Apple expands independent repair program to Mac after US antitrust investigation | Hacker News Reader

Apple expands independent repair program to Mac after US antitrust investigation

techcrunch.com

439 pointsirontinkerer220 comments

Just as a reminder, their phone "independent repair program" has you signing rights to your business away (you are forced to let apple audit you at any time, you have to share personal client data on all of your clients with apple. All of this not limited to Apple repair part of your business) for the right to:

- remove battery / screen from client device

- send battery / screen to Apple with all clients personal information

- wait for replacement unit (at a price not dissimilar to the price of same model 100% working used device)

- mount new battery / screen after about a week

Its designed in a way to not make any economical sense, but sound like Apple is a real independent repair champion.

This is Apple trying to avoid real Right to Repair legislation by taking actions that look like they support independent repair.

Consider taking a moment to donate to https://repair.org/ - we're pushing to get Right to Repair laws passed in state legislatures across the US.

Apple's workaround may work in US but don't think it will get very far in EU

I don't know. It's infuriating what Apple gets away with in Germany. For example right now to maybe get my 2018 MacBook Pro keyboard fixed, I have to relinquish the unit for a minimum of five workdays. Mind you nobody guarantees me that they will actually do the repair within the time frame or that it will in fact be covered by the extended warranty. This is just the minimum time they will hold the unit to have a look at it and tell me what's up. Cool.

I actually just handed in my 2016 MBP and got the keyboard replaced under their extended 4 year “butterfly mishap”-warranty. The new keyboard feels so much better than the last one. Plus they also replaced the battery because it’s all soldered together, so battery life got like 50% better. It cost me nothing and they did it when I was on vacation anyway, so it wasn’t much of a nuisance. No data loss at all.

I live in Sweden but I think they sent it to Czech Republic for the replacement. Handed it in Monday evening and got it delivered to my door Tuesday the week thereafter.

All in all it was totally worth it, but I’ve only had it for a few weeks now so who knows how long it’ll last this time.

Would you take vacation the next time your laptop breaks?

I'm not an apple fan and never owned an apple laptop but, even with other brands unless you buy their enterprise models (e.g. dell latitude, lenovo thinkpad) with the appropriate warranty you won't get same day hardware support in most of Europe.

And even with onsite support with Dell I had a case when the battery died completely and the laptop could only work when plugged in, they did show up at the office, they checked it out diagnosed that the battery is dead (no kidding), and came back 2 days later with a new battery.

> unless you buy their enterprise models (e.g. dell latitude, lenovo thinkpad) with the appropriate warranty you won't get same day hardware support in most of Europe.

This is the case in the US as well, but I think it should be said that Apple is trying to compete with those classes of computer, not low end consumer grade models. I don’t know if I’d say they’re doing particularly well, but most of why Apple computers are so expensive is because they are designed to last and work well for business.

With other brands you can get 3rd party repairs done on a much quicker basis.

Heck, HP and Dell publish freely available technical manuals that you can look at and fix the device yourself.

I am a real believer in right to repair. But I wonder, if we are unable to achieve legislative results, what can be done to build hardware on open standards?

People have tried and failed.

https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/2/12775922/google-project-ar...

I think there is no money in letting people repair and upgrade components.

That was a dumb idea to begin with. We don't need phones that work like lego. Just reverting to how phones worked 5 years ago would be a massive improvement. For almost all users all they will ever need to do is replace the battery. We used to be able to replace the battery with no tools or skills and the screen was pretty easy if you had some skill at all.

The problem we face now is that the user can't fix anything at all, repair stores can fix things with great difficulty but they can't get new parts, and apple themselves can't even fix most things because the individual parts can't even be replaced on their own without replacing the whole thing. (The macbook keyboard which was prone to fail was attached with 50 rivets)

All we need is user replaceable batteries, and for service centres to have access to all the parts they need. Lewis rossman can't get access to a chip that was >$1 on the old macbooks and is prone to fail. The newer version of the chip is impossible to source meaning those macbooks either get binned or pay apple for a whole new mobo which costs more than the laptop is worth.

For real, all I want is for us to go back to the time where you could pop off the back cover of your phone by at worst unscrewing some screws, and the easily replace the battery.

Then maybe Apple wouldn't need to send out a backdoor patch to underclock old devices. People that still want the long battery life the device had on purchase could go out and purchase a new battery (or attempt to force Apple to give them a new one) - those folks that are fine being tethered to a power outlet can choose to ignore the shortening battery lifespan. Either way, it'd move the decision into the hands of the consumer instead of Apple making that choice for you. And don't forget that Apple did get into trouble over their stupid underclocking "We hope no one notices that we don't allow people to repair things" patch.

Then you could vote with your wallet and take a Fairphone :-)

This doesn't work. You can't rely on individual action for massive scale initiatives. Look how far that got us for the ozone layer (solved through governmental action), climate change (unsolved, because there is no governmental action), decent working conditions (everything achieved was through unions, protests and government intervention), etc

Project Ara was so overdesigned that I'm almost convinced that it was a false flag.

Google kills off a lot of things lol! I'm more concerned with raspi and ARM and etc :)

Only functionality missing would be valid cell tower functionality. Wifi and satellite would work just fine

The market could fix this issue if a significant enough chunk of consumers comprehended what they were losing when going with Apple and were willing to put their money where their mouth was. That's simply not going to happen and a market based solution is unreasonable - this is a time where subject matter experts need to help make an informed decision for the population at large.

Apple is hardware maker. Of course it make sense for them to design the hardware so only they can repair it. It is part of their business model.

Except.. They're not the only ones who can repair it (even though they act like it). And their efforts to hurt independent repairshops show signs of antitrust, which is the topic at hand.

But in many cases this is achieved solely by supply-side restriction of replacement parts - stopping IC manufacturers from supplying those chips to people who could easily repair the device given those parts (macbook power IC springs to mind - same device as a commercial one, just a different pinout for the unobtainable Apple version), or making replacements locked down (such as on new macbooks - you can't just swap a screen now).

Should we also have to pay $990 for oil changes on a leased BMW? ^.^

It just isn't something most people buying electronics care about, and there are real tradeoffs with size, weight, and aesthetic design choices. Combine those factors, and it's easy to see why the economics don't work. Making your device easily serviceable makes it more attractive to a tiny segment of the market, while making it less attractive to a much bigger segment.

I disagree that making your device easily serviceable necessarily makes it less attractive to that portion of the population. I think that making your device brittle, fragile and easy to tamper with makes it less attractive to that portion of the population - having open documentation about the ways to approach repair and then letting the electronics repair shops all be able to repair your device makes it really attractive to pretty much all of the population.

If your ease of repair comes at the cost of quality people will complain about the lack of quality - but nobody specifically wants something that can only be repaired by one market entrant that has full control over the price of repairs.

Also, if you really want to emphasize quality you can run a repair certification program that distributes high priced stickers to aide in people's confidence.

I think the point was that making it easier to repair will compromise something like device size or weight, making it less attractive to the larger portion of the population.

If they could provide the same form factor and make it easily repairable, then I think you would be right that would be attractive to all, however I think small size and repairability are mutually exclusive properties.

Ten minutes watching YouTube will demonstrate that amateurs are certainly capable of repairing todays devices, even down to something small like an apple watch, so small size and reparability are clearly not mutually exclusive. Why would they be anyway? Certified repair technicians aren't magic, they just have access to training, parts and tools that help.

You should see the insanely tiny pads I had to solder to on my Xbox 360 to install the RGH mod. With a 10$ solder iron, homemade flux, miracle I was able to do it. But I did repeat it and given the same incentive even if they made it smaller next time I would get some jewellers glasses and a better iron.

Right to repair is not about redesigning products to become easily serviceable, its about access to same tools and parts manufacturer uses for its own internal service.

That can lead to a full on 'only replace' strategy, as you can see with canon's consumer printers.

Unfortunately 'only replace' does seem to be workable for many devices, like TVs. At most you will be replacing entire boards.

There's a difference between intentionally making a device harder to repair and making design tradeoff to satisfy certain consumer preference.

This has the same problem I've seen with other such proposals: it joins together "you should have the legal right to repair" with "manufacturers should be forced to make only devices with modular replaceable parts". The latter sounds good in theory, except if it means thicker, heavier, less optimized devices. By all means offer such devices, but don't take away the option of devices at a different point on the tradeoff between modularity and thin/light/optimized.

You should absolutely have the legal right to open, tinker with, repair, or otherwise mod any device you own. That doesn't mean prohibiting the legal right to manufacture, sell, purchase, or use devices whose design trades off simplicity of repair for some other property that people purchasing it want more.

> except if it means thicker, heavier, less optimized devices

Speaking specifically of my MBP Retina, and looking inside, I fail to see how eg. a soldered NVME would make the laptop any thinner. There is plenty of space created by the much thicker heat sink, leaving room for a bunch of components to be modular.

The reason all these components are soldered in is to make it hard for users or small shops to do quick repairs and cheap upgrades.

You must buy a new laptop for a RAM upgrade.

Apple negotiates with component suppliers as a single buyer, drives the price of components down, keeps all the savings to itself, and re-sells the components at an exorbitant markup.

It is ridiculous for anyone to think this has got anything to do with quality.

A modular battery would make the laptop bulkier. If a modular NVMe drive wouldn't, it's because other components have already have. And beyond that, you should be comparing to an Air or MacBook, if we're talking about devices that have been optimized at the expense of modularity.

Also, soldering down RAM means you don't have to include support for negotiating the properties and quality of arbitrary RAM sticks, which you'd have to do with socketed RAM; that can mean booting faster and providing more performance.

There are good reasons to design components to work specifically with other components. There are also good reasons to make devices more modular. Both have value, to different users with different use cases.

> There are good reasons to design components to work specifically with other components. There are also good reasons to make devices more modular. Both have value, to different users with different use cases.

If your point is that there is a trade-off to modularity, I'm not sure who it is in response to. It's obvious that modularity has a tradeoff. And I don't see any significant group in this conversation contending that. Nobody is asking for a user-replaceable RAM on an iPhone.

My own point (and R2R's I think) is that Apple, in most cases makes hard to repair products not as a tradeoff in favor of simplicity/compactness/robustness, but to increase profit.

> If your point is that there is a trade-off to modularity, I'm not sure who it is in response to. It's obvious that modularity has a tradeoff. And I don't see any significant group in this conversation contending that. Nobody is asking for a user-replaceable RAM on an iPhone.

I've seen many people in "right to repair" discussions arguing for legal mandates that every device must have a replaceable battery, for instance. That goes beyond having the right to repair, and into restricting the manufacture of devices.

If we start legislating technical architecture, we limit the possibility of innovation and competition, and we drastically reduce the chances that anyone will ever dethrone any of the current market leaders by building something nobody saw coming.

> I've seen many people in "right to repair" discussions arguing for legal mandates that every device must have a replaceable battery, for instance.

That's actually a good example of choosing the right tradeoff in demanding right to repair. Again, people are asking for replaceable batteries, not interchangeable RAMs (which would effectively disallow SoCs). This seems to limit the downsides of regulation to pretty much nothing.

A common worry about regulation is that it'll snowball [0] and stifle innovation. But R2R isn't asking for generic regulation. It is asking for specific and imo sane things like replaceable batteries. That is not too much to ask.

[0] As in: "If we give them batteries, pretty soon they'll ask for generic SoCs on phones" or something like that.

I actually do support the right to repair. I even donated at the link you provided. But, as a hardware designer myself, the devil is in the details for something like this and people need to be really careful.

https://repair.org/policy

"Unlocking: Legalize unlocking, adapting, and modifying any part of the machine, including software."

The backdoor tools the FBI is asking for could easily fall into that category.

I'm not saying don't do it. I'm saying, be very careful what you ask for.

nonono.

This is not the right place for that restriction at all. You should have the right to install backdoor tools on a technical level. If you install backdoor tools on equipment without permission from the owner or a properly executed warrant that is the crime and what must be prevented.

Don't conflate restraining the FBI with being allowed to treat the device you paid for and own exactly as a device you paid for and own and is entirely your property.

The FBI can commit crimes with impunity, that much has been made clear. So given that, the best thing you can do to your hardware is make sure that even criminals can't get in, which also restrains some of the rights of the original owner.

Right because everyone knows that rootkits and other malware are just a hypothetical issue - no one ever deploys them against unsuspecting victims because that would be against the law.

Illegal actions - especially by the government - must be punished. Otherwise our laws are just a polite suggestion. I agree that it's problematic to conflate Right-to-repair with technical issues that are supposed to be solved by the legal system.

The trivial solution to this is you have to unlock the bootloader/etc via a command/option which is only available on an unlocked device.

This is how google phones work. You can flash whatever you want when the bootloader is unlocked but it is locked by default and can only be unlocked while the phone is unlocked.

Are you referring to the secure enclave?

That’s a part of the machine therefore it would technically be included by the statement given on the right to repair policy page.

Obviously that page is meant to be a high level statement, it’s not law. But hopefully you can see my point.

The secure enclave might end up being where the trap door goes. :(

IME, they've really hobbled the functionality of independent repair shops, making it necessary to supplicate to the Apple Store. I was trying to get the battery replaced in a 2015 MBP and the independent shops were 'required' to keep my machine for about 7 days since they had to first 'diagnose' that the battery was dying, order it, wait for it to arrive, and then replace it. In contrast, one could make an appointment at the Apple Store to get the battery replaced while one waited.

This level of customer-hostility would cause a huge uproar for any other "Pro" or "workstation" vendor.

Indeed and it's this utter nonsense that made me finally give in and switch to Windows. Turns out it's nicer than I thought.

But which version do you run? The only version I would consider currently is the Enterprise version of Windows 10.

I have both pro (Home desktop) and enterprise (Work laptop). I don't notice a difference. But we don't really take advantage of the group policy very much.

It used to be Home versions couldn't get more "Enterprise" features, like full partition encryption and the ability to join a Domain. Naturally GPO doesn't apply to a home user.

These days, I run Pro on pretty much everything and don't seem to miss anything. Perhaps "Enterprise" comes with less Candy Crush and other bloatware pre-installed?

I don't think there is any difference between pro And enterprise except for some of the ways licensing is implemented and some group policy stuff.

Now that i've check it seems Enterpise get's the feature sof Pro for Workstations. https://www.microsoft.com/en-au/windowsforbusiness/compare

I used to use Pro so I could use NFS with Windows.

Apple fans seem okay with this and also not being able to install apps outside the app store.

Its usually less that they are ok with these problems and more that the alternatives have even more problems. Most OEMs copied apples designs so everything is shit. Rather than taking your laptop to the local apple store you now have to send it off to china and face all the same problems.

Windows also isn't useful for productivity and linux is only viable for certain jobs.

We buy Lenovo ThinkPads for work. We pay a bit more (not that much, like £50 a laptop I think) for the warranty package. When something goes wrong they send a tech out who repairs it onsite. More minor things like hard drive issues they just ship us a new NVMe drive and we swap it.

I think the techs work for IBM, weird they still keep this bit.

> Rather than taking your laptop to the local apple store you now have to send it off to china

For "pro-grade" laptops Apple is the odd one out by not offering on-site warranty repairs at all, instead requiring you to travel somewhere.

> Windows also isn't useful for productivity

Can you expand on this? I think it's the contrarian position to be taking here.

There are so many anti features in windows. They seem to change all the time and depend on what version of windows you have but the main ones are forced updates that can't be done while you use the computer, MS teams poping up and nagging you to sign up when you never installed or use it, adverts in the start menu, dark patterns in the setup page making it tricky to not register a microsoft account. And whatever flavour of the month anti feature windows includes.

Its getting slightly better with the the new WSL but its still not as good as OSX and linux.

I use Linux fine and it is a requirement that I be able to run Linux before accepting a job. When it comes to Android though, they already allow external apps through a security permission that I use for F-Droid and sometimes other apps outside of F-Droid, like Kodi on my Fire TV.

I didn't say it wasn't fine. I use it as well but I work in one of those jobs where it works fine. You aren't going to use linux if your job is video editing or CAD.

What gives you that idea?

When my Macbook battery ballooned up on me I just replaced it myself. It's not hard at all and can be done in 15 minutes, I have no idea why people in tech take their machines to repair places to do it.

There is plenty of people who lack the skill or ability to do fine repairs. Especially with batteries, if you have no idea what you're doing, it can easily lead to insurances not paying in case you do get injured or damage something.

Because people want a genuine part (reliable battery). I would pay the price if the battery was max 200eur. Nope, Apple is greedy. In my case they wanted 400Eur (together with top case)

So buy a genuine battery then? They aren't hard to find and are under $100.

Wait, it is possible to get a genuine* battery replacement for an Apple device? And no, I'm not being sarcastic, my friend was told by an Apple Store that even an attempt to open the Macbook chassis voids warranty. They refused to replace the battery EVEN WHEN HE WAS READY TO PAY "because there was an unauthorized attempt to open the device". He finally had to go to a repair shop and get it done under an hour (because now the warranty was void anyway).

genuine = guaranteed by Apple to not break your warranty

There is no genuine original battery on the market. Only option to get it is from Apple for 400eur. Every seller is lying about originality.

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck...well who cares if it calls itself a swan.

Anyone paying $400 for battery is out of their minds. My $100 apparently ‘fake’ battery performs identical as the one Apple sells. Who cares at that point.

Apple "fans" are less bothered by this than they would be bothered by the problems of the alternatives. Or they are locked into the ecosystem.

Apple generally ships parts overnight to shops. I've worked somewhere that had an AASP as part of it. Occasionally there's a delay but around 90% of the time our guys could order up to about 4PM EST and have it come in for the midday FedEx Express dropoff the next day. And this wasn't in a major metro area where overnight delivery is common/easy.

2-3 days would have been a plausible turnaround time. 7 is laziness or a long queue.

It's fine if an Apple Store is near my home. I prefer such service but also right of self repair.

I don’t think that’s true for all Apple Stores. I just got my battery replaced last week from an Apple Store and it took them a week to do it.

You could have also done it yourself in about 15 minutes. I've done my 2015 MBP twice now, it's not hard at all.

I'm not sure why people in tech bother paying inflated prices for easy repairs. Just because you work with software doesn't mean you have to be afraid to turn a screwdriver ;)

After my futile efforts to get it repaired at the independent shop and the Apple Store (they never came for me even with my appointment and I wasted an hour sitting in that place for no reason), I bought a third party battery and a set of guitar strings to replace it myself. I was successful but the battery was garbage so I had to return it and go back to the original swelled battery to be able to use the laptop albeit plugged in; I gave up and asked work to order me a new MBP instead. Total waste of time: 3 hours plus a perfectly good MBP going probably to the landfill thanks to a difficulty that Apple created for no good reason. Edit2: the guitar strings were used to saw off the nasty glue strips holding the original battery, along with d-limonene as a solvent to weaken their deathgrip.

In contrast, replacing the battery in my HP Elite x360 was a piece of cake - no nasty glue, no proprietary screws, and oem batteries available everywhere. HP sent me the battery under warranty (shipped next day) when I called them to buy one and I was able to replace it in minutes. Now that's a repairable product. Edit: clarified that HP in fact covered the battery cost under the included 3 year warranty.

Edit3: want to say that it was a bit uncalled-for of you to assume that I couldn't do the replacement myself. This was a work laptop (i.e. not my property) so I didn't feel it was my place to dink with it.

> In contrast, replacing the battery in my HP Elite x360 was a piece of cake - no nasty glue, no proprietary screws, and oem batteries available everywhere.

Replacing the battery for my Surface Pro was a different story. The shop told me there's a high probability that removing the screen will break it. Warrant repairs from Microsoft consist of them taking your surface and shipping you a refurbished machine in exchange.

I remember the earlier Surface machines got a pretty bad repairability rating from iFixit but it seems newer models get better ratings. I bought the HP precisely because of its repairability.

I just ordered one off ebay, let my current battery discharge until the mac shutoff (risk of fire is greatly reduced completely discharged), and yanked out the old one with no special care or care about the glue. Set the new one in place, works perfect.

The second half of my comment was clearly tongue in cheek. Sorry if it seemed personal, it wasn't.

I didn't mind - just wanted to clarify that I did try to make this work :) . Thanks for clarifying your intent. Edit: you lucked out that your eBay battery was good - mine was unfortunately a total dud even though it claimed to be OEM (and had labeling on the battery to match) but caused the machine to shutdown randomly. Edit2: I was also responding to a thread on how Apple treats its certified shops, which is why I left out the details on my endeavors to replace the battery after my attempts to get it done properly failed. Edit3: all of the procedures I saw (iFixit, Youtube) showed a fairly complicated procedure with that nasty glue removal so I am surprised your battery came off easily - perhaps it was previously replaced?

Totally understandable. No the battery wasn't replaced previously, I am the first owner. I think the difficulty of the glue is overstated (especially iFixIt's guide where you take apart half the machine to use some solvent, wtf). Just pull the battery cell at an angle so you don't bend it too much, it'll come off.

I replaced it with the string method as well. I didn’t find a recipe to soften the glue before. Thanks

The iFixit guide for battery replacement on the mid-2015 MBP [1] is a 74 step process involving the use of a nasty chemical solvent to remove the glue that holds the battery. You must have found some enormous shortcuts to have replaced your battery in 15 minutes!

I'm quite comfortable opening most electronics, but my MBP is one of the few I would hire a professional to handle.

[1]: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Retina+Disp...

The late 2015 model is, relative to the mid-2015, much simpler. Only removing a few ribbon cables and prying the old battery out (heat and fishing wire works ok, I didn't need solvent).

It was more like 30 minutes for me, but maybe if I need to do it again it'll be quicker.

All this was neccesary because I'm in Poland which doesn't have 1st-party Apple stores and none of the AASP would touch it.

I don't like working with mobile / laptop parts except for user replaceable, or very easy ones. They make all kind of decisions with no repairability in mind. It can be very error prone. All that said, IDK how hard a MBP battery is. The HTC m8 I tried to replace the battery on, it was one of the last parts you could remove and a bit of a mess of wires, glue, ribbon, and tape. Of course that was a cell phone and a laptop should be easier.

I broke an iphone a couple of years ago while replacing the battery. I follower all the instructions but some small part accidentally snapped. I swore Id never touch such tiny corcuitry ever and instead go to a repair guy who charges quite decently, depending on the model. Sometimes its now worth fixing it, the parts and fixing fee are a bit above buting a refurb.

Yeah, I completed a mid-2011 screen replacement. The screen worked, but it'd never leave sleep. It's a very repairable device. I'm sure people that do it all day have an easier time. I was able to fix my projector, which was pretty cool. A rare win.

I'm curious if it's possible to build a 2015 MBP from scratch with aftermarket replacement components...

I forgot the best part - just like Apple Authorized, "independent repair program" prohibits you from performing ANY other repairs on Apple products, you can only do battery / screen replacement and thats it.

Btw Apple also doesnt give you any warranty on supplied parts.

Jessa Jones analyzing leaked IRP paperwork https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OawkqCPi1LQ

That doesn’t sound legal in the EU. Is it true in Europe that to be an independent repair shop you have to get your customers to consent to having their personal data processed by Apple before they can get their phone fixed?

Is the program even available in the EU?

There's loads of authorized apple retailers and apple repair stores, even in countries which don't have any official Apple Stores. So there must be a certification program for those.

I'm not sure if the grandparent was getting to this, but sharing your client information with a 3rd party in the EU and/or for EU citizens is problematic w.r.t GDPR. You'd have to disclose to your client that you are sharing their data, why you are sharing, and get their informed consent.

Consent is only one legal basis, but it’d be hard to argue that sharing their data for processing by Apple is legitimate interest, and the other non-consent bases don’t apply here.

No worries here, Apple IRP actually requires independent business to get a waiver signed by the customer. Among other things Customer acknowledges repair has no warranty from Apple, despite repair being performed "using original Apple parts by Apple Certified technician working within Apple authorized independent repair program"!

Why Apple should know that a random Joe replaced the touchscreen of his iPhone? I don't see any reason. HP doesn't know I replaced my keyboard three months ago and the keyboard works.

> you are forced to let apple audit you at any time, you have to share personal client data on all of your clients with apple

I assume they want to be able to confirm the shops aren't also buying counterfeit Chinese components on the side and swapping them in for the genuine ones.

I also assume they want the repair information to feed into their tracking of the history of the device, as it can affect warranty, AppleCare, whether Apple is willing to service the device in the future, etc.

I don't know the details, but can you point to specifics (actual text) that seem unreasonable, or that don't make economic sense? Also remember that with franchises, repair shops, etc., agreements commonly give the franchiser/manufacturer tremendous power. They don't need it in normal cases, but it's reserved to be able to act against "badly behaving" companies trying to cut corners, falsify records, etc.

Once you buy the device why the hell should Apple prevent someone from putting a counterfeit battery/screen/whatever inside of it? Sure, people might be defrauding AppleCare, but that's their problem - there's no reasonable justification for why they should be able to regulate who fixes their devices.

I can understand the battery but admit the case is weaker for screen and other components.

If someone gets hurt using an Apple product it’s international news [1] and everyone ignores the reports 5 days later when it shown they were using a counterfeit. So I can understand why Apple would care. Keep in mind this article is about bringing repairs to Mac. The 16” MBP has a 100WHr Lithium-Polymer battery. That thing is no joke.

[1] https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-new...

> If someone gets hurt using an Apple product it’s international news

You can replace pretty much everything in your car which are literally killing machines and yet everything seems to be doing ok why give Apple this special treatment?

The question the parents asked, "why the hell should Apple prevent..." and the answer could be, so they don't get raked over the coals by the press when something goes wrong. I don't actually know the correct answer. Tim Cook never told me.

Note, whether or not Apple should sell, or be forced to sell, parts is a different question and conversation.

The injuries usually have different causes though.

For car accidents there is usually human action or inaction at fault. It is possible for parts to be at fault but that's the minority of cases.

For phone injuries it is usually a faulty part at fault.

If someone sharpened their iPhone and went on a killing spree I don't think anyone would be asking which parts are inside.

Note that I support the right to repair. I just don't think this particular analogy is a good one.

> For phone injuries it is usually a faulty part at fault.

Then Apple should have no issues selling good parts for repair but they are not doing that as well.

I fully agree. I support the right to repair, I just disagreed with the specific analogy.

Isn’t it the impact of Apple’s strict rules on repairs? People get used to thinks that they can’t replace any part by themselves. Thus any accident happened, people automatically thinks it caused by Apple itself. For car, it has been known we can replace anything. So most of the time when there is accident people don’t think it is related to manufacturer fault.

If Apple is so worried about people using crappy Chinese parts, they could sell original spare parts themselves, like proper hardware vendors do.

PS: Don't post AMP links, they cause cancer. De-AMP'ed link follows:

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/iphone-5-owner-ma-a...

Eh...they don't really.

Dell doesn't sell most parts to the public.

HP and Lenovo theoretically do, but you've got probably 50%+ odds of the part you want either being perpetually unavailable/OOS or priced insanely if you try to buy direct.

I don't know about Dell but I put several original and not original parts inside my HP laptop and they worked well. HP's next business day service came to my home twice to replace the screen and the keyboard. I replaced the keyboard myself after the 3 years service period expired. I never bought from HP, just googled the part number and picked one of the results. Anyway I think HP sells through partners here.

I increased RAM twice, one rightaafter unboxing the laptop because buying an 8 GB laptop plus 16 GB from a third party was some hundreds Euros cheaper than buying a 16 GB laptop from HP. I bought two SSDs in different years and replaced the spinning disk and the DVD. I can't see myself having to depend from a single company for such things, and some of them being outright impossible.

> why the hell should Apple prevent someone from putting a counterfeit battery/screen/whatever inside of it?

You can definitely do whatever you want to the machine. And the audit prevents my parents got scammed by those individual shops. eg. Paid the price for a genius battery but got a counterfeit from China.

The scam is already included in the price of the phone itself in my opinion.

I am sick of arguments "for" consumer protection here. There is no chocolate pudding if someone shits on your plate. Sure there is QA, but not in the interest of consumers for any replaceable part.

As someone who has quite a lot of apple phones in my hands, the genuine Chinese batteries die as frequently as the not genuine Chinese batteries. They both smell nicely like bubblegum at least.

There's an argument here that the customer could end up the victim if they pay for a genuine part and end up with a knockoff. However, that should be something resolvable after-the-fact— if a device shows up at a Genius Bar with a counterfeit battery, ask the user where it came from, engage lawyers.

I remember when iOS started showing alert for non-genius battery for a while, some people hate it.

Looks like this started in 2019, so I guess it only affects more recent hardware? I put an iFixit battery in my 5S a year ago and I didn't hear any complaints (doubled the life of it compared to the tired old one in there, too).

Most efficient answer to "why the hell should Apple prevent someone from ...":

Control.

If control cost them money they would let control go. The answer is money.

> I assume they want to be able to confirm the shops aren't also buying counterfeit Chinese components on the side and swapping them in for the genuine ones.

> I also assume they want the repair information to feed into their tracking of the history of the device, as it can affect warranty, AppleCare, whether Apple is willing to service the device in the future, etc.

> I don't know the details, but can you point to specifics (actual text) that seem unreasonable,

All of that is unreasonable. When you purchase a device, it is yours. Apple isn't asking for repair information but is demanding personal data on customers of the repair shops.

You also have to ship the part being replaced before you get a new one. And they have to receive it.

Louis Rossmann has a ton of videos of this program originally.

totally bunk stuff they're doing. "Look, we're complying".

I thought specifically one benefit of an IRP was that they had official Apple inventory on hand like screens and batteries without resorting to grey market stripped/scavenged parts. Is that not the case?

> - send battery / screen to Apple with all clients personal information

I trust Apple far more than any independent repair shop with my personal information. But also, what personal information is on a battery / screen?

Additionally I use full disk encryption via FileVault on my Mac and keep the passcode enabled on my iOS devices which is known to be secure. No one, not even Apple, knows my password/passcode.

The point is IRP program requires your personal data, and requires IRP business to send your broken part and wait for replacement, usually taking a week.

Real independent place wont ask you anything beyond contact email/phone number _if and only if_ they are unable to do the repair on site while you wait/do your shopping at the mall/take a short walk. Since most places stock parts on site you will get your battery swap /screen replacement done right away.

If you have to do any serious repairs they will ask you to make a second admin account so they can login and test things.

The one time I brought my laptop to an Apple Store for a serious repair, they asked for the password to my primary account. I told them to just wipe the drive if they needed access.

Wouldn't work with iPads. If you have connected your Apple ID with the device and forget your password, you cannot even reset the device. Not sure on phones, but pretty sure it works in a similar way. Macs are probably different though. A "If they could, they would"-situation probably.

Newer Macs with T2 chips and Activation Lock enabled are similar. In either the case of T2 Macs or iOS devices I'd be happy to just reset the device myself rather than giving credentials. I was surprised that they asked at all - in my mind, asking someone for a password is verboten.

Certainly does create the potential for repair brokers. A person who is the owner for the duration of the repair and as such the details of that person would be provided to Apple to comply with this data grab.

Always a way to game/fight the system.

There's another side to this coin.

I had some work done on a device at one of these independent Apple-certified repair locations. There's a sign in the store telling the customers that they may be contacted by Apple to ask how their experience was.

It's a way for Apple to ensure that the shops flying its flag are quality operations. I'm OK with that. I specifically chose that store because of its relationship with Apple.

remove battery / screen from client device... etc...

That sounds like an extreme case. My repair took three days, and only because the shop was out of the battery I needed, and had to order a new one from Apple. The store said the work is usually done the same day.

This couldnt of been IRP shop, because IRP program does not let you stock parts.

Apple can can certainly limit the scope of use for the data collection for quality assurance only. But it’s probably worded much more broadly.

I need something more specific than "probably" to believe the previous poster's rant. Some actual draconian contact text would be helpful.

Afaik paperwork is 'secret', you can watch video of Jessa analyzing leaked copy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OawkqCPi1LQ

The independent repair program is designed to destroy independent repair businesses and mislead people in the process. It forces their customers to wait 1-2 weeks for any repair (even just a battery replacement) after being forced to provide their personal identifying information, and even then, does not provide parts for anything nontrivial at all. It ensures repair shops don't actually stay in business—customers wouldn't wait 1-2 weeks for just a battery replacement. Louis Rossmann explains it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPRjVvccQVM, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rCUF-V1esM

Just for some perspective, I can call up my Dell small business sales rep (who reached out to me after I bought just three or four machines over a period of some years) and give him an obscure part number. He says he needs a minute to look up the part, etc and asks if I’m taking this to a Dell-authorized technician; I say no. He takes advantage of how long it takes for the likely instantaneous result to pop up on the screen to ask if I’m interested in the specials he has going on for business laptops, I politely decline but express interest on behalf of future me. He gives me a quote for the part around 1.5x to 2x what the Chinese knockoff that won’t last a week (I know because I tried) costs, I agree and give him my credit card number which they refuse to keep on file, then he throws in free next business day shipping. I get the part, reference the service and repair manuals Dell makes freely available, and do the repair myself. Oh, and depending on the part in question, there’s a good chance that it is under a two year warranty even though I did the repair myself.

For Apple, I buy used parts in the hope that they come from a genuine device being parted out on eBay each for 50% of the cost of the original device because I know all the new parts are not just fake but bad fakes. I get a part that is past its expiration date, rather abused, but will work. I soak the MacBook in corrosive chemical baths to get the industrial super-strength glue (thank God it’s not epoxy?) to loosen up a little before I get out my exacto, needle nose pliers, a scraper, and a plastic pry tool. I pray nothing breaks while I try to get the part out. Something inevitably breaks (also, try to avoid piercing a battery while you pry it out; li-ion batteries do not like to be manhandled). The cost of a replacement part does not make economic sense. I either let the product sit disused on a shelf hoping to find the part cheaper at a later date, hock the device on eBay for pennies on the dollar for a parts shark to snap up then part out, or throw it in the trash because I’d rather not sell my eight hundred dollar phone for a hundred dollars and this at least gives me the satisfaction of cursing at Apple while I do it.

(Yes, the Apple story is an amalgam of many different adventures with different endings over a decade with many different devices, the majority of which were either ultimately written off or else repaired at prices that didn’t make much sense.)

Oh, in addition to sometimes doing my own repairs, I’m also the final arbiter when it comes to all IT purchases for a school. When I’m asked if we can/should get a fleet of Macs for the faculty and students, I insist we get Thinkpads or Latitudes instead.

This is the difference between actual professional equipment, and "pro" aspirational marketing for consumer devices.

I don’t know, I guess you can have different definition of PRO. Yours is more about a fleet of devices that’s easy to maintain for a corporation or a school.

Easy repairability is as important for freelancers as it is for larger businesses.

The anecdote that I was replying to seems to be about a freelancer (or at least a very small business - see "bought 3 or 4 machines over a period of a few years"), not someone maintaining a fleet of devices.

My definition of "pro" is just "uses device to make an income".

Apple really doesn't like the environment, does it? You're forced to get a new device every time.

God for business, shit for the world. But Apple customers don't seem to care one bit.

I've a macbook air which is 9 years old, which never gave me a problem until now even after tons of abuse. My work laptop is Dell, about 4 years old - wifi drops at random, battery has swollen etc.

Maybe the reason Apple customers don't care is because their machines give them less trouble? And they have more disposable income?

Not defending Apple here (my next computer is definitely not going to be Apple), just trying to understand how Apple users think.

The thing that sucks is other industries/companies copying Apple. Lenovo computers are increasingly becoming harder to repair. Expensive, big machines like tractors are being locked down etc. Samsung made fun of apple when they removed the headphone jack but now Samsung and everyone else is doing the same, trying to squeeze more money out of the customer, airpods style.

Maybe we should make a list of repair friendly, environment friendly and customer friendly hardware and stick only to those.

For your anecdote there are many others to the contrary. 2 colleagues with Macbook Pros had to hand them in after about 3 years.

A friend bought her Macbook in 2016 or so as a student and it went started having screen problems after a year... so she promptly bought a new one because repairing cost as much a new one. A loan was necessary for that too (poor student).

There was a shared Macbook Pro at work with a bad screen that also had a faulty RAM and it too was easier to simply replace than pay for repair. I was told there was some kind of support contract on it too.

A friend got a secondhand Macbook from 2012 that got slower over the years. Still had a CD/DVD drive and booting from it took about 2 minutes, more until actually accepted input. I resized the Mac partition and installed ubuntu 18.04 on the other partition and that booted more quickly + ran more fluidly with KDE. Her laptop wasn't supported by Apple anymore and she couldn't update the OS either.

I honestly don't see how Mac is easier to use, more reliable or even better supported. Imo, it's just habit, a flashy UI and the "exclusivity" price point. It's a status symbol more than anything. Giving that up is difficult for many, I assume.

I’ve wondered the same for some time, they intentionally used to degrade performance of older iPhones on OS upgrade. Or sell spare parts at obscene prices, actually buying a new device makes more sense than repairing, creating more e-waste. Calls itself a green company!

Disclaimer: you can call me a Apple fanboy, exclusively using multiple Macs for > 12 years, never owned a smartphone that’s not iPhone.

If you're aware of this, is it going to change your shopping behavior?

I guess it's a bit more nuanced. On one hand they support and update their phone's OS for quite a long time, relative to others, and on the other this anti-repair stuff, platform closedness and making a kind of fetish out of having a new phone every year with their superhyped (people camping in front of stores for a phone, really?) yearly release cycle.

This is Apple trying to do the least that allows them to get away from more regulation.

The goal should be self repair. I want the manuals and parts so I can make my own repair.

Exactly right. I can (and do) repair my own car. Not so long ago you it was a normal thing that you could build your own TV...

https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Catalogs/Allied-Catalo...

> I can (and do) repair my own car.

Out of random interest, what age is your car? Personally back when I had it I felt comfortable doing everything except steering, brakes and structural frame work on my 1994 VW T4, but I wouldn't dare touch a modern car. Too much investment required for special tooling, and diagnosis of problems requires a computer and specialized programs in contrast to a multimeter...

Well my fleet has grown to three: a 2000 VW B5 Passat (230K miles), a 2010 VW CC, and a 2003 Cadillac CTS I inherited from my parents and which is a good car for kids to learn to drive on.

I'm a bit invested in VW tools... (but no "vagcom" yet). One amazing thing is that the VW service books are cheaper than the GM one for the CTS...

Actually the CTS probably needs a steering rack. It's the only car I've ever owned that has play/backlash in the steering and it doesn't appear to be the linkage. I haven't quite worked up the nerve to do it yet, but I think about it every time I drive the thing. I'm tempted to sell it, but the value is not much, its mileage is low and my kids do need a car..

Like Thinkpads, yeah.

And then someone will mess up the repair and blame Apple for a malfunctioning device or demand they fix it for free.

That's what the car companies said would happen if independent mechanics were fully allowed.

Everyone deals with these type of customers. Product sellers, repair shops and yes that already includes Apple. And even if Apple was currently magically immune why do people want to protect the most profitable company in the world from something everyone else deals with?

> And then someone will mess up the repair and blame Apple for a malfunctioning device or demand they fix it for free.

I call this bs. Apple doesn’t want devices repaired because they are too greedy. Their own repairs in store are sometimes more expensive than buying new. Guess why that is? Pure greed.

And then what?

right? ok so they complain, apple proves they used 3rd party repair and... that's it?

i mean, we do that with literally everything else -- why is apple special?

And I demand a pony.

Apple independent repair is a scam, and public media should call it out on it.

Not only are the terms extremely abusive, what you get from them is a joke.

The benefits of independent repair is that they can repair the actual damage, e.g. by replacing some broken capacitors, connectors or ships on the motherboard. Which might sound supper hard but this are skills anyone who has a stable hand, reasonable good hand eye coordination and is bit clever or at least not stupid can learn in a view month maybe, half a year if they have proper guidance.

Heck anyone who enters the program will not only not get support from Apple to do proper repair they will lose their ability to do so because Apple forbids them to have potential replacement parts for this chips around... (And also makes sure they are not available on the marked.)

Paging Louis Rossmann for how this actually is just lip service and not an "expansion" of any rights at all for anyone but Apple

There you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPRjVvccQVM

I think you all are reading more into this that Apple is claiming. Apple is claiming expanded access to genuine parts and it seems they are delivering that.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2019/08/apple-offers-customer...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-repair/apple-expand...

"Apple said Wednesday that 140 businesses with 700 locations have signed up for the program in the United States. Some of the independent shops, such as uBreakiFix, have multiple locations, while some are sole proprietorships."

That seems like expanded access, for shops and customers, to me.

> [article] provide "uneven" service

I guess that they can't legally claim it's inferior, because of how dreadful their service is in comparison to Rossmann. Apple wants to level the playing field to the bare minimum, i.e. their official repair quality standards.

Based on my repair experience back in China, I understand and support Apple doing this. My opinion is based on the personal experience I had before, and I support people with different opinions.

Back the days (and I still believe it's the case right now) in China there are a lot of phone repair shops ran by individuals or small businesses, and those shops are not certified by any programs, they "operate" by someone has skills to repair electronics. I was tricked by them multiple times.

The first time I was repairing my Nokia N95 with a broken screen (N95 has an exposed "soft" screen), I sent it in to one of those shops; a few hours later, I got a call with an estimated price, and I accepted. Until months later I realized the price they charged me almost doubled the price it supposed to be if I went to a Nokia office service center. I agree I had some fault on this one, but I'm not a pro-consumer that knows everything.

The second time I was repairing a SE M608. Based on the lesson from last time, I refused the price they gave to me and want to get another quote from SE certified repair center. Then the latter told me my phone's internal components was swapped and no longer the original one. I suppose that was done overnight in the repair shop after I refuse their price.

Not to mention my friend got working components in her phone "repaired".

Then I never go to independent or 3rd party repair shops anymore, no matter they're certified or not, because I don't trust them.

I know HN have lots of people know how to repair stuff or able to learn from iFixit, but that's not for everyone. I strongly support Apple put more control and audit to the IRP or ASP to make sure they don't trick their customers. On the other hand, I also think Apple should sell repair components directly on their website, so anyone can repair by themselves if they want to.

My repair experience in China was completely the opposite, and I think you made the first mistake: leaving the device with the shop for any length of time and out of your sight.

Some time ago, in Shenzhen, I saw a friend get his laptop component-level-troubleshooted and repaired while we waited and watched. It was a busy shop too, with multiple stalls and a lineup of others waiting for service.

I have different experience in China. I have been to Shenzhen where is the biggest market for Apple and I couldn’t believe my eyes. Battery replaced in minutes and I could have watched them. The only thing they said is that I need to bring my own battery - there were numerous sellers on the same floor. I also bought my iPhone XR (2nd hand) for a very cheap price and there is diagnostic for free (computers that have licensed software).

Now when I was asked to pay 400eur for battery replacement for MBP that has double the value I declined. I replaced it myself for some 3rd party battery.

I have a 2013 MBP that started random crashing several years back. I took it into a Mac store and they could not help me. I have always suspected a hardware issue. Repair for a new board was just not worth the cost.

If this works and it would bring the cost down, I would still consider trying to get this machine fixed.

Try https://www.rossmanngroup.com/ he also has a YouTube channel and is very active in the right to repair movement.

It will cost you ~$450 in a real independent shop. Apples only option for repairing logic boards was always swapping whole thing for $850-1600 or up-sell to a new device.

This is my experience too. An unexpected failure on my 2013 mba and Apple suggested new logic boards with no guarantee of fix the problem & recommended a new mba. I literally went across the road and a flat fee of $500 got me going again. He desoldered a few components and replaced with parts taken from a spare mba mobo. Couldn't be happier.

I was a 2015 MBP owner for many years and suffered through being stuck on 8GB of RAM the whole time because Apple refuses to swap logic boards up to different specs than the original SKU.

I only realised later on that the indie shop near me would have been willing to do that upgrade, or perhaps swapped my machine over to a 16GB one they had traded in with a smashed screen.

The TCO of an appliance includes warranty price, and the expected lifespan equals the warranty duration. If you use your apple appliance beyond 3 years, you are scavenging trash (good for you, but no expectation that the device will function). If $2500+ for 3 years of a laptop sounds bad to you, don't buy Apple.

Recently my MBP 2015 couldn’t boot because of the dead battery. I asked authorized repair centre and they quoted 400EUR as they need to order whole topcase. This is such a ripoff from Apple. Almost no one ships batteries cross border now. Finding a good replacement is almost an impossible task. The only thing I want the battery to be safe (not catching on fire or damaging my MBP)

>Almost no one ships batteries cross border now.

I'm a little puzzled. I went on amazon uk where I happened to be and searched "macbook pro battery 2015" and got dozens of results, some with 5* reviews and from reputable companies like Sloda for example. Prices around 70 EUR. I swapped my 2013 Air battery the other day which takes about 2 mins. Not sure how hard it is on the 2015 pro.

I bought the so called 5* battery. It seems good but it degrades quickly after few charges. People review mostly in the first week (battery works and seems good), but the battery will lose original capacity in few weeks. If you read carefully you will find these reviews. In my case I am down 10% capacity after 11 cycles. PS: Battery is a sensitive item and cannot be shipped by plane. This explains the cross border problems.

I got mine replaced under a recall, maybe yours is eligible too?

Unfortunately not. I was hoping for it.

Reading the comments below, Apple is damned it they do and damned if they don’t.

One should start from the premise that whatever apple are doing is wrong.

They have implemented their strategy of it being cheaper to pay lobbyists, advertising, events and PR than it is to do the right thing. Eg they don't pay their tax but have a much bigger say in making and enforcement of law than any US tax-payer.

Treating their actions with suspicion and hostility until shown without doubt to be benign is the only sensible response to a company that employs these policies. You're paying for the enforcement of their property rights because you pay a big whack of your income in tax, they don't, they mooch off you.

That is the only correct state of affairs for corporations (and governments) as big and powerful as Apple. Constant criticism no matter what they do. It's the only way to hold them even remotely accountable.

I don't know why you're getting downvoted for this. Power is kept in check by criticism and close observation.

If Apple weren't held accountable at all, you can be sure they'd declare themselves a sovereign dictatorship w/ Mr. Cook at the supreme leader (/s of course, but...?).

Is it truly a surprise why I keep being downvoted for pointing out abuses of power by Hacker News's favorite megacorp?

They are so nasty, that no one will trust they have good intentions. Whose fault is that I wonder.

The stock price abides. They'll survive the damnation.

Lack of repairability is the main reason I do not buy Mac Books. Yes, they are more reliable, however, if you encounter a problem, you endure a long wait at a Mac Book repair centre that is miles away. My work laptop developed an issue while I was on holidays in Spain, and if it had been a PC it could have been easily fixed by any of the local repair centres. Of course Apple being Apple, I would have to drive 2 hours to the nearest Apple repair centre with no guarantee it would have been fixed in time before I returned back home.

They’re not more reliable. I’m still using a thinkpad from 2013 as my daily driver. My work mbp failed after 6 months because dust specs got under the keyboard keys and stopped them from registering presses anymore.

I concur, I work in a department of mainly MBP15's and they have a terrible reliability experience here. The most common things that go wrong are faulty displays, keyboards and overheating issues.

I'd go far as to say the MBP15 has a design flaw where the screen breaks right in the centre where you place your fingers or thumb.

My MacBook overheated and the entire logic board had to be replaced. Apple has designed the MacBook Pro to run right on the thermal limit, but their cooling doesn't seem to work well when you run multi threaded heavy IO processes. I now have a McBrick Pro

Last I checked apple was forth in manufacture reliability, behind Asus, Toshiba, and Sony. They are better than average, but people really overestimate the build quality of the macbook.

That must have been a really long time ago, if you're listing Toshiba and Sony, which are both gone from the laptop market, and had a tiny market share for many years before their exit.

Is it for laptop? Got any source? I wonder at which place Thinkpad / Lenovo is. And I'm amazed that Asus is better than Apple.

This may be controversial (or maybe not, this is HN and not reddit), but there's a question I've never seen answered.

I don't really care about how easy it is to repair my phone, or at least not as much as I care about using iOS. I knew if my iPhone were to break I'd have to take it to Apple, so I pay for Apple Care (like I pay for iCloud for my backups).

I don't feel like I've been swindled. I feel like I made the purchasing decisions that reflect my budget and concerns.

Similarly for laptops. I had a Macbook Pro that died from a burnt out reverse voltage protection diode (probably cost less than a penny). Apple quoted me the cost of the entire main board. My next laptop was not a Mac, it was a device that was easier to repair and upgrade because that reflected what I valued in a personal laptop.

Why should companies not be allowed to compete along this axis of features? Why do we need to kneecap one business model in favor of another, and limit engineers ability to make design decisions because that business model is not viable?

Surely the markets have spoken. Apple's customers don't care about having a right to repair. If they did, Apple would be selling machines that could be repaired by anyone.

Because there is other issues like e-waste. With repair we expect less e-waste. As you know Apple repair tends to replace the whole things instead of the broken part.

Could you show numvers regarding difference in e-waste amounts with repairable parts and without them? Repair tooling and components generate waste too, including waste in logistics.

Taxing pollution is the ideal way to solve this.

Thinkpad customers want a laptop with a 16:10 screen. Has Lenovo given it to them? No. Will they go and buy a Macbook with a 16:10 screen? No. So Lenovo can screw them ad infinitum.

> Why should companies not be allowed to compete along this axis of features?

They can be allowed to compete in those features. That's fine. But people should also be allowed to do whatever they want with devices that they own.

Including getting it fixed by a 3rd party.

> Surely the markets have spoken

No, the market has not spoken. Because Apple will sue you if you try to do independent repairs, without going through them.

> No, the market has not spoken. Because Apple will sue you if you try to do independent repairs, without going through them.

can't you just avoid Apple and buy phones that are easier to repair? That's how market works.

> can't you just avoid Apple and buy phones that are easier to repair? That's how market works.

It is absolutely not a market if Apple is suing people for engaging in voluntary trade.

You can feel free to not support markets, if you don't like. It sounds to me like you do not support free markets.

But please do not pretend that it is a free market, when Apple is literally suing people, for engaging in voluntary trade regarding devices that they own.

> But please do not pretend that it is a free market, when Apple is literally suing people, for engaging in voluntary trade regarding devices that they own.

In a free market, if a company acts inadequately, you stop any interaction with it, you stop providing service to its customers, and go to its competitor or create your own competing platform, and try to get as many customers with you as you can.

Please do not pretend that the market is Apple alone, and that you have no other choice but to demand the government to take an action against the company whose policies and actions you don't approve of, it's a very infantile position to hold and it hurts the free market that you seem to care about. Free market has never meant "expect a fair play from everyone", it means that there's enough economic clout and capital out there to drive unfair competitors out. And if you appeal to the government's monopoly on physical coercion, you are not acting as a proponet of free markets.

> In a free market, if a company acts inadequately, you stop any interaction with it, you stop providing service to its customers

No, actually. Those customers should have the right to deal with whoever they want. That is how free markets work. They work by not having the government go after people.

> and go to its competitor or create your own competing platform

Or, instead of that, those customers, who own their own devices, should be allowed to do whatever they want with things that they own. That is a free market. Get government out of the way, and don't allow Apple's lawsuits against people.

> that you have no other choice but to demand the government to take an action

It is not me who wants the government to do something. Instead, that is Apple. Apple is the one who is using the government to engage in physical coercion against people.

I want Apple to not have the right to sue people. Government needs to get out of the way, and Apple needs to stop using to government to fight against free markets.

A free market would be the government ignoring Apple's lawsuits against other people.

> And if you appeal to the government's monopoly on physical coercion

Lets get rid of that government monopoly and coercion by removing Apple's ability to sue these people then!

I agree. Lets not use physical coercion. And the way that we do that, is to not allow Apple to use the government to go after people.

> Free market has never meant "expect a fair play from everyone"

I don't want fair play from Apple. Instead, I just want them to not have the ability to use physical coercion against others, by them using government backed forced against others, through their lawsuits.

> it hurts the free market that you seem to care about.

You are the one who is trying very hard to ignore the real physical coercion that Apple is using against others, through their government backed, and government supported lawsuits.

Lets get rid of that. All of the lawsuit and physical coercion that Apple is using against other people should be thrown out, and the lawsuits that Apple is using should be completely ignored by the government.

> No, actually. Those customers should have the right to deal with whoever they want.

They shouldn't, a notion of rights does not include any material implementation of these rights for you by other people. If you disagree, then please make sure that I deal with Tesla and SpaceX on my terms next week, because I definitely want it.

If you find that Apple acts as an abuser in an abusive relationship, you just cut all ties with the abuser. I've never heard of anyone suggesting a victim that "they should have a right to continue living with that person" or that "there's a right to coerce the abuser into the comfortable co-living with the victim".

Again, free market doesn't imply absence of unfair practices. It implies that there's no force that is able to chain you to the abuser.

> They shouldn't, a notion of rights does not include any material implementation of these rights for you by other people

This is about the customers rights. They should have a right to do whatever they want with there own devices, and buy repair services from anyone who chooses to deal with them.

I am not saying it is " for you by other people. ", so I am not sure why you are making this up, when that is clearly not what I meant. I repeated the same point, like 6 times, so I thought my point was clear, but somehow you ignored it.

Instead, I am saying that both these customers, and other companies, should have a right to deal with each other, if both agree, and an unrelated 3rd party, Apple, should have no ability to stop it by them using government force, which Apple is doing.

And if you don't agree in this voluntary trade, then you don't believe in free markets.

> If you find that Apple acts as an abuser in an abusive relationship

I find that they are using government force against others.

> you just cut all ties with the abuser

Well, the people who actually support free markets want to remove Apple's ability to use government force against others.

That is what we want to do. We want to get rid of their government supported coercion that they are using against others.

> "they should have a right to continue living with that person

I don't want a right to force Apple to deal with me. If they don't want to sell iPhones to people, they don't have to.

Instead, I want to remove Apple's ability to use government force against others, for engaging in voluntary trade. For example, Apple should not be able to sue anyone for voluntarily using 3rd party repair services.

> It implies that there's no force that is able to chain you to the abuser.

But there IS force! Apple is literally using government force against others. Stop ignoring this point. Lets get rid of that force that Apple is using against others.

I will repeat once again, so that this is clear.

You said "It implies that there's no force". I am saying that Apple is using force against others, through government support lawsuits, and I want to take away Apple's ability to use this force against others. Lets get rid of their ability to sue people, for voluntarily buying from 3rd party repair shops.

This is the point that I am making, and you keep ignoring it.

I made like 6 sentences where I repeated this exact same point, and somehow you ignored them multiple times that I repeated the same point, over and over again.

So, I’m feeling the swindled part just a little bit. I had an iPhone 8+. Had a charging issue, apple care replaced it free of charge.

The refurbish iPhone I got, lasted ~100 days before the screen broke. Had to get a new phone. Now maybe I could have gotten apple care on that refurbished phone, but it was new and I didn’t expect to have issues like that

I think now you can buy Apple Care if inside one year of purchase. https://9to5mac.com/2020/08/17/apple-expanding-60-day-applec...

> Why do we need to kneecap one business model in favor of another, and limit engineers ability to make design decisions because that business model is not viable?

That is what _every_ business-related regulation is designed to do so the general rhetorical question is a bit odd. As to why, well honestly there are many reasons. User control, business competition, e-waste, etc. Look into the reasoning behind similar sorts of regulations involving cars in the US for the last couple generations.

You may not agree with the reasoning, but acting like this sort of regulation is somehow odd doesn't make much sense. There's enormous precedence and lots of reasoning behind it.

I agree you with this one, it's not one way is better than the other. Personally I care about the design or portability much more than the repairability; I'm totally fine with them swap the whole logic board to repair one tiny chip, or even give me a new one instead; this "reflect my budget and concerns".

The "right to repair" act seems will hurt consumers like me, which prefer a slimmer design than if it's repairable or not. How much repair does it want to push? Repair individual CPU cores?

The free market lets companies make stuff for their targeted consumer groups, which is great. Everyone has a choice, based on individual "budget and concerns".

Right to repair isn't about forcing companies to develop repairable devices. It's about removing the monopoly companies like Apple and John Deere have on their repair business.

Almost any device is repairable, Apple repairs devices themselves. When Apple does component level board repair, they do so with schematics and manuals they don't publish and parts you can't buy.

A free market would allow competing with Apple's repair business.

I think Apple should make a developer/hacker/ifixit score 10 version of their devices. As a consumer you could then choose between the consumer design version or the hacker version.

The hacker version of the hardware should have user serviceable parts such as motherboard, ssd, battery, screen, memory, keyboard and use standard philips or torx screws.

I remember last year when Best Buy stores all became AASP’s...except they don’t really do any work on Macs at all. They send them out to their service centers and don’t even use OEM batteries in their replacements, for example.

With the nearest Apple store two hours away (and not even open this year), it would be nice if Best Buy could do the work...sigh

Authorized Service Providers and Independent Repair Provider are two separate programs. IRP was created a few years ago specifically for iOS devices. This article says that it's expanding to Macs.

ASPs have been around for decades. Computing stores in many US colleges/universities are ASPs. In the past, when Macs were much simpler, they were allowed to do a fair amount of work on then. However, you're right. As Macs have changed and everything has become fused together, ASPs have basically just become an interface between the customer and real Apple. Basically a "Genius" bar not in an Apple Store.

For an up-to-date comment from Louis Rossman (amazing component level Mac repairs) hit this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPRjVvccQVM

Every repair to my iPhone that has been done outside of Apple certified channels has ended in needing a replacement device. Have heard/ read some horror stories of Apple Store repairs, although have yet to experience any myself. Personally I haven’t had a single repair from a third party that has actually been passable.

All this to say that I’m not really seeing a huge benefit of right to repair for consumers. A race to the bottom in price means that there’s no money left to pay/train repair techs well enough to perform the repairs properly (i.e. without taking shortcuts/rushing & thereby causing further problems). This has been my experience so far with the third party shops vs Apple Certified.

I didnt have the same experience. I repaired a few Iphones at an indy repair shop and the repair was solid and way cheaper than with apple.

Word of mouth helps here.

I repaired an iPad and two iPhones at indy shops. Shop #1 did the iPad kinda right, except the one button(tm) was crooked after the screen replacement. Shop #2 did the two iPhones perfectly. Even the one with water damage.

So just ask around.

I’ve used independent shops that were Apple certified that have been fantastic

Years later, and I've had a ton of problems actually finding an Independent Repair provider. As far as I can tell Apple does not actually maintain a directory, and it's left for local repair shops to market/advertise. The later, then is highly dependent on their Google ranking skills.

I went to a local repair shop for years. I went in a third time in a year to change a battery on an iPhone 8. Each time they apologized, blamed it on a bad shipment of batteries, and repaired it for free. However, on that third time, I chatted them up about the IRP. The guy got extremely hostile about the program.

Screw that place. Took me a while, but I finally did find a IRP after much googling and asking around.

Google adsense banned repair and data recovery from advertising on their platform "We need to discuss Google's anti-repair advertising discrimination." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUBJ2LD-Dao

I just searched google for repair and data recovery for several of my devices with adblock disabled and it turned up several local shops. So seems to be provably untrue.

I kind of lost faith in Rossman after he blamed Apple for Customs agents seizing counterfeit parts.

Can you detail your procedure here? I just attempted this and I can't see any advertisements.

on firefox and chromium I searched these phrases without adblock and saw no ads

  macbook repair vancouver
  macbook repair calgary
  macbook repair new york
  macbook repair glasgow

Search results are not adsense

I've had a ton of problems actually finding an Independent Repair provider. As far as I can tell Apple does not actually maintain a directory

Call AppleCare. That's how I found the one that I used.

Great idea, thank you!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com