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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

#411

Post by turbinerneiter »

hatware wrote: post #338
turbinerneiter wrote: post #219

Reading this article and the comments here makes me quite sad. 1. The repair kit described here is not mandatory for anyone to rent to be able to buy the parts. You can just buy the parts alone and use whatever tools you want. If you attempt your own repair, you should use the simple ifixit style tools, and understand the higher risk of damage you are taking. 2. The kit described in the article seems very decent for…

I think you have grossly underestimated how propaganda against right to repair legislation has colored your perception. That is what's sad. We used to fully own the devices we buy, now look at us.

I think my perspective is pretty good, thanks.

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

#412

Post by thetinguy »

shkkmo wrote: post #276
asoneth wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumption (that there are minimal tradeoffs when optimizing for repairability) has not been my experience in industrial design. Every single product has tradeoffs between size, weight, cost, ruggedness, ease of repair, etc. I believe Apple didn't set out to make it difficult to repair, it was just a side effect of not caring one way or the other and optimizing for the other aspects. Personally I buy products th…

> I believe Apple didn't set out to make it difficult to repair, it was just a side effect of not caring one way or the other and optimizing for the other aspects. Apple's efforts with DRM and using IP law to restrict parts supply seem to clearly indicaye a desire and intent to limit the ability to self-repair. While there are legitimate trade-offs to make, it seems obvious to that Apple has made choices that unneces…

Why should Apple allow people to use their trademarks in order to fool people into paying more for “genuine” components. Do you think Louis Rossman was going to tell his customers that, “I know this replacement battery has an Apple logo but I didn’t buy it from Apple.”

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

#413

Post by vladvasiliu »

spookthesunset wrote: post #402
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I view this differently. This article is documenting a process people are surely curious about. But the costly deposit and multiple heavy pelican cases of supplies show just how deep the hole Apple has dug for themselves really is. Apple is so anti-repair they have no provisions for a reasonable at home process. You must realize that a $1200 deposit alone means this process is out of reach of many people. Meanwhile I…

How can you have a user accessible door to remove the battery while still being at least somewhat thin and water resistant? I’m sure there are ways but I would probably significantly increase the BOM costs. For example some kind of waterproof battery that connects to a waterproof jack. That will you the battery but cracked screens and stuff? Those pretty much have to be a pain in the ass to keep the cost, weight and…

> How can you have a user accessible door to remove the battery while still being at least somewhat thin and water resistant?

Don't know what you mean by "somewhat thin", but as far as I'm concerned, maybe they could ask Samsung.

My Galaxy S5 had a removable battery door, removable battery, and was water resistant (I'd use it as a GPS on a motorbike, even under heavy rain). It also had a headphone jack, which also didn't seem to be an issue for its water resistance.

It was less than a mm thicker than my iPhone 7 and barely thicker than a 13 mini.

Dimensions from Wikipedia:

GS7 : 142.4 x 69.6 x 7.9 mm

iphone 7 : 138.3 x 67.1 x 7.1 mm

iphone 13 mini : 131.5 x 64.2 x 7.65 mm

I prefer the iPhone 7 for the overall smaller size, but I think that's a different issue. I never found the GS7 "thick", just "big", because it was too tall and wide and would sometimes be uncomfortable in my jeans pocket (and I'm a guy).

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

#414

Post by turbinerneiter »

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #318
turbinerneiter wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I think they could. They have the best engineers in the world and incredible amounts of money. The regularly invent new manufacturing techniques to enable their new designs. They often invest heavily in their suppliers to enable them to make the parts they need. If Apple wanted to they could make an iPhone that people love and has all the features they want and be much easier to repair then the current version.

Apple tried to make the MacBook Pro just a few millimeters thinner and gave us the disastrous, almost-universally-loathed butterfly keyboard. I feel like your view that Apple engineers have massive design margins they are choosing not to exploit is just not real.

Maybe your view that a massive design margins are needed is not real.

Literally the choice of glue can make a huge difference for ease of repair with no impact on the design.

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

#415

Post by mindslight »

sokoloff wrote: post #234
mindslight wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 mechani…

Yeah, the "could" in my comment was only because I already own the tools, and I had just done the brakes on the other car. I might take the excuse to buy a new jack though, so I can lift up to the jack stands without needing to cheat with blocks.

The funny thing is they also wanted $700 to adjust the valve clearances. This is expensive (it's the stealership after all), but I might have said yes just to have one less thing on my docket. However after the outrageous brake quote put me in the mindset to DIY, I figure I might as well do that myself as well.

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

#416

Post by wrycoder »

salawat wrote: post #378
sokoloff wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have a storage bin holding old smartphones with readily replaceable batteries. That suggests to me that readily replaceable batteries isn't anywhere near the entire story in terms of keeping phones out the landfill (or in your case, a storage bin).

You are correct. without datasheets, you have no way to even approach reprogramming a computer system. Those datasheets, schemata, and documentation are some of the closest, most tightly held trade secrets in the tech world. Increasingly, the world has gotten away from "sell thing to owner to own" to "sell hook for revenue extraction from User". part of which has also increasingly been "be the unofficial or unnoticed…

And that’s the reason to continue to grow the FLOSS / Open Hardware ecosystem.

You don’t have to program or fix stuff yourself. But you should be able to hire your local shop to do it for you at reasonable expense and to keep your old, but good, stuff running as long as you like.

While flip phones are disposable are their price point, that’s not true for hardware like smart phones or beyond. We need better, sustainable solutions.

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

#417

Post by ASalazarMX »

saagarjha wrote: post #394
paulryanrogers wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering that batteries still only last about a day and Apple led this shift to non-user-swappable batteries they still deserve some blame for landfill culture. Most of their efforts around repair appear to be the minimum anyone motivated by new sales would do once faced with looming regulation. Even if at cost the extreme sophistication and complexity of such tools reinforces the point that these devices aren't r…

> Considering that batteries still only last about a day and Apple led this shift to non-user-swappable batteries they still deserve some blame for landfill culture. Sure, but it seems like this makes phones thinner and lighter and consumers want that. It "sucks" that Apple gave them that option and they went for it, but I don't consider this to be inherently malicious. > Even if at cost the extreme sophistication an…

> Sure, but it seems like this makes phones thinner and lighter and consumers want that

Or Apple devices are also a tech fashion statement, so their loyal consumers will put up with everything Apple changes. iPhones could show off their sleek design if they weren't designed to need a case. People definitely wanted bigger screens and batteries for years, and Apple was very reluctant until the iPhone 10. I'm sure many iPhone users miss the fingerprint reader, but they won't get it, and they will still buy the next model because the slight and gratuitous design differences make it obvious you're using an old iPhone.

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

#418

Post by gernb »

js2 wrote: post #344
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I view this differently. This article is documenting a process people are surely curious about. But the costly deposit and multiple heavy pelican cases of supplies show just how deep the hole Apple has dug for themselves really is. Apple is so anti-repair they have no provisions for a reasonable at home process. You must realize that a $1200 deposit alone means this process is out of reach of many people. Meanwhile I…

It's a trade-off. I am someone who repairs my own stuff. I've repaired my fridge, my dishwasher, my oven, my microwave, my garage door openers, my 1998 Jeep Cherokee, and on and on. 99% of people do NOT do this. I've replaced the batteries in multiple first generation iPhone SEs. I'll never replace a battery again in an iPhone, nor do I ever desire too. The phones have become too hard to open, but in return, Apple of…

I don't think it's all that hard to make a replaceable battery and have the phone be waterproof or small. My Go Pro has a replaceable battery and it's waterproof. Googling there are plenty of waterproof phones with replaceable battery.

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

#419

Post by ksec »

jeffbee wrote: post #347
madeofpalk wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> show just how deep the hole Apple has dug for themselves really is I guess it shows this hole to the public , but Apple's know this the whole time. They scale out in-store iPhone repair to 500 stores around the world where they have low-paid retail workers performing the repairs.

And it's a great service, too. You pay $50 and wait a few minutes. You get a new, genuine OEM battery with a warranty that extends the life of your phone indefinitely. The right-to-repair people have just lost contact with reality. This is the way people want it to work. It is a great product experience.

>You pay $50 and wait a few minutes.

I would have no problem if this was true. But it is not. $49 only for non-Face ID Model. $69 for FaceID, or pretty much all current iPhone lineup except iPhone SE. You also have to wait 30 min to hours depending on store. Not few minutes unless you are the only one doing Battery Swap which is highly unlikely given how they are always fully booked.

Depending on which part of the world you are in, your prospective on the Battery swap pricing differ greatly on a $10 Battery part.

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

#420

Post by desmondwillow »

jeffbee wrote: post #397
paulryanrogers wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For buyers of new devices that may be true. Yet I've sold plenty of phones I had bought second hand (after years of my own use), and those with user swappable batteries are far more likely to be reused without great expense. More so if they also have an SDcard slot to minimize wear on the soldered storage. As phone features plateau we should strive to make them last longer and avoid unnecessarily consuming tons of ne…

The facts aren't really on your side of the argument. The glued-together Apple phones are the ones least likely to be in the trash. They are still shipping the latest software on phones from 2015. By contrast, removable-battery phones are all garbage practically as soon as you open the box. The Samsung XCover is only 2 years old, might not even get Android 12, and definitely will never get anything after Android 12.

> By contrast, removable-battery phones are all garbage practically as soon as you open the box. The Samsung XCover is only 2 years old, might not even get Android 12, and definitely will never get anything after Android 12.

That isn't a property intrinsic to removable-battery phones; An Apple phone with a removable battery would be the best in terms of software and battery longevity, both of which are factors which serve to prolong the life of the phone.

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