Holiday Guide: How to buy Apple gear, affordably
It’s the holidays and the special Apple fans in your life have their fingers crossed for some new gadgets to unwrap. But you’ve got a problem: The bank account isn’t quite robust enough to pay full price for an iPhone 5 or the latest Mac. What to do?
Luckily, Macworld has you covered with a variety of suggestions for getting Apple gear in a cost-effective fashion, along with the pros and cons of each approach. Most of these ideas probably won’t satisfy the early adopter in your family, but to get the very newest gear under your tree, you usually have to pay full price. So, for everybody else, here are a few options:
Apple sells good-as-new refurbished products directly.
Refurb
You can actually buy used Macs and iOS devices directly from Apple—and in a condition that’s almost as good as new. The “refurb” category includes both preowned devices and those returned for defects, although Apple says that only “some units” have been returned for technical issues. Before resale, Apple cleans the machine, replaces any defective or substandard parts, reinstalls software that originally shipped with the unit, tests the Mac for quality-control issues, then repackages it with fresh cables and a user’s manual. The company even stamps the machine with a new serial number.
Pros: You get Apple-certified quality machines at a reduced price. (Prices are usually at least ten percent off what you’d pay for a brand-new device.) You even get the free year of AppleCare that you’d get from purchasing a new device.
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