Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown • Hacker News Board

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#71

Post by tobylane » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:38 PM UTC

rndn wrote: post #60

tobylane wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

User upgrades don't make much difference to the waste. If anything those types of users are likely to have power heavy desktops using up more energy and precious metals. The average user's waste is reduced because the motherboard is much smaller, as well as Apple's general efforts to stop using some chemicals. My first iMac had a warning about mercury in the screen, the second doesn't.

I'm talking about an ideal, not about the advancements they have made. Maybe it's the Dunning-Kruger effect, but it seems that they could have easily soldered on slots for SSD and RAM and added a little access door with Philips screws even with this smaller board. I could also very well imagine that people would buy upgrades if they were cheap, quick to install and if they knew about them in the first place.

Slots take up space, panels take up space. It wouldn't be the same size as before, I imagine those two things would add depth more so than width or length.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#72

Post by dublinben » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:38 PM UTC

maxerickson wrote: post #51

colinramsay wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Repairability" really means two things: 1) You can fiddle with the insides 2) You can fix it when it goes wrong Despite what you may read on places like HN and Reddit, no-one in the real world gives two hoots about #1, and if you make a product that has good reliability then #2 becomes moot.

It's clear enough that users do not place a high priority on serviceability. It's harder to draw conclusions about how much absolute value is placed on it when it barely exists in a product category.

They certainly don't at the time of purchase, but many regret that decision when they need expensive repairs.

There's a reason why large enterprises still issue Lenovo/Dell/HP business class notebooks. A field technician with minimal training can fully rebuild one in an hour. That's not possible with anything from Apple.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#73

Post by rsynnott » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:39 PM UTC

revelation wrote: post #54

ghshephard wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that Apple is one of the leading companies when it comes to eWaste. Also, this is the one of the rare Apple product that that only has industry standard ports/power chargers on it. You can't critique them on building a product that is hard to repair (and wow, this one looks next to impossible for your average non-technician) - but the ewaste/standard charger concerns don't appear to be valid.

Only if your understanding of "leading companies in ewaste" is that their products tick a bunch of boxes for materials used to be easily recyclable. But that is not the essence of the term. To avoid ewaste, you should avoid creating any in the first place. Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle .

> Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle.

I've had my current Apple laptop for three years, and see no need to replace it any time soon. The Apple laptop I had before that lasted me five years, and a relative is still using it (so, eight years). The HP laptop I had before that lasted about a year and a half before literally beginning to fall apart.

If anything, I would have said that Apple, along with Lenovo, are about the _best_ for longevity in this space.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#74

Post by rsynnott » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:42 PM UTC

cowsandmilk wrote: post #65

a_bonobo wrote: post #13

Worth noting that this device, typical for Apple, gets the worst "repairability" score: >The MacBook 2015 Repairability Score: 1 out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair) There are several reasons why this happens; the optimist says that to save space Apple had to glue and solder so much, the pessimist says it's so that Apple can charge more for repairs/replacements. But I think both can agree that this generates more e-wa…

> all mobile chargers in the EU have to be of the same standard to reduce electronic waste. And yet this is the first criticism of the macbook 2015 by iFixit. In their opinion, moving to USB-C is creating waste since you cannot reuse your magsafe adaptor with this new macbook. Then they state moving to USB-C will cause more accidental damage than using magsafe, thus creating more waste.

I wonder is the new Macbook actually heavy enough for magsafe to work properly. Certainly, with the Air, it's pretty marginal; if the surface isn't very grippy you can pull the laptop with the cable without the magsafe disengaging.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#75

Post by rsynnott » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:45 PM UTC

a_bonobo wrote: post #13

Worth noting that this device, typical for Apple, gets the worst "repairability" score: >The MacBook 2015 Repairability Score: 1 out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair) There are several reasons why this happens; the optimist says that to save space Apple had to glue and solder so much, the pessimist says it's so that Apple can charge more for repairs/replacements. But I think both can agree that this generates more e-wa…

> Worth noting that this device, typical for Apple, gets the worst "repairability" score:

Typical for Apple? The iPhone 6 gets a score of 7; the Galaxy S6 and HTC One M9 get a score of 3 and 2 respectively. The HTC One M7 got a score of 1 (they considered it impossible to open without damaging the case).

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#76

Post by rsynnott » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:49 PM UTC

hahainternet wrote: post #16

hahainternet wrote: post #9

$1300, what an absolute joke.

Aaaand lovely proof that HN is broken. It's a $1300 netbook but this comment is not allowed to be seen.

Netbooks typically used Atom (OEM price: ~$30). This uses a Core M (OEM price: $281). That's more expensive than most netbooks all on its own; it's a slightly different class.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#77

Post by tragic » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 12:55 PM UTC

xienze wrote: post #69

userbinator wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing's going to stop you from running this laptop 10 years from now just like nothing's going to stop you from running a PC laptop 10 years from now. Except for the parts that fail and can't be easily repaired...? Incidentally, I know many people who are still using machines in the 6-8-year-old range, and it fits their use cases perfectly well. We're long past the days of multiple-times improvements in efficiency…

> Except for the parts that fail and can't be easily repaired...? And there aren't parts like that on a more open PC? I mean, if your USB port or display stops working, it's going to be a bit of an undertaking fixing it, glue or no glue. > Incidentally, I know many people who are still using machines in the 6-8-year-old range, and it fits their use cases perfectly well. We're long past the days of multiple-times impr…

> And there aren't parts like that on a more open PC? I mean, if your USB port or display stops working, it's going to be a bit of an undertaking fixing it, glue or no glue.

Depends how you define "more open".

With a home-built desktop, if the USB port goes, you can either get a splitter for one of your other 8 USB ports, or a PCI card with USB ports on it. You can get a new graphics card or monitor.

An extensible laptop will be easy enough to fix for most failures excepting, as you say, display (as long as not ALL your USB ports go out, you can still get a splitter).

And then there are apple-wannabes who glue everything together and charge a kidney for repairs. Such is life...

> But unless you're interested in antique computing, are you seriously going to make a go at using this thing on a day to day basis in 30 years?

Who knows? George R.R. Martin keeps an ancient DOS warhorse around so he can use Wordstar.[0] People have different needs.

[0] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27407502

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#78

Post by a_bonobo » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 1:07 PM UTC

rsynnott wrote: post #75

a_bonobo wrote: post #13

Worth noting that this device, typical for Apple, gets the worst "repairability" score: >The MacBook 2015 Repairability Score: 1 out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair) There are several reasons why this happens; the optimist says that to save space Apple had to glue and solder so much, the pessimist says it's so that Apple can charge more for repairs/replacements. But I think both can agree that this generates more e-wa…

> Worth noting that this device, typical for Apple, gets the worst "repairability" score: Typical for Apple? The iPhone 6 gets a score of 7; the Galaxy S6 and HTC One M9 get a score of 3 and 2 respectively. The HTC One M7 got a score of 1 (they considered it impossible to open without damaging the case).

You're right, in their mobile phone dept. they've come a long way since the first iPhone which started with a 2 - the iPhone 6+ has a 7

https://www.ifixit.com/smartphone-repairability

Their tablets are bad, looks like all of them got a 2: https://www.ifixit.com/tablet-repairability

There is no simple overview for laptops/PCs so I randomly picked some:

>iMac 27" Retina 5K >5/10

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iMac+Intel+27-Inch+Retina+5K...

(a slightly different version got the same score: https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iMac+Intel+27-Inch+EMC+2639+... )

>MacBook Retina 2015 15" (not OP's 13") >1/10

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Retina+Macbook+2015+Teardown...

>iMac 21.5" EMC 2638 >2/10

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iMac+Intel+21.5-Inch+EMC+263...

>MacBook Pro 13" Retina late 2012 >2/10

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Retina+D...

>MacBook Air 13" Mid 2011 >4/10

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Air+13-Inch+Mid+2011...

So I change my above statement: Their current mobile phones and their desktop machines are alright to good in repairability scores, tablets and laptops are bad

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#79

Post by Rossimac » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 1:13 PM UTC

rsynnott wrote: post #73

revelation wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if your understanding of "leading companies in ewaste" is that their products tick a bunch of boxes for materials used to be easily recyclable. But that is not the essence of the term. To avoid ewaste, you should avoid creating any in the first place. Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle .

> Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle. I've had my current Apple laptop for three years, and see no need to replace it any time soon. The Apple laptop I had before that lasted me five years, and a relative is still using it (so, eight years). The HP laptop I had before that lasted about a year and a half before literally beginning to fall apart. If anything, I wou…

I'm still rocking my MacBook Unibody (Late 2008). Coming up to 7 years old and the only issue is the battery is down to an hour and half, which sucks.

Other than that, 8GB RAM and a 120GB SSD gave it the much needed boost (5 years ago...).

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#80

Post by mwcampbell » Fri, Apr 17, 2015, 1:18 PM UTC

xienze wrote: post #58

revelation wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if your understanding of "leading companies in ewaste" is that their products tick a bunch of boxes for materials used to be easily recyclable. But that is not the essence of the term. To avoid ewaste, you should avoid creating any in the first place. Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle .

> Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years Well that's just a matter of opinion, isn't it? Nothing's going to stop you from running this laptop 10 years from now just like nothing's going to stop you from running a PC laptop 10 years from now. The question is _are you going to want to_ continue using a 10 year old laptop? That's an eternity in technological terms. Sure you can upgrade a PC laptop to squeez…

Then we software developers need to get better at using hardware resources efficiently, so that the amount of RAM that's considered adequate today is still adequate 10 years from now. As I've said before, why isn't a PC with a 366 MHz processor and 64 MB of RAM (the laptop I used in college) good enough any more?