Phones are getting more expensive so people are holding on to them longer, so it’s a nice quality of life improvement to remove the barriers to battery replacement so less people have to go down to a phone repair store to get it changed. The more of a hassle battery replacement is seen the more likely people are to just upgrade and create e-waste.
The problem here is that in order for most people to be able to replace the battery themselves safely they need to be really idiot proof.
We’d need to return to back covers with latches or big screws and batteries in cases and contacts. This shit is bulky, heavy and hardly waterproof.
New iPhones use lipo pouch with a ZIF connector straight to the motherboard with a “pull to release” adhesive strip hidden under a panel with a single use sticky seal and two small screws. There is no black magic in replacing the battery yourself and the solution is small, lightweight and waterproof.
However most people wouldn’t even know which way to turn the screws to loosen them and probably wouldn’t be bothered by throwing the phone away and getting the one with a better camera AI and more emojis.
@riodoro1@NightOwl I dunno, if you compare capacities of say, iPhone 14 Pro (12.38Wh) to Fairphone 4 (15.03Wh) and then the product dimensions of the two. There’s not a huge amount in it. Adding the 14 Pro Max (16.68Wh) for additional comparisons.
The Fairphone is 2.6mm thicker than the iPhones. (Yes the screen bezels are chonk too lol) But the fairphone is also making allowance to make every single component swappable, and has an IPS display (switching to OLED would save 1+ millimeter)
The hard part with iPhones isn’t the battery side of the equation here, it’s Magsafe (which is great imo) While regular QI charging is fairly lowkey, I could see the extra tech required inside the phone for that being prohibitive in terms of spatial management.
my first smartphone was an lg optimus s. that thing saw more toilet time than my butt. i lost track of how many times i dropped it in the toilet. it went in a lake a few times, also. it was a beast
Though it wasn’t ever cheap enough for my allowance 🤣 probably for the best, my first android smartphone came a couple years later in the Vodafone Smart 4 Turbo. (snapdragon 410 version)
Yeah, I wish there was some advancements made when it came to trying to create swappable battery devices that retain water proofing. That area has just stalled since expensive disposable tech is more lucrative. Average person should just get a new one like you said as long as the process is still more difficult than changing a light bulb.
Yeah, I wish there was some advancements made when it came to trying to create swappable battery devices that retain water proofing.
If nothing else, regulations like the one described in here will do just that. So far the tech giants haven’t had any incentive to design sleek, waterproof devices with replaceable batteries. But you’ve gotta believe that if they’re required to have replaceable batteries, they’re not going to say “OK, back to chonky non-waterproof devices for us!”. They’re going to spend some of their R&D budgets to innovate ways that makes it more realistic to do all three.
The original Moto Defy got it right the first time with ip67 rated, removable battery, expandable storage, and a headphone jack. The next major improvement came with the xperia z(or z3) and they got waterproof charge ports and headphone jacks (no port plug required) but ditched the removable battery. Every other phone since seems to have stripped away some useful feature since. The new defy 2 is going to have satelite messaging but is huge and no removabpe battery or headphone jack iirc.
[edit: deleted, echo chamber here. Android good, Apple bad. Moving on and blocking this community, can’t have a reasonable conversation, just like reddit I guess].
The difference is that most of the people isn’t expected to own a mechanical watch, but having a smartphone is pretty much expected. You cannot treat a basic commodity as if it were a luxury item.
Would it have been appropriate when everyone had mechanical watches? Nope. Not then either.
How about another analogy, most people own cars (at least in North America), how about the government putting laws in place that car manufacturers change their designs so that everyone’s mother is able to swap an engine by opening up the hood and unplugging one plug, lifting the old one out and putting the new one in?
It’s probably even technically possible, but what business does the government have in making that decision on everyone’s behalf.
How is this an Android vs Apple thing? Most of the major manufacturers are making devices with the battery sealed in; they’ll all have to innovate ways of making them removable.
Phones are getting more expensive so people are holding on to them longer, so it’s a nice quality of life improvement to remove the barriers to battery replacement so less people have to go down to a phone repair store to get it changed. The more of a hassle battery replacement is seen the more likely people are to just upgrade and create e-waste.
The problem here is that in order for most people to be able to replace the battery themselves safely they need to be really idiot proof. We’d need to return to back covers with latches or big screws and batteries in cases and contacts. This shit is bulky, heavy and hardly waterproof.
New iPhones use lipo pouch with a ZIF connector straight to the motherboard with a “pull to release” adhesive strip hidden under a panel with a single use sticky seal and two small screws. There is no black magic in replacing the battery yourself and the solution is small, lightweight and waterproof. However most people wouldn’t even know which way to turn the screws to loosen them and probably wouldn’t be bothered by throwing the phone away and getting the one with a better camera AI and more emojis.
@riodoro1 @NightOwl I dunno, if you compare capacities of say, iPhone 14 Pro (12.38Wh) to Fairphone 4 (15.03Wh) and then the product dimensions of the two. There’s not a huge amount in it. Adding the 14 Pro Max (16.68Wh) for additional comparisons.
The Fairphone is 2.6mm thicker than the iPhones. (Yes the screen bezels are chonk too lol) But the fairphone is also making allowance to make every single component swappable, and has an IPS display (switching to OLED would save 1+ millimeter)
@riodoro1 @NightOwl
The hard part with iPhones isn’t the battery side of the equation here, it’s Magsafe (which is great imo) While regular QI charging is fairly lowkey, I could see the extra tech required inside the phone for that being prohibitive in terms of spatial management.
Nah, the og motorola defy had removable battery, ip67 rating, expandable storage, and a headphone jack. It was a tiny phone and it was brilliant.
my first smartphone was an lg optimus s. that thing saw more toilet time than my butt. i lost track of how many times i dropped it in the toilet. it went in a lake a few times, also. it was a beast
@Know_not_Scotty_does @riodoro1 for some reason when I was 16 I really wanted the Defy Mini (XT320)
Though it wasn’t ever cheap enough for my allowance 🤣 probably for the best, my first android smartphone came a couple years later in the Vodafone Smart 4 Turbo. (snapdragon 410 version)
Yeah, I wish there was some advancements made when it came to trying to create swappable battery devices that retain water proofing. That area has just stalled since expensive disposable tech is more lucrative. Average person should just get a new one like you said as long as the process is still more difficult than changing a light bulb.
If nothing else, regulations like the one described in here will do just that. So far the tech giants haven’t had any incentive to design sleek, waterproof devices with replaceable batteries. But you’ve gotta believe that if they’re required to have replaceable batteries, they’re not going to say “OK, back to chonky non-waterproof devices for us!”. They’re going to spend some of their R&D budgets to innovate ways that makes it more realistic to do all three.
The original Moto Defy got it right the first time with ip67 rated, removable battery, expandable storage, and a headphone jack. The next major improvement came with the xperia z(or z3) and they got waterproof charge ports and headphone jacks (no port plug required) but ditched the removable battery. Every other phone since seems to have stripped away some useful feature since. The new defy 2 is going to have satelite messaging but is huge and no removabpe battery or headphone jack iirc.
[edit: deleted, echo chamber here. Android good, Apple bad. Moving on and blocking this community, can’t have a reasonable conversation, just like reddit I guess].
The difference is that most of the people isn’t expected to own a mechanical watch, but having a smartphone is pretty much expected. You cannot treat a basic commodity as if it were a luxury item.
Would it have been appropriate when everyone had mechanical watches? Nope. Not then either.
How about another analogy, most people own cars (at least in North America), how about the government putting laws in place that car manufacturers change their designs so that everyone’s mother is able to swap an engine by opening up the hood and unplugging one plug, lifting the old one out and putting the new one in?
It’s probably even technically possible, but what business does the government have in making that decision on everyone’s behalf.
People disagreeing with you isn’t what an echo chamber is.
How is this an Android vs Apple thing? Most of the major manufacturers are making devices with the battery sealed in; they’ll all have to innovate ways of making them removable.