INTRODUCTION/UNBOXING/FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Wow! I am quite fussy and buying "refurbished" from a company I had not heard of before was a bit of a worry, as the word is a bit subject and I did not know what to expect. I assumed a new battery and perhaps a new keyboard, but would have thought it unreasonable to not expects some blemishes and scratches - the question being how many.
So the parcel arrived! An i9 retina 15" 1TB 32Gb monster! The laptop came in custom but plain box, which was a good fit but I would have preferred it had some plastic foam or bubble wrap around the laptop. That said, BackMarket's website overtly states their commitment to the environment and the laptop arrived in perfect health with no plastic packaging involved.
The MacBook does not come in an Apple box and I do not care. The charger is not OEM, and I am delighted because my experience of Apple OEM chargers is not that great.
Then there was the shock and I am still reeling, because I do not understand how this is possible given this pre- M1 device is years old. It is pristine. It looks like what is called "New Old Stock" i.e. a device that has passed into obsolescence on a stock shelf and never been used. I do not really believe that the casing if used could still look like this and do not believe that the MacBook satin silver finish could be restored to blemish free after scratching and general wear. In short, I believe this is exactly what I've just mentioned - a new-old-stock device with (hopefully) a battery replacement. It can be described in a single world with no need of a fuller review - and that word is 'Stunning'
CLOSER SCRUTINY: The boot up showed English and Pinying as keyboard layout options instantly selectable, without need to click '+' and enter a list. This is revealing as looking at the keyboard the UK market Macbooks have a '£' symbol on the '#' key but this keyboard has no £ symbol. Given '#' is also a 'Pound' symbol, and [Option] + # delivers the '£' symbol - this does not bother me in the slightest. Nevertheless, these two aspects make me wonder. I had assumed a UK company refurbing these computers but now I think any refurb in happening at a much greater scale and happening in China... were that not so I think a UK layout with the £ symbol would have been fitted be that if this is the New-old stock or a replacement.
The Macbook I have bought from BackMarket has the massive touchpad Apple shouted from the rooftops about, claiming it the largest in the market, perhaps as a counter to the reality, that even fairly cheap Windows machines offered a rather larger touch experience - the entire screen! I had thought the touchpad had a bit of an odd noise and worried it was a refurb cheap replacement - but coincidentally watched a movie today where someone used the same model Macbook and the noise was identical.
I hade not realised I was buying a machine that still had the wonderful if bizarrely then discontinued touchbar - I love it! I am unsure why Apple abandoned it as I had been suggesting such a feature for years and was shocked that when Apple became the company to implement it, it did not catch on.
BATTERY: BackMarket offers a great value 2 year battery replacement warranty. I wanted to keep my costs down so this is a personal choice but I kinda figured that the most basic aspect of 'refurb' would be a battery replacement, and I would not expect a battery to fail in two years. However now I am inclined to think this new-old-stock, I can see the possibility the battery having never been used may be original; so this may be a good option.
CHARGER: This was a disappointing third-party item which within a few days when plugging into the mains greated me witha blinding white flash from inside its casing accompanied by a loud electronic 'Crack!!'. I am not sure if I was using the correct supplied USB lead or another, but thereafter I was unable to get it to charge the laptop and even had that not been the case I would still have binned it as clearly this sort of behaviour from a charger suggests it is perhaps not up to the quality, or ear even perhaps the safety standards we expect in the UK. I bought an OEM one (Horribly expensive) and a different third party charger of specific MacBook purpose and clone of its form (reasonably priced) , and both work fine with the MacBook which is now charging gain as normal.
UP SELL: OK so BackMarket also suggest adding a soft case. I didn't bother because I assumed a MacBook with sufficient scratches, or worse, to roll with any more occurring in my use. i never imagined I was going to receive a pristine 'as new' device. So now I need a softbag! Back Market's was not unreasonably priced and buying it at the same time would have been so much more convenient than now buying one elsewhere.
CONCLUSION: I appreciate this review may sound so effusive, bar the disappointing charger and that some may think I have a connection to Back Market. I promise you I do not. This MacBook, in this specification, at this price is incredible. I would suggest however that Back Market up their game on the chargers they are supplying and ideally with chargers that at least look like the OEM design as there are many such items available and those I have tried do not exhibit the above issue, albeit one i bought some years ago had a tendency to run alarmingly hot, so they'd need to do a bit of a study before choosing which to include in future.