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The current version of iOS still supports iPhone X, from 6 years ago. Who are these imaginary people you think want or need a 7+ year-old phone?

bb88 3y ago
So here's a graph: https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-iphone-sales-since-fiscal-year-2007/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-ipho... What happened to the many hundreds of millions of iPhones sold before 2017? Landfill?
- funnybeam 3y ago
  That graph shows iPhone sales year on year. I’d be interested to see recycling stats as I know Apple will recycle iPhones for free but I couldn’t find much with a quick search. How many Android devices are still in use after 7 years? And receiving updates? I suspect these are generating e waste at a much higher rate than iPhones but would love to see some comparable figures
  - bb88 3y ago
    I'm in complete agreement here. All phone makers should make their devices last for a minimum of 10 years after purchase. Not just Apple. But Google too. I too would like to know those stats for both Apple and Android. I suspect it's rather low though. I'm pretty sure e-waste just gets sent to China these days. This is a shame because there are a lot of old tablets and phones that would be useful as general computing devices.
    - fsflover 3y ago
      > All phone makers should make their devices last for a minimum of 10 years after purchase. I don't think it's necessary. They should just allow full user ownership and let the community use the phones as they wish. Including the Android's closed drivers, which should become FLOSS after 10 years or so.
- brewdad 3y ago
  I have sent at least 8 Android phones to the landfill over the years. They either lost support and had no alternate path to a new OS or a catastrophic hardware failure that made them a paperweight. I'm on year 2.5 with iOS and all three of our phones are as smooth as the day we bought them and I expect to receive at least another 2.5 years of support.
bambax 3y ago
I love when people say that and apparently think it's admirable/amazing that a device would still work 6 years after its release. But most devices used to work a lifetime. My motorcycle was made in 2009 (14 years ago) and is in pristine condition. The previous one was over 25 years old when it got stolen (by someone, presumably, who thought it was worth the risk). Blenders from the 40s still work. Not to mention non-electrical tools like hammers and such, which last for generations. Parts of my home desktop computer are over 15 years old; the case itself was made in the 1990s. It's one thing to get newer devices that do new things, and quite another to have to throw away old ones that should still be working fine. Phones have no moving parts, there's no good reason they should become obsolete.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  Well, the iPhone from 2009 was an iPhone 3GS, it had a 320x480 screen, 256MB of RAM and only supported 3G - a networking standard that has been turned off by the major carriers. If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? > Phones have no moving parts, there's no good reason they should become obsolete. You’re right, Apple should have made it so the cell radio supported wireless standards that didn’t even exist at the time.
  - bb88 3y ago
    If the iPhone emitted toxic poisons on a daily basis, yeah, we'd want to ban it too. But it doesn't. Also the original iPhone from 2006 had bluetooth and wifi -- so there's that.
  - bambax 3y ago
    > If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? Yes! It was the case with the previous one (the one that got stolen); all I had to do was add a few drops of a special liquid every time I filled her up. No problem at all.
  - sniglom 3y ago
    >only supported 3G - a networking standard that has been turned off by the major carriers. Remember, the US is not the world. What major carriers do in the US is not necessarily a global fact. Where I live 2G and 3G is still a fallback if 4G or 5G doesn't work. It will continue to be that way until 2025. >If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? Google lead replacement additive or think about whether the engine could be rebuilt/replaced on a motorcycle. I certainly would prefer an engine rebuild/replace over replacing a modem in an iPhone 3GS. >the iPhone from 2009 was an iPhone 3GS, it had a 320x480 screen, 256MB of RAM The iPhone from 2009 wasn't that impressive in specs compared to other phones at the time. My even older 2.5G dumbphone had higher PPI on the screen and could run useful j2me apps. In 2010, the iPhone 4 came, had a 640x960 screen and 512MB of RAM. The fact that the specs could be doubled within a year shows that the earlier 3GS wasn't pushing anything spec wise.
krichprollsch 3y ago
I use a ~10yo iphone 5S...
- the_overseer 3y ago
  The number of people like you is too small to care about.

bb88 3y ago

So here's a graph: https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-iphone-sales-since-fiscal-year-2007/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-ipho... What happened to the many hundreds of millions of iPhones sold before 2017? Landfill?

funnybeam 3y ago
That graph shows iPhone sales year on year. I’d be interested to see recycling stats as I know Apple will recycle iPhones for free but I couldn’t find much with a quick search. How many Android devices are still in use after 7 years? And receiving updates? I suspect these are generating e waste at a much higher rate than iPhones but would love to see some comparable figures
- bb88 3y ago
  I'm in complete agreement here. All phone makers should make their devices last for a minimum of 10 years after purchase. Not just Apple. But Google too. I too would like to know those stats for both Apple and Android. I suspect it's rather low though. I'm pretty sure e-waste just gets sent to China these days. This is a shame because there are a lot of old tablets and phones that would be useful as general computing devices.
  - fsflover 3y ago
    > All phone makers should make their devices last for a minimum of 10 years after purchase. I don't think it's necessary. They should just allow full user ownership and let the community use the phones as they wish. Including the Android's closed drivers, which should become FLOSS after 10 years or so.
brewdad 3y ago
I have sent at least 8 Android phones to the landfill over the years. They either lost support and had no alternate path to a new OS or a catastrophic hardware failure that made them a paperweight. I'm on year 2.5 with iOS and all three of our phones are as smooth as the day we bought them and I expect to receive at least another 2.5 years of support.

bambax 3y ago

I love when people say that and apparently think it's admirable/amazing that a device would still work 6 years after its release. But most devices used to work a lifetime. My motorcycle was made in 2009 (14 years ago) and is in pristine condition. The previous one was over 25 years old when it got stolen (by someone, presumably, who thought it was worth the risk). Blenders from the 40s still work. Not to mention non-electrical tools like hammers and such, which last for generations. Parts of my home desktop computer are over 15 years old; the case itself was made in the 1990s. It's one thing to get newer devices that do new things, and quite another to have to throw away old ones that should still be working fine. Phones have no moving parts, there's no good reason they should become obsolete.

scarface_74 3y ago
Well, the iPhone from 2009 was an iPhone 3GS, it had a 320x480 screen, 256MB of RAM and only supported 3G - a networking standard that has been turned off by the major carriers. If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? > Phones have no moving parts, there's no good reason they should become obsolete. You’re right, Apple should have made it so the cell radio supported wireless standards that didn’t even exist at the time.
- bb88 3y ago
  If the iPhone emitted toxic poisons on a daily basis, yeah, we'd want to ban it too. But it doesn't. Also the original iPhone from 2006 had bluetooth and wifi -- so there's that.
- bambax 3y ago
  > If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? Yes! It was the case with the previous one (the one that got stolen); all I had to do was add a few drops of a special liquid every time I filled her up. No problem at all.
- sniglom 3y ago
  >only supported 3G - a networking standard that has been turned off by the major carriers. Remember, the US is not the world. What major carriers do in the US is not necessarily a global fact. Where I live 2G and 3G is still a fallback if 4G or 5G doesn't work. It will continue to be that way until 2025. >If your motorcycle only supported leaded gas could you use it? Google lead replacement additive or think about whether the engine could be rebuilt/replaced on a motorcycle. I certainly would prefer an engine rebuild/replace over replacing a modem in an iPhone 3GS. >the iPhone from 2009 was an iPhone 3GS, it had a 320x480 screen, 256MB of RAM The iPhone from 2009 wasn't that impressive in specs compared to other phones at the time. My even older 2.5G dumbphone had higher PPI on the screen and could run useful j2me apps. In 2010, the iPhone 4 came, had a 640x960 screen and 512MB of RAM. The fact that the specs could be doubled within a year shows that the earlier 3GS wasn't pushing anything spec wise.

krichprollsch 3y ago

I use a ~10yo iphone 5S...

the_overseer 3y ago
The number of people like you is too small to care about.