M.A.C. Berkeley

Reviews 7

BE

beth alyse snyder

I literally cannot find enough good things to say about this place. Everyone I worked with has been so unfailingly kind, generous, helpful, and absolutely freaking brilliant. Ive been struggling with a rats nest of computer problems for the past year--thanks, Apple Store YOU SUCK--and had finally given up on getting any of them straightened out. Push came to shove and I had no choice but to deal with it, but nothing was getting me to ever go back to the Apple Store…so I finally stumbled desperately into M.A.C. Juan immediately assured me that he could help, and right away I knew I was in the right place. I had to go back a few weeks later for another issue, and this time it was the wonderful Wai who took me under his wing and solved all my problems. He referred me to Matt for some specialized fixes, who heroically and patiently sat down with me for as long as it took to fix a myriad of entrenched problems, never once showing frustration with my lack of ability to understand the technology we were working on. Interestingly, because these guys continually managed to explain every step of the way in language that I, essentially a tech idiot, could understand, what had formerly been a dreaded chore actually became very interesting. I am amazed to say that I had fun. It was truly a pleasure to work with them all, and all I can say is dont waste your time going anywhere else. There is a reason these guys have been around for as long as they have: they are totally professional, genuinely good human beings, very creative at problem-solving, easy to be around, interesting to talk to, and hot damn do they know their stuff.

---

BE

Ben Gebre-Medhin

These guys are the best! A local shop where I can get great advice about my Mac from knowledgeable technicians who are allowed to wear whatever color shirts they want and work the kind of magic that the "geniuses" at the Apple store seems to be above. Ok ok, so I might be a little biased. These guys just rescued me, big time. Heres what happened. My GFs computer had been acting strange for a few months so I said Id take a look at it. I noticed that it seemed to be a bit out of date, but nothing a little OS upgrade might not be able to fix. Long story short, about half way through the installation of Snow Leopard I got scary messages telling me that the installation had failed and that the drive was unreadable. With no backup my worst fears came true: everything on her computer was seemingly lost, and I was to blame. I took a deep breath and made an appointment with the Geniuses over at the Apple Store. Within 10 minutes they had run disk utility (which i had already tried) and proclaimed the drive dead. I was mortified. Surely the Genius at Apple knew what they were doing, right? WRONG! Without much to loose I took the drive over to M.A.C. They quoted me a price range that was way more reasonable than the data recovery services advertised online, they communicated some very clear and honest odds, and gave me a 4 day timeline. Sure enough, on day 4 I called and found out they had rescued all my data and helped me figure out how to get it back on my original machine, and all for under $100. They just earned my business for life. Thanks M.A.C., and keep up the good work.

---

PA

Patrick Dugan

Ive bought a couple accessories from MAC over the past year and a half and always had a positive experience until recently. I purchased a $20 dvi adapter for my macbook after being unable to find my original. Turns out a couple of days later I found the original factory adapter and brought the replacement in for a return. The store attendant was extremely rude about it and carried on about how they werent in the rental business, etc. He wasnt even going to let me return the item in question until I pushed back. Paid no mind to the fact I was already paying a 10% restocking fee on the return. The store clerk literally went on this tirade in front of a long line of customers. Didnt matter a bit that Id purchased cables, cases, power adapters, and all manner of accessories from them in the past. This guy was acting like a $20 dollar return was the end of the world and it made me extremely uncomfortable. I like supporting local business and usually dont mind paying an extra few dollars to do so. In this specific case, I could have purchased the adapter in question from Amazon for 1/2 the price and returned it without the hassle or the restocking fee. Instead I purchase locally and was treated like absolute garbage. Last time Ill be shopping here. Really unfortunate because I liked the place too.

---

GM

Gmoney 6422

So I stopped by thinking "oh cool a mac computer store" but I was unpleasantly supprised. a little bit of info i like the older macintoshes like the g3 g4 and g5. i asked to buy an i mac g3 and I thought "woah look at all of these computers in the middle" so i asked this man that worked there and he said that everything in the pile would be 75 dollars and he stormed away. so I asked how much would an i mac g3 be and he said "like I said before it would be about 75 dollars" so I was picking out the i mac and I set it up next to this woman that was talking to a customer and she says "you can set it here for now" very snotily and then the icing on the cake was when the guy said "you know that computer is junk what do you need it for" I said I that I want to play old games from my childhood on it" and then he started ranting about how it was playable on newer macs ect so then I was gonna buy it and he starts saying oh we have to prep it blah blah blah and I new I wasnt coming back AGAIN after how rude they were. Also the lack of helpfulness and service wasnt appreciated. I like supporting local buisnesses but I guess I wont be supporting these guys.

---

A

A Private User

I called them for a quote on an external hard drive, but when i got to the store they said they had given me the wrong price. Nevertheless I decided to support a local business rather than drive to the big box store in Emeryville. Later I had problems with the drive and took it back for testing. Clearly they did not test it because they said there was nothing wrong with it. I made them attach it to a computer and demonstrated the problem. They said that was normal with these type of drives and my problem was I should upgrade to a faster machine (I have the fastest Mac there is). I will never shop there again.

---

AM

Amo Tarnoff

I have been doing business with M.A.C. for twenty years and have always had outstanding service from them. They have solved problems with mac products for me that the famous "genious bar" guys couldnt handle - they seem to know way more than Apple Store employees about Apple products! They are consistently helpful and will often bend over backwards to give you the most cost effective solution even though they would have profited more otherwise. I wouldnt go anywhere else for Apple related issues, both sales, and especially service.

---

LU

Lucian Novosel

I went here today to get an external hard drive. I ended up in a good discussion with Wai about the problem I was actually facing with my MAC and the reason for why I was buying the external hard drive. By the time I left he had recommended that I buy the less expensive external hard drive given my scenario. I took his advice on that along with another piece of advice that ended up saving me $500. Helpful service. Clear advice. Knowledge of current computer services. Proper diagnosis of problem.

---

---