Ugh. There's a Mac repair place in Evanston I might take it to instead.

Now I have my doubts that it's the HD, even though the HD sometimes make weird noises when I try to start it. A bad HD shouldn't stop it from booting off a DVD or USB drive, right? I fear it may be some disk controller issue that would be beyond my ability to fix.

Thoughts?

My 2008 MacBook pro had the motherboard go out last year. Took them about 90 minutes to diagnose tho.

My 2008 MacBook pro had the motherboard go out last year.

Did you have it fixed? If so, how much did it cost?

Darn. I was thinking of replacing my MacBook Pro with one of the new 13" MacBook Pros with retina display and SSD (that comes out later this year, right?) So I don't wanna stick a lot of money into it, as it's 3 years old.

Sorry things have taken a long time at Apple stores for you. They have turned repairs around for me in 24 hours many times. Rarely more than 48. The last time I walked in with a bad computer I walked out with a brand new one 60 minutes later.

Do you think the Apple store would be a better option than a reputable independent repair place?

Do you think the Apple store would be a better option than a reputable independent repair place?

Well, you could take it to the Geniuses and try to figure out what's wrong, and then see if it's cheaper at an independent place...

I felt better treated by the Genius encounter I had. Not least of all because they replaced my water damaged thingummy for free even after my warranty expired. But they were nice and focussed and businesslike. There's no use extrapolating from my independent repair experience to what's available to you, but I felt there was a degree of sketch there--possibly because I used to run a tech support department, except it was Compaq and IBM instead of Apple.

tommy,

my computer was under warranty, so they took it from me and repaired it. ND is right though, they told me it would take a week, but I think it took 2 days max.

are you sure your computer is not under warranty (applecare)?

Some geniuses will cut you a break, so hopefully you'll get a good genius who will try to minimize the expense for you.

tommy, try resetting the SMC if you haven't already:

[link]

tommy, try resetting the SMC if you haven't already:

Hmmm. The list of things that a screwed-up SMC causes doesn't sound like my problem.

In any event, I have a 6 PM appointment at the Genius Bar at the Michigan Ave. store in downtown Chicago.