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Non-user-replaceable batteries in phones+laptops should be banned outright. While people generally won't admit to replacing an entire phone/laptop due to a deg
by bluescrn 3y ago
Non-user-replaceable batteries in phones+laptops should be banned outright.
While people generally won't admit to replacing an entire phone/laptop due to a degraded battery, it's a significant nudge to get people to do just that, with battery replacement being made inconvenient and/or costly.
- bradstewart 3y agoI will completely admit that is the main reason I ever replace my phone. It usually ends up being more expensive to replace the battery (even doing it myself with an iFixit kit) than to get a new one with carrier subsidies and whatnot.
- appplication 3y agoIt seems like an alternative option could be available then: if you sell phones without user replaceable batteries, it could be mandated that the manufacturer is responsible for subsidizing costs such that replacing the battery is comparably priced to the cost of a replaceable battery. That seems a lot more reasonable to me. There are a lot of legitimate technical and design reasons for why batteries are not user replaceable today.
- jmull 3y agoPlease don't try to force your own personal preferences on everyone else in the entire world. Why don't you buy a phone that has a user-replaceable battery, if that's what you want, and let me buy the phone I want to buy?
- uoaei 3y agoThose who choose non-user replaceable batteries are prioritizing some socially valueless sense of aesthetics over the real negative social value incurred by e-waste. Different choices have different externalities and sometimes certain choices have net-negative outcomes no matter how well-intentioned the chooser or how much they insist on recasting the question as one of personal choice.
- trabant00 3y agoI take care of my batteries, I charge them slow and usually up to 80%. All my phones (Android) where retired after about 4 years with perfectly good battery left. What would a user replaceable battery do for me? And when I think about it I don't know anybody in my circle that replaced a phone because of the battery. It's usually because of old hardware, no software support left and a cracked screen and banged up body on top of it all. And even if the battery would be the problem you can go to a phone repair shop and get it replaced there. There's no need for me to easily be able to do it.
- UtopiaPunk 3y agoI do think a major consideration is guaranteed software updates. In Android-land, the standard is a measley two years of updates for the OS. Running an old OS that isn't receiving security updates is risky. Screens and shells should be repairable, of course.
- jbstack 3y ago"And even if the battery would be the problem you can go to a phone repair shop and get it replaced there. There's no need for me to easily be able to do it." This one is easy to counter. For the majority of low and medium end phones, by the time you need your first battery replacement, the cost of having it done in a shop will generally be close to, or exceed, the value of the phone itself. The last time I had a phone with replaceable batteries, I was able to purchase several spare batteries for a fraction of the cost of a shop replacement.
- uoaei 3y agoA lot of people are either bad with their finances or have too much money to care (too often both -- see the existence of DoorDash and ilk). They won't put that effort in. Replaceable batteries are an outlet that provides those folks with better choices via the market to divert (i.e. delay) e-waste.
- osigurdson 3y agoIt seems odd that people would throw away an iPhone just because the battery is dead. Why not go to the store, get the battery replaced and sell it instead?
- McDyver 3y agoGood thing European union didn't hear you, then: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2023/07/10/council-adopts-new-regulation-on-batteries-and-waste-batteries/ https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2023... From 2027, all batteries must be replaceable, FTA: "The regulation of the European Parliament and the Council will apply to all batteries including all waste portable batteries, electric vehicle batteries, industrial batteries, starting, lighting and ignition (SLI) batteries (used mostly for vehicles and machinery) and batteries for light means of transport (e.g. electric bikes, e-mopeds, e-scooters)." "The regulation provides that by 2027 portable batteries incorporated into appliances should be removable and replaceable by the end-user"
- stcg 3y agoSo no phones? That's a shame
- McDyver 3y agoIn the article they emphasise "all batteries", so I suppose it includes phones
- osigurdson 3y agoEnjoy non water proof phones, EU members.
- malermeister 3y agohttps://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xcover-pro/ https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xco... You can make waterproof phones with swappable batteries.
- sbuk 3y agoNote that this doesn't mean toolless battery replacements. See §38 to PE-CONS 2/23 "A portable battery should be considered to be removable by the end-user when it can be removed with the use of commercially available tools and without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless they are provided free of charge, or proprietary tools, thermal energy or solvents to disassemble it."
- malermeister 3y agoBecause the phone you want to buy will turn into e-waste in a few short years and we're living during a major ecological crisis. We shouldn't humor every antisocial choice in the name of freedom.
- bilbo0s 3y agoProblem is, the phone you want will also turn into e-waste. How many people still use devices from 20 years ago? Jornada's had replaceable batteries and were far more configurable than today's devices. They still got tossed. As phones go, RAZRs are another example. Most are just laying in landfills today. The list goes on and on. The e-waste problem goes wayyy beyond replaceable batteries. Nowadays you can't even send outdated tech to developing nations. The Chinese keep a lot of those nations well supplied with affordable recent phones for instance. Tech improves, and no one wants the old stuff. That's the problem you have to solve to address the e-waste issue.
- Nullabillity 3y ago> Tech improves, and no one wants the old stuff. That's the problem you have to solve to address the e-waste issue. Tech improves, for a while. In some ways. And then it slows down significantly. Welcome to the S-curve.
- jbstack 3y agoOf course nobody still uses devices from 20 years ago, but we aren't talking about a binary choice between "dispose of devices constantly" vs "never dispose of devices". Nor are we talking about a binary choice between current levels of e-waste vs. zero e-waste. Any reduction in e-waste should be considered a good thing. If I can keep my phone for 5 years instead of 2 years due to a replaceable battery, then I'm producing 40% of the e-waste that I was before. Yes, tech improves, and no one wants the old stuff. But realistically, there isn't anywhere near the level of innovation with new phones as there was 10 or 20 years ago. The phone I bought 5 years ago makes all the same calls, sends the same messages, browses the same internet, takes the same photos, and runs the same apps, as the phone I would buy in the shop today. I'd be quite content to postpone upgrading for 5+ years at a time, and I suspect most people would be too.
- naasking 3y ago> Why don't you buy a phone that has a user-replaceable battery, if that's what you want, and let me buy the phone I want to buy? You are free to opt out of replacing your battery on a phone that allows it, but you can't opt in to replacing your battery on a phone that doesn't allow it. If there's to be a standard, that standard should clearly be replaceable batteries.
- Raidion 3y agoBut phones without user replaceable batteries have advantages like water resistance, size, weight, etc. If you mandate everything has to have replaceable batteries, you restrict the ability for consumers to choose devices that prioritize other things. Only logic that I would say could be used is an environmental concern, but you'd need to really show that replaceable batteries would lead to significant improvements in the amount of e-waste we generate. If everything has a replaceable battery, but only a few people take advantage of it and the average lifetime of a phone remains constant-ish, it's really not valuable. I think the replaceable battery thing is very much a HN bubble issue. It's not like there aren't phones with them. If more people wanted them, more people would sell them, but most people prefer the additional battery life, increased water resistance, and thinness of modern phones.
- naasking 3y agoOther niche features like water resistance can be achieved other ways, like suitable cases or removable sealing compounds along seams. Engineers are clever, they solve problems the simplest way possible within a given set of constraints. Changing those constraints won't change the possibility of achieving similar outcomes. > If more people wanted them, more people would sell them, but most people prefer the additional battery life, increased water resistance, and thinness of modern phones. You're overstating the preferences and availability of alternatives here. All the best engineering talent went towards sexiness hype cycles, little went into making phones with that were more eco friendly. Lots of people also liked Tho-Radia, a radioactive cosmetic from almost 100 years ago. That's not a justification for permitting it.
- 3y ago
- bee_rider 3y agoNon-replaceable batteries produce phones that become waste more quickly. Unfortunately, lots of e-waste just gets tossed out. This is a form of cost externalization. If people want to buy phones with a non-replaceable battery, that is OK I guess, but we need of fee or deposit to prevent them from dropping that cost on the environment. Edit: come to think of it, we probably also need a fee or deposit for replaceable batteries. But at least it could be smaller, since it is just for the battery. We probably don’t want a deposit for every piece of electronics, just because that would be annoying.
- xwdv 3y agoA replaceable battery just means I’m going to dump a phone with a replaceable battery into an e-waste landfill whenever I want a brand new phone. I will absolutely not keep a phone any longer just because the battery can be replaced.
- bee_rider 3y agoYeah, as I mentioned in the edit, we should also have a deposit for the replaceable battery, but at least it could be smaller, since it is just for the battery.
- UtopiaPunk 3y agoWhat would convince you to keep a phone significantly longer?
- schmorptron 3y agofair enough, then substantially increased taxes on devices that are sold non-repairable to price in the externalised costs on the environment?
- vanderZwan 3y agoBecause you only get to make the choice for products that are actually available, and in many situations companies won't bother to make certain choices available unless forced to, even if it would be perfectly profitable to do so. Consumer choice is a blatant lie.
- dottjt 3y agoBecause reducing e-waste is more important than individual preference.
- bluescrn 3y agoAnd it's certainly more important than making a 2mm thinner phone
- e2le 3y agoThat is an opinion which assumes waste/pollution affects no other person than the one creating it. Ridiculous and naive.
- gus_massa 3y agoFor my laptop, my main concert to avoid replacing it is that I will have to reinstall all the softsoftware and configure it. It's like 2 or 3 full days.
- jbstack 3y agoThis exact issue is what eventually persuaded me, over 10 years ago, to switch from Windows to Linux, having already been on the fence for some time. I've never looked back. Installing all my software and configuring it on a new machine is a simple matter of running one command and waiting for it to complete, using Ansible (or similar alternatives). This is highly problematic in Windows where (at least at that time; I don't know if things have moved on) each item of software tends to have its own custom installer which isn't easily automated in a consistent way.
- PrimeMcFly 3y agoSetup a system so that when you install you can install with all your software and settings already on the system. For Windows you can use something like NTLite.
- osigurdson 3y agoBan this, ban that, without understanding the consequences. As someone mentions below, fairphones are fragile and susceptible to water damage. That is a horrible trade-off for having to go to the store once every 2 or 3 years to get the battery replaced.
- fsflover 3y agoWater resistance is a solvable problem even with replaceable batteries. Fairphone is a tiny company though, so your expectations are too high from them.
- systemvoltage 3y agoSpeak for yourself. I prefer a smaller phone with non replaceable battery. I don’t ever want to DIY my phone. I don’t care about repair. I’d prefer iPhone for this reason: it’s a highly optimized device from packaging standpoint and vertical integration is great for me as a consumer. A high performance secure phone.
- bluescrn 3y agoThe trend has been for larger phones with great big screens, though.
- tomjen3 3y agoI don’t think I ever wore out a battery on my phone. Did a couple times on old laptops, but the modern batteries are much better than those. I suppose I would mind the trade ofs less on a laptop.
- PrimeMcFly 3y agoI want a removable battery so I can get at my phones innards if I need to (I would never buy a laptop with a battery I couldn't remove), but honestly all my phones have failed for other reasons before the battery ever did.