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Also, good enough is good enough. If the battery lasts about 2 years people want the next model anyway.
I'm not sure I would have bought AirPods if I knew ahead of time that the battery would die in less than two years and replacing them costs as much as getting new Airpods.
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PodSwap seem to have worked it out. https://www.thepodswap.com/
How? This seems only for people with good batteries that want to upgrade. There's no new pods with good batteries being added if it's just swapping.
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PodSwap seem to have worked it out. https://www.thepodswap.com/
How? This seems only for people with good batteries that want to upgrade. There's no new pods with good batteries being added if it's just swapping.
No? The "Here's How it Works" section specifically implies they're replacing the batteries.
>we'll send you a pair of genuine AirPod buds with restored battery life that have been cleaned and sanitized.
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I don't know about that. I still have my original AirPods, and they had no noticeable battery loss, and it's been over 3 years by now. They might have lost some battery if I tried to measure it empirically, but I have no way of knowing without measuring it explicitly, as I cannot really catch a battery loss of less than 5-10% with normal use over the course of 3+ years. But I use them all the time interchangeably wit…
I got the original Airpods and after less than two years the battery lasted like 15 minutes in one of the pods. They are a disposable product.
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PodSwap seem to have worked it out. https://www.thepodswap.com/
I'm curious how they did it. Is there a video out there on how that's possible?
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They can, it's just that the trade-off isn't worth appeasing a few HN readers. >The reason earbud companies use non-replaceable rechargeable batteries is simple: It makes the earbuds smaller. Earbud buyers generally prefer more compact devices, but that means the earbuds have less room inside for all the necessary components. Designers need to cram a Bluetooth chip and processor, an antenna, a battery, drivers, contr…
The reason is simpler than that. Battery will inevitably wear out, and it is a very deliberate planned obsolescence move.
My former coworker worked on airpods. Most of RnD for them was made in Apple's Shenzhen RnD centre which existence Apple for long time tried to hide.
the first airpods were released in Dec 2016, roughly the same time apple opened the Shenzhen r&d center, so I don't see how r&d for this product was done there.
The earliest I heard of Apple running something like a permanent engineering centre in the city was in 2013.
I was saying them trying to hide its existence because for long Apple demanded its employees in China to even refrain from publishing the fact of their employment with them like on LinkedIn
But the industry is too small, everybody knew about it for years. So 2016, was more like an official inauguration, when Apple admitted its existence, moved all their offices in the city to Kerry plaza, and put a nameplate on it.
But somehow they cannot figure out how to make a replaceable battery. hmm
This is the weirdest product to complain about this for. For something so small, replaceable battery hardware would double the size of the thing from the battery connectors alone.
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The reason is simpler than that. Battery will inevitably wear out, and it is a very deliberate planned obsolescence move.
I disagree - it's clearly what consumers want. There are a million phone options, including ones with replaceable batteries, and overwhelmingly people choose the smaller form factor with nonreplaceable batteries.