Danish consumer group finds design flaw in iBook G4

After an investigation, Denmark's Consumer Complaints Board says it has found evidence that a design flaw in Apple's iBook G4 caused the notebooks to stop working after about a year of use.

(Credit: Forbrug.dk)

The board's investigation found that turning the laptop on or off over time causes a solder joint to loosen and eventually separate, preventing current from flowing through the joint. Owners of Apple's iBook G4s had complained about system problems, and even filed a class-action suit to advance their claims, but Apple has not admitted to any sort of design flaw with the systems. The Macbook--with Intel's processors--replaced the iBook last year.

Given the new findings, however, the board has settled several claims on behalf of Danish customers of Apple International, it said. Its investigation could have an effect on other iBook G4 customers who have experienced similar problems, but an Apple representative declined to comment on the report.

A copy of the report can be found on the board's Web site. A lot of the site is written in Danish, but there is an English copy of the report and photos of the test setup.

[jopek]

Mine is working fine for 5 years.

I have 3 Macs ,the most reliable is so far the iBook G4 working
for 5 years now with no problem.
My iMac 20" G5, (2005 model) had a problem with board's
capacitors and the motherboard was replaced without charge.
In my latest MacBook Pro (1st generation Core Duo) the fan was
allready replaced during the waranty period and various noises
that I hear plus other symptoms don't make me feel pariculary
optimistic about the durability of the machine.

[Hairnester]

Just because yours are okay....

It's not necessarily all G4s. It seems to have affected a batch purchased somewhere between April 05 and Nov. 05

[Thomas, David]

I found a design flaw in a PIII system last week

... maybe you get my point.

My iBook is over five years old as well. Not only does it still work, I
have given it to a very close friend who has used it for the past 2
years in college.

Something is fishy in Denmark. (what else)

[peter.mortensen]

Very typical design weakness

It's not uncommon a consumer electronics product that the first wear out problem, typically after years of use, is due to a soldering joint breaking caused by stress, either indirectly due to the stress that a change in temperature can cause (when the device is turned on/off and materials expand/compress), or more directly when it's exposed to mechanical stress e.g. soldering joints holding a connector that is often used - e.g a headset connector where you plug in your headset daily.

However, a good design is taking these things into considerations, so expected operating time is far beyond the warranty period and should be several years.

Product tests include:

1. Board layout reviews. Often the consumer electronics companies have some guidelines of what is a good layout that any layout must comply with.
2. Life and environmental type tests where the product is exposed to high temperatures and low temperatures. Often many units are exposed to such tests.
3. Environmental stress tests where the design is exposed to rapid temperature changes. E.g. at "Bang & Olufsen", all boards have to go through a very demanding "boiling test" where the boards with all components were continuously exposed to boiling water followed quickly by cold water rapidly to stress the soldering joints excessively for several days. Subsequently the tested boards were analyzed under microscope to identify any microscopic cracks. Such type of testing can be tough to pass and can be a good prediction of long term durability.
4. Mechanical vibration tests minimally on a complete product level (e.g. transportation tests.
5. Stress tests on connectors and buttons perhaps above 100,000 operations.
6. Drop tests where the product is dropped from a defined height hitting a defined material from a defined height on different defined angles.

It's obvious that if a high percentage of customers see a product "die" simply due to a particular soldering joint breaking just shortly after the warranty period, insufficient care has been done around the board layout and QA of the board. The QA and review processes should ensure longer durability.

Apple is a company that is known for careful intelligent design and it's a bit disappointing that something like this has passed their QA process.

But with the agressive R&D schedules in any innovative company like Apple the QA process relies on reviews and simulated tests. Some times even the best simulation type test fails in predicting a certain usage pattern or environmental stress condition.

[Thomas, David]

It's 2007, I'm Curious ...

The G4 iBook is no longer produced, and it has been out for
some time. While the story implies there are a lot of unhappy
iBook owners, whose laptops stopped working for this reason, it
is strangely curious this is a story in the year 2007 ... in May.

I know there are instances where a manufacturing problem can
occur at a plant for many reasons, leading to a batch of
problematic devices. However, this has nothing to do with
quality assurance, and control in the design process. This was
not implied, but expressed by a previous poster. Having
worked with laptop models from Dell, Sager, IBM (the only ones I
can recall), I can tell you from a personal experience that the
Apple laptops exceed the Q&A of the other manufacturers.

What makes this story so curious is its premise for building a
case for poor design, and manufacturing against a company
known for its great design, using a case with an out-dated
laptop, that is NOT known for design problems.

Very curious indeed.

[Henning Poulsen]

Warranty

The consumer agency represents consumers on all claims on
purchases during the warranty period, and there is a two (2) year
warranty on everything purchased in Denmark and the rest of
the EU.
Considering that all iBooks bought since May 2005 are still
covered by warranty this is still very current.

Two year warranties only apply to private (that is, not
businesses), stores selling to people offer two-year warranty,
but have to pay repairs themselves after one year, as Apple only
gives one year to them.

My G3 600 iBook experienced the exact same thing, only after
four years (a year ago), so I couldn't claim anything. I had to
press a hand on the left hand side of the palm rests to get the
backlight back on. At last I pressed so hard that the hard drive
was pressed and died. So I have an iBook, works perfectly,
except for the display and the hard drive. I still haven't found
out how to get the hard drive out on that computer.

Anyway, the MacBook was presented right after, and I got money
tax money back to finance it.