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Comment by ljm | Hacker News Reader

So, essentially their new Macbook line is a glorified iPhone/iPad but with a foldable display (on a hinge)?

Not too far-fetched when you see the direction MacOS is headed, UI-wise. And it sounds nice, but if it means that repairability suffers then we'll just end up with a whole wave of disposable laptops.

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To be fair to apple, people keep their macbooks for years and years, keeping them out of landfill longer. They are well made and the design doesn't really age. Written on my 2015 Macbook pro.

To be fair to the rest of the world, this comment is written on a 20 year old PC. It has had some component upgrades, but works like a champ after 20 years.

If you keep replacing failed/failing components or give needed upgrades to the system every few years, is it fair to call it 'working like a champ for 20 years'?

I'll take it a step further. Is it fair to even call it the same system after 20 years of changes?

Like the Ship of Theseus thought experiment, at what point does a thing no longer have sufficient continuity to its past to be called the same thing? [1]

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

Some parts are kind of like tyres on a bike, just need to be replaced from time to time, it doesn't mean the bike is bad or not working like a champ.

Yeah, but it does mean it is no longer the same bike. If you replace every part of a bike, even one at a time over years, it is no longer the same bike. So it all depends on what GP means by "replacing some parts". Is it entirely new computer in a 20 year old case? Or is it a 20 year old computer with a couple sticks of RAM thrown in?

Regardless, I have a hard time believing a 20 year old computer is "working like a champ". I've found the most people who say their <insert really old phone or computer> works perfectly have just gotten used to the slowness. Once they upgrade and try to go back for a day, they realize how wrong they were. Like how a 4k monitor looks "pretty good" to someone that uses a 1080p monitor everyday, but a 1080p monitor looks like "absolute unusable garbage" to someone who uses a 4k monitor everyday.

Definitely not if the metric we care about is keeping components out of landfills.

I don't understand the landfill argument here.

A typical "Upgradable" PC is in a box 10 times the size of the mini. If you upgrade the GPU on a PC, you toss out an older GPU because it has pretty much zero resale value. Typical Apple hardware is used for 10-15 years, often passing between multiple owners.

It's a shame we don't have charities that would take such parts and then distributed them to less fortunate countries. Ten years ago a ten year old graphics card would no longer be quite usable, but now 10 years old card should work just fine for most of the tasks, except more advanced gaming.

I don't see the point. There is nothing to put it into. It's far cheaper to just ship modern CPUs with integrated graphics which will be faster and more efficient than that 10 year old GPU. The era where computer components were big enough for it to make sense for them to be discrete parts is coming to a close.

This is particularly true on the lower end where a 10 year old part is even interesting.

I thought you could donate any part of a computer and then people could sort and match, but I think you're right.

if only two parts got replaced, then landfill mass was reduced.

Why do I think of Trigger's Broom when I read this?

Apples and oranges. I've never kept a laptop for five years.

That's only applicable to Macbooks made upto 2015.

I guess I'll throw my 2016 MBP out then.

You probably will before I throw out my 2010 MBP thanks to easily replaced parts.

To me it looks more like they swapped the motherboard out with their own, keeping the rest of the hardware the same.

With RAM and SSD already soldered to the motherboard, repairability can't really get much worse than it already is.

It's not difficult to replace RAM or SSD with the right tools (which may be within reach of an enthusiast), problem is that you often cannot buy spare chips as manufacturers can only sell them to Apple or that they are serialised - programmed to work only with that particular chip and then the unit has to be reprogrammed after the replacement by the manufacturer. I think they started doing it after rework tools became affordable for broader audience. You can get a trinocular microscope, rework station and an oven for under a $1000 these days.

You can get a screwdriver (allowing you to replace RAM and SSDs in most laptops, including older macs) for $5. There's really no excuse for them to do this all the while claiming to be environmentally friendly.

Depends on the model. My 2012 mbp15r uses glue and solder, not screws. Maxed out the specs when I got it, which is why it's still usable. Would've been delighted for it to have been thicker and heavier to support DIY upgrades and further improve its longevity while reducing its environmental impact, but that wasn't an option. Needed the retina screen for my work, bit the bullet. Someday maybe there will be a bulletproof user-serviceable laptop form factor w a great screen, battery life and decent keyboard, that can legally run macOs... glad to say my client-issued 2019 mbp16r checks most of those boxes. /ramble

Something like ATX standard but for laptop shells would be awesome - imagine being able to replace a motherboard etc, just like you can with a desktop PC.

Intel tried this more than a decade ago. The designs were as horrible as you might imagine, and a few OEMs did come out with a handful of models and parts.

As I recall, consumers didn’t care or wouldn’t live with the awful designs that they initially brought out. I don’t remember. I remember thinking I wouldn’t touch one after seeing a bunch of engineering samples.

Maybe it was too early for this kind of thing. I could imagine today such shell would be much slicker.

Except the RAM is in the M1 now. Pretty good excuse Id'say.

Is it? I thought only memory controller is in the chip, not the memory itself.

The M1's RAM is integrated into the SoC package. But it's still separate RAM chips, not actually on the same die as the M1.

Mmm... it's certainly better than they had before. But really they ought to be designing repairable machines. If that makes them a little slower then so be it.

My 2007 MBP, yes. I don't think that's true of my 2017 MBP, nor my 2012 MBA.

It's been years since Apple did away with this stuff, and nobody expected them to suddenly allow after-market upgrades.

Serialized components should be illegal, frankly.

There are good privacy and security reasons that someone might want serialized components.

Sure, but you add the option to ignore the serialization, or options to reset the IDs as part of the firmware or OS. That way the machine owner can fix it after jumping through some security hoops, rather than requiring an authorized repair store.

Mostly because, its doubtful if state level actors (or even organized crime) aren't going to pay off an employee somewhere to lose the reprogramming device/etc. Meaning its only really secure against your average user.

I don't believe those reasons are more important than open access and reducing the environmental impact of planned obsolescence, outside of the kind of government agencies that are exempt from consumer electronics regulations anyway.

Surely there is a better (and I'd bet, more effective) way to handle environmental regulations than mandating specific engineering design patterns within the legal code.

Perhaps instead, it might be a better idea to directly regulate the actions which cause the environmental impact? i.e. the disposal of those items themselves?

Engineers tend to get frustrated with laws that micromanage specific design choices, because engineering practices change over time. Many of the laws that attempt to do so, backfire with unintended consequences.

It is quite possible that your solution might be just that -- many industries with high security needs are already very concerned with hardware tampering. A common current solution for this is "burner" hardware. It is not uncommon for the Fortune 500 to give employees laptops that are used for a single trip to China, and then thrown away. Tech that can give the user assurance that the device hasn't been compromised decreases the chance that these devices will be disposed of.

As a side note, I don't think serialized components is even one of the top 25 factors that does(/would) contribute to unnecessary electronics disposal.

I think resetting instead of bricking doesn't compromise security, but saves a burner laptop from ending up in landfill. I get your point, but I think company would have to demonstrate that e.g. serialising meets particular business need that is different from planned obsolescence. Could be a part of certification processes that products before getting marketed have to go through.

Based on what legal principle should they be illegal?

In practice, such a law could resemble right-to-repair bills like the one recently passed in Massachusetts, which requires auto manufacturers to give independent repair stores access to all the tools they themselves use. A bill like this for consumer electronics could practically ban serialized components, even without mentioning them explicitly.

Illegal, no. Taxed extra.

Why beating around the bush? If the function of extra tax is to stop producers from implementing planned obsolescence, then why not just stop them directly and require that components are not serialised etc. as a part of certifications products need to go through? If you add tax, then all you do is restricting access to such products for people with lower income.

the point is to push the market into the correct^Wdesired direction without outright banning anything. non-serialized would be cheaper, hence more accessible. there are use cases where serialized parts are desired (e.g. if i don't want somebody swapping my cpu with a compromised part).

Normally I prefer nudges to bans, but I'm not sure they work on giant monopolies. Unless the tax were high enough to have no chance of passing, Apple would dodge it or write it off as cheaper than being consumer-friendly.

With Apple Silicon, the RAM is not even on the motherboard. It's integrated into the SoC package!

I don’t think that’s true for M1.

Yes, it is true of the M1. RAM is integrated into the M1 SoC package (but not on the same die).

> So, essentially their new Macbook line is a glorified iPhone/iPad but with a foldable display (on a hinge)?

This isn't some new. Since day 1, the iPhone has always been a tiny computer with a forked version of OS X.

> but if it means that repairability suffers then we'll just end up with a whole wave of disposable laptops.

Laptops have been largely "Disposable" for some time. In the case of the Mac, that generally means the laptop lasts for 10-15 years unless there is some catastrophic issue. Generally after that long, when a failure happens even a moderate repair bill is likely to trigger a new purchase.

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