I don't have the answer to this, but somehow getting consumers to factor in repairability is going to be key to creating the kind of leverage that can drive real change in the industry.
Replacing the battery on year 3 makes a huge difference in how long you would want to keep a phone around for.
I still failed because some moron gifted an echo 5 to someone who refuses to let it go.
My 830’s saving grace has been the ease of changing batteries. If the battery was internal I’d have tossed it years ago.
Not only because of security issues in software, but also because of possibly revoked certificates. And newer, safer, web protocols. Also strange if your bank still supports it.
Hardware might be fine when it comes to being speedy enough, but may also have issues.A digital device still working is just not good enough anymore.
I don’t bank on my phone beyond checking my balance with SMS. If I need to actually move money around I’d rather do it on my computer.
The phone is used for calling, texting, mp3s, the weather, the calendar/reminders, and very occasional maps. I do have my gmail setup via imap with is probably the biggest risk I actually take.
I’ve written half a dozen of my own programs for specific things I need, but otherwise there’s nothing installed.
I know there’s some risk but I’m well aware of it and accept it.
The 6T had the latest LineageOS and the P8 has GrapheneOS. Both have the latest Android but there's nothing on the Pixel that's better than the OnePlus.
6 years and no noticeable differences in terms of battery, performance, screen, ergonomy, etc.
I should have stuck with the old one but I was convinced things were still progressing. My bad.
It not being a flagship gives them 2 forgiveness points for the lack of performance. But it not being a flagship also gives them 4 demerit points because they're charging as much as a flagship.
Unless the level of "flagship" is higher than it used to be, in which case it's okay that it's not a flagship, but then "not a flagship" stops being an excuse for mediocre performance.
They can't eat the "not a flagship" cake and have it too. Both interpretations are bad for them.
But in that case, Pixel 8 is one tier below flagship, so it should be on the same tier as a 2018 flagship. Especially since the price is so close. But if it met the same standard, then a model 6 years newer would be much faster, so it's failing pretty badly.
Unless you're saying I shouldn't expect performance improvements for phones that are only high tier? I don't see why that would be the case.
Or maybe you're saying that flagship tier is the same, but it got far more expensive for no benefit? That option makes Google look the worst of all, and definitely isn't a "to be fair" defense.
I agree with everything.
I don't like how disposable everything is, but labor costs to repair are huge. I just got rid of a van because of a failed head gasket, because it's too much work to get to the not that expensive part.
It's still my dedicated MP3 player.
Works quite well mostly still.
Why not yours if you don't have very high expectations?
On the flip side, you are the first person I know of talking about about repairing your blender, and I've never seen a blender repair shop. Larger home appliances, sure, but blenders?
I'm not saying you are wrong to prioritize these things. Just pointing out that you are an outlier.
Problem is people buy a $25 hamilton beach blender that doesn't make any financial sense to repair but makes huge amounts of sense as an initial purchase. If you buy a $500 vitamix, you can keep it running forever with new parts, but that's the same price as 20 of the cheap blender. And blender technology isn't really advancing at a huge rate compared to, say, cell phones.
That's part of it, but also the vitamix and hamilton beach really have quite different capabilities. For most peoples usage, it doesn't matter much, but the vitamix (at least the core one) show their commercial kitchen background.
The real problem is that there isn't anything much between the $25 one and the $350 one. From a technical point of view, there isn't any reason someone couldn't produce a $90 one that was robust and repairable but less powerful etc. than the vitamix. I dont' think i've ever seen one - if you do find a $90 one it's essentially the $25 one in a fancier looking shell.
The market, as they say, has spoken. In most cases you are better off going for commercial suppliers if you want longer life, repairability, etc., but often the only things on offer there are way overkill for e.g. a home kitchen.
Small appliance repair is alive and well in parts of the world where it is easy to access parts supply close to the source (i.e. you are paying roughly small batch wholesale prices).
I think this is a huge problem. If you don't know a good brand (or can't trust the brand), why risk the $350 one when you can buy 14x $25 ones for the same cost and maybe get lucky?
Take the humble toaster for example. Are there some nice, well built, repairable ones that can (possibly) make the toast of angels? Sure, I've heard good things about Dualit[1]. But I bought a generic Black and Decker toaster for $15 over 20 years ago and it continues to work just fine. I would have had to replace that toaster roughly every 3.5 years in order to get over the cost of the cheapest Dualit toaster. It's not fancy and not consistent, but it is functional, and I can more or less guarantee that walmart will be selling it or a similar item for decades. Buying a more expensive "repairable" toaster from a small brand is just a risk that doesn't make a lot of sense, even before you factor in that repair shop labor is going to be in the $40-50/hr range.
Yeah it would be nice if Apple provided in depth repair guides and sold individual chips for cheaper repairs, but realistically I don’t think it’s going to change all that much vs other product categories.
If it weren't glued in place and if they wouldn't tie Face ID components to the goddamn screen, it would be far less expensive. I managed to break my iPhone 12 Mini's screen in a freak incident - the protection glass is intact, but it shattered below it, right over the left Face ID illuminator.
A new display + glass would clock in at 60-100€ plus maybe half an hour of time to do the replacement - but that would break FaceID as the components are paired for whatever reason. Apple's quote is 279€. What a fucking joke!
Also... why is there any need for the FaceID sensor to be paired? It's two LEDs illuminating the face from different angles in infrared so the camera can create a depth map. None of that needs a secure connection.
Hector Martin has some nice rants about right-to-repair zealots and their lack of understanding as to why Apple made the decisions they did.
Phone theft is a billion dollar industry, and as Apple tries to lock down parts, thieves adapted by forming far more efficient logistics and by centralizing value extraction from stolen phones. Apple's tactics haven't so far made a big impact to a phone thief's incentives, and I don't see it happening in the near future either.
You will own nothing, and you will be happy. :^)
Pairing sensor and mainboard is fine as long as I can reset it when I reset the phone.
In my town, there are several repair shops that fix small appliances such as blenders. I've never used them, because I fix my small appliances myself.
I can't stand throwing away machines that can be fixed and put back into service. It seems so utterly wasteful.
Going from the 4a to the 8? Barely noticed a change in functionality.
Fair enough. But there are also a fair number of people who, like myself, would be pretty irritated to have to replace their phone after only 5 years.
A phone that can be repaired, is worth something. For ewaste you get €0 (some recycler may get a few bucks from rare materials). For a phone that can have a second life, you might get some €100. This is one reason why people love iPhones: their value, second hand, remains rather high.
You're right that customers don't care about Free software and yet it won. Free software has moved from a niche to dominating the software marketplace. The linux kernel, GNU coreutils, gcc, binutils - these are amazingly popular and keep getting ported to new platforms. And of course, Open Source software is yet more popular still.
The right to repair movement seems to have its effects in the EU, with a ‘right to repair’ directive adopted by the EU parliament. Of course it still needs to be implemented into national legislations and the devil will be in the details… it shows the impact though.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20240419IP...
If history is a guide, people generally take abuse from authority in stride so long as the intensity generally remains below a threshold.
That doesn't seem to be the case for phones unfortunately.
Also, the closest consumers got to using free software was Android and Chromebook (i.e. not exactly free) plus using services hosted on Linux servers, cause it actually makes sense there, and GNU/Linux home desktop has still not won.