My Apple iPad 2 32Gb is coming up to its six birthday and has travelled the world with me. Accompanied me up mountains, slept in a tent and sailed on ocean racing yachts. The only time it has put a foot wrong was when the internal battery had to be replaced. It’s not a love story but I have become quite fond of it as an efficient business tool.
Three days ago without warning it decided to upgrade to IOS11 itself, automatically and then rebooted itself. Once the silver Apple logo had finished its business and switched itself off it all looked good.
It then refused to switch on and the was notice saying it was Application locked until I typed in my Apple name and my password. Wrong! Name not recognised, then wrong password half a dozen attempts and am now frozen out until the following day.
Next day On the advice of the AppleSparks shop I switched the tablet on and before trying anything else I hard rebooted it. Same problem.
Apple have an impressive website for customer support and I went on that via my iPhone. To speak to anyone or contact by text or email you are required to prove you are a human being and not a robot by typing in a few letters and numbers. You do that, but the continue button remains greyed out. I tried that performance 16 times over two hours and could get no further. I’m a calm and placid type but my bloody iPhone nearly left my office via the window.
My local Apple technical repair shop had a go but got no further that I had and I was advised that if I couldn’t get on-line support I would have to go to my nearest Apple Store which is in Milton Keynes. A round trip of 30 miles! Have you ever tried parking in Central Milton Keynes?
I found the ? Store in the centre and was fortunate to find a support technician who spent over an hour on the problem after expressing a determination not to let it beat him. I left bearing a working iPad now linked to my iPhone, with somewhat mixed feelings about Steve Jobs and the Apple Corporation.
A little bird in their store let slip that one of their biggest complaints was from customers not being able to access the on-line support website. Not good from the worlds largest Information Technology Company who also send their customers glitches in their updates. No doubt they will soon be sending out updates containing patches to repair the problems.
I wonder if this grumpy old sod can claim for wasting three days of my life and thirty miles worth of petrol in a V8 4.5 litre car for sending a maggot to eat into my Apple?
