surprised to see it in there. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

First of all, maybe just don’t buy an Apple Pencil if you need one. There are much cheaper third-party styluses. But if you are dead set on getting a genuine Apple Pencil, do NOT pay the full MSRP of $80/$130.

Instead, buy a broken one from FB marketplace or eBay for $15 - 25. Then, take it to the Apple Store and get a replacement for $30. That’s right: a brand new, genuine Apple Pencil from the Apple Store for ~$50.

How is this possible? The Apple Pencil has a notorious design flaw wherein if the battery goes uncharged for too long, it will completely go bad and never hold a charge again. This is so prevalent that it even affects fresh Apple Pencils that have been sitting in stockrooms for too long. Apple knows about this issue and their only solution is to replace the entire Pencil for $30 (which is much closer to what it should cost anyways). If the Apple Pencil is new enough to be under warranty, then the replacement is free!

IMPORTANT: When searching for broken Pencils, you must be sure of two things:

1. Kind of a no-brainer, but it has it to be a genuine Apple Pencil. There are a lot of knock-offs out there and Apple obviously won’t replace a fake Apple Pencil. Ask for a receipt or proof of purchase, if possible.
2. The Apple Pencil must still be able to connect to your iPad and it must still attempt to charge. When you are shopping for broken Apple Pencils, look for descriptions like “still works, but won’t hold charge” or “battery stuck at 0%”.

These are the only two things that the Genius Bar will check for. If you pass these two criteria, they will be more than happy to offer you a new Apple Pencil for the “battery rate” of $29 + tax and take in your old one for recycling. (Finally, ask if you can keep the Pencil Tip before they take it away. Pencil Tips are consumable so it’s good to keep as many spares as you can get.)

1. Go to Settings —> Privacy —> Analytics —> and search for log-aggregated-2021-08-21-xxxxxx.ips (choose the latest date from the list)
2. Select all the data and paste it into a note or other word-processing application
3. Search for ‘MaximumCapacityPercent’

You should find a piece of text which says:

<key>com.apple.power.battery.MaximumCapacityPercent</key> <integer>number</integer>

with the number being the maximum capacity your iPad battery holds.

Edit/Update 09/24: Apple ended up closing the investigation and made things right. There wasn't much of an investigation so I'm sure it was partially based on my purchase history and subscriptions. I'm still nervous about the MacBook I sent in, but I at least boxed and packaged that one myself.

Lesson Learned: I will ONLY be going into the Apple Store from now on to do any sizable trade-ins. If you don't have a local store, I would definitely suggest at least calling and having them send you a box to package it yourself.

Ugh, I've traded in a lot of stuff with Apple and never had any issue. One time I sent a watch in and they returned it saying it had OLED burn-in, but I asked for it back and they sent it back in the same condition. I didn't notice any burn in, but whatever, I gave it to my sister and she still wears it today.

They just raised the trade-in values of a lot of products and I figured it was a good time to trade-in some tech to puts towards a Duo when they launch. I requested a trade-in for my iPad Pro M4 11" and they offered me $685. They provided me a QR code and asked me to bring it to FedEx, no box, which felt super weird... I handed them the iPad and they gave me a receipt. I asked several times if they were going to box it up and they said yes and just stared at me. Okay...

After Apple / Apple trade-in partner whatever received the device they sent me a revised value of $155 because of chips and cracks. Got the device back today, the screen is smashed. I called Apple and they are going to reach back out in a couple days. The woman on the phone told me if they don't solve the problem, then I need to call back and ask for a manager.

What a headache. I traded in because I wanted to do something easy. I also have an M3 MacBook Pro I sent yesterday. After the weird experience of dropping this off with a QR code, I at least asked for them to send me a box.

If you're doing a trade in and they tell you to just drop it off, I 100% recommend calling support and insisting they provide you with a box. Also, take as many photos as you can. I wish I had taken an actual photo showing the serial number of the iPad.

This is a warning to anyone considering buying a new iPad without Apple Care.

I purchased an 11” iPad M4 512GB in August 2024 with the keyboard and pencil pro. All in about $1,625. I very stupidly did not buy the Apple care. I’ve had very good luck with Apple products over the years and just didn’t think it was necessary. This was a very grave mistake on my part.

Since last August I used it very lightly, maybe 5 hours a week total. Never dropped it, treated it like a baby. On Monday 10/13 I attempted to mirror it to my Apple TV as I’ve done dozens of times, and the iPad screen freaked out. I knew instantly something went wrong the way it fizzled out. Fast forward after 2 hours of troubleshooting with my Mac and researching online, I determined it had what the internet refers to as the “black screen of death.” LCD screen fried.

I made an appt at the Apple Store, hoping they would stand by their product and either let me buy the Apple care after the fact or at least cut me a deal on repairing it. Guy in the store was no help, I’m 64 days past the grace period to buy the Apple care, but try calling the support line and maybe they’ll make an exception. If not, it would be $850 to send it in for a screen repair.

After a literal hour on the phone with Apple support the very nice woman in the agreements dept informed me that I was out of luck. No exception would be made. May only choice is to pay $850 to repair it or own a $1600 brick. Not even a discount for the repair. They don’t care that I spend $75 a month for their services, and have spent thousands of dollars on their products. Sorry, tough luck.

I know it’s my fault for denying the coverage, but seeing how many people have dealt with this exact issue (there are dozens of YouTube videos to help troubleshoot it), I feel like at the very least you should get warned of the possibility that it could die after a year of use when denying the coverage. That’s obviously not the case, so that’s what I’m doing here. Don’t make my mistake.

Edit: Based on reading through all the comments I wanted to add some context

-I live in the US. I’ve learned through this post that many countries have much better consumer protection than we do here. You all are very lucky in that regard.

-I used an Apple Card to make the purchase, which I learned after the fact does not offer any extended warranty on purchases.

-I have contacted the third party repair shops in my area and the best price I can find is $399 for a screen repair, but unfortunately the needed parts aren’t available for my model yet. I’ll keep checking.

-Apple One coverage is no longer possible. You have to prove that the device works, and by making a repair case I proved that it doesn’t.

-In response to all of the negative comments, I’m sorry if this post angered you. My main motivation was to warn others to think twice before denying the extra insurance like I did. I grew overly confident by never having a device just ‘fail’ for no reason. This caused me to view Apple Care as damage and theft insurance, which I had no concerns about. The iPad never leaves my house and I was willing to risk that I wouldn’t damage it. I didn’t go to Apple with a smashed screen asking them to cover it, I went in with a product that failed purely because of faulty hardware, and an apparently common failure at that. I fully expected to pay for this, but I do feel that $850 to repair a (faulty) $1200 iPad is unreasonable. If you don’t think there’s something wrong with that and I’m just acting entitled, I’m not sure what else to say.

For anyone who's trying to to decide on which iPad to buy, here's a size comparison that may be able to help you decide.

From left to right:

iPhone 16 Pro, iPhone 16 Pro Max, iPad Mini A17 Pro, M4 iPad Pro 11", M4 iPad Pro 13"

Picture taken with a Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Don’t believe everything from the internet. There are various posts on MacWorld saying that the iPad 2 is obsolete. You can still download apps nowadays if you have them in your purchases tab. And if Jailbroken (I did and installed a classic iOS theme) it has way more functionality like installing apps made specifically for this model of iPad.

I'm sure this is already known and I'm unfortunately just late to the party. But apparently, even if you purchase through Amazon Resale (which they're supposed to check and make sure everything is in factory setting and working condition), you may receive Apple products that are still connected to someone else's Find My.

I learned this the hard way today. Got a Pencil Pro on a really good sale via Amazon Resale. Hooked it to my iPad today and I get the "this is already connected to someone else's Find My" notice. Spoke to an Apple rep who said they couldn't do anything on their end, even with the serial number, and confirmed that whoever has it linked to their Find My can now see my location. Love that.

Learn from my mistakes, friends. Don't purchase used Apple products, even from official resalers, unless you can confirm they're not linked to someone's Find My. Or unless you're sure you can return it (which I'll be doing tomorrow. What's one more day of a stranger knowing my location I guess lol)