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Thanks for the link. I'm a long-time customer of iFixit, but I've been really disappointed in iFixit's attempts to shill their products with FUD (warranted or

by runjake 14y ago

Thanks for the link. I'm a long-time customer of iFixit, but I've been really disappointed in iFixit's attempts to shill their products with FUD (warranted or not) about Apple. It reminds me of the "Chewie's" chewing gum scene in Clerks, where the gum salesman is ranting about the cigarette industry. Every critical post they make is a long diatribe followed by a shilling of their products that does nothing to solve the larger problem. It's all about selling their product. And hey, it's their right, but I find it tacky. What's the point of their $10 "liberation" kit? It includes the pentalobe driver for the screws they're replacing. Why would I really need to replace the screws at this point? I don't. I thought this was a recent iFixit trend, but I see they've been using these tactics for a while.

thebigshane 14y ago
The issue is more philosophical than practical. see: https://freedom-to-tinker.com/ https://freedom-to-tinker.com/ Note that in this case, an iPhone is locked down enough in hardware and software to where it really doesn't matter if you can open the screws or not. Actually I don't own an iPhone, is there something you can gain by opening it up? Replacing battery or SD card or something?
- runjake 14y ago
  By opening up an iPhone, you can replace the battery, the front and back glass, the digitizer and display assemblies. (The display assemblies may all be fused together anyway, so I might be redundant here.
true_religion 14y ago
The liberation kit is for if you want to replace the screws yourself, or otherwise just unscrew the thing to take a look at the internals.
- runjake 14y ago
  Which I can do by buying the included pentalobe driver by itself. In other words, it's a big gimmick.
  - true_religion 14y ago
    Doesn't the lib kit come with screws and phillips head? If you don't have those handy, then it can seem like a good deal.
  - DanBC 14y ago
    The liberation kit includes the replacement screws, and a philips #00 screwdriver, as well as a pentalobular driver. $10 is perhaps a bit pricey for some people. I have no idea of the quality of those drivers, but I've spent well over that on single items before. Paying £30 for a pair of tweezers seems crazy to some people, but if you're using that item for 8 hours a day it makes sense to buy something that you really like. And having spent that much on professional quality tools I'm not fussed about spending £7 on a couple of screws and a couple of screwdrivers.
kwiens 14y ago
Kyle from iFixit here. I just wanted to say that we just present our perspective. The way we see things has evolved from taking apart thousands of gizmos and learning from people all around the world what goes wrong with hardware. We're constantly inspired my creative repairs. Our goal is to help people get things fixed, and encourage designs that are long lasting. You're certainly welcome to disagree with us. I don't think we're any more opinionated than Apple's designs are. We have a different perspective, and we share it. We back up our opinion with relevant products. People only buy them if they find them useful. The Liberation kit was a fun way for everyone to get involved in the process. We also sell standalone Pentalobe drivers—so if you want to keep your original screws, you can do that too. Having Phillips screws on your phone is actually quite convenient—most eyeglass kits have the small Phillips drivers, so if you're in much better shape if you ever need to open your phone up to dry it out while you're on a trip. The liberation kit is effectively the same thing Apple techs use when you take it in for service and they swap out your screws for Pentalobe ones. iFixit isn't about marketing gimmicks. We didn't build the world's largest repair manual and open source it just to sell tools. We're trying to change the world. Repair is win-win-win. You save some money by making something work again, the manufacturer wins because their product is useful longer, and the environment wins because it didn't end up in a landfill. I'm convinced that what the world needs now—more than ever—is a free, open source repair manual for every thing. That's what we're building, and it gets better every day.
- slurgfest 14y ago
  By publicly suggesting that Apple did something wrong, you guarantee yourself a large number of enemies.
  - Ziomislaw 14y ago
    and even larger amount of followers ;)

by runjake 14y ago

thebigshane 14y ago

The issue is more philosophical than practical. see: https://freedom-to-tinker.com/ https://freedom-to-tinker.com/ Note that in this case, an iPhone is locked down enough in hardware and software to where it really doesn't matter if you can open the screws or not. Actually I don't own an iPhone, is there something you can gain by opening it up? Replacing battery or SD card or something?

runjake 14y ago
By opening up an iPhone, you can replace the battery, the front and back glass, the digitizer and display assemblies. (The display assemblies may all be fused together anyway, so I might be redundant here.

true_religion 14y ago

The liberation kit is for if you want to replace the screws yourself, or otherwise just unscrew the thing to take a look at the internals.

runjake 14y ago
Which I can do by buying the included pentalobe driver by itself. In other words, it's a big gimmick.
- true_religion 14y ago
  Doesn't the lib kit come with screws and phillips head? If you don't have those handy, then it can seem like a good deal.
- DanBC 14y ago
  The liberation kit includes the replacement screws, and a philips #00 screwdriver, as well as a pentalobular driver. $10 is perhaps a bit pricey for some people. I have no idea of the quality of those drivers, but I've spent well over that on single items before. Paying £30 for a pair of tweezers seems crazy to some people, but if you're using that item for 8 hours a day it makes sense to buy something that you really like. And having spent that much on professional quality tools I'm not fussed about spending £7 on a couple of screws and a couple of screwdrivers.

kwiens 14y ago

Kyle from iFixit here. I just wanted to say that we just present our perspective. The way we see things has evolved from taking apart thousands of gizmos and learning from people all around the world what goes wrong with hardware. We're constantly inspired my creative repairs. Our goal is to help people get things fixed, and encourage designs that are long lasting. You're certainly welcome to disagree with us. I don't think we're any more opinionated than Apple's designs are. We have a different perspective, and we share it. We back up our opinion with relevant products. People only buy them if they find them useful. The Liberation kit was a fun way for everyone to get involved in the process. We also sell standalone Pentalobe drivers—so if you want to keep your original screws, you can do that too. Having Phillips screws on your phone is actually quite convenient—most eyeglass kits have the small Phillips drivers, so if you're in much better shape if you ever need to open your phone up to dry it out while you're on a trip. The liberation kit is effectively the same thing Apple techs use when you take it in for service and they swap out your screws for Pentalobe ones. iFixit isn't about marketing gimmicks. We didn't build the world's largest repair manual and open source it just to sell tools. We're trying to change the world. Repair is win-win-win. You save some money by making something work again, the manufacturer wins because their product is useful longer, and the environment wins because it didn't end up in a landfill. I'm convinced that what the world needs now—more than ever—is a free, open source repair manual for every thing. That's what we're building, and it gets better every day.

slurgfest 14y ago
By publicly suggesting that Apple did something wrong, you guarantee yourself a large number of enemies.
- Ziomislaw 14y ago
  and even larger amount of followers ;)