<p>the online store (apple.com) gives 10% discounts on everything if you log in w/a college ID</p>
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syn: I am not saying that apples have higher failure rate, but that it is much harder to replace when the drive does fail. Drives today are higher density and runs hotter thus mechanical failure can happen pretty often. You will be banging it around also which doesnt help, one drop can be fatal to a hard drive.
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OK, I was just clarifying. Your saying that hard drive failures were "very very common" and "pretty common" just seemed incongruous. Naturally if you drop your laptop, things are likely to fail, the hard drive being one of them. I believe IBM pioneered, and Apple later followed suit in "drop-safe technology," where the heads on the hard drive automatically park if the laptop detects itself falling. That said, I think that random hard drive failures, disregarding user-inflicted damage to the computer, are rare enough to not be an immediate concern when buying computers. Again, if you have any numbers or stats to the contrary, please post them.</p>
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For example my dad had a Powerbook G4 which he takes on business trips. He dropped it awhile ago at the airport and the hard drive died. You have to open up the entire case to expose the motherboard in order to remove and replace the hard drive. Not to mention the drive used was a 4000rpm drive and since we replaced it with a 5400rpm drive the bottom of the computer got even hotter. A windows computer is generally more versatile because most big brand laptops are based on the same models from a contract manufacturer. If something goes wrong parts are much easier to find and easier to replace.
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The laptops use standard ATA hard drives. If you install a faster hard drive in any laptop (depending on the circumstances; see later), it will get hotter. That said, it's actually possible that your computer will run cooler with a faster hard drive. Even though more power is used to run the faster spinning drive, the computer accesses the hard drive for a less amount of time, which results in less fan-spinning and overheating. Combined with a RAM upgrade, which lets your computer rely less on the hard drive for storing memory, upgrading from a lower speed drive isn't necessarily a bad idea. Battery life will go down though, if marginally.</p>
<p>Excuse the tangent :) Anyway, Apple is a manufacturer just like any other hardware company. They don't produce their own hard drives nor do they use anything unusual in the way of hard drives. Practically everything inside their computers are standard (graphics card, hard drive, ram), with a few exceptions (AirPort, battery). If you check the stats of any PowerBook, even the same model, you'll find Toshiba hard drives, Panasonic, Hitachi, etc... Make sure you look for the right Serial ATA drive (of which there are many) and you'll be fine.</p>
<p>As for replacing; it involves turning off the computer, unscrewing the bottom of the case, spreading the clasps that hold the hard drive together, replacing the hard drive, and reversing the process. This might be a generalization, but I think it's apt: Those who are able and willing to replace a hard drive in any laptop will be just as comfortable replacing one in a PowerBook as they will be with a Toshiba or a Dell or a Panasonic. Those who aren't will most likely resort to a support service. I can't vouch for Apple's support being any better or any worse than other companies. The only time I had an issue (I'm on my second PowerBook) is when I plugged my power brick into the wall and it started sparking. I called them up and got a new one FedExed in the mail. But anecdotal evidence is largely useless, so I encourage anyone interested in any company to look online for custom satisfaction ratings/polls for individual companies before making it a part of their buying decision.</p>