Five Apple gadgets declared ‘obsolete' including popular iPad model now on ‘kill list' & there's a costly consequence
SOUR APPLE Five Apple gadgets declared 'obsolete' including popular iPad model now on 'kill list' & there's a costly consequence
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APPLE has declared several more of its gadgets "vintage" and "obsolete", including a popular iPad model, macs and accessories.
The updated status of these electronics could make them more costly for people to keep using.
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This is because they may be more difficult to repair at Apple stores
Credit: Getty
Apple considers a product "vintage" five years after it was last distributed for sale, which then becomes "obsolete" two years later.
One addition that finally made it to the vintage list is the 2013 "Trash Can" Mac Pro, 12 years after being sold.
This was because the computer was on the market for so long, that it did not discontinue selling until December 2019.
Apple was unable to introduce a new Mac Pro to replace the cyclindrical version due to design limitations, the company admitted in 2017.
It was much smaller than the previous generation of Mac Pro, and there was not space to upgrade internal components like GPUs.
Apple's hardware chief at the time, Craig Federighi, admitted: "I think we designed ourselves into a bit of a thermal corner."
Along with the 2013 Mac Pro, several other Apple devices were added to the vintage products list.
These include:
2019 13-inch MacBook Air
2019 iMac
2018 11-inch iPad Pro
2018 third-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro
iPhone 8 128GB
The 128GB version of the iPhone 8 was sold for longer than its 64GB and 256GB counterparts, however has now joined them on the vintage list.
Apples's big announcements from WWDC with a flurry new features for the gadgets you already own
A number of devices were also transitioned from Apple's vintage list to "obsolete".
These include:
Second-generation AirPort Express
2TB and 3TB AirPort Time Capsules
802.11ac AirPort Extreme
Apple retail stores and Apple Authorised Service Providers (AASPs) still offer repairs for vintage products if the required parts are availablle.
If these parts are not available, repairs are unlikely to be possible.
Products that are obsolete are not repaired by Apple stores or AASPs.
Apple also no longer provided parts for them.
However, some Mac laptops may be eligible for a battery-only repair for a period of up to 10 years from when the product was last distributed for sale.
This is subject to the availability of parts.
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BBC News
3 hours ago
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Zoe will be responding to reader comments about this article between 11am and 12pm (BST) today. Go to the comments section at the bottom of the page from 10am to share what you think about the impact of screen time on childrenThe other day, while I was doing some household chores, I handed my youngest child his dad's iPad to keep him entertained. But after a while I suddenly felt uneasy: I wasn't keeping a close eye on how long he had spent using it or what he was looking at. So I told him it was time to stop.A full-blown tantrum erupted. He kicked, he yelled, he clung to it and tried to push me away with the might of a furious under-five. Not my finest hour as a parent, admittedly, and his extreme reaction bothered older children are navigating social media, virtual reality and online gaming, and sometimes that concerns me too. 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