I have the very same problem, I contacted Apple and they said they would only do the repair work for free if the machine was under four years old, no exceptions. Mine was four years and two months and they would not entertain it. The best of it is that had I been made aware of the problem by Apple who obviously knew about it, it could have been done under there scheme when it first started to show signs of the fault a year earlier!!! Apple could have contacted everyone who bought a machine like this via email which they will have obtained when the machine was registered with them, very simple!