Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I did it in about 45 minutes the first time, and could do another in 20-30 minutes pretty easily. Does it work with recent water-proof phones? I thought that there's some kind of glue to protect from water.
I don't know, but I do know that if the phone was covered under Apple's $29 (parts and labor) battery program, I'd go that way for sure. https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/battery-power
Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
61–70 of 263 posts
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#62You know what helps products last longer and reduces waste at the same time? Repairability . The repairability of apple products is so poor that even Apple can't fix most of their own products without replacing surprisingly large portions of any given Apple device. End user repairability has been utterly neglected. Disassembly is frequently impossible without causing damage, and components such as batteries are frequ…
This is understandably a very popular assumption amongst people who like to tinker but it's oversimplified. "Repairability" is only a positive in the absence of any other factors. Devices that are harder to repair can also increase the active matter to dead matter ratio which reduces a whole host of energy and material requirements and be sealed better which increases environmental tolerance. That's ignoring any other user benefits like practical security.
More generally I think it's really, REALLY important to be careful to separate goals vs tools, because humans have a real history of putting the cart before the horse and starting to treat successful tools as values in and of themselves which inevitably leads to misapplication. For most of the population, including amongst the technical set, "repairability" is a tool, not a goal. The goal is something along the lines of "any item I get should last for a reasonable time as a function of its price, including having a good 2-5 year period during which any failures should be Dealt With (meaning a restoration of functionality at reasonable speed) for free (significantly abnormal shipping aside), and for expensive items a longer period after where any issues can be Dealt With for reasonable expense."
Repairability is one possible tool to use are part of a mix to meet that goal. But so is more money put into materials and engineering, better quality control, manufacturer insurance, manufacturer direct or partner support networks, etc. Each has tradeoffs, like any tool, and the right mixture will vary based on people's priorities and budgets. Repairability is not simply a positive.
This is also part of what I hate in all the awful "Right to Repair" legislation attempts, the ones I've read have universally pushed a method rather then a goal which almost always makes for terrible law. Markets are our best tool for figuring out and then dynamically adapting to meeting goals, but of course do not have goals themselves. What legislation should do is mandate the goal and make sure costs are internalized then leave it to everyone else to figure out the best ways to make it happen for different parts of the population.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is an incredibly unfair and ignorant question. No, of course not, there are more, compute heavy, features and it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling.
> it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling Unfortunately, without the newer versions of the iOS the phone loses functionalities pretty quickly (the apps will require newer versions of iOS), which, quite conveniently for Apple, will make you need to buy a new one. Aka planned obsolescence. But kudos for getting at least one version of iOS to perform better than the la…
I reset my first generation iPad - last updated 2011 - last year and was able to load and run older versions of most of the apps for streaming services that were available back then - Netflix, Hulu, Crackle, Spotify, Plex, etc.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#64You know what helps products last longer and reduces waste at the same time? Repairability . The repairability of apple products is so poor that even Apple can't fix most of their own products without replacing surprisingly large portions of any given Apple device. End user repairability has been utterly neglected. Disassembly is frequently impossible without causing damage, and components such as batteries are frequ…
I could not agree more. It is so frustrating to have a device like my iPad Air 2 sitting unused because the screen got cracked. The cost to repair it was higher than replacement cost. If we care about the environment even one single little bit repairability should be on everyone's priority list. I'm sure the sleek new $1100 iPhones that came out last week are even worse.
At the risk of being rude, you haven’t tried very hard then to replace the screen. It’s pretty easily doable under $100, IF you don’t go to Apple to get it repaired that is.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is an incredibly unfair and ignorant question. No, of course not, there are more, compute heavy, features and it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling.
> it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling Unfortunately, without the newer versions of the iOS the phone loses functionalities pretty quickly (the apps will require newer versions of iOS), which, quite conveniently for Apple, will make you need to buy a new one. Aka planned obsolescence. But kudos for getting at least one version of iOS to perform better than the la…
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know, but I do know that if the phone was covered under Apple's $29 (parts and labor) battery program, I'd go that way for sure. https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/battery-power
Well, that $29 is only a limited offering. I only recently bought iPhone 8, so, I hope, it'll work few years, but then probably it'll require battery replacement.
Still not a huge amount of money given the cost of the phone.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is an incredibly unfair and ignorant question. No, of course not, there are more, compute heavy, features and it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling.
> it's not worth it to spend huge amounts of time to support a phone you're no longer selling Unfortunately, without the newer versions of the iOS the phone loses functionalities pretty quickly (the apps will require newer versions of iOS), which, quite conveniently for Apple, will make you need to buy a new one. Aka planned obsolescence. But kudos for getting at least one version of iOS to perform better than the la…
https://www.fastcompany.com/90237242/take-apples-advice-dont...
Yes, as hardware improves and the OS and applications take advantage of this hardware, newer applications may run slower on older hardware. I'm not aware of any phone manufacturer or OS for which this isn't true. AFAIK, there is no other system that supports this level of backwards compatibility.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#68You know what helps products last longer and reduces waste at the same time? Repairability . The repairability of apple products is so poor that even Apple can't fix most of their own products without replacing surprisingly large portions of any given Apple device. End user repairability has been utterly neglected. Disassembly is frequently impossible without causing damage, and components such as batteries are frequ…
> How easy is it for end-users to replace the battery in that off-warranty 5S? Oh. I see. I did it in about 45 minutes the first time, and could do another in 20-30 minutes pretty easily. It's now a 5-year old phone. 10 minutes labor per year is OK in my book. How easy is it for end-users to replace the clutch in that off-warranty Civic? For that matter, how many people even change their own brakes (one of the easies…
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#69For an example from my country. A 2007 2L Passat is a common old car currently taxed @ €1,000 pa. It quickly escalates to 2,000 as engine size/emissions increase. Passats are decent quality cars with long lived engines, so most of the 10-15 year olds are still alive. For their time, they were average CO2 producers, say 200g/km.
The tax system is designed so that an incremental decrease in emissions substantially decreases annual tax. A 30% carbon saving (say 60g/km saved, in this example) will save you 60% -70% on your annual tax (€600-€800 ish). People buy/drive 12 year old cars for value, and the tax system (by design) takes that value away.
The way to lower your annual tax is to buy a car designed after the new tax regime was designed. The net effect of the policy is that perfectly good old cars are being crushed and replaced with newer, "greener," short lifecycle cars. There's no point building a car that will last more than 8-10 years because tax laws will probably get it off the road by that time. The most economical way to drive is not the old cars, it's cheap new cars.
The real (environmental) question is whether the net effects of building a new car outweigh the case by output of the older car.
Idk what the carbon cost of manufacturing a car is, but the number to beat (for my example, anyway) is about 600 kg co2. My uneducated guess is that it's about even, ie the policy is just another Volkswagen subsidy.
Re: Apple now strives to design and build products that last as long as possible
#70> After a long life of use, ensure that they are recycled properly. Anyone ever read about Apple's must-shred agreement[0] with recyclers? Is that what "properly" refers to here? > Ensure that Apple products last as long as possible. Anyone read about Apple's recent lawsuit[1] for planned obsolescence in iPhones? [0]: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/yp73jw/apple-recy... [1]: https://www.commondreams.org/ne…
The original iPad also had OS updates discontinued incredibly quickly.