17/06/2026
When you buy a premium product like an M4 iPad Air, you are buying a complete, working package—both the aluminum shell and the code running inside it. If a standard over-the-air update or local reset can’t easily fix a device because it deadlocks on its own settings menu, the average buyer shouldn't be expected to break out a PC, navigate recovery modes, and risk losing data just to make a brand-new device function. But that's Apple's answer - why don't you factory reset it - why should we - it's their software generally that's not working on a device they made. Why can't they fix it !
Under the UK Consumer Rights Act, goods must be:
Of satisfactory quality
Fit for purpose
As described
A tablet that crashes when you try to open the Settings panel fails the "satisfactory quality" and "fit for purpose" tests right out of the gate.
Had a customer bring a brand new M4 iPad in that everytime you try to go into settings, gives the black whirrig ring of death and it's a software fault casused by a recent update, Apple's own update, what happens behind the scenes when you click on the settings icon is SpringBoard, the fundamental user interface application for iPadOS (it manages the home screen, app launching, and core UI graphics) has a security and stability daemon called watchdogd (the Watchdog Timer). Its job is to ping vital system services constantly. If a core service stops responding for too long, the watchdog intentionally panics the entire system and reboots the device to prevent a permanent freeze.
My crash logs showed this was bugging out - so the fault was a software fault attributed to the ios - not a faulty device and as the customer said ' but it's apple's device and apple's software and it's not fit for purpose', it's not my job to pay to have it fixed - he's quite right - he paid me for my diagnostics and is off to John Lewis to remind them of the Consumer Credit Act of 1985 that requires an electrical device bought in the EU be fit for purpose for 6 years and that should include software errors as Apple force their software onto the device.
He is going to update me the outcome.
