My Powerbook G4 died of logic board failure can you help or advise me ?

Question

On Christmas eve I was working on my 2 year old 12" Powerbook G4, I got a notification that the battery was low so I thought lets save my work and drain the battery. It was a good idea at the time because I've heard its sometimes good practice to completely drain the battery and give it a fresh charge ? so the machine finally quit and before going to bed I plugged it into the mains to charge, immediately I noticed the power cord connection to my mac turned green and not the amber I expected. This powerbook has travelled the world with me over the past 2 years so its been a little buddy and I was alarmed to see this happen ? I waited 20 minutes guessing that there would be sufficient charge to wake the machine. After hitting the power button there was nothing !!! no click, chime or indication that he machine was in any way operational.
I tried cleaning the battery and touch points in the machine, I even tried my spare battery in the machine and everything I could to wake the machine. Nothing worked. I was pretty annoyed to be honest, its in perfect condition, no dents scrapes and it was always maintained and well ventilated etc.
On December 27th I flew to Irelands official Mac repair centre here in Galway as I needed it fixed ASAP and I was very concerned about loosing all my work and the physical machine itself. Five days later I called to see if there was a update, the representative explained to me that it was the logic board in my machine and that it was damaged and I would require a new logic board if the machine was to ever successfully boot again. The bill in total would be €670 inc. parts and labour and unfortunately Apple will only guarantee the new logic board for 3 months and after that I'm on my own. Sadly when I bought my machine (in Australia)I didn't take out the extended cover on the machine because it seemed quite expensive at the time and I knew I'd take good care to maintain and upgrade the machine as necessary.
The update I received from the official Apple repair centre was that there was no evidence of any water damage, dust or physical damage and there was no clear explanation as to why the part "just gave up"! The representative was very helpful and removed the hard drive for me, placed it in a external (USB)enclosure and sent it back to me so I did manage to save my work but still Imp very disappointed with Apple that I only got 2 years out of a machine that's become a daily tool to me.
I wanted to post and see what other people have done in this instance, luckily I'm fortunate enough to be able to purchase a new Macbook 2.0ghz to replace my machine but that's now costing me €1519 just because the Apple hardware was well quite frankly crap ! What I would like to know is - does this happen often, is there recourse to go back to Apple and is there a cheaper way to fix my poor Powerbook http://www.flickr.com/photos/bfitzsimons/215516415/ ?
Many thanks in advance for any advice you can give me
Brian H Fitzsimons
Dublin
Ireland

Answer 1

Hi Brian.
In the UK we have some degree of consumer protection (Sale of Goods Act) for situations not too far from yours. Basically we, as consumers, have a right to expect goods that we purchase to be of a certain standard of quality/reliability. The SOGA provides up to six years of protection, unlike the standard one year warranty many manufacturers offer - which, to some degree, renders extended warranties unecessary.
However each case is different, and consumers will get different mileage depending on their individual circumstances but it is not uncommon for consumers to have successfully obtained repairs, replacements, or refunds using the SOGA - although they will have had to be prepared to argue their case.
Perhaps you might want to check out what kind of consumer protection the Republic of Ireland offers. At the very least, there is probably an EU equivalent of the SOGA which will cover the ROI as well.
NB: I've just re-read your post and realised that you bought the PowerBook in Australia - which probably disqualifies you from any EU or ROI consumer protection. That said, it may still be worth your while to find out what kind of consumer protection is available to you for future reference.
2.0GHz MacBook, 15" 1.25GHz/12" 1GHz PBs, 2xPPC Mac minis, 12" iBook G4,   Mac OS X (10.4.8)   Cube, 2xTAMs, iPod 4G & nano 2G, 1G & 2G iPs, AEBS, AX