Activated MacBooks have appeared for sale in Russia. This is a new trend causing interest among consumers as well as questions about its repercussions.
Activated MacBooks are delivered to Russia in small batches. Mainly they are new models, acquired in the USA immediately after the start of sales. This method avoids suspicion from regulators, as it enters the country as a device for "personal use".
However, there are also drawbacks. The main one is the reduction in the warranty period. The warranty for such devices starts with the activation moment, not when the final buyer acquires and turns on the device. But the situation can also be viewed from another angle.
The date of the start of the warranty period is only calculated from the date of activation in the Apple database. This is convenient because you can just come to the authorized service center without a receipt, and they will check the term. But, firstly, Apple manually extended this period if you present a receipt with a later sales date. Secondly, from May of this year, the company's ASC is closing in Russia. Buyers of Apple equipment in Russia in case of breakdowns will refer to the sellers, and their warranty period in any case is calculated from the sales date according to the receipt or from the database of regular customers.
Editor-in-chief of iXBT.com Ilya Rubtsov
Activated MacBooks offer the same features and capabilities as their non-activated counterparts, but the box with the device is not opened by the buyer himself. This allows the retailer to engrave the Cyrillic keyboard onto the device. Apple also takes orders for the required keyboards, but such devices will take longer to reach the buyer.
Activating equipment abroad also helps to bypass the law on mandatory pre-installation of Russian software. This is associated with the fact that such devices do not fall under the jurisdiction of the aforementioned law. But it should be remembered that even in this case the seller in Russia is obliged to provide a warranty for the device, imported via parallel import. Thus, if technical problems are found after buying an activated MacBook, the buyer can return the device under the warranty provided by the retailer.
However, when purchasing already activated MacBooks there are also stumbling blocks. As Eldar Murtazin from Mobile Research Group emphasized in a comment to Izvestia, the buyer cannot be sure that nothing was done with the computer after its activation. As a result, the buyer acquires a laptop that has already been unpacked and possibly used. This can lead to certain problems, especially if unauthorized changes have been made to the device.
It's important to remember that when buying an already activated MacBook, it's always worth checking for hidden surprises, such as pre-installed third-party programs or changed settings.