Apple is doing everything it can to make free iPhone and Mac repairs impossible. The latest step concerns the MacBook Pro: here the display is probably connected to the logic board via a serial number. If you exchange it for another one – even an original one from another MacBook Pro – there are no setting options in the software and extra graphic errors are introduced in the upper area to make it clear to you that initiative is not desired. It is explained and illustrated in detail in the very good video by Hugh Jeffreys.
But the opening sensor of the display is just as important: it is linked to the display. So if you swap the display but not the sensor, the sleep functions of the display won’t work, and in some display positions the entire MacBook won’t either. Apple thought it up cleverly: Sensor and display belong together and paralyze the Macbook Pro if a part is replaced. At the same time, if you put the matching sensor and display in a MacBook Pro with a different logic board, the display will not work properly either. Whichever way you look at it: You may have bought a MacBook Pro, but the question is increasingly whether you own it.
Since word is slowly getting around about climate change and the limited resources of our earth and it is already on fire in several places, you should ask yourself whether it is appropriate to prevent a free repair for a laptop costing several thousand euros. It is important to understand that this fact does not result from technical necessity, such as water resistance or, for example, cheaper production methods. The incompatibility is specially built in by Apple so that the laptop is scrap if you don’t want to pay Apple’s repair prices.
As long as you still have older Apple laptops that can be easily repaired, you will find suitable spare parts on Replacement Ninja. If you want to install a new operating system on older hardware, take a look at the OpenCore Legacy Patcher.
