Brand New 16inch Macbook Pro Dies after 9 days of use

[JDane]

Hi! So I bought a new 16 inch Macbook Pro 2019 and received it last week. It’s been working fine and fast until today.

All of a sudden while I was editing a video it just died. It wasn’t plugged but the battery was more or less at 60-70%.

I tried turning it back on again but it wouldn’t. Even when it’s plugged. No fans, keyboard light, trackpad click, absolutely nothing. It has no history of any water spill, fall, bump, and accidents.

So I tried a couple of ways from the internet in how to turn it on.

These are what I tried to do:
20-30s power button hold
Reset PRAM/NVRAM
Reset SMC
Booting into Recovery mode
(I also tested the charging brick, It works fine.)

all while plugged and unplugged but nothing happened. It still won’t turn on. I called apple support and they told me to bring it in for a checkup to see if there are ang factory defects. Which I will do next week.

But I would love to hear your thoughts ad if there’s any other way I haven’t tried to try to turn it on.

I’m just baffled how this could happen after using it for 9 days.

 

[4sallypat]

Sounds like it may have overheated.

Was this a refurb or used MBP ?

Any warranty on it ?

Applecare ?

Boot from external drive ?

 

[Falhófnir]

Unfortunately sometimes there are just random manufacturing errors that slip through. It’s bound to happen when manufacturing a product en masse. I expect Apple will take care of you as you are still in your 2 week return period anyway

 

[4sallypat]

Unfortunately sometimes there are just random manufacturing errors that slip through. It’s bound to happen when manufacturing a product en masse. I expect Apple will take care of you as you are still in your 2 week return period anyway

It would be taken care of by Apple, but the 2019 is a year old and unless you bought it as a refurb from Apple or has AppleCare, it may be out of warranty...

 

[Falhófnir]

It would be taken care of by Apple, but the 2019 is a year old and unless you bought it as a refurb from Apple or has AppleCare, it may be out of warranty...

You can still buy the late 2019 16” MacBook Pro new from Apple, that is what OP has done in this case, it’s still the latest model.

 

[JDane]

Sounds like it may have overheated.

Was this a refurb or used MBP ?

Any warranty on it ?

Applecare ?

Boot from external drive ?

I thought so too! But the conditions were unlikely, the fans were not throttling and my edit wasn’t heavy at all. Just regular 1080p footage with a little text motion graphics.

I didn’t purchase apple care since I’m pretty confident in how I handle my tech and It still has the 1year warranty which expires October 2021. It’s not refurbished it’s brand new. If it is a factory defect the warranty would cover it.

 

[JDane]

You can still buy the late 2019 16” MacBook Pro new from Apple, that is what OP has done in this case.

It is the late 2019 one. Brand new not refurbished. Just purchased this October 2020 from their website.

 

[JDane]

Unfortunately sometimes there are just random manufacturing errors that slip through. It’s bound to happen when manufacturing a product en masse. I expect Apple will take care of you as you are still in your 2 week return period anyway

Yeah man. What are the odds. I guess I’m lucky that way hahaha! It’s just a hassle since the nearest service center from me is a 4hour drive. But yeah, I’m pretty confident Apple would take care of it.

 

[Falhófnir]

It is the late 2019 one. Brand new not refurbished. Just purchased this October 2020 from their website.

Yep I think @4sallypat might be confused as the 16” hasn’t been updated this year unlike the rest of the MBPs, so the late 2019 is still the latest model.

 

[Falhófnir]

Yeah man. What are the odds. I guess I’m lucky that way hahaha! It’s just a hassle since the nearest service center from me is a 4hour drive. But yeah, I’m pretty confident Apple would take care of it.

Oh yeah that’s a pain when you’re a way from the Apple store - still at least you can be confident of getting a fix or more likely a new unit 😀

 

[ght56]

It sounds like there was a hardware defect and it didn't show up until the computer was being used under heavier load. It's not unusual for electronics to have higher failure rates in the very early stages of ownership (compared to the several years that follow) given some hardware defects may not manifest until the electronics see a bit of heavier and extended use. I think they will likely replace the unit if it is only 9 days old.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/78/Bathtub_curve.svg/2560px-Bathtub_curve.svg.png

 

[Allyance]

I am not familiar with Apple laptops, can you easily remove battery so you can do a true cold boot? Used to do that with PC laptops.

 

[JDane]

It sounds like there was a hardware defect and it didn't show up until the computer was being used under heavier load. It's not unusual for electronics to have higher failure rates in the very early stages of ownership (compared to the several years that follow) given some hardware defects may not manifest until the electronics see a bit of heavier and extended use. I think they will likely replace the unit if it is only 9 days old.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/78/Bathtub_curve.svg/2560px-Bathtub_curve.svg.png

This is great! Well technically it’s like 2months old.

I bought it in Singapore and got it Shipped to the Philippines. Since I had to go home because of Covid. The transit took almost 2 months.

The cargo arrived last week and I used the MBP for the first time fresh out of the box 9 days ago. So technically it’s a little older that 9 days but has only been used 9 days.

 

[MrGimper]

Sounds like it may have overheated.

Was this a refurb or used MBP ?

Any warranty on it ?

Applecare ?

Boot from external drive ?

Just like to point out that Apple refurbs aren't more likely to suffer failures than brand new.

 

[JDane]

I am not familiar with Apple laptops, can you easily remove battery so you can do a true cold boot? Used to do that with PC laptops.

Nope! Can’t do that. The battery is built in with the unit.

 

[4sallypat]

Just like to point out that Apple refurbs aren't more likely to suffer failures than brand new.

I am fully aware of that - refurbs from Apple are the best as if new compared to other 3rd party refurbisher.

I was trying to ascertain if the MBP was new, used, refurb, and AC coverage...

It's a moot point since the OP said it's a new unit from Apple and has a 1 year factory warranty.

OP: it's probably a good idea to buy Apple Care + if you want to keep it. At first I didn't but when I noticed how hot it runs, I bought AC+ within the first month. Now my battery that is 1 year old is starting to fail @ 80% capacity. Waiting to see when it drops below 80% so that I can have it covered.

 

[LinkRS]

Hi! So I bought a new 16 inch Macbook Pro 2019 and received it last week. It’s been working fine and fast until today.

All of a sudden while I was editing a video it just died. It wasn’t plugged but the battery was more or less at 60-70%.

I tried turning it back on again but it wouldn’t. Even when it’s plugged. No fans, keyboard light, trackpad click, absolutely nothing. It has no history of any water spill, fall, bump, and accidents.

So I tried a couple of ways from the internet in how to turn it on.

These are what I tried to do:
20-30s power button hold
Reset PRAM/NVRAM
Reset SMC
Booting into Recovery mode
(I also tested the charging brick, It works fine.)

all while plugged and unplugged but nothing happened. It still won’t turn on. I called apple support and they told me to bring it in for a checkup to see if there are ang factory defects. Which I will do next week.

But I would love to hear your thoughts ad if there’s any other way I haven’t tried to try to turn it on.

I’m just baffled how this could happen after using it for 9 days.

Howdy JDane,

Out of curiosity, when you plug it into power, do you hear the chime? When you plug it in, it should make the same sound as an iPhone/iPad does when plugged in. If you hear that, it means that it is at least somewhat responsive. Have you tried plugging in an external display? Maybe just the LCD is not working, or the backlight has failed (would mean the screen looks black)? Just some ideas.... Apple will take care of it, regardless. if you were using iCloud Drive, you shouldn't even lose any data if they have to replace it, or the logic board. Good luck!

Rich S.

 

[anthony13]

Could also be the T2 chip update problem. A friend of mine had a fairly new MacBook Pro 'die' because of this. Basically some sort of glitch that causes the machine to brick while updating. Great thing about Apple is I'm sure they'll cover it, its only been 9 days? I've had apple literally replace 4 year old laptops for free (with an updated one).

 

[MrGimper]

I am fully aware of that - refurbs from Apple are the best as if new compared to other 3rd party refurbisher.

I was trying to ascertain if the MBP was new, used, refurb, and AC coverage...

It's a moot point since the OP said it's a new unit from Apple and has a 1 year factory warranty.

OP: it's probably a good idea to buy Apple Care + if you want to keep it. At first I didn't but when I noticed how hot it runs, I bought AC+ within the first month. Now my battery that is 1 year old is starting to fail @ 80% capacity. Waiting to see when it drops below 80% so that I can have it covered.

I appreciate that, but wanted to avoid anyone coming across your post and interpreting it incorrectly.

 

[NT1440]

Sounds like it may have overheated.

Was this a refurb or used MBP ?

Any warranty on it ?

Applecare ?

Boot from external drive ?

Overheating wouldn’t permanently disable a computer. It would shut itself off for protection and as soon as its cooled off its back to normal.

This just sounds like a lemon, which is unfortunate on a product that costs a lot, but this is mass manufacturing at the end of the day.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

Sounds like you have two choices at this point:

1. Take it to a brick-n-mortar Apple Store genius bar,
or
2. Call Apple Support, and request that it be returned to them for repair or replacement. They'll send you a prepaid shipping box for the return.