07-18-2009, 06:19 AM

I had 2 CDs my one year old iMac8,1 wouldn't recognise or accept. On Thursday 16 July I took them to an Apple reseller and the CDs played on another Mac with no problem.

"Great" I thought. "I'll go home - call Apple and get the problem with my one year old iMac sorted."

Wrong!

Apple Care told me it didn't take responsibility for this kind of problem. Apple fit a wide range of disc players and the problem they said is with the the disc.

I expect my one year old iMac to play a disc that a Mac in a shop will play. I am pretty upset with Apple. I would really like to play the discs.

I told Facebook friends what has happened. One of them referred me to this site. Another suggested I should run a Lens Cleaner CD. Tried that. It wasn't recognised either. Called Apple Care again. Found there was no record of my original call. However Apple Care now said it could trouble shoot this problem- we ran some checks and I have been referred to an Apple Store to get the problem fixed.

I am still very angry about the response to my original call. Apple Care isn't all it is cracked up to be. How many bad Apples in Apple Care?

07-18-2009, 07:08 AM

Get a grip.

How many thousands of employees do you think Apple (or any other firm that provides technical support) has? When you call up Apple, do you think you're talking to "Apple" or an "individual" that's been hired to do a "job".

Do you think tech support divisions are able to accurately screen all those employees so that there will never be an example of a bad support call or just one you don't happen to agree with or like? Or that even the best of support techs don't have a bad day or a bad call?

A call to tech support can always be a frustrating experience. I don't care what company it is. Sometimes you're going to get an "individual" that's fresh out of training and it's their first day on the job. You think they're prepared for just any call that may come in? Not a chance!!! No matter how good the training is.

So bottom line - you made the right decision and didn't give up with the first "individual" you talked to. The bad decision was to then go find a new forum to join up to post about the bad call, but not until after you have talked to someone that is trying to take care of your issue.

07-18-2009, 09:40 AM

You are quite right to post when you get crappy service - the notion that we should just keep on trying when we get bad service only encourages companies to provide poor customer service. We PAY for Apple Care, dammit, it's not a free service and Apple ought to ensure that the FIRST point of contact is the last point of contact. I don't write after a bad experience of Apple Care - in fact, my only experience was a very good experience in that it got me a full-sized keyboard instead of the new laptop-sized they now supply with new Apple iMacs - but I expect that everybody's experience should be a good one - after all, after sales service is often the only way to distinguish a good company from a bad one, and I'm sure that Apple doesn't want to be in the latter category.

07-18-2009, 11:46 AM

I'll still stand by my first post, especially if the only disks the OP had problems with were burned disks and not commercial disks, which he/she conveniently failed to report here. If they were disks burned on another machine, sorry to say, the original contacts with Apple, while not very helpful, were indeed correct and a similar response would have been provided by any of the system manufacturers you care to name.

Even with commercial disks, that are scratched, dirty, etc.; some players are better at playing them than others. And he has only two disks that won't play? Definitely indicates an issue with the disks. 2 disks that won't play out of a stack of disks, does not indicate anything inherently wrong with the drive.

07-18-2009, 12:10 PM

Commercial CDs will not play. The problem was identified with the first two commercial discs but I have since tested mint commercial discs from other sources. None of them are recognised.

07-26-2009, 07:02 AM

End of Story. The good news is that the Apple Centre at Brent Cross, London replaced the optical drive. The bad news is that this Apple Centre is under resourced and over crowded with unhappy Apple customers who are not getting the service they expect. I was next to someone with another faulty optical drive on a MacBook purchased at the store only three months before. Go away and come back another day was what he was told.