A Reddit forum user under the handle otto-mate shared an unusual outcome from visiting an Apple Store to fix an outdated laptop. Instead of just a simple battery swap, the company gave him a brand-new 16-inch MacBook Pro M4 Max, valued over £3249 (roughly 343.3 thousand rubles), free of charge.
The reason for visiting was a system prompt indicating the necessity of replacing the battery in a 15-inch MacBook Pro from 2018. An independent service estimated the repair cost at £200 (about 21.3 thousand rubles), whereas Apple’s official service quoted £45 (around 4.7 thousand rubles) for the battery replacement. Following diagnostics, engineers ordered parts and advised the procedure would take about a week.
However, the repair was delayed: after two weeks, the owner was informed that the laptop had failed during the maintenance process. Efforts to restore the device using two sets of new components proved unsuccessful. Consequently, Apple offered the customer compensation via a replacement with a device having “the closest possible specifications.”
According to the user, he had anticipated receiving a refurbished MacBook with an Apple proprietary processor, but instead, he was issued a new 16-inch MacBook Pro running on the Apple M4 Max—the most powerful model in the current lineup. Based on the stated value, this points to the flagship configuration featuring a 16-core processor, 48GB of unified memory, and a 2TB SSD.
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