# So, in your experience, what went wrong in the Macs?



## Sunnz (Jan 25, 2007)

I have only been using Macs for 6 months, haven't had any problems yet... but quite contrary to my experience, I heard a lot about the Mac isn't as good as it used to be... it had all kinds of problem... I guess the new one being the one with Intel chip and the old one being PPC. And people saying they liked the iBook more than the MacBook... which I really can't understand!!!

So I was wondering, maybe it is because I never owned a PPC Mac to realise what a Mac _should_ be capable of? I always use PPC Macs at school, can't really tell the difference... except that my newer, Intel Macs is faster!!! 

So may I just ask, if you had any problems with newer Macs, what were the problems? Would they have happen back in the PPC days where the QA is supposedly better?

Cheers.


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## Timotheos (Jan 25, 2007)

The only Mac i have ever owned is my 2 year old PPC pBook. Apart from the fact it was dropped 3 times (needing 2 new hard drives, expensive for a student but atleast she still runs like the first day I got her) I cant say I have had any problems.

I did have a flat mate that brought a new intel macBook, the first mac she has ever owned and I cant say she has had any problems. There were issues with heating, quality control and things like that in macBook pros that i know of. One of my friends had one (a macBook pro) and im pretty sure he didnt have problems. It did look damn fine too.

To be honest, while they would be problems with the new macs (since people complain), I would doubt  its nothing compaired to most, if not all other companys. The fact that we (mac users) complain is what pushes apple to deliver better and better products.

Or atleast thats what I think when we have all these negative threads on the forums. Its all good for apple


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## HeliAnimal (Jan 25, 2007)

I can't imagine any problems except for people at 1st being ticked for moving to intel. I have not heard anything. I used an iBook and it sucked and was major freakin' slow. 

Hey I'm not far from you currently.. Auckland NZ


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## Timotheos (Jan 25, 2007)

Im not far from either of you, Tauranga (summer) Wellington (winter)

Pacific represent!


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## Yesurbius (Jan 25, 2007)

Apple has had a lot of history with their PPC line.  I think they've learned a lot from their mistakes in the past, and apart from new problems specific to the Intel chip - I think we can expect a lot fewer mistakes in the future.

Remember: A company that innovates, makes more mistakes but learns more from them and has a superior product in the end.


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## fryke (Jan 25, 2007)

When I got my MacBook it got too hot without the fan kicking in for keeping it cool. Its keyboard-surrounding plastic has turned orangey-brown, which kinda defies the purpose of the beautifully designed white plastic. Battery life was better at the beginning, it's much shorter now (and yes I *do* keep it 'fit'). *NEVER* had such problems with my PowerBook 150 back in the 90s! 

Well, that PB 150 was very good, albeit slow, and it _really_ didn't get hot. But its battery life was less than the MB's from the beginning and of course the plastic was dark, which wouldn't show wear so quickly anyway. So I'm just kidding, really. Love my MacBook.


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## Sunnz (Jan 25, 2007)

Timotheos said:


> There were issues with heating, quality control and things like that in macBook pros that i know of.



Umm may I ask exactly what quality control and 'things like that' problem it had? Any links??

I got a MacBook now, thinking of going MacBook Pro sometime in the future. (When I finish school.)


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## Thank The Cheese (Jan 25, 2007)

MacBook Pro:
- DVD drive failed. 
- repalcement DVD drive fails to burn discs more often than it succeeds
- gets very very very hot
- I hear the whine a lot

Apple is definitely having some teething issues as they expand too fast to keep up, but I still love my MacBook Pro. The DVD drive thing is annoying, but that's really the only serious thing, and I dont tend to use it much anyway.


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## Sunnz (Jan 25, 2007)

How hot does it actually get??

Sometimes I can feel the heat from the left side of the keyboard of my MacBook, it is hot but still 'typable'. It cools after a while if I put it into asleep. I got the black one so I don't see any yellow thing that happens on the white ones yet...


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## pds (Jan 25, 2007)

I don't think the "not like it used to be" is necessarily connected to the Intel switch. It reaches back further to the time when Macs used scsi HDs and other higher quality parts.

My older Macs - 2 LC IIIs and a 6500 (one of the first IDE equipped Macs) - still run flawlessly as typing stations and e-mail stations. The toilet seat iBook was a work horse and handled everything I threw at it and never missed a beat until the repairman folded the keyboard cable wrong when upgrading the HD. :-\ In short - things lasted forever and upgrades were choices, not necessities.

White iBooks were another matter altogether. The G3 motherboard problem just plain stank. I lost one 14 incher before Apple extended the warrantee and then had to replace the board 3 times on the 12 inch I bought as a replacement. The 12 inch finally died a final time in December. Four major failures of one machine, more than all other failures on many machines going back to 1992.

We were not accustomed to problems with dead pixels on laptops, or bad battery life, or out of the box HD failures that have happened in recent years as Apple has used more "mainstream" components. I can't remember a battery recall before this one (ok - I blame it on Sony, but still....)

Upgrades were less contentious back when also. Software Update is usually good, but a few fixes needed to be fixed - notably the update to Jaguar that  fried many peoples batteries (my battery life dropped from just under 2 hours to about 10 minutes) and a firewire foul-up with one of the Panther upgrades. 

Still, even worse than before is better than the other options. I read somewhere that about 25% of Dell laptops fail in the first month or so.

Fortunately first impressions are lasting ones and so my first impressions hold me through the recent less stellar times. I am happy with my white Macbook, not worried about the heat (my G4 iBook was hotter) and looking forward to newer and better stuff.


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## ebykm (Jan 25, 2007)

I'd say these days Apple is after 6months deadline, so proper QC suffers. Back in the 90's things were different, new hardware rarely came out every 6months they had plenty of time. And there weren't cheapo, poor quality components those days. Nowadays the fake industry makes anything even HDTV's


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## limike28 (Jan 25, 2007)

I have one of the earlier MacBook Pros.  And it has been ok, but had some issues with the superdrive and does get pretty hot.     

I don't think anything went seriously wrong with the Macs.  It's more of a shakeout when they moved from PPC to Intel.  

Basically, if I had had the chance I would have used the same sound advice used with cars.  Never buy a car in it's first model year.  There are always small kinks that need to be worked out.


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## HeliAnimal (Jan 25, 2007)

Timotheos said:


> Im not far from either of you, Tauranga (summer) Wellington (winter)
> 
> Pacific represent!



Holy Crap.. I'm in Tauranga right now! Crazy small world! i'm going to Rotorua today. I haven't seen one Apple store in NZ.


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## MrTAToad (Jan 25, 2007)

I have heard there have been quality control problems (a fair few mentioning it in the Mac section of ADSLGuide) - although most people tend to complain about the quality (or lack thereof) of repairs.


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## Sunnz (Jan 25, 2007)

HeliAnimal said:


> Holy Crap.. I'm in Tauranga right now! Crazy small world! i'm going to Rotorua today. I haven't seen one Apple store in NZ.


AFAIK there are no Apple Stores in Australia... only resellers... I guess it is similar in NZ?


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## Ferdinand (Jan 25, 2007)

I think he _also_ meant re-sellers, since real Apple Stores _only_ exist in the US, the UK and Japan, so...


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## Thank The Cheese (Jan 25, 2007)

Sunnz said:


> How hot does it actually get??
> 
> Sometimes I can feel the heat from the left side of the keyboard of my MacBook, it is hot but still 'typable'. It cools after a while if I put it into asleep. I got the black one so I don't see any yellow thing that happens on the white ones yet...



my MBP is typable, but the bottom of it, and the bar that runs across the top of the keyboard gets damn hot, sometimes literally too hot to touch. When doing anything intensive like 3D rendering I have to point my fan directly at it, or place it in the fridge because it gets so darn hot it would surely be shortening the lifespan.

I got a 7200rpm hard disk, which probably doesn't help matters. 

this yellowing macbooks is a real issue. i'm trying to convince my sister to get one, but I'm worried about the discoloration. I'm surprised apple haven't found  a fix yet.She actually wants to get it coloured pink, but I can't find any australiancolorware-type places.


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## Sunnz (Jan 25, 2007)

Ahh cool they ship internationally too... (link) though it is very expensive...

Maybe you can try ask at MacTalk, an Australian Mac forum.

Anyway, the bottom of my MacBook gets pretty hot too. I can put my hand _under_ the desk and feel the heat from there!!! I guess this was not the case with G4? Is it the processor that's hot or a combination of mobo, hdd, cpu?

What about performance-wise? The Intel should blow away the G4 on paper... but I have heard that people can go without a shutdown/reboot for months, where I can't really do it with my MacBook. The max uptime I had is 10 days? Is this normal with MacBook or???


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## mdnky (Jan 25, 2007)

It should be noted the MB Pros that get really hot are the first generation models (pre Core2Duo).  

The Core2Duo version I have hasn't got any hotter than my PowerBook (last G4 model made) did.  In fact, I almost have to say its cooler.

As far as speed...it blows the G4 away from my experience.  Even Photoshop CS2 seems to run faster (that's under Rosetta, mind you) on the MB Pro.  In something like Seti, there's a huge advantage.  MB Pro does 2 work units in one hour and forty minutes, while the G4 1.67 did one work unit in four hours thirty minutes.


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## HeliAnimal (Jan 26, 2007)

I don't have any problems with my 1st Gen MacBook Pro getting hot.


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## Lt Major Burns (Jan 26, 2007)

fryke, have you got pictures of your yellowing macbook?


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## fryke (Jan 26, 2007)

nope, and it's really ugly. don't want to post any pix. but there were a lot of pix around when this problem first cropped up about a month after the MacBook's introduction. I'm told Apple will simply replace the top and keyboard under warranty - but I can't part with my MacBook for the 2 weeks I'm told it takes. :/ ... I have to find some way before the warranty runs out, though.


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## Mario8672 (Jan 29, 2007)

Yea, the intel mac's boot up time is almost HALF of the PPC's.


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## Captain Code (Jan 29, 2007)

AFAIK they've fixed the yellowing Macbooks by replacing the palm rest with different material.  And you can get yours fixed for free by Apple.  I don't really think there are too many problems compared to the PPC Macs.  The PPC laptops always had some problems too so they weren't perfect.  I haven't really heard anyone having problems with the Mac Pro either.

The C2D MBPs are really pretty cool when you're not taxing the cpu much.   They do get somewhat warm under load but no more than the G4 Powerbooks did.


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## nixgeek (Jan 29, 2007)

Mario8672 said:


> Yea, the intel mac's boot up time is almost HALF of the PPC's.



I can attest to this, even when compared to my iMac G5.  The Intel Macs (even the first Core Duo model) were snappy with their boot times.


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## pds (Jan 29, 2007)

It's a bit of a "plus/minus=zero" in my book. Sure the start-up time is shorter, but the new machines are dog slow waking from sleep. If my macbook goes to sleep with less than 10% charge on the battery, I usually need to restart to get it moving again. I _never_ had to do that on my iBook.


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## Captain Code (Jan 29, 2007)

That's strange because my MBP takes less than 3 seconds to wake from sleep.


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## fryke (Jan 29, 2007)

Yes, but 2.5 seconds is longer than the 0.5 it took my TiBook/500 back then.  ... It's still fast enough for me, though.


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## pds (Jan 30, 2007)

yeah - the iBook woke on opening the lid - before I could get my hands on the keyboard. And even the macBook beats a Toshiba we have at work - it takes as much as a minute to be ready to go.

But it's all a bit of a sideline to the thread - What went wrong? Nothing really.


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## ApeintheShell (Jan 30, 2007)

I think the difference between the Power PC Macintosh and the Intel Macintosh  is design. The hardware design went through many changes in 1998 thru 2005. 

We had the tray loading iMac, the slot loading iMac, the Flat Panel iMac, and the iMac G5. All of which had completely different designs. Even the Mac Mini was different.
Then there was the Power Mac G3, the Power Mac G4, Power Mac G4 Cube, and Power Mac G5.
Finally, the laptop line had three distinct changes: Powerbook G3/iBook G3 Clamshell, Powerbook G4 Titanium/iBook G3 Icebook, and iBook G4/Powerbook G4 Aluminum.

The new Mac line has a Macbook, Macbook Pro, iMac, Mac Pro, and Mac Mini. This is great but there was minimal changes to the design of these machines besides the addition of new ports, placement of those ports, and wider/bigger screens. The laptops are thin and the iMac is slimmer but the buzz about them is not as big as it was. I remember when Apple released the Titanium Powerbook and it was 'the next big thing'. People described it as 'sexy'. No one called a PC 'sexy' or even 'cool'.


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## fryke (Jan 30, 2007)

I guess the main reason for them *not* to change the designs too much while in the intel transition was to not give the idea of those not being Macs or something like that. The iMac very nicely showed that it looked the same, worked the same etc. - but faster.

One year later now... They _can_ start to change designs. The question probably is: Does it make _sense_ to change the designs. Other than a short-lived wow-effect, I mean...


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## ApeintheShell (Feb 4, 2007)

If you are talking about short lived 'wow' from the Mac user base than the iMac G4 hit the mark. There is always room for improvement and Apple proved it when they released the iMac G5 in September 2004. Walt Mossberg labeled that design as the "Gold Standard of desktop computing" and PC Magazine gave the iMac G5 a 5 out of 5. The only change was its thickness which is about the same from my point of view. Suprisingly, the editors from PC Magazine actually gave the iMac a 4.5 out of 5 when Apple went intel. Maybe they wanted a new design also.

The second generation of the iMac G3 did well and there were a total of four major revisions. This pattern has continued all the way to the Intel Core 2 Duo. So we can expect to see two more revisions and a new design but it is Apple's call.


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## Darshan (Feb 4, 2007)

I'd say that overall Apple quality control has been sliding since they moved operations to the Chinese mainland from Taiwan a few years ago.
Workers in China are most often horribly and mercilessly exploited, with pathetically meager wages -very long workdays in nasty, high pressure environments - crowded, unhealthy and expensive living conditions - health care unavailable/unaffordable for hundreds of millions - and no union protection.  
Can one really expect quality work from people living/working under those conditions? 
No doubt, most of Apple's management and CEOs, many with their multi-million dollar mansions, private jets and gold plated perks care little about their workers in China.
Out of the billion and a quarter people living in China, only a very small percentage are benefiting from China's economic boom.
It's not only Apple, of course, that's screwing the Chinese people(with the Chinese government's blessing, of course) and profiting mightily. Thousands of companies, worldwide, including China's own, are doing it.


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## sirstaunch (Feb 4, 2007)

Sunnz said:


> AFAIK there are no Apple Stores in Australia... only resellers... I guess it is similar in NZ?



In my town in Victoria AU, there is a resller who once had an Apple repair man and couldn't afford to keep him on, saying the upgrades made it expensive for them to keep training him


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## Sunnz (Feb 4, 2007)

What upgrades?


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## sirstaunch (Feb 4, 2007)

Like the hardware upgrades and such, the changes in different types of Macs, from the old 604e processors to the G5 and now the inTel. They needed to pay their Apple service man to be updated to keep his licence, and it was to expensive for them.


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## irfaan (Feb 5, 2007)

Captain Code said:


> AFAIK they've fixed the yellowing Macbooks by replacing the palm rest with different material.  And you can get yours fixed for free by Apple.



Is there any way to know if a macbook has the new material in it or not (if you bought it late, as in Aug of last year, did they start using the new material)?


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## fryke (Feb 5, 2007)

They corrected the material relatively early, and the yellowing started about a month after buying one, so I'd say you're safe if it's not yellow yet.


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## Yesurbius (Feb 5, 2007)

You guys in Australia and NZ are lucky.   Word is, the situation in Greece and Poland are very bad.  A single company has the license from the government to import Apples - and no other can get a license.  Apple doesn't (or maybe can't) setup shop in the countries - so everything is at the mercy of these middlemen who really foul things up.

http://digg.com/apple/We_Want_Apple_Greece


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## Sunnz (Feb 5, 2007)

sirstaunch said:


> Like the hardware upgrades and such, the changes in different types of Macs, from the old 604e processors to the G5 and now the inTel. They needed to pay their Apple service man to be updated to keep his licence, and it was to expensive for them.


Ohh so every time Apple releases an upgrade they have to "upgrade" the Apple repair man as well?


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## Mystic Gohan (Feb 17, 2007)

I have a G5 PowerPC that has 2x250gig HDDs RAID 0 together, and one of them went corrupt for no apparent reason. Other than that, I have never had any issues that I didnt do myself.


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## Lt Major Burns (Feb 17, 2007)

hard drives die.  that's what they do.


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## middigit (Feb 18, 2007)

Work iMacs (G3) were always a pain in the ass - well that's partly true, it was mainly OS9. Personally i have an iBook (G4) and a Mac Mini (G4), had a few minor things with both but nothing that isn't just general niggles


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## Ferdinand (Feb 25, 2007)

I ordered my MacBook in Febuary, and got it in June, so they made it in April/May. Mine doesn't get yellow at all, so they must have fixed it really fast, considering they introduced the MacBooks in January. When did you get yours, Fryke? And how did you get it so fast? In Europe they started with the MacBooks in Febuary, so I placed the order, as soon as the stores had them. Did you buy yours online or at a store?

Oh and by the way Fryke: Neuigkeiten wegen dem Apple Store in der Bahnhofstraße, oder wo immer die jetzt ist? Bauen sie schon?


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## Sunnz (Feb 25, 2007)

Hmmm... new Apple store has been built?


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## ApeintheShell (Mar 19, 2007)

Looking back at my post and not wanting to include additional tid bits from history I feel it was a smooth transition from PowerPC to Intel. It could have been a lot worse if Mac users wanted it to be.
Apple has finally come full circle with their hardware and operating system. It works as advertised and when I select Shut Down from the menu it shuts down. When I press the power button it is ready to go as soon as I turn around. I have yet to see a Windows PC do what a Mac does. It just works and it works well.


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## fryke (Mar 19, 2007)

Actually, though, selecting Shutdown or Restart prompts you if you really, really want to do that. They added that in Panther or something. Hate it.


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## ApeintheShell (Mar 22, 2007)

Well obviously it is there for a reason. When you accidently hit the power button while plugging in a USB or Firewire device. It is also gives a countdown so if you want to wait for two minutes you can always cancel it. You must accidently shut down a lot. lol


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## Satcomer (Mar 22, 2007)

fryke said:


> Actually, though, selecting Shutdown or Restart prompts you if you really, really want to do that. They added that in Panther or something. Hate it.



Be a keyboard master and hit control+eject button. To sleep immediately hit option+command+eject button.


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## fryke (Mar 23, 2007)

I don't really have a problem with those. I close the lid when I want it to sleep.  But Apeintheshell: I was talking about the Apple menu items "restart" and "shutdown". You don't hit those by accident, I think.


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## RompStar (Mar 24, 2007)

I have my G5 Power Mac, dual core PPC 2 GIG and Iove it, i hod 2gig of ram, but can expand it to 16gig, take dat!

I love my machines, laptop is next in the future.


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## ApeintheShell (Apr 6, 2007)

What if there was a natural disaster like rocks falling on your roof and one came through, hit you on the back of the head, and your hand slipped and moved the mouse all the way to the shut down menu. With your last breath you whispered, "no!!" as the computer shut down and lost all of your work. It wasn't your last breath and from now on you use the control-eject key commands.
Thanks for the key commands btw Satcomer.


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## RompStar (Apr 9, 2007)

Whatever is that you are smoking, I sure would like some!


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## Sunnz (Apr 9, 2007)

ApeintheShell said:


> What if there was a natural disaster like rocks falling on your roof and one came through, hit you on the back of the head, and your hand slipped and moved the mouse all the way to the shut down menu. With your last breath you whispered, "no!!" as the computer shut down and lost all of your work.



Yea but...

What if there was a natural disaster like a _power outage_, and as you see the light goes out, with your last breath you whispered, "no!!" as the computer shut down and lost all of your work.

Yea, only if there is a dialogue box: "Power outage initiated, cancel or allow?"


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