If you read my blog, you might remember that about 2 years ago, I bought a black MacBook laptop from Apple. I also purchased Apple's "AppleCare" extended warranty for it, which cost $249 (maybe a bit less since I'm an academic) and extended the warranty from 1 year to 3 years. Extended warranties (usually the ones offered by retailers like Best Buy, Office Max and Circuit City) get their share of probably deserved criticism, but AppleCare is entirely manufacturer-run, like some (though perhaps not all) similar extended warranty plans offered by other computer makers. Since I travel extensively and use my laptop for probably 10-14 hours a day, I like AppleCare. Fairly early on - about three months and 20,000 miles in - I had some problems with its wireless internet capabilities, which turned out to be due to a defective AirPort card. I "worked around" the issue for a while, then finally had the sense to take the laptop to an Apple r