It was an extremely hefty bill for a drink from Apple. What I did about it.

Over the holidays, a bunch of us were gathered around the table, laptops open, enjoying the holidays when a drink spilt into my keyboard.  I cannot tell a lie, it was my fault.

After doing the customary recovery attempts -- turn computer off, flip upside down, let drain and dry over night, I discovered my computer still worked fine, but had developed a few keyboard quirks.  A few keys didn't type at all, others would generate two key presses, and some keys just kind of auto repeated endlessly. To see if the damage was limited to the keyboard,  I plugged an external keyboard into it and it worked fine.  The computer still ran, my iPhone still synced to iTunes.  It all ran just fine.

With a resigned heart, I knew the keyboard needed to be replaced.  Were this a desktop, it would be simple -- unplug old keyboard, plug new keyboard in. Kick yourself for being clumsy, but it's something you can fix yourself. But with a laptop, it is not so simple, and so I knew my best course of action was to take it to the Genius Bar in Altamonte Springs, FL.

I visited the Apple store a few days later, and awaited my appointment with a "Genius".  I explained the situation, and his first comment was "this is going to be expensive."  I knew a new keyboard was going to be expensive, and I was prepared for that.  I had priced them online, and the going price was around $250.  But I had just missed some important foreshadowing.  As we went over the situation, he commented about if the logic board was damaged it, alone, was going to be $800.  Of course, I knew the logic board was working fine, so I ignored the comment.  I had tested the computer with an external keyboard and it all worked.

He took the laptop in the back and was gone so long I assumed he had gone on break in the interim.  My level of anxiety was growing.  I went over his comment in my mind -- why did he assume, without any knowledge, that the logic board needed to be replaced? Is this a problem with the design of the Airs -- anything spilt on the keyboard goes right to the logic board? That would be bad if it were true.

When he finally returned, he told me he had bad news: both the keyboard and yes the logic board needed to be replaced.

I stared at him.

"You're kidding me," I told him, "the logic board is working fine.  It's just the keyboard that's not working."

He assured me that the logic board was covered in goo and it was only a matter of time before it was dead.

I challenged him: but it's obviously working now!  His response was that the goo on the logic board could, in time, do further damage (something about acids) and that keyboard problems pointed to logic board damage.  I did not believe him.

I asked him, point blank, if, even understanding what he said, I still wished for them only to replace the keyboard: would they do that?

No.  Logic board replacement or nothing.

At that point, a scenario flashed in my mind.  It's a car repair scenario, where the shady auto mechanic tells you that you need to fix things in your car that are not broken just so they can charge you a higher bill. In my mind, Apple had just become the shady auto mechanic, asking to replace a pricey part that gave no signs of being broken.  And to be clear, they had offered no proof that it was broken.  Just the word of some anonymous tech in the back; the computer had be returned to me completely closed back up.  I was at a disadvantage, because I could not inspect the logic board myself.

I took stock of the situation.  The computer was working fine, save for the keyboard.  They were offering me a my-way-or-the-highway expensive repair that they asked me to accept, on faith, contrary to the facts that were evident to me, was absolutely needed.

I came to one opinion:  I was being duped by Apple.

I was mad.  I declined to pay for what I felt was surely an unnecessary expensive repair and left.

Of course, that left me with a "Now what, smarty pants?" kind of problem.

I've seen the videos on the making of a MacBook Air on Apple's web site -- precision manufacturing, miniature assembly, etc.  Apple may be, in my mind, the analog of the shady mechanic overselling repairs, but that makes the MacBook Air the analog of high end cars, which are much more complicated than their predecessors and competition.

I went home and did some more research.  Apple sure doesn't encourage a DIY spirit of repair.  In fact, they invented their very own kind of screwdriver, the "Pentalobe", just so you cannot open your own computer! My first step was ordering a custom "Apple Tool" just so I could take the back off the thing.

I formulated a plan.  First, I would just look inside to assess the damage.  Was the logic board really covered in goo as the "Genius" implied?  Could it be cleaned?  Maybe I could prevent the further damage the "Genius" worried about. Could the keyboard be cleaned? In days of old, flushing a keyboard with water or alcohol could clear up mis-functioning keys. Worst case, I would replace the keyboard.  And if it really was as bad as they said, I would have to either suck it up and have them replace the parts (or replace them myself), or just treat the beast as a desktop computer (since the external keyboard worked fine) for as long as it cared to go on living.

It took a while to get the right screwdriver (heh, Apple has two different Pentalobe kind of screws, and I got the driver for the wrong one first). After the right tools arrived, I followed the instructions on the iFixit.com website to disassemble my MacBook Air.  I must confess some trepidation.  This was not a toaster I was taking apart, this was a $1500+ computer.  And if I broke something else, there would be no one to back me up.  Apple had already told me there was nothing they could do for me, as I had chosen the "highway". I was totally on my own with this.  On the other hand, if the Apple repair truly was $1000, I might as well upgrade the computer, so I figured my risk wasn't the entire $1500.

Disassembly went smoothly -- mostly --  and I saw that the computer design was sufficiently modular that it wasn't as hard as I worried.  Just very time consuming.  A few steps required some puzzling out to do, and there was some fearful moments along the way.

I saw two things when the computer was apart.  First, there was some goo under the fan.

But, also very clearly, the logic board was clean.  The fan is attached to the logic board, but is completely separate and easy to remove on its own.  The goo was not on the logic board.  Close, but not there.  There was a bit of goo under, but not touching the logic board on the keyboard:

The logic board mounts on stand-offs and is not in physical contact with the black plastic you see (the fan is in physical contact with that plastic, which is why some goo got on the fan itself.

Let me be really clear about this:  I will be charitable, and say that the tech was confused about what had been affected by the spill and/or was extremely overly cautious.  There is room for opinion in everything.  But it is my strong opinion that they overestimated the extent of damage, and that overestimation was in the direction of greater profit for Apple.  They were wrong in their recommendation.  You can ask, who am I to suggest my opinion is better formed than Apple's? Read on, and you decide.

I cleaned the goo off the fan with some rubbing alcohol, and set it aside.  Since the problem was with the keyboard, I thought that, perhaps, the problems were caused by some lingering dirt or goo in the keyboard itself.  I removed all the keycaps, and bathed the keyboard in alcohol and contact cleaner, and reassembled the computer.

Unfortunately, the behavior was the same.  It ran fine, but the same keys that either didn't work, generated multiple keystrokes, or auto repeated still did.  On the plus side, I had done no damage to the computer.  But on the minus side, well, no progress had been made.  So much for the cheap, labor-only repair.

I ordered a new "top case" (the keyboard and the aluminum top to the computer are an integral unit) from the web.  It took a few days to arrive, and then I once again tore my computer apart.  As it turns out, all the parts of the Air mount into the top case, so it's not quite like you're just swapping out a part.  You are basically taking your computer completely apart, and then assembling all those parts into your new top case.

As before, I was worried about some new damage in the process.  The connectors and sockets in the computer are fragile and not built for repetitive removal and insertion. I didn't want to push them to the breaking point.  I did my best to be careful.

When I was done, I pressed the power button.  It booted just fine.  I gave the keyboard a quick test, and it all appeared to be working.  All the problems were fixed.

And so here I am.  The MacBook Air works perfectly, and I am typing this blog post on it.  Just in case I've missed a letter: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.  Perfect.

Total cost? About $225 for the top case.  Or, about $800+ less than I would have paid Apple to replace the logic board and the top case.

There are few real lessons I've learned from this.

First, the "Genius Bar" is neither.  You should treat their recommendations for repairs the same way as you would as the guy who repairs your car or fixes your plumbing.  Most of the time, they're going to be right.  But if it seems like they are asking to do a lot more work than you expected, it's time for a second opinion.

Second, Apple isn't perfect, and that hubris we saw in Steve Jobs extends down to the lowest levels.  It's not pretty, and I hope that Tim Cook manages to bring some humility to Apple.  They definitely need to get rid of the arrogance about repairs.  I've been around computers longer than these kids have been alive, and I know one thing: you can never be certain of being right until the computer works.

Third, I'm going to be more active and less passive the next time I have a repair issue.  I should have pushed back hard.  I should have demanded to talk to a manager.  I didn't feel like I was on solid ground because I did not (and, at that point, could not have) see the extent of the damage myself.  Now, if I hear something that seems wrong, I will demand proof.

Fourth, the Genius Bar is just a "swap shop".  They replace parts, they do not repair them.  Something that could be a $20 repair but is a $200 swap is going to cost you $200 because they don't do real repairs.  Maybe I could have sent it off to Apple somewhere or somebody else and gotten a better repair, but I wasn't willing to trust Apple at that point.

Apple still is, in my mind, the best PC on the market, and I still recommend them to anyone.  But Apple's not perfect, and we need to keep that in mind. I will be caveating my recommendations to everyone from now on with those observations.

Finally, I recommend people keep all drinks at least foot away from their computer...