Well, it seems it was a good choice buying Apple Care last year after all... I took my MacBook into the Bellevue, Washington Apple Store, and a support technician (I can't bring myself to refer to them as 'geniuses'... I reserve the term 'genius' for folks like Charles Darwin, Carl Sagan, Thomas Jefferson, etc, you get the picture) popped in a new hard drive and restored a Leopard image on it. Now I'm back in operation...

I left my MacBook running, as usual, after my somewhat regular routine of blasting home for lunch to graze on veggies and beans while I navigate to www.ComedyCentral.com to catch up on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert. When the Colbert Report finished, I closed the browser and headed back to the office. Getting home latter that eve, I was greeted by a gray screen of death...
After a few attempts at rebooting, refreshing pram, etc, I was soon greeted by the flashing directory with a question mark on it. Meaning this MacBook can't find an OS.

I bought a fancy new alarm clock, the Sangean RCR22. It is an atomic clock, that is, it connects to the atomic clock in Boulder Colorado to display the most accurate time.

Now this is funny:
http://www.dailymotion.com/aarplane/video/12725654

It seems there is no Firewire on the new 13" MacBooks. Not that I am considering buying one... my 2006 MacBook (the subject of the title of this blog), after all the back and forth and final replacement, has been acting as I was originally led to believe...

Over the last couple of days I noticed the MagSafe connector was getting quite warm and the led in it was flashing between green, amber, and nothing at all. Today, I saw my battery was not charged 100% and it should have been having been plugged in all night long. I reached for the MagSafe, and it was too hot to hold, when I moved the cable, the green led came on, followed by the amber, then off again. I unplugged it, removed it and investigated. The rubber covering over the cable right at the join of the MagSafe had melted exposing electrical wiring.

So, as the one year anniversary approaches since Apple sent me my replacement black MacBook, I received an email reminding me my last chance to purchase the additional two years of Apple Support was fast approaching. I'd wait till payday, but I was definitely going to make the purchase after my experience with MacBooks so far.

Well, things with my MacBook have been running fine since the long and sordid story of my broken MacBook... Until now. This last week, while I am running on battery power, I am experiencing random shutdowns. No warning, just power off. When I try to restart right away, nothing, its dead. After about 5 minutes, it will start again, but only long enough for me to start a browser and then click, off it goes again. If I plug the MacBook into an power outlet, it runs again without shutting down.

http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/04/27/battery/index.php?lsrc=mwrss

Though my replacement MacBook is running like a champ and trouble free, an unlucky Australian almost had his home burn down due to a MacBook battery exploding and caching on fire: MacBook Burns.