[silman]

Been using a 2010 15" Macbook Pro since i found it in the dumpster in 2014 (yup...), it was my first ever time owning a macbook and using OSX (outside of some time on friends computers, etc) and i love that thing. I used linux before but wasn't so hot on the grueling labor of repairing simple stuff, and so i was stuck on windows coming from a windows-fanboy past - now i am a huge OSX fan for its combination of ease of use and POSIX compliance; but i refuse to buy any new macbook pro.

I want my magsafe charger, i want my displayport and ethernet port, i want my CD drive, i want to be able to replace the battery myself (done it twice), and to swap hard drives (done it four times) and RAM (once) easily, I want physical keys for escape and media buttons.

I have gone so far as to personally take out the motherboard and replace a single tanatalum capacitor with an aluminum-polymer capacitor (requiring me to scrape off some of the soldermask off so i could solder to the ground plane easier since the Al-Poly cap is much larger) because the tantalum one was causing GPU kernel panic crashes. (Big thanks to Louie Rossman for the tutorial video!)

I've brought this thing back from the brink of death many times and i will continue to do so until Apple cleans up their act and makes a true developers laptop again.

[FullyFunctional]

Funny I have an identical situation with my 17" 2006 MBP which has been repaired, and upgraded countless time. It has passed to many family members but it's back with me and I love it everytime I use it. Unfortunately, High Sierra doesn't support it so I don't know what it's future holds. My MBP 2016 is a disappointment; TB 3 is cool but I hate the touchbar and keyboard.