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I bought one of these as part of an appliance packaged when I remodeled my kitchen. 6 months later I learned about all of this and did the filter bypass ‘hack’

I bought one of these as part of an appliance packaged when I remodeled my kitchen. 6 months later I learned about all of this and did the filter bypass ‘hack’ mentioned elsewhere. This single act of stupidity by GE has solidified I will never buy an appliance from them ever again. This act of requiring ‘authentic’ filters is intentionally and without question anti-consumer to chase a few dollars but as long as the others don’t follow suit they’re shooting themselves in the foot because consumers will flee. How long before we see an article about consumers repairing and chasing down ancient refrigerators that are sadly inefficient but at least repairable?

linuxftw 7y ago
> sadly inefficient but at least repairable? Wait until you hear about cars! Fortunately for the big corporations, most people lack even the most basic mechanical skills and are totally reliant upon others to do even trivial maintenance. Thus almost everything is becoming disposable because it's cheaper to throw something away than it is to pay a technician to fix it, parts notwithstanding. Car makers are really hoping the EV thing sticks so they can force you to buy a brand new car every 5-6 years once the battery is toast.
- bronco21016 7y ago
  Still driving my bought and paid for 2011 Ford. It’s borderline unrepairable on some stuff but FORSCAN gives capabilities to access most ECUs so barring any major failure I should drive it until it rusts out. But unfortunately you’re right. It’s probably the single biggest thing keeping me from pulling the trigger on a Tesla.
  - outworlder 7y ago
    You think Tesla will force you to buy a new car? https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty > Model 3 - 8 years or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first, with minimum 70% retention of Battery capacity over the warranty period. But that's warranty. https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-data/ https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-dat... Some forum discussion: https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/cost-battery-pack-10-years-now https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/cost-battery-pack-10-y... Keep your car if it works for you. Financially that's the sensible choice regardless of technology. But you should expect to have less maintenance work if/when you switch to an EV.
    - bronco21016 7y ago
      No not that they’ll make me replace it. That they’ll make it impossible for me to repair myself.
  - hansthehorse 7y ago
    I live outside the rust belt and my 2012 Civic has been paid for the last 5 years and trouble free. No repairs outside of wearing parts like shocks, brakes and a serpentine belt which was replaced even though the techs told me it didn't need it. I was just worried that 140k miles was enough service out of it. My ongoing service has been 5k oil and filter changes plus tire rotation. I've never missed that service. Take care of a quality car and it will last outside of the rust area of the US. I fully expect to keep this car until it starts to have electrical issues, if it ever does. In my experience once a car starts down that road it's time to move on.
    - EvanAnderson 7y ago
      140K miles on that Civic is just breaking it in, for sure. My wife's 1995 Civic has over 330K on it, and my daily driver 2007 Civic is nearing 200K. They both burn very little oil and neither has lost appreciable fuel economy. We do try to take good care of them, from a maintenance perspective. (I'm in Ohio, and the road salt is taking its toll, however.)
- outworlder 7y ago
  > Car makers are really hoping the EV thing sticks so they can force you to buy a brand new car every 5-6 years once the battery is toast. What? No. This doesn't make sense at all. First, most traditional manufacturers are NOT keen on having their fleet replaced. They don't want to cannibalize their own products. When they can, they will even retake possession of 'compliance cars' and destroy them. Second, dealerships are also NOT pushing EVs. EVs make very little money due to less maintenance. Third, no EV battery is toast after 5 years, except maybe first generation Nissan Leaf batteries (lookup 'lizard battery' if you are interested). Tesla's should last for 10 or more. They really cannot prevent aftermarket batteries from being installed, or individual cells replaced. They can try to make the process more difficult (as GE is doing), but if there's enough incentive it will be circumvented. Anything that does not deal with the drivetrain works just the same as any other car. You might have a point if you mentioned the EV electronics. But can you repair a car ECU? Most likely, you can't. If that fails, you replace it. Same thing here, except there's less to replace.
  - tjoff 7y ago
    Truly hope and believe batteries last much longer than 10 years. Imagine how abysmal the second hand prices would be to offset a new battery pack after 10 years. The environmental impact would be really bad as well.
    - raverbashing 7y ago
      Or, most likely, it will be economical to recycle batteries, especially if they contain rare elements
      - AstralStorm 7y ago
        Recycle is still worse than reuse - these batteries can be reused for a few years more as backup power supplies.
        raverbashing 7y ago
- wedowhatwedo 7y ago
  Interesting. My 2012 Chevy Volt has the exact same range today it had in 2012 when I bought it. Maybe I got lucky.
  - userbinator 7y ago
    I suspect there's compensation/"excess space" for wear over time, somewhat like spare blocks on SSDs, and when it was new, it would've had even better range if it didn't have that compensation. Related: https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/10/16283330/tesla-hurricane-irma-update-florida-extend-range-model-s-x-60-60d https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/10/16283330/tesla-hurricane-...
    - hvidgaard 7y ago
      That is such a lovely thing for a big company to do in this day and age. It probably also allows them to use the battery optimally, i.e. not fully charge or discharge, for a longer lasting battery.
  - nuccy 7y ago
    Chevy Volt has one of the best batteries among all EVs with excellent thermal control system. In Ukraine it is common these day to buy damaged EVs from US and restore them to brand-new state, including Tesla, Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt. One of the shops has a Youtube channel and they made an episode comparing batteries from different cars. Chevy Volt's battery cell survived already about 3000 cycles without noticible loss of charge, the test is being running for years already, charging-discharging it every 30 minutes.
charwalker 7y ago
The make great power strips/surge protectors. That's all I know.
gvb 7y ago
Note that you did not buy an appliance from GE, you bought it from Haier & KKR. Haier & KKR bought the appliance division from GE and licensed the GE brand until 2056.[1] The home appliances business, namely Haier Smart Home, has 7 global brands – Haier, Casarte, Leader, GE Appliances, Fisher & Paykel, Aqua and Candy. [2] Boycott the mothership for best effect! (Most of the stuff you see with the GE logo on is licensed branding and GE has nothing to do with it except collecting a fee for the use of their logo.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Appliances#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Appliances#History [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier
- flog 7y ago
  I learned this from the GE repair guy who came out to repair my broken down 2yr old dishwasher. He also said: "Never buy anything from GE." Then he plugged an ethernet cable into my fridge and updated the firmware. Mind blown.
  - stanferder 7y ago
    Repair people are second only to exterminators in their ability to speak the truth, then get something done, in the space of a few minutes.
    - dredmorbius 7y ago
      Harry Tuttle lives: https://invidio.us/watch?v=VRfoIyx8KfU https://invidio.us/watch?v=VRfoIyx8KfU Have you got a 27B/6?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- bronco21016 7y ago
  We bought our set right after the acquisition happened. The sales guy at Home Depot told us about it and assured us the model we purchased was still pre-Haier. I’ll be sure to boycott Haier, and thus all of GE Appliances.
orev 7y ago
I can see both sides. The companies are clearly making money grabs with these kinds of things (don’t forget the current state of printer ink), but there’s also a huge market filled with counterfeit or shoddy products. Those filters on Amazon are cheap for a reason — they don’t actually filter anything. If the companies priced them reasonably, there wouldn’t be a need to go to these lengths to force people.
- kalleboo 7y ago
  Printer ink is going in two directions, on one hand you have HP and their "ink as a service" and remote-disabling cartridges when you stop paying, on the other hand you have Brother and others with ink tank systems that have zero DRM and you just squirt ink into.
userbinator 7y ago
How long before we see an article about consumers repairing and chasing down ancient refrigerators that are sadly inefficient but at least repairable? Inefficient? Maybe "old" (60s-80s?), but not "ancient" (30s-50s) --- this article might be worth reading: http://web.archive.org/web/20121218033749/http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/musings/choosing-energy-efficient-refrigerator http://web.archive.org/web/20121218033749/http://www.greenbu... The 1930s GE Monitor-Top (ironicallly also made by GE, but the good old GE) uses less power than a lot of modern refrigerators, and many others from that era are similar. Despite their age, used working ones are very expensive. I have a 1938 Frigidaire which I restored. The compressor, which was marketed as the "Meter-Miser", draws less than 100W when running, and it doesn't run very often. So far it seems it will be around 280kWh/year. It has no "smarts" to subvert me, and the sealed nature of the system means that it could likely continue running for another century and outlast me...
- gdm85 7y ago
  Great article! Thanks for the link. Nowadays I cringe when I regularly see small fridges completely encased in furniture in hotel rooms, with no air circulation. They get very warm and even the top surface of the furniture sometimes. I wonder what William Holladay, the grandfather of the article's author, would have to say about that. The idea of putting the compressor on top is also interesting, why is it not being pursued? Noise issues?
- hvidgaard 7y ago
  A modern fridge use less than half of that, that will probably not be anything that matters. In Denmark with the current power prices, that'll pay for a new fridge over 10 years. That isn't exactly a good case for buying a new one.
  - mosselman 7y ago
    I am more interested in the effect on the environment. What is the break even point for replacing an inefficient fridge with a new one in terms of damage to the environment considering things like the production process, transport and the eventual power consumption?

linuxftw 7y ago

> sadly inefficient but at least repairable? Wait until you hear about cars! Fortunately for the big corporations, most people lack even the most basic mechanical skills and are totally reliant upon others to do even trivial maintenance. Thus almost everything is becoming disposable because it's cheaper to throw something away than it is to pay a technician to fix it, parts notwithstanding. Car makers are really hoping the EV thing sticks so they can force you to buy a brand new car every 5-6 years once the battery is toast.

bronco21016 7y ago
Still driving my bought and paid for 2011 Ford. It’s borderline unrepairable on some stuff but FORSCAN gives capabilities to access most ECUs so barring any major failure I should drive it until it rusts out. But unfortunately you’re right. It’s probably the single biggest thing keeping me from pulling the trigger on a Tesla.
- outworlder 7y ago
  You think Tesla will force you to buy a new car? https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty > Model 3 - 8 years or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first, with minimum 70% retention of Battery capacity over the warranty period. But that's warranty. https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-data/ https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-dat... Some forum discussion: https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/cost-battery-pack-10-years-now https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/cost-battery-pack-10-y... Keep your car if it works for you. Financially that's the sensible choice regardless of technology. But you should expect to have less maintenance work if/when you switch to an EV.
  - bronco21016 7y ago
    No not that they’ll make me replace it. That they’ll make it impossible for me to repair myself.
- hansthehorse 7y ago
  I live outside the rust belt and my 2012 Civic has been paid for the last 5 years and trouble free. No repairs outside of wearing parts like shocks, brakes and a serpentine belt which was replaced even though the techs told me it didn't need it. I was just worried that 140k miles was enough service out of it. My ongoing service has been 5k oil and filter changes plus tire rotation. I've never missed that service. Take care of a quality car and it will last outside of the rust area of the US. I fully expect to keep this car until it starts to have electrical issues, if it ever does. In my experience once a car starts down that road it's time to move on.
  - EvanAnderson 7y ago
    140K miles on that Civic is just breaking it in, for sure. My wife's 1995 Civic has over 330K on it, and my daily driver 2007 Civic is nearing 200K. They both burn very little oil and neither has lost appreciable fuel economy. We do try to take good care of them, from a maintenance perspective. (I'm in Ohio, and the road salt is taking its toll, however.)
outworlder 7y ago
> Car makers are really hoping the EV thing sticks so they can force you to buy a brand new car every 5-6 years once the battery is toast. What? No. This doesn't make sense at all. First, most traditional manufacturers are NOT keen on having their fleet replaced. They don't want to cannibalize their own products. When they can, they will even retake possession of 'compliance cars' and destroy them. Second, dealerships are also NOT pushing EVs. EVs make very little money due to less maintenance. Third, no EV battery is toast after 5 years, except maybe first generation Nissan Leaf batteries (lookup 'lizard battery' if you are interested). Tesla's should last for 10 or more. They really cannot prevent aftermarket batteries from being installed, or individual cells replaced. They can try to make the process more difficult (as GE is doing), but if there's enough incentive it will be circumvented. Anything that does not deal with the drivetrain works just the same as any other car. You might have a point if you mentioned the EV electronics. But can you repair a car ECU? Most likely, you can't. If that fails, you replace it. Same thing here, except there's less to replace.
- tjoff 7y ago
  Truly hope and believe batteries last much longer than 10 years. Imagine how abysmal the second hand prices would be to offset a new battery pack after 10 years. The environmental impact would be really bad as well.
  - raverbashing 7y ago
    Or, most likely, it will be economical to recycle batteries, especially if they contain rare elements
    - AstralStorm 7y ago
      Recycle is still worse than reuse - these batteries can be reused for a few years more as backup power supplies.
      - raverbashing 7y ago
wedowhatwedo 7y ago
Interesting. My 2012 Chevy Volt has the exact same range today it had in 2012 when I bought it. Maybe I got lucky.
- userbinator 7y ago
  I suspect there's compensation/"excess space" for wear over time, somewhat like spare blocks on SSDs, and when it was new, it would've had even better range if it didn't have that compensation. Related: https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/10/16283330/tesla-hurricane-irma-update-florida-extend-range-model-s-x-60-60d https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/10/16283330/tesla-hurricane-...
  - hvidgaard 7y ago
    That is such a lovely thing for a big company to do in this day and age. It probably also allows them to use the battery optimally, i.e. not fully charge or discharge, for a longer lasting battery.
- nuccy 7y ago
  Chevy Volt has one of the best batteries among all EVs with excellent thermal control system. In Ukraine it is common these day to buy damaged EVs from US and restore them to brand-new state, including Tesla, Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt. One of the shops has a Youtube channel and they made an episode comparing batteries from different cars. Chevy Volt's battery cell survived already about 3000 cycles without noticible loss of charge, the test is being running for years already, charging-discharging it every 30 minutes.

charwalker 7y ago

The make great power strips/surge protectors. That's all I know.

gvb 7y ago

Note that you did not buy an appliance from GE, you bought it from Haier & KKR. Haier & KKR bought the appliance division from GE and licensed the GE brand until 2056.[1] The home appliances business, namely Haier Smart Home, has 7 global brands – Haier, Casarte, Leader, GE Appliances, Fisher & Paykel, Aqua and Candy. [2] Boycott the mothership for best effect! (Most of the stuff you see with the GE logo on is licensed branding and GE has nothing to do with it except collecting a fee for the use of their logo.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Appliances#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Appliances#History [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier

flog 7y ago
I learned this from the GE repair guy who came out to repair my broken down 2yr old dishwasher. He also said: "Never buy anything from GE." Then he plugged an ethernet cable into my fridge and updated the firmware. Mind blown.
- stanferder 7y ago
  Repair people are second only to exterminators in their ability to speak the truth, then get something done, in the space of a few minutes.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    Harry Tuttle lives: https://invidio.us/watch?v=VRfoIyx8KfU https://invidio.us/watch?v=VRfoIyx8KfU Have you got a 27B/6?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
bronco21016 7y ago
We bought our set right after the acquisition happened. The sales guy at Home Depot told us about it and assured us the model we purchased was still pre-Haier. I’ll be sure to boycott Haier, and thus all of GE Appliances.

orev 7y ago

I can see both sides. The companies are clearly making money grabs with these kinds of things (don’t forget the current state of printer ink), but there’s also a huge market filled with counterfeit or shoddy products. Those filters on Amazon are cheap for a reason — they don’t actually filter anything. If the companies priced them reasonably, there wouldn’t be a need to go to these lengths to force people.

kalleboo 7y ago
Printer ink is going in two directions, on one hand you have HP and their "ink as a service" and remote-disabling cartridges when you stop paying, on the other hand you have Brother and others with ink tank systems that have zero DRM and you just squirt ink into.

userbinator 7y ago

How long before we see an article about consumers repairing and chasing down ancient refrigerators that are sadly inefficient but at least repairable? Inefficient? Maybe "old" (60s-80s?), but not "ancient" (30s-50s) --- this article might be worth reading: http://web.archive.org/web/20121218033749/http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/musings/choosing-energy-efficient-refrigerator http://web.archive.org/web/20121218033749/http://www.greenbu... The 1930s GE Monitor-Top (ironicallly also made by GE, but the good old GE) uses less power than a lot of modern refrigerators, and many others from that era are similar. Despite their age, used working ones are very expensive. I have a 1938 Frigidaire which I restored. The compressor, which was marketed as the "Meter-Miser", draws less than 100W when running, and it doesn't run very often. So far it seems it will be around 280kWh/year. It has no "smarts" to subvert me, and the sealed nature of the system means that it could likely continue running for another century and outlast me...

gdm85 7y ago
Great article! Thanks for the link. Nowadays I cringe when I regularly see small fridges completely encased in furniture in hotel rooms, with no air circulation. They get very warm and even the top surface of the furniture sometimes. I wonder what William Holladay, the grandfather of the article's author, would have to say about that. The idea of putting the compressor on top is also interesting, why is it not being pursued? Noise issues?
hvidgaard 7y ago
A modern fridge use less than half of that, that will probably not be anything that matters. In Denmark with the current power prices, that'll pay for a new fridge over 10 years. That isn't exactly a good case for buying a new one.
- mosselman 7y ago
  I am more interested in the effect on the environment. What is the break even point for replacing an inefficient fridge with a new one in terms of damage to the environment considering things like the production process, transport and the eventual power consumption?