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Everything with a battery should have an off switch

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Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#211

Post by bombcar »

lavela wrote: post #146
baq wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the real problem is the design team doesn't give two shits about neither users nor developers of the product... developers aren't treated as customers by design teams and then everybody is confused why the thing doesn't work. (hint: maybe it's stupid hard to make it work if you are actively prevented to be able to work on it?)

the real problem is that you can't keep all those little features you'd wish for in your head, so while you are making a buying decision they don't factor in as much as the lower price achievable without those features.

Perhaps we need government labels like we have on food - little boxes for common things like “battery: removable” or “on/off”.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#212

Post by Loughla »

Aardwolf wrote: post #9
Nanite wrote: post #4

Examples lying around in my house: Bathroom scale: lovely it powers up when you tap it, but eats up 2 button cells a year for a few dozen uses a year Kitchen scales, bit more use, at least once a day but again 2 button cells a year electronic caliper: Same, eats up 1 button cell a year, just sitting in my toolbox Strangely enough none of our kids toys with batteries seem to suffer from this problem How much extra cos…

Bathroom scales, kitchen scales and calipers all have versions that work without electricity and aren't much less convenient (if not more convenient since no waiting for electronics to boot up slower than they should or clunky menus)

I disagree. Measurements are funny things depending on the level of detail you need; analog versions of measurements are very clunky when you need precision. (now this is a bit much for bathroom scales and kitchen scales, but it was the calipers that interested me). When I need under .01 precision, my analog calipers just do not do the job as well as my electronic calipers. I can read them, but the last couple of thousandths are always sort of a guess. If I'm working on a project with tolerances of .01 or less, that's just not an option.

I guess a fun middle ground - I have a set of mechanical calipers with a readout in actual numbers on the side like electronics would, but all mechanical, like clockwork or whatever it is in there, going to .001. They're infuriating to use, because the numbers are so small on the side, and at that level of detail, stupidly sensitive.

edited the decimals because it's early and my brain shut off.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#215

Post by wildmanx »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #86
iamben wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is because they, one, don't listen to anyone ever; and two, never use the products they design. Oh, sure, there might be a user study or two. But they never actually have to live with or work with the damn things. I wonder the percentage of consumer (and business - have you ever used a POS in a pub?!) electronics this applies to? It's gotta be high 90s. I've lost track of the number of times I've lamented "did…

> I've lost track of the number of times I've lamented "did anyone actually use this?" We have a combination oven and microwave (yes...) that seems to have been designed with the primary purpose of enraging the owner. The microwave can only be set in 15 second increments. But you can fine-tune it, in five-second increments, by spinning a dial. Except that you can't do that while the oven is on. The microwave makes a…

> The microwave makes a noise while it's operating. When it's finished, it will beep unobtrusively and then continue to make the operating noise. You can stop it from making the operating noise by opening the door.

Check out Chesterton's Fence.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#216

Post by bombcar »

rebuilder wrote: post #35
CogitoCogito wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Kitchen scales, bit more use, at least once a day but again 2 button cells a year I had a kitchen scale that would eat through its battery pretty quickly (within a month) even when not being used. I figured it could be an interesting project to open it up and try to figure out where the stray power draw was happening, but the obviously correct solution was just to leave the battery cover off and pop it in and out f…

I dropped my kitchen scale and it broke, so I had to go shopping for a new one. Which was kind of fine since that scale wasn’t great. But finding a good scale turns out to be pretty hard! In the end I found some review that compares different scales and as a reference they used an entry-level lab scale. So I figured, hey, why don’t I just buy the benchmark scale? It costs about the same anyway. So now I have an ugly…

This is the secret for lots of these things; if you step slightly above “home use” you can often find industrial/commercial products that will work just fine - though do be aware of the limitations in some.

Or you could go with fully mechanical balance scales.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#217

Post by eternityforest »

Soft switches are fine if the power is really, really, low. For real.

Like, if the battery is rechargeable, 5-25uA is pretty much zero drain.

If it's disposable, you get about 1-5uA before it's A Problem(Because the only good use for a disposable is on stuff that only gets changed once in multiple years).

In a lot of cases the switch is the least reliable part, and it makes case design harder, and maybe compromises waterproofing.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#218

Post by bombcar »

m_eiman wrote: post #51
ggm wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is special pleading. At the volume we're discussing a surface mount flow solder on off device is not going to kill the BoM, and could be designed not to be ugly. It's no different to any other bad design. It could be better. All phones and computers can be completely powered down. They're hardly ugly switches.

> All phones and computers can be completely powered down. They're hardly ugly switches. iPhones (and I assume most Androids as well) can't be completely powered off. Neither can Macbooks. In fact, I'd guess that most modern digital things with non-replaceable batteries can't be powered off.

There’s a specific Dell laptop reset procedure that requires you to open the case and disconnect the battery so you can then press and hold the power button to get it to discharge all residual power. It’s a pain.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#219

Post by bombcar »

maxerickson wrote: post #122
nickff wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ” How much extra cost does a hard on/off switch add to the bill of materials?” BoM cost is not the whole story; a physical switch can greatly complicate an assembly, and may require hand-soldered wires. In addition to those cost-related factors, external switches are usually quite ugly, and getting them right can be very challenging, so it’s much easier to just omit them.

The caliper and kitchen scale already have buttons. (they would both be shitty without a zero/tare button)

Many of these “auto zero” which is why you have to do the scale dance - tap it with your foot to turn it on, wait for it to say zero, then step on.

Re: Everything with a battery should have an off switch

#220

Post by galangalalgol »

Aardwolf wrote: post #9
Nanite wrote: post #4

Examples lying around in my house: Bathroom scale: lovely it powers up when you tap it, but eats up 2 button cells a year for a few dozen uses a year Kitchen scales, bit more use, at least once a day but again 2 button cells a year electronic caliper: Same, eats up 1 button cell a year, just sitting in my toolbox Strangely enough none of our kids toys with batteries seem to suffer from this problem How much extra cos…

Bathroom scales, kitchen scales and calipers all have versions that work without electricity and aren't much less convenient (if not more convenient since no waiting for electronics to boot up slower than they should or clunky menus)

I try to never buy something that uses batteries and has a version that doesn't. My bathroom scale is a spring one. I do notice it isn't as accurate. The ones with weights are best, but those are quite expensive and take up a lot of room. For the kitchen I use electric for the extra precision while saving space.
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