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Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

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Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#231

Post by seanmcdirmid »

ornornor wrote: post #223
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You have to admit that requiring 79 lbs of equipment, a 1200$ deposit, and so much effort just to swap a friggin’ battery is a tad overkill You know people were swapping batteries long before this was available, right? And that you don’t have to rent the official factory tools? Apple did a great thing by providing this option at a loss to themselves. The fact that people are rushing to criticize the move suggests m…

Not having easily replaceable batteries (and pardon me but I don’t consider requiring 79 lbs of equipment and a 1200$ deposit “easy”) in modern phones is akin to selling cars with the tires welded on. It is ridiculous, consumer hostile, and wasteful. Batteries are consumable, they should not be a reason to throw the phone away once they stopped working. You don’t throw your house away when the garbage bag is full or…

If my house was 90% garbage bag, I’m not sure. Houses get razed and rebuilt all the time, especially in Japan. They are not as modular as we’d like them to be, as I’m finding out in planning a kitchen renovation.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#232

Post by d3nj4l »

judge2020 wrote: post #160
Jiejeing wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ... and when there's enough of you for this to represent an actual, realistic target market you will then find someone who will sell you one. Probably not, considering the very high cost of entry in the target market, it is unlikely to be offset by the marginal amount of additional money people are ready to invest into such devices. Markets don't produce goods out of nothing. Especially if that person specifically…

the iPhone Mini was a testament to that Apple themselves will respond to a certain amount of market demand, however its inability to sell well (with reportedly under 4% of total iPhone sales) is probably going to be a lesson for Apple to heavily consider whether or not extra SKUs are really worth it.

They're keeping the same number of SKUs, but they just want a cheap(er) but bigger phone. They're looking at how many Pro Maxes they sold in China and thinking "We could make a lot more money making a big model that was slightly cheaper."

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#233

Post by Nextgrid »

sokoloff wrote: post #208
Nextgrid wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not trivially - see my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31458161

Your complaint seems to center around the idea that you don’t want to eat a ~$25 core charge to have standing by on the shelf a replacement battery, which is a part that degrades over a period around 20x slower than ground shipping. As a consumer, why not just order the battery when your battery is down to 80-85% health and it’s about to be convenient to spend a half-hour of quality time with your phone? As repair sh…

> As a consumer, why not just order the battery when your battery is down to 80-85% health and it’s about to be convenient to spend a half-hour of quality time with your phone? As repair shop, Apple has already undercut your price to use official supply chain parts, so you’re likely already using the branded batteries and the $100 bootleg part programmer.

In my case self-repair is more about convenience than money. Bootleg parts/tools are still a better experience for me than shipping a phone to Apple for repair or making appointments to the Apple Store and then reinstalling the software on the new phone (twice, if you have to do it on a spare device to use in the interim).

Regarding batteries specifically, I agree, Apple's prices are unbeatable. In my case, my main use-case for self-repair is screens - the batteries are just a bonus because if I'm already in the phone I may as well put a new battery in there. The pricing on screens (including the "core charge") is much higher and makes self-repair more attractive.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#234

Post by sokoloff »

mindslight wrote: post #130
srvmshr wrote: post #13

If made to fulfill the word of the law without actually having to follow it in spirit, this would be my modus operandi too. By designing $1200 deposit, $49 rental & two Pelican suitcases of tools and manuals, while keeping the battery replacement price same at $69 (what you'd normally pay in total at Store), they have entirely disincentivized self-repair without actually breaking any law. Masterstroke /s

IMO the $1200 deposit is less ridiculous than the same-as-store $70 battery price. If the cost for the new battery were at wholesale prices, and one were able to purchase tools from the kit individually, I think that would be the best Apple could do (besides redesigning their devices to make repair easier). Tools always cost money, a capital investment which ends up being vested in professionals that buy the tools on…

I have a standing offer for my friends: I’ll do a brake job with you in my driveway to show you how easy and cheap it is. It’s common for those $1000+ dealer quotes to be $75-$150 in parts, $5 in consumables, and Over 20 years, I’ve done this for a few handfuls of people. How many have switched to DIYing anything more than filling washer fluid and maybe replacing a lamp? One. (Two others have switched to indy mechanics.)

The others keep complaining about their $800-1250 per axle brake jobs and $2500+ service visits at the dealer and how expensive it is to own a car, but keep right on doing it.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#235

Post by turbinerneiter »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #191
turbinerneiter wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely made up and false conundrum. You can design devices that are easy to repair and still waterproof and sleek. This is a made up target-conflict that is easily resolved by any trained industrial designer and engineer.

So if the market already produces that kind of phone (and I assume has good aspects in variables you didn’t mention like reliability, battery life, performance, production costs, etc…) why do we need to force Apple to produce the same? Can’t consumers just buy the phone on the market that already suits their wants?

We don't need to force them. Where did I say I want to force them?

I pointed out that the conundrum of repairability vs. quality is made up, or at least dramatically overstated.

There is currently only one company that I know of that focused on repairability in their phones (Fairphone) and they have a hard time competing on other factors due to the fact that they are tiny.

Now your are going to say that them being tiny means nobody wants repairability. Then I'm going to say that people do, but it's just one aspect and that the phone is lacking in others. Then you are going say that this means you can't build good repairable phones. To which I will say that you can but nobody but one small company is trying. At which point we will be stick in an endless loop.

Truth is, if Apple really wanted the could design their phones in such a way that you could open the back with a couple of screws go replace the battery, but they have no motivation to do so and instead prioritize other aspects. 99% of the industry does the same.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#236

Post by sva_ »

jt2190 wrote: post #213
honkdaddy wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I ran an iOS sales and repairs service for years, eventually stopping around the iPhone X era. I had decent third-party tools, but despite being careful, I'd still break peoples' devices on rare occasion and have to eat the cost. The adhesive they use to bind the screen to the body has gotten consistently tougher over the years, to the point where there really isn't a reliable way for someone to do it correctly on th…

> The adhesive they use to bind the screen to the body has gotten consistently tougher over the years... Unless they ditch the adhesive... We talk about this adhesive as if it's easily replaced with some screws, but I wonder if that's really true anymore. I can imagine that as devices and their tolerances get smaller that simply screwing something together might actually make the device a lot more delicate. Do you kn…

The adhesive makes the phone waterproof.

I recently replaced my gf's iPhone screen and all I really needed was a hairdryer to heat up the adhesive, a suction cup to pull it off, and a screwdriver. I guess with these tools it'd be safer, but it worked well regardless.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#237

Post by annoyingnoob »

This creates a small market for an after-market repair kit. The things you need for the repair do not need to cost $1200.

My family of 5 has more than 5 devices, it could make sense to just buy the tools. I'm also the kind of person that likes to do repairs, so others ask me for help too.

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#238

Post by seanmcdirmid »

411111111111111 wrote: post #216
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if the market already produces that kind of phone (and I assume has good aspects in variables you didn’t mention like reliability, battery life, performance, production costs, etc…) why do we need to force Apple to produce the same? Can’t consumers just buy the phone on the market that already suits their wants?

> Can’t consumers just buy the phone on the market that already suits their wants? It sounds straightforward but actually isn't. In a perfect world with unlimited resources and no dangers of pollution etc it would undoubtedly be a clear yes, but in reality the consequences of all sides have to be evaluated to decide this.

I’m actually suspicious that the phone doesn’t really exist, that some compromise was made by Apple or the other vendor to achieve their design goals. Saving people from themselves is reasonable given socialized environmental costs, but given that the battery makes up much of the phone these days (and Apple thankfully requires them to be returned for proper recycling), what we are trying to save are the higher value but less environmentally expensive components (eg screen, semiconductors).

Re: Apple Shipped Me a 79-Pound iPhone Repair Kit to Fix a 1.1-Ounce Battery

#240

Post by formerly_proven »

judge2020 wrote: post #160
Jiejeing wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ... and when there's enough of you for this to represent an actual, realistic target market you will then find someone who will sell you one. Probably not, considering the very high cost of entry in the target market, it is unlikely to be offset by the marginal amount of additional money people are ready to invest into such devices. Markets don't produce goods out of nothing. Especially if that person specifically…

the iPhone Mini was a testament to that Apple themselves will respond to a certain amount of market demand, however its inability to sell well (with reportedly under 4% of total iPhone sales) is probably going to be a lesson for Apple to heavily consider whether or not extra SKUs are really worth it.

The mini iPhones seem in an odd position between SE and "normal". As far as I know, the SE models have always been quite popular.
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