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Bad iMac G5 online survey


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Bad iMac G5 online survey
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VL-Tone
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
 
2005-06-25, 17:19

I used to love Macintouch.com in the days, before I became a Macsurfer addict... And let me tell you that I don't mind their very basic html design.

Now they just released an online survey that shows a really high failure rate for the iMac G5.

I'm not denying that there may be some quality issue with this model.

But I'm really tired and getting angry at seeing online surveys passing as valuable data with no disclaimer. Those online surveys are almost always skewed.

Anyone knowing about the way polling should be done knows this. Macintouch have this special report about hardware failures in the iMac G5 since soon after the release. Since they are the only one (aside from MacFixIt) to cover the story continuously, it's very likely their readership has now a disproportionate amount of people that had or have problems with their iMac G5. Another flaw in their survey is that they ask people to count ("iMacs that they manage") so their must be some overlapping with iMac G5 users.

Also there is the factor of people who had the problem to be more likely to take the time to fill a survey. There are those who had no problems with their machines and want to make sure Macintouch knows about it, but then again there are those who hate Apple so much that they could post fake votes and stories about failing hardware.

I can see a bunch of Pro-Wintel or MS employees having a kick at posting a story about an iMac G5 blowing up smoke. I guess this is all speculation but this is the problem with online polls... too much speculation possible.

I guess the online poll Macintouch did could give some indication at a real problem with the machines, but the percentages shouldn't be interpreted as is. At least they should acknowledge the very high margin of error they have and tell that online polls can be very skewed.

Consumer electronics have failure rates, that's the way it works in the market. A product with a 0% failure rate would cost like 10 times more. On the Wintel side, it seems that people with popular brands of computers don't have the same commonly known centralized places to discuss and read articles about problems with their specific Dell x2504 model for example.

Mac users have MacSurfer, MacFixIt and ehm Macintouch and others which act like magnifying glasses. Much the same applies to the iPod...

Apple is in the spotlight (pun intended) and many people have in their agenda to show that they are not as perfect as some would like to believe. This is a weak point for them. If MS felt threatened by Apple at any point in the future, they could just ask some of their employees to post tons of fake failing hardware reports targeted at MacFixIt and others to add to the magnifying glass effect.

Again, I'm not deniying problems and it's important to stay critical when Apple messes up, but it's getting harder and harder to know when things are blown out of proportion.

Anyway I felt like ranting about this today

(Don't worry I won't make a PodCast about this!)

VL-Tone
---------
A calculator, with a built-in synthesizer!
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Amadeus
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: Massachusetts
 
2005-06-25, 18:55

I hope that you feel better now after your rant. Verbalizing a problem usually helps. It would seem that the Rev. B iMac should be much improved.
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rasmits
rams it
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Seattle
 
2005-06-25, 21:12

In my experience, the problems with the Rev. A iMac G5s were plentiful and genuinely critical.
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Paul
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: New York City
 
2005-06-25, 21:51

yeah, I have seen a TON of iMacs at every genius bar I've been to in the last few months... Not to mention mine having to go in twice...

1215/234215 (top .51875%)
People really have got to stop thinking there is only one operating system, one economic system, one religion, and one business model. -EvilTwinSkippy (/.)
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VL-Tone
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
 
2005-06-26, 00:09

Yeah I feel better

Anyway I don't care if the anecdotal statistics happen to match the Macintouch poll, this doesn't make it more scientific, nor the method used more accurate. My point is that Macintouch and others relying on online polls should add a disclaimer about the "non-scientificness" of their survey.

Ok now I'm off to post a fake story on Macintouch about an iMac G5 having shifting colors in the LCD and smoke getting out off the bottom air vent.

VL-Tone
---------
A calculator, with a built-in synthesizer!
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alcimedes
I shot the sherrif.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Send a message via ICQ to alcimedes  
2005-06-26, 08:43

We bought two, both of which had logic board failures within 3 months. Both were fixed within 2 days though, so I'd kind of forgotten that they'd died.

Google is your frenemy.
Caveat Emptor - Latin for tough titty
I tend to interpret things in the way that's most hilarious to me
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thegelding
feeling my oats
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: there are nice people here...that makes me happy
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2005-06-26, 09:19

yeah for rev b...thegelding knocks on wooden leg

g
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Wickers
is not a kind of basket
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2005-06-26, 14:33

Just to point out...
At work we still see a high amount of Rev.b's in for repair. Overall I'd say about the same amount as when the Rev.a's were released.

I've also noted an increasing amount of powersupply issues...

no sig, how's that for being a rebel!
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VL-Tone
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
 
2005-06-27, 00:22

<sarcasm>Yeah come on down people that had problems with iMac G5s, come post your stories here! As for people who never had problems with them, do as usual (don't read this thread and don't post your positive story). Now we'll be able to prove that the iMac G5 has a 100% failure rate!</sarcasm>

Wickers, seriously I would trust an nation-wide survey of repair shops and Mac resellers. But my whole point is about presenting readership polls as accurate data without any disclaimers, which I find is just wrong!

Last edited by VL-Tone : 2005-06-27 at 00:31.
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nassau
Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
 
2005-06-27, 10:19

ok, a real quote from a renowned repairshop (that will remain unnamed for somewhat obvious reasons):

the iMac G5 sucks, it's horrible. (this is from a quality point of view)
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