Live data from Hacker News

iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

geekbench.com

31–40 of 270 posts

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#31
post #4

> This will likely feed into the “planned obsolescence” narrative. well, non-replaceable battery and all...

It's replaceable, just not as a DIY. Apple encourages people to take their phones into Apple stores/authorized dealers to get the battery replaced.

(Also, the repair is free if the battery's capacity has declined to <80% while under warranty. If you pay for two-year AppleCare+ [$99], you've basically pre-paid for a free battery replacement [normally also $99] at the two-year mark, as long as you've used—abused?—your phone heavily enough to wear its battery down by then. So, Bad Life ProTip: if you have AppleCare, make sure to run your battery flat a lot to get its capacity down, so as to get your money's worth.)

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#32
post #21

Interesting that the battery aged extremely fast when iOS 11 got installed and took the performance down to the „really unpleasant“ level.

There are a billion iOS devices out there. It only stands to reason that for a LOT of these devices, battery performance would hit a critical level at around the same time iOS 11 got installed, just by coincidence. In addition, new iOS installs create a lot of extra battery load, increasing the chances of this occurring.

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#33

This screams "planned obsolescence". If battery scaling is a feature, then why isn't it mentioned by Apple? Why do we need a Reddit thread and a third party benchmarking tool to figure it out? Also, why does the google search for "iphone slow" peak every time a new iPhone is released ( https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=iphone%2... )? Is it purely psychological? I can't find there are no similar spik…

No, it screams "planned and careful shepherding of user experience".

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#34
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication…

You really can't though. I had a phone with an awful battery-- it would shut off around 25% randomly. I brought it into Apple 3 times, it even had apple care-- and because the f *ing diagnostic suite identified the battery as good, they wouldn't replace it. They wouldn't even LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR.

> LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR.

Then you would know that it is totally their fault and the liability would be on Apple to fix other people's devices.

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#35
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication…

But it's not as cheap or easy as just popping the back of your phone and slipping in a new battery. Mind you, most flagship phones these days can't be refurbished in that way.

Have you tried the nearby "We repair iPhones" store? They can replace your battery for a lot less than a new phone.

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#36
post #5
post #4

> This will likely feed into the “planned obsolescence” narrative. well, non-replaceable battery and all...

You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication…

> You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores

Or you know, Apple could make it easy for the user to replace the battery by themselves. But they chose not to.

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#37
post #36
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication…

> You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores Or you know, Apple could make it easy for the user to replace the battery by themselves. But they chose not to.

Know how I can tell you haven't designed any consumer products with a battery, replaceable or otherwise?

This is the engineering equivalent of saying, "Why doesn't someone just go to the Middle East, sit down at a round table with with the Israelis and Palestinians and Sunnis and Shiites and rebels and Baathists and Saudis and ISIS members and refugees and all those other guys, and help them work out their differences peacefully?"

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#38
post #14
post #3

How do non-apple devices cope as they age ? Any word on what Nexus, Galaxy or Pixel devices of a similar vintage do? does the performance stay the same but the battery life becomes shorter?

Most Android devices have rather severe issues with flash degradation (due to use of cheaper chips, controllers and connection... cheap MMC controllers are still very standard) which makes them practically unusable after a few years.

I've owned two low cost Moto G phones and never had this issue.

Re: iPhone Performance Degrades as Battery Ages

#39
post #31
post #4

> This will likely feed into the “planned obsolescence” narrative. well, non-replaceable battery and all...

It's replaceable, just not as a DIY. Apple encourages people to take their phones into Apple stores/authorized dealers to get the battery replaced. (Also, the repair is free if the battery's capacity has declined to <80% while under warranty. If you pay for two-year AppleCare+ [$99], you've basically pre-paid for a free battery replacement [normally also $99] at the two-year mark, as long as you've used—abused?—your…

> If you buy 3-year AppleCare, you're effectively pre-paying for at least one battery top-up.)

Unless I'm missing something, AppleCare on new iPhones is limited to two years ... which, in my experience, is just shortly before iPhone batteries degrade noticeably.

Post reply on HN