Well, Margretta’s old 2011 headless MacBook Pro is still running. But swapping out a new screen didn’t fix its problem. Namely, it doesn’t have a working screen, which is a real bother, complicated by the fact that I actually need a laptop that will also run Snow Leopard (mid-2011 was the last year that the Snow Leopard OS was supported) for editing and scanning software that too has been rendered obsolete. Not to mention software for those back taxes.
And it’s nice to have a laptop I can move around. You know, actually use on my lap. Margaretta’s old MBP is tethered to an wonky lavender-hued external Apple LCD monitor—which is also losing its resolution. Now, I love lavender and all things purple, but not on a screen. It’s OK for Netflix, but makes editing photos a nightmare. I harbored some vague hope that swapping screens would work, I had nothing to lose. It was way easier than I expected, so I was pretty chuffed.
I do have other obsolete MacBook Pros, but this one was once my main squeeze for a few years as it has most of my work (photo archives) on it. And it runs my scanning and editing software. I have an exceedingly pricey top of the line Epson negative film scanner that cost $1200. Scanning old negatives was my big pandemic sequestration project.
I have file cabinets of thin black and white negatives of famous artists musicians and writers I need to bring into the 21st. c. (See a few samples here.) Reason enough to keep a working version of Snow Leopard alive. And before you ask, yes, I tried some of the newer third-party scanner software. No joy.
Then there are those back taxes. Shhh! As a teaching artist/poet, I make so little money, I am below the poverty belt, so to speak, but because I am also self-employed, I might as well be a billionaire as far as filing complicated taxes goes.
No short 1040 form for the self-employed. A draconian system where the billionaires pay no taxes, while those of us living in poverty pay more taxes than they do. Complicated doesn’t even begin to cover it. That’s the real reason why I don’t always file my taxes on time. I don’t have the bandwidth. I absolutely suck at math, but give me an old Mac that isn’t working and I can strip it down and reassemble it like a soldier fieldstripping his gun.
Every couple of years TurboTax ups its game and leaves me stranded. I probably would never upgrade at all if it wasn’t for TurboTax forcing my hand. But it would also help I just paid my taxes every year like other folks, then I wouldn’t have to hang onto obsolete technology. But it’s not as simple as that. I have scanning and editing software that will only run on the older MacBook Pros with Snow Leopard.
And the Intel cut off date for running Snow Leopard is mid-2011 MacBooks, not late 2011. I tried inserting a Snow Leopard hard drive in a 2012 MBP I picked up in June of 2021. White screen of death. I’ve also tried running my scanners on that same MacBook Pro. No support for Catalina. But that’s another story of no joy. This one’s about overcoming my fear of fixing a computer screen.
See, way back in 2016 or 17, Margretta gave her 2011 MacBook Pro a very generous glass of Chardonnay which didn’t go over well. (Backstory here.) Apple wrote it off as a total loss. She gave it to me for parts. I fiddled with it, washed it with Q-tips and 90% alcohol, I burped it and patted it and smacked it around a bit, and I couldn’t believe my luck, I got it up running.
I guess I got most of the vino corrosion off Margretta’s motherboard after all. Apple was wrong. The pundits said it wasn’t possible. They said it wouldn’t start. They said it would never run. They said it would soon die because of the wine residue on the motherboard. They gave it the thumbs down black screen of death. I am allergic to no. So I didn’t give up on it. When it comes to old MacBooks, I am very good at getting them to restart.
And I souped it up. It became my main squeeze for a few years, replacing my headless 2008 MBP, which I also rescued and souped up. I didn’t dare turn Margretta’s MBP off because the off-on switch was sticky. When I lived with Neil, it was my main computer, but its lack of a working screen became a major problem when I became feral, that is, homeless in August of 2018.
I had an extra 2012 MBP screen that took me two years to gather up enough courage to swap it with Margretta’s MBP, I was terrified. Using iFixit, I practiced first on the blown MBP someone gave me in 2021. I disassembled the screen without too much fuss but the hinges were downright cumbersome to disengage. So yesterday, I cracked my knuckles, took a deep breath (hell, I was hyperventilating), donned two pairs of readers and swapped screens. Swapping spit is a whole lot easier. I was drooling with concentration. But I did it. I overcame my fear (but really, I had little to lose) and swapped screens, jabbering to myself like a bluejay all the while (I’m also dyslexic).
The bad news, iFixit is right, the video cable is a bitch to reattach, the good news, I did it right. Erm. Second time was a charm. The other bad news. Apple too was right, it was a partially blown logicboard and/or video card. I tried all the reset PRAM tricks and all the other keyboard tricks as well. No love. Time to let go of Margaretta’s MBP, which I’ve used since 2017. Apple said it would corrode, it would die….not. I love proving the tech boyz wrong. But it’s time for catch and release.
All was not wasted on that ill-fated 2021 trip to San Francisco, where a 20-something douchebag sold the working 2012 MacBook Pro I had planned to buy to run TurboTax (yeah, fine print) as I drove down the highway from Sebastopol in Sonoma County. Apparently he couldn’t wait the hour and a half it took me to arrive. I was furious when he tried to fob off a blown 2012 MBP, saying it was just the battery. Not. I may have been old enough to be his grandmother, but did he really think that I was that stupid?
I tried to put it through its paces (I brought a power cord and an external hard drive), it couldn’t even do a basic two-step, it was a dead parrot, clearly a blown motherboard. After I refused to buy it, he eventually gave it to me as if it was a weird consolation door prize. We both knew it was a lost cause, and I guess he was impressed by my doggedness and determination. Ironically, I thought that I couldn’t use any of the parts, but I was wrong.
I wound up with a nonworking 2012 MacBook Pro for the price of a tank of gas. Last year, I cannibalized the battery, the optical drive, the hard drive, and other bits off the 2102 (when I got inside the case, I discovered it was really a late 2011—all the parts from 2009 to 2012 are swappable) so I got the idea to fix my 2011 MBP. And my 2010 MBP (with an equally lavender screen) was happy to get the battery and a working optical drive.
Swapping MacBook screens
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