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

Ask a Repair Shop

philip.yurchuk.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 135 posts

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#21

Post by TeMPOraL »

Kenji wrote: post #19

It's actually much simpler than that: Never rely on the opinion of someone who can make immediate profit off your decision.

Exactly. It's a pretty obvious concept, and I don't understand why I have to explain it to so many people in real life.

Particular context, in which I have to explain this often: when needing advice about which computer/phone/appliance to buy, never ever ask the salesman in the very store you'll be buying in. It's literally their job to give you bad advice - to suggest a deal good for the store, not for you.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#22

Post by jjn2009 »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #17
xapata wrote: post #5

If you ask an enterprise vendor if their software has feature X, the answer is always, "Yes!" You'll find their software is infinitely customizable with just a bit of configuration. What they're not telling you is that their configuration tool is really a poorly implemented, proprietary programming language. You won't be able to configure the software yourself and must now hire consultants to read your watch and tell…

> If you ask an enterprise vendor if their software has feature X, the answer is always, "Yes!" You'll find their software is infinitely customizable with just a bit of configuration. Or, like it happens in smaller B2B deals, they'll say "Yes!", and then after the meeting go to the dev team and say: "we just signed a contract in which we promised feature X; you need to implement it in two weeks".

>"we just signed a contract in which we promised feature X; you need to implement it in two weeks".

This hits wayyyy to close to home.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#23

Post by timcederman »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #20
timcederman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's interesting to me is that for all my appliances in my house (different brands), I've been able to repair each of them (microwave, air conditioner, washer, dryer, dishwasher, and wine fridge) on my own, using some basic instructions on the internet and a part that at most has cost $50. I believe we're in a golden age for self-repair (particularly with YouTube videos), but I keep hearing about how everything is…

Amazing is the price you paid for the screen. Maybe iPhone screens are in such high supply - but with modern Android smartphones, we're usually talking about ~$100 for the screen package. Whether or not you'll be able to replace that without specialized equipment depends on the manufacturer (I did one such repair myself on Samsung Galaxy S3 without problems, but with my S7 I'd have to first cut it apart - and Samsung…

Sure, there are some items which are not repairable in a reasonable way. Classic example - my wife's Apple Watch, after she broke the screen on that. However, my point was I own a wide variety of appliances from different manufacturers and my default experience has been thrifty and simple repair.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#24

Post by timcederman »

cyphar wrote: post #16
timcederman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's interesting to me is that for all my appliances in my house (different brands), I've been able to repair each of them (microwave, air conditioner, washer, dryer, dishwasher, and wine fridge) on my own, using some basic instructions on the internet and a part that at most has cost $50. I believe we're in a golden age for self-repair (particularly with YouTube videos), but I keep hearing about how everything is…

The problem is that companies (especially Apple) are explicitly trying to make their devices harder to repair -- which is the reason for the whole Right-to-Repair movement[1]. If you want to see how much dodgy stuff repair shops have to go through to figure out how to fix Apple products, check out the channels of Louis Rossman[2] and Jessa Jones[3]. [1]: http://ifixit.org/right [2]: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC…

Louis Rossman has an axe to grind, and from the recent iFixit teardowns, other manufacturers, particularly Microsoft, have been worse than Apple for repairability.

But there are trade-offs... fixing my iPhone 5S back panel was a huge pain. But - I could do it! And it was cheap! And I get a device that's tiny, resilient, and generally a wonder. I've seen devices and repairs evolve from the 80s through to now, and I still firmly believe we're better off now (in general), than we were, simply due to economies of scale and the reduction in information asymmetry.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#25

Post by Johnnynator »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #20
timcederman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's interesting to me is that for all my appliances in my house (different brands), I've been able to repair each of them (microwave, air conditioner, washer, dryer, dishwasher, and wine fridge) on my own, using some basic instructions on the internet and a part that at most has cost $50. I believe we're in a golden age for self-repair (particularly with YouTube videos), but I keep hearing about how everything is…

Amazing is the price you paid for the screen. Maybe iPhone screens are in such high supply - but with modern Android smartphones, we're usually talking about ~$100 for the screen package. Whether or not you'll be able to replace that without specialized equipment depends on the manufacturer (I did one such repair myself on Samsung Galaxy S3 without problems, but with my S7 I'd have to first cut it apart - and Samsung…

In my experience only Screen with a resolution above 720p are expensive, for my Moto G2 I paid around 15$ for Screen and it got send with a fitting screwdriver for the phone.

(I never went making a comparison of prices of different phone screens, I only know from 3 other phones with 1080p+ screens that they are way more expensive)

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#26

Post by lvillani »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #20
timcederman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's interesting to me is that for all my appliances in my house (different brands), I've been able to repair each of them (microwave, air conditioner, washer, dryer, dishwasher, and wine fridge) on my own, using some basic instructions on the internet and a part that at most has cost $50. I believe we're in a golden age for self-repair (particularly with YouTube videos), but I keep hearing about how everything is…

Amazing is the price you paid for the screen. Maybe iPhone screens are in such high supply - but with modern Android smartphones, we're usually talking about ~$100 for the screen package. Whether or not you'll be able to replace that without specialized equipment depends on the manufacturer (I did one such repair myself on Samsung Galaxy S3 without problems, but with my S7 I'd have to first cut it apart - and Samsung…

Most modern smartphones have the LCD, digitizer and glass all fused together. It improves image quality and reduces the distance between the glass and the image. This, however, greatly increases the replacement cost since you would then have to replace the entire unit when you break it. Also, higher resolution screens are more expensive.

I think the 3GS is old enough to have these layers as discrete components that you can replace one by one, hence the lower cost.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#27

Post by w458cmau »

cyphar wrote: post #16
timcederman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's interesting to me is that for all my appliances in my house (different brands), I've been able to repair each of them (microwave, air conditioner, washer, dryer, dishwasher, and wine fridge) on my own, using some basic instructions on the internet and a part that at most has cost $50. I believe we're in a golden age for self-repair (particularly with YouTube videos), but I keep hearing about how everything is…

The problem is that companies (especially Apple) are explicitly trying to make their devices harder to repair -- which is the reason for the whole Right-to-Repair movement[1]. If you want to see how much dodgy stuff repair shops have to go through to figure out how to fix Apple products, check out the channels of Louis Rossman[2] and Jessa Jones[3]. [1]: http://ifixit.org/right [2]: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC…

Do you think though that this is Apple actively trying to reduce your ability to repair, or is it that they pursue other goals and the ability to repair is waaay down on the list?

I would assume, from experience in large corporations, that it is the latter.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#28

Post by staofbur »

Another bit of advice I can give from dealing with a few particularly shitty vendors is that if you can't actually download a copy from their web site or extract one from their sales team and see it in action yourself, they have something to hide.

This is usually cost escalators, a really poor deployment and management story, an upsold incomplete product or just a wall of lies.

Also refuse to buy a license until you trial it on your own kit.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#29

Post by _puk »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #17
xapata wrote: post #5

If you ask an enterprise vendor if their software has feature X, the answer is always, "Yes!" You'll find their software is infinitely customizable with just a bit of configuration. What they're not telling you is that their configuration tool is really a poorly implemented, proprietary programming language. You won't be able to configure the software yourself and must now hire consultants to read your watch and tell…

> If you ask an enterprise vendor if their software has feature X, the answer is always, "Yes!" You'll find their software is infinitely customizable with just a bit of configuration. Or, like it happens in smaller B2B deals, they'll say "Yes!", and then after the meeting go to the dev team and say: "we just signed a contract in which we promised feature X; you need to implement it in two weeks".

They wait for the signature?

I thought it was always "in the bag, last couple of redlines to get sorted, but that'll be sorted by the end of the week, no worries."

But yeah, 2 weeks to implement, then it sits there whilst they sort out some overlooked complication

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#30

Post by cyphar »

w458cmau wrote: post #27
cyphar wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that companies (especially Apple) are explicitly trying to make their devices harder to repair -- which is the reason for the whole Right-to-Repair movement[1]. If you want to see how much dodgy stuff repair shops have to go through to figure out how to fix Apple products, check out the channels of Louis Rossman[2] and Jessa Jones[3]. [1]: http://ifixit.org/right [2]: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC…

Do you think though that this is Apple actively trying to reduce your ability to repair, or is it that they pursue other goals and the ability to repair is waaay down on the list? I would assume, from experience in large corporations, that it is the latter.

It's intentional.

They do not provide schematics to anyone outside of Apple and FOXCONN. They only provide diagnostics tools to "authorised repair shops" (which actually don't repair devices). They provide no information to repair shops on where they might be able to buy replacement chips (aside from searching the chip name on AliExpress). It's not as though they don't know how to repair devices, there is mountains of evidence that Apple gives refurbished devices (the boards they provide clearly are not new) even though they call them "re-manufactured" whatever that means.

The most glaring thing is that there are instances where third-party repair shops have figured out why a defect was occurring before Apple did (the graphics card fiascos were shown to be caused by a heat-sensitive tantalum capacitor used near the graphics chip that is damaged due to thermal stress). We know Apple didn't know why the boards were failing because they would give customers refurbished boards that would fail a few months later because they didn't fix the issue. Not to mention that Apple doesn't tell its customers about recalls of their products (which happens almost every year) which is actually illegal in Australia.

You might say all of the above is laziness, but once you have a company which specifically writes software to detect whether an "unauthorised repair" has taken place[1] then I consider them to be malicious. They've also threatened to sue repair shops, and are constantly attacking third-party repair shops (the term "unauthorised" comes from them and is not a term used in any other repair industry).

If you compare this to how other companies operate, this is completely at-odds with the entire industry when it comes to repairability. Microsoft is trying to copy Apple (in all of their negatives) but the rest of the industry doesn't work that way. You can get schematics for other consumer laptops or electronics equipment. In the automotive industry there are laws that make sure that schematics, tools, and parts are available for any third-party repair shop.

tl;dr: Apple is intentionally trying to gain a monopoly on the repairs of their devices.

[1]: https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/techandscience/apple-busted-m...

Post reply on HN