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I disagree that the only two buckets of consumers are people who can afford a new laptop anyway and those who want their laptops to live forever. There's a bro

I disagree that the only two buckets of consumers are people who can afford a new laptop anyway and those who want their laptops to live forever. There's a broad spectrum of people who simply want options. IMHO they want the option to repair, replace, upgrade or some combination of the three and they want it on their terms, not the manufacturers'. Warranties and extended purchase plans are profit centers. So as one example you can either pay $199+ on a warranty, gambling that the issuer agrees to honor it in case of failure, or instead pocket the money and use it on a repair or upgrade when the laptop fails. I know which I prefer and it's not tacking on $200 to the cost of a laptop for a Microcenter warranty or Applecare.

nottaylorswift 5y ago
Most electronics fail from manufacturing defects within 6 months of use. After that, it will probably last as long as you want to use it, or until you pour coffee on it. Excluding the battery. Just because something might fail doesn't mean it's going to. Much of the equipment you use will function longer than you will. And there's another side to this right to repair movement. There's now less incentive to make the individual components reliable. Since the penalty is no longer a full logic board replacement, the components can have a lower MTBF - that lowers cost and promotes the product at the same time by convincing the customer of the need for repairability. Many of the customers are really just laymen hobbyists looking for a project that seems technical. Kind of like the gamers who wire up a series of unnecessary fans and RGB LEDs and pretend they invented the microprocessor. They have no buying leverage.
- jaywalk 5y ago
  I know you're not Taylor Swift, but are you Tim Cook? My goodness, I've never seen a regular person so against allowing people to repair/upgrade stuff they own.
  - nottaylorswift 5y ago
    If I gave the impression I'm against it, I'm not. It's nice to have repairability, a bonus feature, but not a competitive or innovative incentive to purchase over the, and at this point everyone has to admit, very well designed Apple line of product. I do believe we are well into the era of disposable electronics, and both assembly, disassembly, recycling and repair will be fully automated in the near future. Because, in order to make products more compact and continuing the SoC trend moving components to silicon, there's no longer a place for the human technician.
    - technofiend 5y ago
      Well I suppose that depends on what you consider well designed. Designed to maximize Apple's profit and prevent consumer choice or upgrades? Undeniably true. Woe to the buyer who decides a year later he needs double the RAM or storage. At the very least he or she must resell their device and buy new again. So to that buyer I dare say frame.work is both competitive, innovative and a better choice than a glued shut hunk of electronics with everything soldered on. System on a chip is not relevant here as both storage and memory are outboard, as is a GPU once one needs better graphics performance than an integrated GPU/CPU can provide.
      - felistoria 5y ago
        Framework can't compete with the M1 chip unfortunately. I love what Framework is doing though.
        technofiend 5y ago
        Absolutely the M1 and I'm sure M1X / M2 beat everything on the market. The question is whether consumers need the M* chips or if the latest Intel or AMD offerings are good enough given the tradeoffs. I don't have FOMO over most work per watt or suspend features on a laptop. Funnily enough my ipad pro is great for light development work and remote access to a real workstation when I need it. For me there's no compelling reason to buy a MacBook. And as my pro is past the two year Applecare window I now have to treat it with kid gloves since a dropping it will be a $1,000 mistake. That definitely informs my next purchase which will not be an impossible to repair and expensive to replace disposable-by-design device.
- AttakBanana 5y ago
  I want to be able to have an affordable repair option if I spill coffee on my laptop 6 months in. This sentiment is pretty universal, you don't hear about it much because consumers don't think they have a choice. If you go into an Apple Store with a Macbook whose keyboard doesn't work because of spilt coffee, Apple can charge you whatever they want, and theres proof that they will frequently (unintentionally or not) misdiagnose a problem and quote you 80% of what you initally paid to replace everything. What framework is doing is enabling customers to go to any repair store around the corner to get their device fixed for a fraction of the cost.
- runamok 5y ago
  > Most electronics fail from manufacturing defects within 6 months of use. Citation needed.

nottaylorswift 5y ago

Most electronics fail from manufacturing defects within 6 months of use. After that, it will probably last as long as you want to use it, or until you pour coffee on it. Excluding the battery. Just because something might fail doesn't mean it's going to. Much of the equipment you use will function longer than you will. And there's another side to this right to repair movement. There's now less incentive to make the individual components reliable. Since the penalty is no longer a full logic board replacement, the components can have a lower MTBF - that lowers cost and promotes the product at the same time by convincing the customer of the need for repairability. Many of the customers are really just laymen hobbyists looking for a project that seems technical. Kind of like the gamers who wire up a series of unnecessary fans and RGB LEDs and pretend they invented the microprocessor. They have no buying leverage.

jaywalk 5y ago
I know you're not Taylor Swift, but are you Tim Cook? My goodness, I've never seen a regular person so against allowing people to repair/upgrade stuff they own.
- nottaylorswift 5y ago
  If I gave the impression I'm against it, I'm not. It's nice to have repairability, a bonus feature, but not a competitive or innovative incentive to purchase over the, and at this point everyone has to admit, very well designed Apple line of product. I do believe we are well into the era of disposable electronics, and both assembly, disassembly, recycling and repair will be fully automated in the near future. Because, in order to make products more compact and continuing the SoC trend moving components to silicon, there's no longer a place for the human technician.
  - technofiend 5y ago
    Well I suppose that depends on what you consider well designed. Designed to maximize Apple's profit and prevent consumer choice or upgrades? Undeniably true. Woe to the buyer who decides a year later he needs double the RAM or storage. At the very least he or she must resell their device and buy new again. So to that buyer I dare say frame.work is both competitive, innovative and a better choice than a glued shut hunk of electronics with everything soldered on. System on a chip is not relevant here as both storage and memory are outboard, as is a GPU once one needs better graphics performance than an integrated GPU/CPU can provide.
    - felistoria 5y ago
      Framework can't compete with the M1 chip unfortunately. I love what Framework is doing though.
      - technofiend 5y ago
        Absolutely the M1 and I'm sure M1X / M2 beat everything on the market. The question is whether consumers need the M* chips or if the latest Intel or AMD offerings are good enough given the tradeoffs. I don't have FOMO over most work per watt or suspend features on a laptop. Funnily enough my ipad pro is great for light development work and remote access to a real workstation when I need it. For me there's no compelling reason to buy a MacBook. And as my pro is past the two year Applecare window I now have to treat it with kid gloves since a dropping it will be a $1,000 mistake. That definitely informs my next purchase which will not be an impossible to repair and expensive to replace disposable-by-design device.
AttakBanana 5y ago
I want to be able to have an affordable repair option if I spill coffee on my laptop 6 months in. This sentiment is pretty universal, you don't hear about it much because consumers don't think they have a choice. If you go into an Apple Store with a Macbook whose keyboard doesn't work because of spilt coffee, Apple can charge you whatever they want, and theres proof that they will frequently (unintentionally or not) misdiagnose a problem and quote you 80% of what you initally paid to replace everything. What framework is doing is enabling customers to go to any repair store around the corner to get their device fixed for a fraction of the cost.
runamok 5y ago
> Most electronics fail from manufacturing defects within 6 months of use. Citation needed.