Forbes columnist writes about iMac repair experience at Apple's SoHo Genius Bar

David A. Andelman tells of his maddening experience with getting his 17-month old iMac G4 repaired after it failed to show any signs of life one evening last week. Being a New Yorker, David chose to bring his iMac down to the Apple store in SoHo at 6am on a Tuesday morning, lured by the "promise" that computers arriving at the Genius Bar before 8am would be ready the same day.

Unfortunately, despite that pledge and despite having the phone numbers of several well-placed Apple corporate contacts, it still took 3 days to get his iMac back – and were it not for those calls made to Apple corporate, it would have been at least a week.

Andelman admits that his experience wasn't unique to Apple, but he also raises an excellent point about how computers in general are still not nearly as reliable as the other things we rely on in our daily lives, such as automobiles, refrigerators and even television sets.