Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

rte.ie

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 147 posts

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#11

Post by NL807 »

vv_ wrote: post #4
troupo wrote: post #2

> including a repair obligation for manufacturers of certain products Unfortunately regulations often don't go far enough. I have a ~10 year old iPad Pro in perfect working condition. I can basically do nothing with it, and increasingly it can no longer even browse the internet because Safari is so outdated on it. So it will be waste. See similar story about Amazon bricking old Kindles: https://www.techradar.com/tabl…

Updating old products is expensive, especially as their hardware falls further behind. Unless manufacturers adopt some kind of subscription model to justify the cost of continued updates, which would likely be very unpopular, I don’t see how they can realistically keep older devices supported indefinitely.

>I don’t see how they can realistically keep older devices supported indefinitely.

They don't have to. Open up the platform for linux and custom OS.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#12

Post by troupo »

vv_ wrote: post #8
seemaze wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

unlock old hardware and let the community support

It is not always possible to provide the required support. First, it is expensive, as someone needs to prepare all the materials and resources the community would need to continue supporting the product after official support ends. Second, there are legal restrictions, for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware. Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual pro…

You've just made an argument for a bunch of regulation to force opening up and removing obstacles.

E.g.: "for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware." Given that everything has a radio these days (everything is wifi- and/or bluetooth- enabled), this is just stupid. Why is firmware for basically essential infra not legally available?

Same goes for many, many, many other things.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#13

Post by vv_ »

troupo wrote: post #6
vv_ wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Updating old products is expensive, especially as their hardware falls further behind. Unless manufacturers adopt some kind of subscription model to justify the cost of continued updates, which would likely be very unpopular, I don’t see how they can realistically keep older devices supported indefinitely.

They don't have to support it indefinitely. Allowing users install what they want on it would be the best case scenario. Instead we have bullshit like "your TV is three years old? No updates for you": https://developer.samsung.com/smarttv/develop/specifications...

Your link doesn't say that the device isn't getting any updates. It only says that, if I understood it correctly, pre-2023 devices don't receive OS updates. They still get guaranteed security updates for five years.

> They don't have to support it indefinitely.

How long should support for devices last in that case? And what should be supported?

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#15

Post by Hendrikto »

troupo wrote: post #2

> including a repair obligation for manufacturers of certain products Unfortunately regulations often don't go far enough. I have a ~10 year old iPad Pro in perfect working condition. I can basically do nothing with it, and increasingly it can no longer even browse the internet because Safari is so outdated on it. So it will be waste. See similar story about Amazon bricking old Kindles: https://www.techradar.com/tabl…

I recently had to throw out a first gen iPad that was physically still in mint condition (even including the battery, somehow), simply for the lack of support essentially turning it into a useless brick.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#16

Post by Hendrikto »

vv_ wrote: post #4
troupo wrote: post #2

> including a repair obligation for manufacturers of certain products Unfortunately regulations often don't go far enough. I have a ~10 year old iPad Pro in perfect working condition. I can basically do nothing with it, and increasingly it can no longer even browse the internet because Safari is so outdated on it. So it will be waste. See similar story about Amazon bricking old Kindles: https://www.techradar.com/tabl…

Updating old products is expensive, especially as their hardware falls further behind. Unless manufacturers adopt some kind of subscription model to justify the cost of continued updates, which would likely be very unpopular, I don’t see how they can realistically keep older devices supported indefinitely.

Vendors do not have to support their product indefinitely. They have to design their products in a way that they do not become useless after support ends. E.g. by opening up the bootloader and letting users install custom software.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#17

Post by vv_ »

realusername wrote: post #10
vv_ wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not always possible to provide the required support. First, it is expensive, as someone needs to prepare all the materials and resources the community would need to continue supporting the product after official support ends. Second, there are legal restrictions, for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware. Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual pro…

> Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual property publicly available. You can just stop to the last reason, they don't want to give up ownership back to you. They would prefer you to throw the device in the bin and buy a new one, preferably from them again.

> they don't want to give up ownership back to you

No, it's simply that your demand is completely unreasonable. You are essentially asking them to adopt an open-source model. That can mean giving up control over its intellectual property and potentially exposing proprietary technology to competitors, especially when some products are valuable precisely because of the software that runs on them.

Edit:

I don't know why it is not allowing me to reply to you.

> No, I'm asking these devices to work like normal computers

What exactly is a "normal computer," and what specific behavior are you expecting?

Can you freely tinker with your motherboard's firmware? Can you modify the Bluetooth or Wi-Fi firmware on your motherboard? Can you modify and independently update the internals of Windows itself? These are all examples of components that are proprietary and subject to limitations, even on what we would consider a "normal computer."

There may be some exceptions to the above, but the same generally applies to mass-produced, commercially distributed devices. They are often locked down for technical, legal, and security reasons, and "unlocking" them is simply not a reasonable expectation in many cases.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#18

Post by realusername »

vv_ wrote: post #17
realusername wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual property publicly available. You can just stop to the last reason, they don't want to give up ownership back to you. They would prefer you to throw the device in the bin and buy a new one, preferably from them again.

> they don't want to give up ownership back to you No, it's simply that your demand is completely unreasonable. You are essentially asking them to adopt an open-source model. That can mean giving up control over its intellectual property and potentially exposing proprietary technology to competitors, especially when some products are valuable precisely because of the software that runs on them. Edit: I don't know why…

No, I'm asking these devices to work like normal computers, because that's what they are.

Also I doubt that there's anything left on 2015 era hardware that will grant you an edge on current age competitors

To give a reply:

> Can you freely tinker with your motherboard's firmware? Can you modify the Bluetooth or Wi-Fi firmware on your motherboard? Can you modify and independently update the internals of Windows itself? These are all examples of components that are proprietary and subject to limitations, even on what we would consider a "normal computer."

Yes I expect do be able to do all of those things if I want to, it's my computer and I should be free to do whatever I want on it. Including modifying firmware, modifying the OS and modifying anything else you can think of.

Do I want to do all of these? Probably not but the freedom for me to do it should be there if I change my mind. And no, it's a reasonable expectation.

Re: New EU-wide product repair rules come into force

#20

Post by vv_ »

troupo wrote: post #12
vv_ wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not always possible to provide the required support. First, it is expensive, as someone needs to prepare all the materials and resources the community would need to continue supporting the product after official support ends. Second, there are legal restrictions, for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware. Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual pro…

You've just made an argument for a bunch of regulation to force opening up and removing obstacles. E.g.: "for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware." Given that everything has a radio these days (everything is wifi- and/or bluetooth- enabled), this is just stupid. Why is firmware for basically essential infra not legally available? Same goes for many, many, many other things.

> Given that everything has a radio these days [...] this is just stupid

Manufacturers need to pass certification for their radio implementations, such as FCC, CE/RED, PTCRB, Bluetooth SIG, etc. Any modification to the radio firmware can potentially change the device's RF characteristics and cause it to fall outside of the conditions under which it was certified.

This is why manufacturers generally cannot simply release the radio firmware and allow users to modify it freely, as doing so could result in devices operating outside their certified RF parameters and expose them to regulatory or legal liability.

Not to mention the intellectual property rights of the manufacturer and their vendors. The firmware may contain proprietary code, algorithms, or other licensed technology that the manufacturer does not have the legal right to redistribute, especially if it was developed by a third-party vendor.

Post reply on HN