this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2024
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In two years time Apple, and every other smartphone manufacturer on the EU market for that matter, will be forced to make the battery user replaceable and that one will most likely benefit everyone; unless Apple wants to release two versions of every iPhone to comply with EU regulations which they won't.
Just like with USB-C, which the EU regulated and now the iPad and IPhone have.
the stupidest thing is iPad had USB-C since 2018! and yet on iPhones they latched on to lightning for another 6 years before EU forced them to standardize
That’s because they’ve been pushing the iPad as a sort of Mac Lite, but they can’t do that unless you can plug peripherals or a thumb drive into it. You can 100% plug a USB-C laptop dock into an iPad, and it’ll work. You can even use a mouse with it if you really want to.
But they wanted to keep Lightning around as long as possible, because they made a commission on every single lighting cable that was sold; Companies had to license the rights to use the connector, and had to pay Apple for every one they used. That’s why Lightning cables were always a few bucks more expensive than a comparable USB-C cable. That extra few bucks was going straight into Apple’s pocket. It was a huge source of passive income for the company, which they were reluctant to let go of.
no no no, that was just Apple being brave /s
IPhone 16, with 30% more courage
When they do come to it. I hope its the easily swappable like the ones in Nokia 3310. Otherwise its pointless imo.
AFAIK, the EU defines "user replaceable" as literally that; you open a hatch, pull the battery out and stick a new one in.
Fuck, let's hope they at least allow screws. Click-in latches are prone to breaking and wearing out
How many often are you planning on replacing the battery in your phone that it would wear out the panel?
The ware would most likely come from someone that has a spare battery that is ready to go. Think of your phone burning 80% of the juice and you’re about to hop on a flight that you’re barely going to make (no time to charge). Slap that stand by battery in and off you go. That’s what I did with my old Nokia or blackberry back in the day. Oh and for my HTC aria.
With my N900 I used to travel with 6 to 10 charged batteries to have a few days of runtime. Things got better now with powerbanks - but for something like hiking just carrying a few spares would still be smaller and lighter.
Honestly for hiking I’d suggest a power bank with solar charge capability. One thing to charge them all.
Hust make sure, that you can detach the solar panel. Batteries don’t like the heat and the solar panel most likely lives longer than the power bank, so you want them to be replaceable individually.
The space used by the smallest solar charger I've seen on Amazon seems to be similar to 6 or more batteries in the format the N900 was taking - so if you look at space, slow charging from solar charger, and reliance on sun conditions taking individual batteries seems to be the better option for a few days hike. It's also easier to stow individual batteries to wherever you still have space left.
Meh, most iPhones live in a case, it'll be fine
They should do, although I can't really imagine manufacturers incorporating plastic tabs into their sleek glass-metal sandwiches....
I have a Phone with a click-in latch and nothing wore our over the last 5 years
Unfortunately, they do not define it that way.
And there are exceptions based on capacity and how long you guarantee the battery capacity will be good for. IIRC, if it still has 70% capacity by 3 years time, it doesn't have to be replaceable at all.
Can you really guarantee that? I mean, it's pretty much dependent on individual usage.
Sure you can. Car manufacturers do it today.
You will have to define "3 years" as well. It can't be a blanket 3 calendar year thing, it would have to be X number of cycles which the average user would realistically hit with 3 years of usage. Not someone glued to their phone playing games all day that need to charge three times a day.
I do not remember reading that, the only exception I remember is for devices that are intended to be used under water, which phones are definitely not
Sounds really good to me!
They'll make the replacement so expensive nobody will do it. And then there will be a new rule mandating it needs to be a reasonable price. Apple will say it's reasomable because it factors in environmental costs, and so the dance continues.
Everyone will benefit, but have to imagine relatively few will buy tools to actually take advantage of it.