One of the most popular Macs of all time among mobile users says goodbye quietly: Apple has decided to keep the original model of the 12 inch MacBook officially on the so-called obsolete list to put. Hardware ends up on this for which Apple offers neither spare parts nor services – not even for (a lot of) money and good words. Users who want to continue using the Intel machine are therefore dependent on independent repair shops that hopefully still have original components in stock.
A fancy start
Apple first launched the 12-inch MacBook eight years ago. The entire series was withdrawn from the market in 2019. The machine, equipped with a retina screen, shone with its compactness and low weight of 920 grams. Nevertheless, a full-fledged keyboard was installed.
Fanless chips from the Core M, M3 and M5 series (Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake) and most recently i5 (Kaby Lake) were used as processors. Only the variant with Core M is initially obsolete. The small notebook was never very fast, but it was definitely enough for office tasks, simple multimedia applications and the web. The calculator was a classic “Grab & Go” system that even Apple’s iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard made it look clunky.
Better treat with care
As now MacRumors reports, Apple will by the end of June the obsolete status for the original 12-inch MacBook explain. This is what it says in an internal document that the company has distributed to repair shops and the in-house AppleCare department. “Once the notebook is declared obsolete, it can no longer be repaired or serviced at Apple Retail Stores and Apple Authorized Service Providers (ASPs) because replacement parts are no longer available,” Apple said.
The 12-inch MacBook was initially seen as a machine their revival as a variant with Apple Silicon as seemed logical, the chips of the Apple M series deliver a lot of performance and comparatively low power consumption. So comes about the current MacBook Air M2 without fan off. So far it is unclear whether Apple will bring another compact Mac onto the market, there are not really any current rumors about it.
Users who want to continue using their system should now handle it with particular care. This applies in particular to the keyboard: Apple installed it here for the first time problematic butterfly keyboard, which was considered sensitive to contamination. The group had to set up an exchange program several times for this.
(bsc)