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iFixit are a business. They are driven on attention and sales. Not facts. Although some of the time they overlap.
by cjk2 3y ago
iFixit are a business. They are driven on attention and sales. Not facts. Although some of the time they overlap.
- throwaway48476 3y agoI'm not going to denigrate them for being a business. They've done more for repairability and sustainability than most. Repairability is a process not a factual end state, there are tradeoffs in design.
- cjk2 3y agoI will because their own products aren’t particularly good and their assessment of repairability on some products, as evidenced here, is likely biased by business relations. I do a lot of repair work (ex EE / production engineer) and I’ve been shot by poor parts and tools from them. I look elsewhere first.
- throwaway48476 3y agoWhat I believe you are referring to is that most of the ifixit branded parts are white label with commensurate quality. This is not really a unique problem. Almost everything on Amazon/aliexpress is the same white label junk. Buying brand name parts sometimes implys a brand name level of QC but its increasingly not the case. As for ifixit I would treat the products sold in partnership with the OEM differently from the ifixit brand ones.
- cjk2 3y agoAgree on all points. However sometimes the OEM branded parts are bundled in packs with iFixit tools. Notably with the Pixel parts as an example. Honestly I'd rather go direct to vendor for parts or service and decent turnaround and there's only one that offers this I can name.
- throwaway48476 3y agoIdeally OEMs are best able to provide parts and service. The problem is too many have abused their position to restrict consumer choice. As long as parts and manuals are available to the user I've no problem with choice. The free market keeps everyone honest. The problem is we have too many captured markets. I have a furnace yet as a user I'm not even allowed to see the manual. The HVAC people lobbied the EPA to make it hard for anyone but them to work on furnaces.