What's more depressing is "tech enthusiast" circle (eg. in reddit or hardware forums) will be more than eager to rationalize, defend and disseminate any weak technical excuse made up by manufacturers for keeping their anti consumer practices.
Making things is an incredibly difficult dance between electrical engineers, purchasers, manufacturers, sales and product managers, and logistics teams. I think that people who work exclusively in software often trivialize how difficult it is to choose how many of something to produce, how many extra pieces to keep around for repairs, etc., because they took some EE classes in school and they think that they basically understand the process of making boards.
The reality is the actual engineering is usually the easy part. The hard part is logistics, and it's not something that you can just outsource to a dedicated purchaser and be done with. Software people don't actually have something analogous.
For everyone that works in hardware, the last 2 years has been hell in terms of quickly redesigning things around parts availability, often stripping functionality entirely and reevaluating how it can be done generically in software without a certain chip. We make PoE devices and we can't get validated ethernet PHYs.
Basically, what I'm saying is this: as someone who sees how things are made, the idea that there's some guiding principle of being evil or some principle of maximizing overall bottom line at all costs and making shit products is just so far from the truth that it makes my head spin. Things suck because it's hard.
I also remember the little Nokias with replaceable batteries.
And I’m wondering - wouldn’t standardizing batteries make the availability issue easier to solve?
Could you - from the viewpoint of your expertise help me understand why this is something that wouldn’t work? I know my view is pretty simplistic.
I disagree. It's the opposite. If you have a hard logistic problem to solve, there is a very large number of companies who can solve all your issue very quickly. Moving cargo around the globe, renting buildings, buying off-the-self industrial equipment, etc.. that's a problem that has been solved a long time ago. All you need is money and a few phone calls.
Designing a good product on the other hand is not something that gets a lot more complicated and most companies can't do it even with best efforts, good talents, and lots of cash.
This is a good and necessary first step. Focusing on all the ways it could be circumvented isn't a rationale for not doing it, they are all just rationales for strengthening it.
1. MicroSD card
1. Headphone Jack
1. Removable battery
If it was possible in 2014 and the days of Micro USB, it's possible today.
[1] https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s5_active-6356.php
Current iPhones are IP68 rated, which is markedly superior.
Does anyone care that iPhone is IP68 instead of IP67?
Does anything stop you drom making a phone with a headphone jack and microSD card that will survive submersion to the depth of 2 miles?
My MacBook battery is replaceable. I don’t want removable as I don’t ever swap batteries.
These aren’t losses. They are whimpers from people who are living through rose tinted glasses.
Is your MacBook battery easily replaceable or is glued in making it a danger to be removed by an amateur at home? And even if you never swap batteries how does having it removable effect you really?
Batteries: I extended the life of my 2010 MacBook by swapping the battery and it was very easy. Apple is going to come out with kits for amateurs to do part changes themselves for the iPhone, where that part change will be harder (broken screen swap) than swapping out a MB battery.
Bluetooth is absolutely atrocious, every 2-way call over bluetooth is sampled down to absolute garbage because the meager bandwidth is halved and the codec in prehistoric
2010 MBP were far more repairable than the modern stuff. After that Apple started gluing down the batteries which required prying to remove.
I’ve got a 14” MBP. It has pull tags and is easy to replace. I’d still take it in apple store to get it replaced.
Pull tabs are only slightly better. If the tabs break you're just back to prying off adhesive and the tabs do break if you're not careful.
And what are you going to do in 7 years when you're trying to get it working as a laptop for your kid or something and Apple tells you they no longer service that model as it's "vintage"?
I've also replaced several batteries in Apple products, even without pull tabs and it's not difficult.
Regarding replacements, my mother's 6s just got a second new battery last month and it's still supported after 7 years.
I'm glad you're currently well to do and can afford all new shit for your kids. Some people can't and sometimes a repair is the only option. Is it worth making repair considerably harder for a few extra mm of thinness and less than a hundred grams of weight? I'd argue no. Compare the repair of a 2010 MBP with one from 2016 and then tell me the 2016 one is easy.
Headsets with mics on them did exist before bluetooth, and so did headsets with control buttons (source: my early-2000s portable mp3 player). The only thing bluetooth added to the mix is cross-device compatibility.
- Notebooks would become thicker and clunkier. They don't want that.
- Same for cellphones, added with things like less waterproof/humid resistance.
With that said - many of the most vocal "tech enthusiasts" consume a lot. These are the people that are passionate about consumer electronics, and will purchase new phones/laptops/TVs/etc. every 1-2 years. So I'm not really sure why they'd care too much about phones etc. potentially not living their maximum lifespan.
On the other hand, it did have a plastic cap on the micro USB port which you had to open every time in order to charge it. I'm not sure if this was a limitation of micro USB (or whatever the Samsung-specific extension next to it was) - modern phones with open USB C ports seem to have no problem being waterproof.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-USB-3-0-Cable-Male/dp/B0...
I’ve replaced several iPhone batteries myself - I have the necessary tools, including the opening tool. Outside of it being a fiddly job involving miniature connectors, I find that the replacement batteries don’t last as long as the OEM ones, even when bought from iFixit.
Also, the battery is glued to the back shell, and the release tapes usually break, because the hot rice bag isn’t as hot as the heated vacuum stage that Apple uses. Then you have to work a monofilament under the battery, which is an annoying three hand job, if you don’t have the stage.
Apple gets $69 to replace the battery. Given the above, that’s reasonable. But, the nearest service is an hour away. The real decision is the personal time and delay to get to and from the service place (twice, or wait around for a couple of hours) vs spend an hour to do it myself.
If the battery was OEM and came out easily, I’d do it myself, every time.
Phone replaceable battery; a rubber gasket and 3-4 screws - waterproof up to 5-6ft.
Though I guess you could get away with a cheaper clip based approach... Like some cheap Chinese ham radios. I had a friend drop one in a lake, then pull it out (maybe 3ft deep). You wanna know what part broke? The speaker - it was a bit muffled, but that's due to probably water penetration and pressure on that membrane.
It really is shocking how many people think it's "hard" to waterproof a small battery if it can be removed. Tupperware is water proof, doesn't cost a lot to make. Why would a battery encased in plastic be any harder? Especially for multi-billion dollar companies who can afford to scoop up some of the best engineers and have them work on consumer devices.
Laptop manufacturers have been saying that for years, and look at the Framework.
I returned a M1 Macbook Air to get the Framework instead, so essentially, I've now paid 50% more to get a laptop with almost infinitely worse battery life when idle and 3-4x worse battery life in use. It's also slower, heavier, thicker, and has a screen resolution that a lot of apps don't know how to use well.
At this rate, I better be able to replace the battery because I'm having to do a full charge/discharge cycle multiple times a day if I'm not just constantly leaving it plugged in.
I love the idea of it in theory, but it's essentially a worse laptop than even the decade-old Apple laptops that did have replaceable batteries.
At least unless you put a big glaring "This laptop has 3 hours battery life" on the purchase page. Instead, they just repeatedly say how many Watts the battery holds and leaves you to assume that it's such a big number that it'll have great battery life.
The Framework and M1 Macbook Air weight the same at 1.3 kg, and are both 16 mm thick, according to the specs that I can find. Did it really _seem_ thicker and heavier to you?
Height: 0.16–0.63 inch (0.41–1.61 cm)
So they're the same thickness at their thickest point, but I'd guess that the Air has much less of the laptop at that thickness. I'd be curious about a volumetric comparison.
In the end, I wasn't even trying to say that the battery size mattered. If anything, the fact that it's a bigger battery almost makes it worse. They crammed more battery in and it's still a drastically worse user experience when it comes to everything about the battery.
Some of this is definitely because they're having to buy worse parts to try to make sure they're replaceable, and maybe that would improve if more places made parts for it. Maybe I could upgrade to a more efficient CPU/Mobo in the future, or a better battery, but then what do I do with the old one? I'm still contributing to e-waste.
And you can get comparable results in Linux, but you need to tweak it yourself at the moment.
The ports are great - I love that about the Framework, but having an HDMI port only matters so much if the battery is so bad you can't even show a fully movie on a TV with it not plugged in to power (and with a fairly beefy power transformer at that.)
I'm not arguing the Framework isn't more powerful on paper, but functionally, I just can barely use it. I was on a trip the other month and walked to a coffee shop in the morning to do some work and lost 20% of my battery charge on the way to the shop with it just in my backpack. Every minute using it I'm aware of how fast it's discharging in a way that literally no other electronic device I've owned in a decade has made me think about it.
It's important to remind ourselves that the metals in these phones are mined in part by people with very difficult life conditions, often so bad that they die on the job. We ought to be able to repair what they contributed to build instead of asking them to mine yet another pound of metal just so we can save 0.9mm. This will also reduce need for mining, which creates all sorts of pollution.
That answer is going to sound unpopular here, but deep down is how most people feel.
To be candid: in some matters, the regulators should not give a shit about how you want your phone.
Good for EU and their mandates.
And you do realise that no countries have complete democracy? Even Switzerland with their many referendums doesn't put every decision to a democratic vote. Partly for practical and pragmatic reasons, but also because some things are best not decided by the masses.
Or planes would cost slightly less to fly if they were not required to carry safety equipment.
That’s exactly because people like you don’t give a shit and corporations will do anything to save/make a buck that laws and regulations like this have to be made and enforced.
Either that or we come up with laws that keep us competitive without destroying everything around us. I hope that's what Europe will do and I will support regulation that takes a tiny bit of comfort away if it makes us more resilient in the face of climate change and geopolitical difficulties.
Regarding your second point, that's also objectively incorrect. When accidents happen, passengers, especially backseat passengers, become projectiles that cause additional injuries or excess deaths for other occupants. It's not just the dude not wearing a seatbelt dying, it's also the people around them.
Let’s be honest here: This is all of us to some degree. OP is just one of the few that admits it.
Or is your "to some degree" take into accounts degrees so small as to be meaningless?
I’m not sure exactly where we our disagreement lies, but I think it’s a mistake to dismiss small degrees of sentiment as those small degrees manifest as purchase decisions, which collectively manifest as multimillion dollar industries that are supported by those individual actions. Additionally, asserting that someone either cares or doesn’t care and that there’s not some continuum is a false dichotomy.
But we're talking about this line of discussion. Which was sparked by someday saying they didn't care and no one did. I objected to the latter part of that. It's bullshit that no one cares. There are ethical vegans and people who do all kinds of things because of personal responsibility.
Applying the golden rule, so why should anyone give a shit about what you think?
And yes, many, if not most people are selfish cunts in many ways. Myself included.
But that does not make it good. It is something that you, I, and everyone else should be deeply ashamed of.
You could do this #2 screws which are tiny, use 3-6 of them around the edge. Add a rubber gasket. And you have a water proof battery that is replaceable in under 5 minutes with a precision Philips head (aka those little screwdriver heads you get with the multi-head screwdriver kits)
Quite the opposite. I want larger/heavier devices. Make my phone a bit thicker and heavier and sturdier, please. I feel the same about a laptop. I recently got a new laptop, and the flimsiness of high-end machines was a turnoff. The salesman kept saying "but it's only X lbs, so much lighter" as though that was a selling point. But I want strong hinges, large replaceable batteries, etc. I could care less about 3 vs 7 lbs.
Making better designs to allow for easier to replace batteries isn’t crazy hard either, current designs already tend toward that. This proposal seem to only mandate that “users should be able to exchange them with commercially available tools.” so it leaves a pretty wide array of options for the manufacturers. They could probably even make their own custom tools available if this is what it takes yo keep phones thin and sturdy as you want them.
It really isn't that hard. Maybe a few extra days of design and development by a team of engineers. If that... Once you come up with your preferred design, it more or less can be replicated to every other similar device.
Still not a problem: The examples upthread of phones from many different manufacturers that had replaceable batteries, headphone jacks, and card readers and were watertight a decade or more ago show that those weeks have already been invested and paid for.