European Union votes to bring back replaceable phone batteries
techspot.com
techspot.com
Why would you want to replace a battery in a useless device?
Please, EU: bring a law that forces manufacturers to release their drivers / firmware whenever they stop updating a digital device.
Basically, I'm not sure that any one "thing" is the thing that always fails. There are multiple common points of failure and generally speaking, phones are hard to service in any manner these days. I personally would gladly give up water and dust protection, as well as thinness in exchange for ease of serviceability. Unfortunately, that seems to be a relatively uncommon set of preferences (although obviously it's probably much more common in places like Hacker News).
I have had this problem on a regular basis with all of the iPhones I have owned, and the problem has never been that the charge port is dead, but that dust and/or lint has gathered in it.
The solution is very simple: use a tootbrush or similar, preferably something plastic that won't break, BUT NOT ANYTHING METALLIC, to dig out the dirty stuff. Problem solved.
1. Battery
2. Software
3. Charge port/headphone port
4. eMMC storage runs out of writes
5. Accidental damage
6. Screen scratches
7. Wanting more RAM/storage and faster processing
The software can only be solved by constant effort. There are certain things that could possibly be done to make it easier, such as arranging the device-specific stuff so that the effort already spent on producing a newer set of software for a newer device can be more easily back-ported to the older devices. I think this will only be solved by legislation, such as a law saying that the software must be updated for X years, or even just a law saying that the support duration must be very clearly advertised with the phone allowing consumers to make a choice.
A USB-C port is rated for a minimum of 10,000 plug/unplug cycles, which should be enough to charge the phone once a day for 30 years. If that isn't actually being achieved then we need to ask why not.
The eMMC storage is a problem with many phones. My phone is just starting to slow to a crawl because its main storage is old and it takes a while for it to perform certain writes (or something - it's hard to get an accurate picture of what is happening in there). There is zero information that a consumer has available when deciding which phone to buy to tell them which ones will have a problem with this. This seems to be a fairly obvious target for a law, similar to the software support duration.
Accidental damage - I remember reading a statistic about how the average phone survives a ridiculously short time before being dropped and broken, and I don't get it. I haven't dropped/broken a phone ever. I guess we just let the people who are constantly dropping their phones pick up the tab on that one.
Screen scratch protection is also getting really good now. My current phone has lived in my pocket for several years, and there's almost zero scratching on the screen. Just don't keep your keys in the same pocket.
In terms of replacing a phone because you want something better - I had a look recently to see about replacing my phone. The ones on the market at a comparable price to what I spent on my current one had specifications that were really not much better at all. It doesn't make sense - if a phone with those specifications is deemed suitable for today's market, then my old one with almost identical specifications should be fine too.
So, I don't really see any barriers that aren't insurmountable to a phone lasting several times longer than they do at the moment. Ten years should be easy, 15 years should be possible. At the moment, it's more like 3 if you're very lucky.
And since 2018 I have iPhone XR, and the battery is fine still. So is the phone speed. I’m not changing it anytime soon
iPhone slowness can go hand in hand with batteries going bad, especially in the iPhone 6 days. Apple phones will limit peak performance when it detects the battery voltage can't handle it without too much of a voltage drop. From what I understand its now an opt-out setting, but for most of the iPhone 6's life it wasn't an option.
This isn't the only reason an old phone would be slow though, batteries are not the only consumable component in a phone.
I wish I could upvote this more.
It's a crime how I had to throw away in the past perfectly usable devices because they were forced into obsolescence.
So plan ahead. For the 2024 model of each iPhone, get all the permissions to release all of the firmware in year 2032.
It’s the smaller products and businesses that cease to exist because it’s too expensive to meet regulations. Bad regulation raises the cost of entry into the market and strengthens the big players like Apple.
And that's one that got big enough to remember them. Wikipedia lists 188 mobile phone manufacturers [1]. A lot of them very local (e.g. EvertekTunisie making phones for Tunisia and Morocco) or defunct; But even my local (German) retailer offers 35 brands. Big ones like Apple, Samsung and Xiaomi, budget brands like Oppo or ZTE, niche brands like CAT or Beafon. It's a crowded market that doesn't seem particularly hard to enter.
And judging by the spotty compatibility of LineageOS they don't all use the same hardware either.
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mobile_phone_manufact...
Europe has an unhealthy culture of naturalistic hippiedom, so this is just the same thing that causes Germany to shut down nuclear power.
(If you think this one's good, try combining it with their six other giant laws you haven't heard of some of which conflict with this.)
And every country regulates cell phones in particular, since they use shared airwaves, have rare earth metals in them, sometimes have exploding batteries etc.
Really? Are you claiming that capitalists are so much of a fool that instead of making, say, half the profit they were making before in an unregulated market, they would readily prefer to make 0 profits? The reality is that if American BigTech exit the EU market, then some local or non-American competitor will step in to fill the vacuum. Or have you already forgotten that the European Nokia once dominated the mobile phone industry?
The reason Nokia instantly failed when the US entered the market is because their products were bad and nerdy and they couldn't do good software. eg when they got an iPhone and their reaction was to do low level optimizations of their boring UI to make it 60fps instead of having a nice UI instead.
As a legislative body it certainly isn't perfect but you are ascribing motivations and making statements about it that have zero connection with reality.
Please do link the other "six giant laws that conflict".
The people on here saying phone OSes should be open source and unlocked to make them last longer will find the ecodesign and security regulations actually encourage locking them down so you can't break them.
could you specify the actual GDPR regulations in question which clearly conflict with these battery regulations (without any creative contrivance required on our part)?
or are you saying there isn't a conflict in that case (in which case, which ones do?) that part wasn't clear
it seems like a creative but unlikely contrivance that there is an actual legal conflict there as you describe
you quoting yourself when it doesn't answer the question, without adding more context, leads me to believe that you don't think there is any actual legal conflict there, either
Yes, I firmly believe every every manufacturer would ignore an economic block full of developed countries and 450M people.
This is the sort of bad take that keeps me returning to HN. Some people here are incredibly dense.
On a side note, I wouldn't mind if Apple decided to not sell their toys around here anymore.
Regulations can be adapted to affect only the companies that reach X percentage in sales or in market share. The EU's Digital Markets Act does precisely this, for instance.
The regulators can let smaller players grow and thrive, and regulate them once they've exceeded a certain threshold.
No one is building a product from complete scratch.
In 2011 you obtain a patent wholly owned by the company.
In 2012 you fail to pay the franchise tax and filing paperwork for your company so the state dissolves it. You don't care because you aren't making money.
In 2013 another company starts making a product that infringes on your patent.
You are the defacto owner of the patent. This is because you were the owner of the company when it was terminated. All of its assets and liabilities devolved to you. No action was required of you for this to happen, it just happens.
Now imagine this business was actually a joint venture between two wholly owned subsidiaries of two different holding companies, one of which was public but has gone bankrupt and the other was private but subsequently merged with a public conglomerate that spun off a child company, keeping only 40% of its stock after IPO.
The patent is still owned by people, but good luck finding them all.
This is reversing the natural order of things. That bureaucrat isn't nullifying fucking ANYTHING. That bureaucrat is artificially limiting who is allowed to create/use a thing.
The natural state of the information is: "Use this - it's free". The whole of humanity might exist because mirror neurons literally go: "Hey - I can do that too!".
It's only when you add a monstrously complex and entirely artificial patent system on top of things that it gets complex.
So we're ALREADY deciding who is allowed to use things, and it's already artificial and bureaucratic.
All this does is fucking stop making it worse. And patent/copywrite is already so god damn egregious as a system. I'm firmly in the camp of "nuke it from orbit". It's time to try something other than this hideous abusive system.
I agree that patents are odd here, but the solution isn't to patch in more power to bureaucrats over the top of the other power. You seem to be saying this at the end as well, so, as I say, I'm not sure what point you're making. But your excitement on this topic is appreciated.
What is confusing here? The entire structure is already a perversion of the natural world.
If we did not have our government, and the rules that it enforces (those "bureaucrats" you don't seem to like), then there is no "invention" to be nullified.
They already have this power. They enforce it through violence and imprisonment (tools reserved officially to the government). If the bureaucrats want your idea - they will take it, because they are the only thing stopping them from doing so.
The question is not: "Will the government nullify my invention?!?!?". It's - "What might my life have been like if the government did not restrict SO many people from competing at all - by artificially stopping them from using the tools and ideas they see around them? (for fairly ridiculous time periods)"
This is possible, but the power to enforce patents is in the courts, and not in the patent bureaucracy. Having a single group that can invalidate parents on a whim is different to that.
And patents can be useful, although I don't have many examples. SawStop is one, though, where even a 20 year patent doesn't seem to have been long enough to establish a successful business before incumbents swoop in. Patents like that are pro-competition in that scenario. Otherwise why bother starting a new business when your R&D effort can just be taken advantage of by someone else as soon as you hit on the answer?
The invention as disclosed and documented in the patent is free to the world.
In reality, it's a bunch of work which costs money, and if you don't have to spend that money, why would you?
There's an entire government department dedicated to selling this property.
Arguably the American model of abandonment is better because abandoned IP doesn't actually result in any lawsuits, while that UK model is built to effectively encourage them.
I think I have even more elegant solution. All IP should be subject to a tax (or maintenance fee or whatever you want to call it). As soon as the IP owner fails to pay the tax, IP falls to public domain irrevocably. The actual structure of the tax can be subject to debate. I would propose a highly progressive tax over time, for example for patents something like $100 for the first year, then doubling every year.
Seriously, why should IP not be taxed? We tax almost everything else that is possible to tax. Especially given it is far from certain that IP is net benefit for society. (I'm willing to give the benefit of doubt though, that's why I am not proposing to abolish IP completely)
I can support your proposal only if the IP taxes are deductible from incoming tax.
If you can't see the glaring problems there then there's no hope for you....
But hopefully you immediately recognize that it hurts the least advantaged the greatest while also providing a mechanism for anticompetitive behavior under the guise of following your precept (make the fee high enough and only established authors/publishers can hold any copyright).
I really get the feeling you didn't think it through at all....
Correct, but easily solved if the tax were to be based on license sales numbers and income. Small/poor license owners would pay almost nothing whereas the big players would pay plenty.
If there's no income the fee is negligible, permitting the rights holder to squat on them for next to nothing and prevent the use of the otherwise abandoned IP by the public....
For instance, an art gallery takes a photo of an artwork that's out of copyright for reference/insurance and (a) doesn't allow photos in the gallery and (b) the photo which is copyright isn't on sale (as it wasn't intended for that purpose). So the out of copyright artwork is locked up from reproduction.
Variations on this theme are a problem with galleries and museums worldwide.
If it wasn't viable then it would either never be created or would automatically enter the public domain.
Currently, if IP is not commercially viable then the author has the choice of not creating it, or creating it and releasing it under CC or just public domain. So essentially the same.
To assert the model isn't blatantly flawed is absurd
I said the structure can be discussed. There is no problem giving first number of years free to see if the IP is commercially viable. The aggressive progression (doubling every year) means that literally all IP is in public domain after a couple of decades.
A simpler solution is to start with a return to something resembling the original IP laws where one lost their rights within their own lifetime.... Theres a reason that was originally proposed, rather than lifetime protections, and why creators originally accepted it with glee... All parties need to remember those reasons, whether rights holder, state or consumer.
Just stop fighting for a broken concept and come up with something better.
Ed:typos
One could also imagine radically different IP laws concerning firmware or even software.
Moreover, there exist devices with fully open source firmware, so if anybody wanted one to copy, they don't need yours. They only need yours to use it with your hardware.
These devices have a chip in them that needs drivers and firmware. That's software. In particular it's the software that interfaces with the operating system. But the software is specific to a given version of the Linux kernel. When a new kernel comes out, you often have to update the software, for which you need the source code. So when the vendor stops doing this without publishing the code, nobody else can cost effectively do it either, and you can no longer use the hardware with recent versions of the kernel. But older kernel versions have known security vulnerabilities in them, so you can't use those either.
The ask is not that they provide free factories for everyone to make their own hardware, it's that they release the source code for this software in particular. Anybody could then copy the software, but it's only useful in combination with their hardware. A competitor in China can't use the same drivers with some other chip, that chip would need different drivers. That's what drivers are. So the only people who want this code are the people who paid the hardware vendor for their product and want to continue using it.
The hardware vendor, by contrast, doesn't want to give it to them, not because they fear some competitor using it but because then the customer would be able to keep using the hardware they paid for instead of having to buy a new one. Which is unreasonable enough to prohibit.
Well, it would also allow compatible hardware to be manufactured. E.g. "IBM compatible".
And it also has no meaning in this context. What is "compatible" with a WiFi chip or a storage controller? They're all already compatible with each other. The driver is the thing that converts from the device-specific operations to the APIs provided by the kernel. The kernel APIs are already public and anyone can implement them for their own hardware.
It's hard to see in the status quo, but it doesn't mean it can't be changed. Whatever system exists today works the way it does because laws defined (or didn't) how they operate. If we change those, the system has to change with it.
Do you want to sell your devices in this large, debeloped, profitable market? The you have to comply.
Manufacturing supply chains are already awfully complicated beast. Complying with reflgulaion of providing firmware for your hardware should hardly be a huge problem.
So no "permission" to release would be necessary if government's modified ther copyright laws to withdraw their granted protections after some "event" occurred.
The bigger problem is not the permission, it is actually finding the code so it could be 'released' once the event triggered. To make this work would require some form of required escrow in order to gain copyright protection in the first place where the code would be held until such time as the removal of copyright protection from it triggered, and then it could be released.
Trying to mandate that for all software might be too ambitious to politically succeed in practice - but mandating source code escrow for software used in certain regulated devices - smartphones, cars, planes, medical devices, etc - might be more achievable. You wouldn’t even need to touch copyright law, it would just need to be a product regulation. Of course, copyright law would have to be touched for a compulsory license, but consider that phase 2 and source code escrow as phase 1 - phase 1 could be enacted now, phase 2 saved for later
There's no such thing as a natural right, period. They're all imaginary creations of humans.
There is a recent movement trying to redefine them as such, led by moneyed interests that would obviously stand to profit from such arguments; but legal history is very clear: IP was never conceived on the grounds of being "natural" or "innate" in any way, but as a device to sustain certain economic sectors. IP is no more natural than subsidies for carmakers are natural.
Copyright and patent are not among those. The Constitution provides that congress can grant "for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries"
"Limited times" could be defined by congress to "expire" under whatever circumstances they choose.
Realistically, I'm sure there's a loophole they can leverage to achieve these. The EU is a major party to the WIPO and other members will likely be open to "renegotiating" if the alternative is the EU leaving completely rendering the WIPO pointless. The US pulled this stunt many times with other international orgs and treaties.
"We would never think about taking your IP but if you want to do business in this region, you must agree to voluntarily open-source all drivers after the product is no longer maintained."
Or:
"Of course you don't have to agree to anything but if you stop supporting the product and don't open source the drivers, consumers can obtain money damages for their devices becoming inoperable. "
Then it would be understood and agreed that anyone making software they have to release as open source what was closed source 5 years back. This way I would say that you can't bring the "but the competitors will use this to steal my business" argument.
What you would get in essence is a snapshot of what technology looked like 5 years ago (or a decent number of years people can agree on) and you can fork from there if there's a will to give a second life to various devices.
But really, I don't want an ugly phone because someone decided batteries should be user replaceable like in the old days. And yes, I like my iPhone to be sleek.
I don't know about ugly, but my galaxy s5 with a replaceable battery was barely thicker than an iphone 14 without one: 8.1 mm vs 7.8 mm, according to wikipedia. The difference is actually bigger between the 14 and the 7, so even without removable batteries, iphones are getting thicker.
The GS5 was also IP67 certified, and, indeed, it had no issues under heavy rain attached to my motorcycle handlebars, during multiple long trips.
I strongly doubt that having a removable cover would noticeably alter the phone's looks or thickness.
Secondly, you put prioritise on asthetics over what's good for the planet?
It’s a typical facade argument you might hear from politicians when they parrot lobbiysts.
Exactly the reason to force manufacturers to change their supply chains.
It is far more than "just a gasket and a few screws". The rating can't just be good on unboxing day. You want it to hold even after a few years, several drops on the floor, in cold weather, etc.
Watch maintenance has been done by skilled professionals using generic tools and (generally) generic components. Waterproofing is an excuse used to limit our ability to repair and maintain our devices and maybe because somebody didn't like the appearance of a screw face or screw cover on one side of the device.
Are you prepared to have a similar ratio for your phone? Basically the phones we have now with a permanent, very durable waterproof case?
Strictly from a product design and especially hardware design standpoint, I get the resistance to easy replacement of certain parts. Designing for a replaceable battery means designing your seal to withstand at least twice as many battery replacements as the law requires, or you make sure you have enough replacement seals stockpiled to cover the number that will be replaced, or you use a a commodity seal (think an O-ring).
Apple eventually made ~86 million iPhone 8 and 8 plus. Let's say that's representative of any given model of phone. How many millions (billions?) of seals is that? How much does that cost to store? To distribute? How much does that affect the cost of the phone?
I am fully behind right-to-repair. I won't work for companies that have lobbied against it (and as an embedded hardware and firmware guy, that's significant). But there is a measurable, monetary cost to designing things to be repaired. Either we accept that only the richest n% of e.g. phone manufacturers can afford to stay in business, we as the consumer accept lower performance at the same price point, or both.
All of that said, my point regarding connectors with finite cycle lifespans is relevant. These physical devices themselves have a lifespan. What is the point of replacing a battery when the charging port, headphone jack, physical buttons, touch screen, etc are spec'd to fail well before the average battery does? What about if you have the same iPhone 8 soldering problem, where the phone can't actually survive being put in the back pocket of a decently tight pair of pants? How does government regulation regarding batteries reverse the trend of people buying cheap things because they cost less?
> What is the point of replacing a battery when the charging port, headphone jack, physical buttons, touch screen, etc are spec'd to fail well before the average battery does
Parts often/usually last far in excess of what they're spec'd for as I'm sure you know. And many of the things you list aren't critical to operation like the battery is.
The vaunted Samsung s5, you still had to make sure that the battery was very secure and just right.
> https://www.gottabemobile.com/samsung-galaxy-s5-water-test-d...
> If you remove the battery, the Galaxy S5 will remind you to make sure the back cover is back in place securely.
The new law apparently doesn't require a user to be able to replace the battery by hand. Just that it is serviceable.
I think the new law would basically mean the end user doesn't have to deal with glue now at least.
Also, it is just ingenious to attribute everything to malice — is a modern combustion engine also irreparable because of some conteo, or is it irreparable simply because for efficiency reasons they had to use more precise technology with smaller error margins, where one’s fatty human hand just doesn’t cut anymore?
Plus the Samsung Active line never needed to go to these extremes to churn out perfectly fine waterproof phones at slightly higher than average prices. And they weren't the only ones with these sort of offerings.
I never claimed it was impossible. I'm only pointing out there are far more severe design constraints than a lot of people even understand, yet they confidently proclaim it is both a simple matter of trivial engineering and completely free of consequences.
The fact is gluing is simpler and cheaper but most importantly it reduces the repairability of phones by third parties. Quite often trying to repair a phone will cause it to be destroyed, making replacing a battery more risky and difficult. Companies would love not to have to use glue, but <design excuse>! Nothing at all to do with built-in obsolescence.
Honestly, it probably only adds a few bucks to the BOM and the consumer who doesn't care about repairability still likely comes out better off in the long run because their phone lasts them longer and/or resells for more because it isn't junk after 3 years.
With android phones the resale value/demand wasn't there (also due in part to bad software support lifetimes which would also need to be addressed) so they'd just get tossed/shelved after 2 to 3 years even if they were perfectly functional.
If you scaled the forces and subjected the car to the equivalent of dropping a phone on the floor it would be totaled instantly... forget about maintaining waterproofing.
Thus I stand by my original statement: people making claims like "just a gasket and some screws" have never designed a product under similar constraints and are making bad assumptions or straight-up Dunning-Kruger errors left and right.
First, it seems like you could just make the phone part waterproof and if they dunk it, they have to replace the battery. I have ruined a phone by putting it through the wash, and I would have been very happy to just replace the battery instead of chucking the phone.
Beyond that, I wonder what the reality is for waterproofing needs. Are people taking smartphones diving? IP65 means it's resistant to 'spray' - like rain, not a firehose - and it seems like a battery compartment with a tight-fitting cover would be more than enough for this. IP68 doesn't apparently mandate a depth rating but recent iPhones are tested to 6 meters for 30 minutes. That's more water pressure than 99% of those iPhones are ever going to see.
I don't personally think the non-replaceable battery has anything to do with IP rating, it's because manufacturers want soft-sided batteries with more delicate terminal connections, for volume/capacity reasons.
Maybe if they decrease size of display, it wouldn't be that bulky. And we would finally get a phone again that is not wannabe tablet.
But how are you gonna show all the ads, dark patterns and newsletter signup forms? We can't afford to miss out on all that growth and engagement.
There is a dive housing that can handle up to 60m depth, but that’s a special case.
Except it doesn't. The last two waterproof phones I had had user-replaceable batteries, a USB port, and even a headphone jack.
What it does is add a few dollars onto the BOM.
https://www.gottabemobile.com/samsung-galaxy-s5-water-test-d....
So this is demonstrably possible. The only reason I can think of that it's not done anymore is cost savings.
I don't want my phone to look like that by law.
Asking unironically: what were they? I want such a phone
http://www.n2ltd.com/intermec-introduces-latest-rugged-mobil...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_5210
They can even fit into a pocket!
They also want displays not to crack. That is why lot of them are buying protective cases.
Are not sealed up phones overrate in this context?
I loved lumia devices - easily openable back to replace battery, nice materials (rubbery polycarbonate?) that offered nice grip. Having PC displays instead of glass would be awesome - no need for extra protective case because the shatter woild be a tning od the past. At the worst, a scratch resistant screen protector, which we all already put in the devices either way to help avoid screen cracks..
Yes, id didn't have newest 5G, but guess what - my new phone has it yet I don't have coverage. Storage could wear out but are you really doing load IO test on it? screen burnin/crack... maybe if someone is glued to the phone "24/7" and doesn't take care of the device... but as I said - using good policarbon materials (including for screen!) would get rid of this problem mostly...
See Jerry Rig Everything. He even says that there are solutions for this even for glued-up phones, manufacturers just don't want to implement them because they're for sure against battery replacements.
It's not like glue is some sort of magic substance.
I have this new Nokia phone with a replaceable battery. It came with the pin you can use to open it (probably costs a few cents to manufacture, but if I had plenty of time to spare, I could've made one with a sturdy piece of plastic and sandpaper). The "mechanism" that keeps the back panel is just a piece of rubber, probably the same kind you find on hermetically sealing food containers.
Also, very few people want their phones water-proof (what for?). And even if you really, really wanted that, you could like spend 5-10 Euro on a water-proof case.
This is insane. So that rain doesn’t destroy it? So that spilling a drink doesn’t destroy it? So that dropping it in the toilet doesn’t destroy it?
I'd take a removeable battery over almost every modern feature on phones today.
If rain destroys your phone that is just plain incompetence from the design department. Or rather, they were not incompetent, but other forces made sure they were not paying much attention to water resistance.
My wettest experience with a smartphone was when I got surprised by heavy rain when walking to the hair dresser. I arrived soaking wet. Got the phone (a HTC Desire Z) out of my pocket, water was running out of it. I opened the battery lid, the hairdresser blew with the hairdryer for a couple of minutes and all was fine.
Once my Google Nexus 4 died because of rain. Normal rain was no problem ever with it, even to make calls in a rain. But one day it rained very heavily with a wind so strong it was hard to walk against it. It felt like being in a carwash for ~ 10 minutes.
I was waterlogged up to my underwear. Nexus 4 was in my pocket and died. I put it to a bunch of rice and let it airdry. After it dried, the phone acted weirdly.
Lesson learnt: if the product doesn't specifically indicate a high level of water protection level, consider it not having ANY protection. "Resistant against spills" and other handwavy marketing mumbo jumbo has zero substance.
Yes, if you were stupid and went swimming with your wrist-watch you would've killed it... and every now and then I'd hear a story about how something like that happened.
Water-proof watches were seen as a luxury, however small, that nobody really needed outside of like scuba divers.
I don't even know if my phone is water proof or not, and I had it since 2016. I never tried swimming with it or leaving it outside in the rain or doing any of the other stupid things you listed... why would any sane person do something like that?
No, they don't. And those who do have to expose their phones to extreme conditions might buy a protective case. Very few people expose their phones to conditions they know to endanger electronics... it's common sense not to use electronics underwater, unless it's the special kind that's designed to do that.
You really shouldn’t want to replace batteries on the fly in general — it makes stealing easier (modern phones can’t be powered off easily without authorization) so you may find it before it loses power, waterproofing suffers, etc.
Yet I don’t see manufacturers add better screen protection, quite the opposite in fact.
So phone cases/bumpers it is for me now.
https://hackaday.com/2023/04/21/the-cyber-resilience-act-thr...
Which would require regulation, or you have way too much faith in humanity. Regulation isn't bad, just dumb regulations.
Regulation is not a bad thing - though within the US a fair amount of regulations were constructed to increase the barrier to enter a market at the behest of lobbying.
If the software problem ever gets solved, you WILL want to be able to replace the batteries won't you? You can and should fight both battles since they serve the same purpose.
The precedent is also good for devices other than phones.
I agree with what you say, but even phones I had that became unsupported and I couldn't replace the OS in didn't become useless. They still worked.
A user-replaceable battery would be useful for them as well.
If one was lucky, maybe with developer tools there was a firmware update, and even those happened at most once.
Feature phones weren't a substitute for personal computers. They weren't as necessary of an accessory as it is today. On the other hand, standards governing how those phones worked weren't changing as fast, so, given good care, you could use your phone for 10+ years.
Updates today are a way to force users into buying a new phone (eg. my banking up decided not to support an older version of Android, phone vendor doesn't produce updates -- I have to buy a new device).
There weren't updates because there weren't banking apps which could've forced you to abandon your perfectly functioning device.
I am quite sure that many people across the African continent and Asian see it differently.
Specially those that were using Symbian devices.
Best you could do on your phone is to play snake or send an email.
And if we are talking about places like Zimbabwe... there might have been like a hundred cell-phones in the entire country.
As for Asian countries? -- well, places like Japan or Hong Kong weren't much different from Europe. Places like India or China, by and large, didn't have coverage. Even relatively well-off Russia only had cell towers in and around big cities. In Russia at that time there were very few people able to afford a high-end Nokia phone, but even if they had one, those wouldn't be the people who needed a replacement for a PC, nor would they ever use their phone in such capacity. Due to poor economical situation all electronics were seen as a way to prevent wealth from depreciating. Few people who did buy expensive cell phones had no interest in using their advanced abilities, nor was there anything to use such a phone for.
Software can come after (or during).
Let's amplify postmarketos a bit ..
Huh, why not? I'd love yours too, but battery is also good. What do you do with a superb open source phone where you need to replace device because battery is dead and you cannot replace it? Let's please aim for both and everything!
Because given limited resources, companies prefer to spend their resources on what pays the most. Manufacturing updates may be comparable or even more expensive than making new devices.
I don't see much hope of such a thing being decided soon, if ever. The incentives for politicians are mostly not aligned in this direction.
The much more realistic path towards having devices/software that can be used for more than 3-5 years is IMO if more people started supporting projects like postmarketOS, fairphone, shiftphones, Librem, (mntreform for laptops) and other such croud-funded and more open/free designs.
Once such devices/OSes work good enough to be usable in day to day life without serious hassle/disappointments, more people will actually use them and a community can grow, allowing the products to mature.
I think a very good example (in software) is the f-droid app store that has reached a sufficient level of maturity that many people now use it exclusively (instead of the Google play store).
i used any and all of my smartphones that long. no problem.
-- sent from my Fairphone 4
We should have both. Replace battery, components, and software access.
They should have to provide documentation for every IP block in the device, source code for any drivers, and the ability to unlock the bootloader.
This would make it easier for people to back-port modern android / iOS, or just run linux on old devices.
Going by HN traffic, it appears that what the EU is for is to redesign the iPhone to get the details right that techies disagree with Applle on. We live in extreme times with some remarkable challenges - the EU is wasting bandwidth on this triviality. And it isn't a phone manufacturer, it is probably not going to make phones cheaper or, on net, better for consumers.
Please EU, behave rationally and focus on creating a peaceful and prosperous environment. Stop generating headlines about backseat driver phone redesigns.
[0] https://theconversation.com/poland-dreams-of-building-europe...
[1] https://www.iea.org/commentaries/europe-s-energy-crisis-unde...
[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65235579
[3] https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2022/html/ecb.sp220...
that'd take actual work from the EU.
Mobile phones are very important for European citizens: there's so much stuff that depends on them... companies require their employees to use them for 2FA, governments use them for logging into various government services, it's the preferred method of interfacing with banks, supermarkets, post office... my son's school has a phone app, which is the only way they communicate school schedule, or stuff like teacher's absence, going on field trips etc.
Apple is just another empire of evil that needs to be regulated in order not to treat its customers like slaves. It's absolutely not a waste of time to make them play nice or gtfo.
I thought fear-driven hyperbole ended with the expiry of covid lockdowns. On to the next end of the world story.
It'd be stupid in the good times. It is still stupid in the current times. Let Apple do what they want and focus on keeping people warm, safe and with a roof over their head - all things that are at risk right now. Spend some time on diplomacy trying to calm the re-arming armies down. In Germany the AfD has gone from nothing to nearly 20% in the polls over the last decade; something is really badly wrong with "normal" in Europe to get that sort of political realignment.
Exchangeable batteries are not going to help.
First, the EU doesn't have that much power. It's restricted to commerce and a small part of intergovernmental policy. Defense, tax, criminal laws, education, wellfare, etc., are all outside its remit.
Second, this doesn't take that much "political bandwidth." Someone proposes it, they discuss, end of. This is not an attempt at extending the parliament's power, or controversial.
Third, where do you get the idea from that Apple makes the best design decisions for consumers? They're a rather capitalist and very American company. They exist to increase profits and shareholder value.
Fourth, even something that is well designed from one perspective, can be bad from another. Repairability is one such aspect. The EU is not very activist when it comes to ecology, but at least they get this right.
Fifth. The A fucking D. That's partially on the neo-liberals. Their grubby little hands have made life for certain groups hard and taken away any prospect. Hence people turn to extreme protest parties. For another part, it's on extremist politicians, of course, but also those on the "good" side, with their holier-than-thou attitude. That drives people to the wrong side. None of these is anywhere near the authority of the EU. Make the SDP go back to its roots, and vote for it.
https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/most-popular-phone-brands
If someone decides to buy the phone that is best for them, most likely designer of that phone is going to be Apple.
If you like maybe there is an argument it is Samsung or a Chinese company - but fact is that Europe, as far as real-world results, doesn't have a person on the continent who is willing and able to make a good phone. They certainly don't have someone like that working for the EU.
> First, the EU doesn't have that much power.
Less power they have, the more it matters what they draw attention to.
Companies optimize for profit, that’s it. Capitalism only optimizes for that. Regulations are the means we can mandate some other values taking any kind of priority. Otherwise we would still have coke putting cocaine into our drinks.
The EU gets convinces people to do things with fines and, ultimately, threats of jail time.
Now if one design people want to own and the other design only takes hold because of threats and fines, we ought conclude that the mandatory design is the weaker one. People aren't paying for replaceable batteries. They're paying for tough, cleanly built & waterproof phones. That is why there are sometimes actual queues outside Apple stored as people try to buy iPhones - people really think Apple designs great phones. For the EU to manage that they'd need a man with a truncheon standing off to the side forcing people to line up when they don't want to.
And they're doing this while Europe is being hit by crisis after crisis. This is a terrible time to be trying to reduce the quality of phones in the EU. It is bad enough in a good year. It is a terrible time to be drawing attention away from the actual problems that Europeans are facing. They should be working on making things cheaper and better for EU citizens.
It’s an intercontinental organisation with 30.000 workers, 705 elected seats in the EU Parliament, and the European Council that sits the heads of state of every EU member state.
It better be able to deal with more than one subject at a time.
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/meetings/mpo/2023/6/corep...
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/meetings/mpo/2023/6/corep...
Incidentally, a lot of cheap Chinese phones based on Mediatek have plenty of leaked documentation available, and a thriving aftermarket community as a result of that.
The EU is ensuring the cell phone companies start by fixing at least one issue. They can then move on to the other.
Without really strict rules in place this would be doomed to fail. You would need to have a huge number of people whose job it would be to review every single software/firmware submission.
Would you mandate that companies must deliver code and build scripts that can be built with a single command and produce usable software/firmware?
Otherwise companies would probably submit random archives of plausible looking code that will never be usable because it depends on 100+ proprietary components.
I ended using even a KaiOS phone just to have a phone I could replace the battery. People keep moaning about phone being waterproof yet my phones fail on me nowhere near water so what is the point?
you know... you could also try asking the US government to do it...
It has considerably slowed down in the last 3-5 years, so it makes sense to only mandate longer lifespans nowadays.
Not sure what the latest update on this is. IIRC the planned penalty was to make the manufacturer give full refunds to the consumer for devices that violate the requirement.
[1] https://www.androidauthority.com/eu-smartphone-updates-rules...
https://www.heise.de/news/EU-Kommission-bringt-Reparatur-und...
So I see it as a starting point, and we need further targeted iterations, including the one you pointed out (thank you!)
No woke bs marketing, no coorporate white washing, no marketing with "green sustainability": they just do it instead of talking about it.
Doesn’t need to be hyperbolic bs marketing just to advertise that your phone has these features.
I want to believe that something so good could happen.
I and many, many other people don’t mind using a phone or tablet for many years, even with an obsolete OS. But battery life tends to be the #1 factor in this devices ending up in the bin.
In fact, by making battery changes easier with less intensive surgery, it’ll put even more pressure on manufacturers to allow for repurposing them with a different OS.
Maybe mandate a 5-year limit before a device must be allowed to be unlocked allowing alternative software to be installed, thus giving these disposable devices a far longer lifespan.
Is there any precedent for forcing firms to release software? And if so, has it resulted in a third party adopting the support after it?
In order to ensure that portable batteries that were incorporated into appliances are subject to separate collection, treatment and high quality recycling once those appliances become waste, provisions to ensure the removability and replaceability of batteries in such appliances are necessary. Consumer safety should be ensured, in line with Union law and in particular Union safety standards, during the removal of portable batteries from or the replacement of portable batteries in an appliance. 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. Commercially available tools are considered to be tools available on the market to all end-users without the need for them to provide evidence of any proprietary rights and that can be used with no restriction, except health and safety-related restrictions.
Nothing stopping manufacturers from using normal fasteners and gaskets to comply while retaining water resistance etc.
[1] https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2023-0237...
Doesn't it still require heat to undo the glue?
Two screws and a plunger get you access to both an easily replaceable screen and the battery. Really is an astonishing design.
This is not a requirement to have 'cartridge' user-replaceable batteries, just that you should be able to open the phone and remove the battery (not much emphasis on actually replacing it) with easily available tools, rather than heatguns, solvents, proprietary glass-pullers etc.
> ... or proprietary tools, thermal energy or solvents to disassemble it.
> with the use of commercially available tools and without requiring the use of specialised tools […], or proprietary tools, thermal energy or solvents to disassemble it.
I'm glad we're getting USB-C on the iPhone, but it wasn't a huge problem and it was probably coming anyway in the next few years. But replaceable batteries? I'm skeptical, and think it could shrink the market and lower the quality for users.
I feel like a much better approach would be to say that phones must work with third party batteries, and manufacturers can't restrict battery replacements to their own repair centres. That increases competition, helps small businesses, and encourages a thriving batter recycling and replacement market, increasing device lifetime. As for USB-C, similar legislation about increasing compatibility and reducing lock-in (neutralising Apple's MFi program for example) could have had similar impact without the downsides of the industry being unable to move forward.
I don't think it's easy to design a phone that would at the same time a) have easily replaceable battery, and b) be waterproof until the first battery replacement.
What's stopping figuring out how the hardware can achieve both battery replace-ability and water resistance?
Phones already have holes in them, e.g. speakers and charger port, and yet are able to survive a water immersion event.
Similar thing with the charger/data port. The outside of the port can be completely sealed up with just the electrical connections going through. The port isn't ever opened, there's no mechanical wear of actually going in and out of the sealed area. Glue it all up but leave the electrical connectors exposed and its sealed.
A battery door is a whole 'nother issue. Starting off, its probably going to have considerably more perimeter needing to seal, especially if its like the doors of yore where you popped off a significant part of the back. Then, you'll need this seal to handle a lot of open/close events and be able to handle the dirt and debris which it will be exposed to. Keeping the device's profile thin gets way more complicated with all of these requirements, and the seal will probably still be less reliable than the seals for the charging port and the speakers/mics.
Nothing, since it wasn't all that long ago that there were phones that did this.
3.7V - 1.23V == 2.47V. 2.47V / 0.2Ω ~= 30W (12.5A).
You will be able the find your phone on the seabed from the bubble emanating from it.
Though the battery protect circuitry (which is inside the battery package) will most likely cut power before the battery is risks damages.
I wonder if that's responsible for the experiences folks had way before waterproof phones were introduced: they would drop their phone into water, it would shut off and refuse to boot for a significant amount of time (enough to send them shopping for a replacement) and then they'd try it a week later only to find that it works fine. Accelerated by putting it in a bag with rice or other desiccant.
You can have both.
> Having a power bank solves the problem of discharged phone for me
There are cases where a power bank isn't a good solution. They big and heavy. Not being able to swap in a fully-charged battery on demand means that I can no longer use my phone for certain things that I used to be able to do.
You can clearly see here[0] that the gasket on the flap protects only the USB port from water ingress. The battery and sim are protected by the grey gasket on the rear cover.
The opening for the rear speakers in the back cover reinforces the fact that the flap is there to protect the interface of the USB port and its housing. The rear cover does not contact the USB port at all.
[0] https://www.paulstravelpictures.com/Samsung-Galaxy-S5-USB-Ch...
https://www.gottabemobile.com/samsung-galaxy-s5-water-test-d...
> If you remove the battery, the Galaxy S5 will remind you to make sure the back cover is back in place securely. reply
I don’t deny that this is a valid use case for you, but I’ve absolutely never been in this position.
I carry around a battery phone charger in situations where I’d depend on my phone. If you squint, yes that’s pretty similar, but the big difference is that a USB charger can power my iPhone and my partners android phone without requiring the phones to use standardized batteries internally.
I think batteries should be replacing in a repair sense, but I’m not sure the “pop open the back and swap it on the streets of Tokyo” is a common use case we should legislate against.
Like others said, I would much rather have it be more durable (eg waterproof). Also I’ll add that thinness is a desirable trait (to a point).
And it has the benefit of being sharable.
And it has the benefit of being able to work hot - you don’t have to turn off your phone to charge it.
They're a lot bulkier. Phone batteries are physically very small and light. Good power banks aren't.
Lots of high-end flashlights do this. Mine isn't much larger than the 21700 cell it contains. If you want to go smaller you can get a 1850-based flashlight and still almost double the capacity of your phone.
Plus, it's a flashlight.
For mm^3/Wh, the results are:
Small vendor swag power bank: 96 x 21 x 26
52_416 / 7.4
7,083 <-- worst one
Canon battery: 42 x 30 x 9
11_340 / 4.5
2,520 <-- wow that's way less
10,000mAh dual USB power bank: 139 x 22 x 60
183_480 / 37_000
~5 <-- wow
By volume / energy, the big power bank wins by a mile. And tbh its not that huge, similar footprint to my phone and about twice as thick. Plus, it can power two devices at once, which can be pretty handy. It has a bit over twice as much power as my phone's battery. This logically makes some sense, as phones these days are pretty much a battery and a screen with a small logic board tagging along for the ride.
If I'm on the go, I'd much rather have a large battery bank that provides a good bit of flexibility rather than a battery that only works with a single device. This one battery pack can charge my phone, my camera, my wireless mouse, my keyboard, my headphones, my e-reader, and then all the same list of stuff for my spouse. If I got a fancier one, it could even provide extra juice to my laptop. If I only had a battery specifically made for my phone, I'd only be able to swap out my phone battery and all of the rest of my devices would need their own batteries or just be left dead.
On top of that, if I wanted to then charge that battery outside of the phone I'd have to lug some specific charger for that model of battery. Meanwhile if I bothered getting a newer USB-C power pack the same power cable that charges my laptop and my phone and my headphones can also recharge my spare battery along with all the rest of the devices I mentioned. I'm much happier having a 10,000mAh battery pack in my backpack to recharge when needed than needing to think about having a few different batteries around and their related chargers to keep track of. Once this one dies I'll probably
Such use cases are normally handled by creating specialty products.
My main motivation for only using battery removable phones is privacy, because I know they are really off, when I remove the battery.
But the choice is currently very limited.
With my 14 Pro Max I charge my phone every 2-3 days, and I'm not letting it get down to <20% when doing this, either. I'm obviously not making heavy use of it over this time, but even on days when I am out and about and using it more, I'm never in danger of it running out of battery.
Personally, at least, I'll take the sleeker design vs. an easily swap-able battery. Thankfully, it sounds like the EU law doesn't actually require it be replaceable in a tool-less manner, so it sounds like the type of design the iPhone 14 (non-max) uses will qualify.
Galaxy Note 4
Dimensions 153.5 x 78.6 x 8.5 mm (6.04 x 3.09 x 0.33 in) Weight 176 g (6.21 oz)
iPhone 14 Pro
Dimensions 146.7 x 71.5 x 7.8 mm (5.78 x 2.81 x 0.31 in) Weight 172 g (6.07 oz)
iPhone 14 Pro Max
Dimensions 160.7 x 77.6 x 7.9 mm (6.33 x 3.06 x 0.31 in) Weight 240 g (8.47 oz)
240 g? What did they put into that phone?
Experts? <chuckle> In Brussels - just as in Washington - they listen to lobbyists.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/08/lobbyists-euro...
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/european-union/article/2023/04/24/...
https://www.economist.com/business/2021/05/15/the-power-of-l...
I'm not skeptical of replaceable batteries. I think the policy that forces them to be removable on top of working with 3rd party manufacturers is a good idea.
I don't think replaceable batteries or USB-C requirements restrict the industries ability to move forward.
Edit: You can continue to argue in this thread, but the point of this reply was simply to point out that the parent comment was all thinly veiled opinions with no substance.
Compelling the use of USB-C will cause stagnation in connector innovation; there's no point in trying to to create new and more durable/water-proof/wear-resistant/faster connectors. The requirements for replaceable batteries may cause stagnation in other innovations; if we imagine that there'd been similar requirements in the alkaline era, we might never have gotten to Lithium-Ion.
Or, just make the new port a barrel connector like a headphone jack, just with more segments. Bonus points if you can plug in an actual headphone and it works. Nobody seemed to have a problem with a headphone jack next to their USB port.
I don’t. It’s all Bluetooth now. I like wireless headphones.
But you should be free to buy them and we can both vote with equally with our wallets.
Go buy phones that have the 3.5mm jacks and send the signal that consumers still want plugs invented in the 1950s. If that’s what you want to signal. You have a great way to tell Apple if you like what they are doing! So do I.
Maybe Europeans like wired headphones over wireless? That’s news to me, but they should vote with their wallets. If you like what a company does, but things that company makes. If you don’t, don’t.
It bugs me to see a government meddle with what customers want to buy.
Don’t rig the system so you get a bigger voice than others. That’s not fair.
What conceivable stagnation could requiring replaceable batteries cause?
This is part of the challenge with these regulations - by definition we're defining a framework based on existential knowledge.
What about batteries that can also be panes of glass that act as the display? What about ultra low-power devices that are powered kinetically by typical human movement or magnetic perturbations?
None of these currently exist in a commercially viable form, but if we regulate based on our current view of technology do we run the risk of making these innovations more challenging to bring to market? That's the challenging balance that needs to be considered.
The answer isn't to abandon policy, it's to design it to be flexible and to respond quickly when problems are discovered.
[0] https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21534416/free-state-...
These ultra thin foldable phones probably couldn’t exist with removable batteries. The thinness required to make it comfortable to use would be hard and so would the structural integrity with a removable backplate.
It would absolutely restrict durability since it’d make waterproof and dustproofing way more challenging, if possible at all.
Removable backs would limit wireless charging hardware like apples MagSafe (which is great!).
I had a phone with a removable back and wireless charging back in 2012. This isn't rocket science.
Modern phones are going for sexy, that's all. They are large in every dimension but Impractically thin even though everybody adds another 3mm - 6mm of case anyway because they're sleek to the point of unusable. I particularly love when we buy a sexy sleek thin phone and then put an otterbox on it :-)
But I'm not a materials engineer. This is just in my lay experience of how thin materials I've encountered perform.
Only if the flap covered the ports…
“Your customers won’t even have to plug anything into their car. FuelSafe just safely hoses down the car with fuel! Over 45% efficient!”
USB-C wasn't the problem, MFi was. The rumours are that Apple's USB-C implementation will be locked down in similar ways, accessory manufacturers will still need to pay Apple to create certified accessories, and data transfer speeds are going to be restricted to Lightning speeds. USB-C everything is nice, but no non-techies I know like it because it's the new cable that's not compatible with any of their stuff (as much as I advocate for it).
Removable batteries in smartphones just aren't workable. We have too high expectations for battery life, weight, durability, water resistance, and size. It negatively impacts all of these. There hasn't been a mass market smartphone with a replaceable battery in a long time, and if they were that great for customers there would have been. A much better option would be to focus on repairability, it would have almost all the benefits, and effectively none of the downsides.
I'm an Android user, but nearly everyone I know has an iPhone. And not even one of them has an iPhone accessory. So how important is this MFi thing, really? From my perspective, the main annoyance is that my partner (who has an iPhone) needs a special charging cable, and can't use the cables I use for my phone and we both use for our laptops.
And I suspect that's mainly what the EU cared about too: charging cables.
> USB-C everything is nice, but no non-techies I know like it because it's the new cable that's not compatible with any of their stuff
If you're talking about all their current stuff being Lightning, then that problem will work its way out in a few years. If their current stuff is all micro-USB or USB-A, then... what? How is that even possible these days? Even the cheap rechargeable motorized cat toys I've bought on Amazon use USB-C cables to charge.
And if it is micro-USB or USB-A that their other devices use, so what? They'd just be going from one charging cable that only works with iPhones (Lightning) to another that only works with iPhones (USB-C). And as their other non-USB-C devices wear out or become obsolete, and they replace them with new ones that charge using USB-C cables, this problem will also sort itself over time.
Once Apple is required to use USB-C and then uses software to block non-MFI connections then the EU will (a) take them to court for trying to undermine the spirit of the legislation (b) if they lose in court pass a new law requiring them to prevent blocking non MFI connections (although they will probably allow them to display scary warning messages).
Oh wait, that’s entirely not the case today.
Removable battery phones are more difficult to design.
Why would a company do something that's more difficult, absent a mandate to do so?
Modern smartphones are not the pinnacle of technical possibility -- they're an optimization between feature and price.
A feature could be beloved by customers but add another $1 to smartphone build costs, and still be cut by every remaining manufacturer in the market.
i buy used sub-flagship phones two or three cycles behind. they're much cheaper, they do what i need, they're not too slow for modern software.
but the battery is the worst part. i get a day's life at best. a year in i'm camping by outlets all day if i need to use my phone more than incidentally.
all of these phones would be perfectly good on the secondary market if a battery replacement service didn't cost as much as replacing the phone itself.
i used to swap batteries myself. but it's increasingly difficult to do without damaging the screen as you peel it apart, and at that point the phone is totaled.
i'm currently running a pixel 4, and a battery swap would cost more than i spent on the phone.
not sure where you're getting your prices, but it doesn't matter. the fact that this is even a point of contention indicates that swappable batteries would make a difference.
Lithium-ion batteries at the $25 pricepoint come from a single well known place of manufacturing and are usually of the unknown quality. They may or may not be safe to use, and there have been precendents of self-ignition and self-explosion to the point that some airlines have banned or have attempted to ban the Li-ion batteries in the carry-on.
A branded $99 battery (all brands) is not 100% immune to the same problems but occurences are much more rare, and typically each such failed specimen is taken back to the manufacturer for an investigation. The only forensic process in existence for failed $25 batteries is called «throw it into the dumpster».
That said, a better QA process by the phone manufacturer does make the $99 battery reasonable. If all suppliers of $25 batteries could guarantee the same rigid QA process for the $25 batteries they supply, that would make the $99 batteries unreasonable.
I do.
But it’s absolutely not a legitimate comparison. An Hermes bag, or a game console are very specialized devices. A smartphone is almost a necessity to live a modern life these days.
Especially if you step out of the U.S. to more developing countries, where many people don’t own computers, or have email addresses. Everything they do, from basic transactions, to government IDs, to receiving govt benefits, etc happens on the phone.
It’s absolutely legitimate for consumers to have different expectations for such essential computing devices, and for governments to step in when the providers of these devices are acting against their citizens’ interests.
Gruber does no such thing
https://daringfireball.net/2016/10/iphone_edition
> Especially if you step out of the U.S. to more developing countries, where many people don’t own computers, or have email addresses. Everything they do, from basic transactions, to government IDs, to receiving govt benefits, etc happens on the phone.
And those people aren’t buying iPhones….
And while $99 may not be a lot in some regions of the world, but it's a significant amount of people's discretionary income in other regions (they may not be buying iPhones but the situation isn't much better for other brands as far as I'm aware.) $99 is also enough to outright buy a new cheap Android phone.
Are there people that find spending $99 on a battery replacement expensive that are really making the decision to replace their whole phone for 5-10x that amount?
https://www.statista.com/statistics/788557/global-average-se...
And that's the average, likely brought up drastically by the sale of extremely expensive phones. Apple and Samsung's flagships start at $800 and go over double that for their absolute top of the line. Unfortunately I couldn't find the global median selling price of smartphones, but the source above mentions that 58.5% of all smartphones sold during the second quarter of 2019 in Latin America had a price tag of USD$199 or less, and 83% of all smartphones shipped to Africa during the 4th quarter of 2019 had a price tag of $199 or less.
From a quick search, one of the best selling phones right now in India is the Galaxy M13, which is Rs. 9,699, or about USD$118 — barely any more than what Apple charges for a battery replacement in the US (obviously it's not that much for a replacement in India, but it does show how unnecessarily expensive $100 for a battery replacement really is.)
https://www.bajajfinserv.in/insights/best-selling-phones-in-...
In China, those that can afford it seem to buy iPhones (10.7% of sales), but all the rest of the best selling phones seem to be cheaper phones (next best selling is around ~USD$220, and the ones after that seem to be a little above or below that.)
https://www.gizchina.com/2023/03/28/top-10-best-selling-mobi...
In Mexico, 63% of smartphones sold in 2021 were between 3,000 to 10,000 pesos (USD$175 to $585.)
https://expansion.mx/tecnologia/2022/08/04/smartphones-mas-v...
However, if I'm not mistaken that all is for new phones, and most phone sales worldwide aren't new. While used and refurbished smartphones make up only 24.4% of phone sales in North America as of 2020, they make up 75.6% of phone sales in the rest of the world.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1208609/used-smartphone-...
So the average person worldwide is not buying a new phone at all (and thus spending even less than whatever the median selling smartphone price is, let alone the average.) However, the percentage of phone sales that are used is projected to decrease over time (according to the source above.) Not super surprising, given that while flagship phones have ditched removable backs for a while now, in the past few years more and more budget phones don't even have removable backs, and if you have to spend a significant portion of the cost of a new phone on a battery replacement, then that's a risky decision, as you don't know how long the other parts in the phone will last, and that's a lot of money that you're gambling on it. Sure, 3rd party repair shops in developing countries aren't charging you USD$100 for a battery replacement, but the labor can still easily double the cost of getting a new battery.
At $35 (and that's from iFixit, which if I'm not mistaken doesn't even make the batteries — if the companies sold the batteries directly, it'd be even cheaper), a new battery would be a much smaller risk, and near certainly would lead to less e-waste.
Certainly I can see them buying an iFixit battery and trying themselves, or paying a 3rd party vendor and taking a risk on that. But there's just no line of logic that makes any sense to me that says "$100 to replace my iPhone battery is expensive, better throw it away and spend even more money to get someone else's second hand phone of unknown state"
Not necessarily, as I can't imagine most refurb/used sales worldwide come from individual sellers; most of them are probably sold by businesses, which sometimes provide a warranty and return policy on their used products. Right now, on the Amazon Renewed Store, the unlocked Galaxy S20 FE 5G 128GB is $187.50. Amazon states,
> The product is refurbished, fully functional, and in excellent condition. Backed by the 90-day Amazon Renewed Guarantee.
> - This pre-owned product has been professionally inspected, tested and cleaned by Amazon qualified vendors.
> - This product is in "Excellent condition". The screen and body show no signs of cosmetic damage visible from 12 inches away.
> - This product will have a battery that exceeds 80% capacity relative to new.
> ...
> - This product is eligible for a replacement or refund within 90-days of receipt if it does not work as expected.
from https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Galaxy-128GB-Cloud-Mint/dp/B0...
So if 2.5 months into using that phone, you feel it doesn't function well, you can return it.
Even for sales from individuals, Swappa (an online user-to-user marketplace for used tech) requires you to list the battery health percentage on iPhones if it's below 80%. They also require that everything functions well and even is in good cosmetic condition. Their standard for "fair" is rather high.
Outside of pawn shops, I imagine most brick and mortar stores aren't selling phones in poor condition. In the US, the phone carriers, Best Buy, and even Apple themselves sell refurb phones, and they don't want to hurt their reputation by selling poor quality products. Apple in particular has high standards for their refurb phones:
> All refurbished iPhone models come with a new battery, new outer shell, are backed by a one-year warranty, have free delivery and returns, and also include:
> - Full functional testing, genuine Apple part replacements (if necessary), and a thorough cleaning
> - The original Operating System or a more recent version
> - All refurbished devices are repackaged in a brand new box with all accessories and cables
I guess anecdotally my iPhone 6S as of recently hasn't been performing well. Would a battery replacement help it? Maybe. But that's not certain (it could be that modern apps are so bloated that its 2015 hardware can't handle it despite most of those apps having essentially 0 new meaningful features in the past 8 years) and I'm surely not going to spend $100 on a nearly 8 year old phone to find out. I've replaced the battery myself before, but last time I broke the screen in the process (something that wouldn't have happened if the phone had a removable back), so I'm hesitant to do it again (I was being careful, and have done plenty of phone repairs at this point, but more than anything the ribbon cables break extremely easily.) But if I could just pop off the back and put a new battery in, I'd be willing to give it a try for $35. But instead I'll probably just deal with it for a little while and then get a different used or refurb phone with better battery health than my own device.
EDIT: another example of an affordable refurb phone: iPhone SE (2nd gen) is $147 in the US from the Amazon Renewed Store and has all the same benefits Amazon guarantees for the Galaxy S20 FE. So for $47 more than a battery replacement, you can essentially try out a "new" used phone for 80 days and determine whether you want to stick with it or return it.
I agree, apple make old phones slow on purpose by software update, apple is evil
The only time Apple made “an old phone slow” was when the battery was too old and couldn’t operate at peak without causing the phone to shut off.
Every time someone says shit like "locked into the Apple ecosystem", god kills a kitten. Lots of people switch back and forth between iOS and Android.
Nobody's going to go for USB-C on their iPhones if they can get Lightning ports. The Lightning port is far superior mechanically (both more durable and easier to clean from debris) and unlike most Android phones, not attached to the mainboard - so it can be replaced if damaged.
Lightning ports may well be technically superior (I can't really judge as I've had dozens of devices using USB-C, 95% of the time with no issues, but relatively few occasions to use lightning ports - thought I do have an iPad that's bricked currently because I can't find a cable for it), but if Apple is unwilling to license the technology to other manufacturers then there's no chance of it ever being any sort of universal standard.
Personally I'd rather hoped that by now we didn't need cables/plugs at all!
Ask yourself what kind of game regulators are really playing?
See how many former banking regulators end up working at large banks, same is true for pharma and without even looking probably many other industries. The regulatory system is in place only partially to safeguard people, it is also in place to enforce barriers of entry and it is in place to act as a nice career pathway for it's participants.
I hang onto my phones until the software becomes unusable, either because apps drop support for my OS (and I can't update any more) or I get scared into upgrading for security. I've never had a battery fail or even get to the point where it doesn't last a whole day—the software fails first.
My understanding is that it's different with iOS, because Apple is much better at supporting their old phones than most Android manufacturers.
Every single one of my Android phones stopped working as phones 3 to 5 years down the line. Couldn't take calls, the phone never became aware of them. Couldn't call anyone, not even emergency services, the phone never connected despite full bars. It's always the fucking phone modem.
I'm still using an Android, but when this one eventually fails (this one's starting to flake out at not even a year old, bought new...) I might seriously move over to an iPhone simply because every single iPhone I've seen others use has apparently never stopped working as phones. That's even if they fried a couple Lightning cables and whatnot.
I bought a phone, I expect it to phone. God damn.
You do realise that the EU gave the industry (i.e. the "experts") the task of defining and agreeing on a standard for charging cables? The manufacturers worked on this and agreed on USB-C, all except one US based fruit company.
But it was the reason why we moved from the crapfest of earlier 2000's "everybody has a different charger"
You're talking about a few-dollar problem.
I don't want a fragile USB-C port on my phone. The lightning port is a joy to use - reliable both in terms of the retention mechanism and connectivity, and easy to clean of debris.
Lighting connector is actually better than USB-C for a phone charger, there is no little contact to snap off inside a lighting port and it’s easy to clean pocket lint out of the lighting port with a tooth pick.
This isn’t the case with USB-C, it’s more fragile and harder to remove debris with damaging it which is why I think apple use it for iPad but not iPhone.
The battery thing is good though, I have seen way too many people using devices with swollen batteries because they are way beyond their useful lifetime.
I don’t know this for sure but I would hope the software on the phone can prevent this on modern devices.
With lightening the cable side is the fragile part, with usb-c the male part of the connection is inside the phone’s socket. This is the fragile part of the usb-c connection.
It makes more sense for the fragile part to be on the cable rather than the phone itself because the phone is more expensive and would need a repair but the cable is cheap enough that you can replace it.
Other than this though, usb-c is far superior to lightening with better data speed and power delivery.
The EU gave the industry an ultimatum in 2009: Adopt a common charger voluntarily or we'll regulate to force you to do so. Almost all manufacturers did, first with micro-USB before moving over to USB-C.
Eventually, because Apple decided not to play well with others, they had to follow through and regulate.
That's the important detail for whether this counts as SNI or not (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...).
Most proposed bills / votes don't end up resulting in much so we tend to downweight those threads on HN and wait for the thing to actually happen (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...).
Mostly a formality IMO. Here's where it can get fairly political even though it's nearly a final (published) rule ... this vote was fairly heavily in-favor, only 20 against IIRC and even fewer abstentions. Some last-minute horse trading can definitely occur and bind it up. My personal opinion is that I think that's almost certain to pass at this point (given the nature of manufacturing in the EU versus say borders or food products) and I definitely would be sourcing screw and battery connector suppliers now if I designed phones.
Progress (in English) can be tracked here: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2023-0237...
To be sure, some time and attention is wasted on repetitive discussions that restate the same issues with breaking any new conversational ground. But complex problems often require multiple attempts at a solution.
However, the other challenge is people like buying sketchy cheap batteries off the internet, as we have seen from the recent spree of e-bike fires in NYC apartments so...
Sounds like something that should be regulated next.
People replacing their own batteries provides an extra incentive to do so.
The market spoke and nobody seems to really care that much about user replaceable batteries except a vocal minority.
Like, I've been owning mobile phones for 22 years at this point and it's literally something I've never cared or benefitted from.
On the other hand, having replaceable batteries is definitely something that's been useful in the past.
I use my cell phone in the rain, I use my cell phone in the shower. I drop it in the mud and rinse it off in the sink.
Waterproof is a top-tier feature, right up there with "not exploding the screen into a thousand shards when I drop it".
Might be a top-tier feature for you, but it never made any difference to me.
I also like to go hiking and camping a good bit. I've lost a few electronic devices from getting caught in a storm. Its nice having the peace of mind that it doesn't matter if I get completely soaked with my phone in my pocket.
Finally, I have kids, and they're of the stage where its fun to throw things in toilets and in sinks.
As well, once a day I run my phone under the faucet while I wash my hands and give it a clean. I absolutely want my phone waterproof and happily will trade a user replaceable battery for a waterproof phone.
Depends on one's lifestyle that can include hiking / cycling under heavy rain for example.
I'm happy for you, for never having lost a phone due to an accidental encounter with water. I haven't lost one recently, but:
- I fumbled an old flip phone while having a night out on the town and dropped it into the toilet.
- I replaced it with a really cute small Kyocera candy bar phone, that my girlfriend at the time didn't notice was still in my pants pocket when she washed my pants (I'm not sure if waterproofing would have saved this...)
- I recently dropped an iPhone 12 into a bathtub full of water and suffered 0 ill effects from it.
If I had to choose between replaceable batteries and waterproofing, I'm not sure which I'd personally choose. I've changed internal batteries in a few phones over the years... it was a bit of a hassle, but kept a $1000 device alive for another year or two. The water-killed phones... there was no bringing them back to life.
Yes.
I'm not discussing it being useful, I merely said that it doesn't feel _really_ needed by me.
If I had to choose between interchangeable batteries and waterproof I would choose the first one hands down.
> Is waterproof even a real needed feature?
That comes across as though you're trying to dismiss it as unimportant; it doesn't come across as though you're actually asking the question and willing to listen to the answer. And then, responding to people who answer you with further dismissals of their reasons continues to seem like you're trying to dismiss it as unimportant because you don't use it.
In response to someone saying they don't want to lose an $800 phone to water damage, what value does it add to say "I never buy over $300 phones, and anyway it never happened to me"? Other people do buy expensive phones, and also, whether expensive or cheap, other people do want to not lose them to water damage, and for that matter, other people do want to use them in environments where they're likely to get wet (e.g. pools/showers/baths).
It comes across as though you're trying to say "but you're wrong to want that", which results in the response you are getting.
I’m probably just clumsy, but I’ve dropped my phone into bodies of water twice in 10 years. I also know of 2 people that have dropped their phones in toilets.
The Venm diagram of expensive phones and clumsy people is large enough to make this a useful feature for some.
I wouldn’t mind if the regulation was that a phone company must offer at least one model with detachable battery, but I’d be sad if the amazing advances in waterproof phones were compromised.
Usually when they write these laws they say something like "replaceable using commonly available and inexpensive tools".
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2023-0237...
---
This was the last user replaceable battery mainline Galaxy phone. This was also the same generation of the iPhone 6, which was dramatically thinner than the S5 and it's replaceable battery. The market spoke.
There is already legislative warranty framework around compliance to promised specs. This means if the date is not honored, customers can turn against stores and return the products. Stores can then return against distributors/manufacturers, etc.
Also forbid sales of any network connected devices (phones, tablets, TVs, routers, etc) past that date because it's a wide security risk, particularly for people who are IT analphabets.
You'll then see how spectacularly quickly everyone lines up to security update schedules and standards. They will also find a way to prolong the date for devices that sell well.
Because the EU forces them to.
Regretfully I don't see this coming to fruition. Apple will find a way, by hook, crook, or lawsuit, to get out of it.
They complied (or are in the process of complying) with these regulations.
Afaik the proposed battery act allows either swappable batteries or a minimum "lifetime".
It's just a case of Americans underestimating the size of the EU market. But the large corporations that already do business in the EU know very well that they can't leave a market that represents half of their revenue.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/382175/quarterly-revenue...
Is the cost of a complete redesign > lost sales in EU? Then don't do the redesign.
It seems clear that there will be some downside to the replaceable battery version, whether it's size, cost, weight, ergonomics, water resistance, etc. Will the convenience of having replaceable batteries and not importing be worth those downsides? We'll have to see.
Assuming everything else is close enough.
I know there's an ocean between me and the EU, but importing a phone becomes significantly more difficult than it needs to be based on which cellular frequencies are supported.
So we're basically part of the EU without the voting rights and toll union benefits..
Besides, our governments and most of the people cross "isle" are very much into the green/circle economy thing. It would get adopted from the EU even without being part of EØS I think.
Personally I think it would be great to be able to have a phone longer, I absolutely hate throwing out working hardware like the 2010 mac pro I used to have but apple decided not to support any more. The funny part is that someone has now made a hack/patch so it runs the newest os x anyway [1]. It was never the hardware that was the issue, just lack of support from apple.
[1] https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/MODELS.ht...
But since I am in the EU I wouldn't mind.
Replaceable batteries just means they will make something else weaker instead, preferably something that fries the device once it fails (see https://youtu.be/7cNg_ifibCQ?t=238).
It's too dangerous not to, as nowadays phones (or computers in general) don't really need to be upgraded that often to remain useful. No manufacturer wants a repeat of the 1080Ti.
I think I'm out of the loop. What does this mean?
Did anything come out of this?
Removable batteries with aftermarket suppliers way less costly than factory originals.
Small enough to fit in the pocket easily, or flip form for versatility.
Each battery lasting over 2 weeks and you could stockpile them for extended off-grid use.
External battery chargers included.
Tactile keypads.
Physical connection for external antenna for better reception, as well as audio interface for hands-free car use, analog headgear etc.
Things that made original smart phones smart:
USB at least plus possibly Bluetooth connection for use as a modem or virtual com or ethernet port as an interface to PC for internet access/faxing, as well as mass storage mode so the phone's file system appears no differently than a regular external drive.
Free downloads of manufacturers' PC software to interface phone to PC, for file management, text/picture/video message composition/viewing, personalized backup/restoration, etc.
Removable Memory Stick (Sony) or SD card.
Prices no higher than $500, which itself was too extravagant to be accepted by many, mostly those requiring it for business.
Superior OS compared to either Android or IOS.
Email & internet access provided by cell carrier without need for special mobile consideration on web sites.
Full manufacturer support independent of cell carrier.
Without these a phone can not be very smart.
When the iPhone appeared with exorbitant pricing and lacking the traditional smart features, plus substituting dumb things like non-removable battery, it was too bad people settled for that.
Power users / tech steeped people like us will care a lot about the original cell phones’ antennas, tactile keypads. But 90% of the public don’t care. And the 10% who are people like us cannot continue using our niche products with no interoperability with iOS/Android, if we expect to keep up with the rest of the society that has now been accustomed to a sealed slab.
Basically, I disagree with the premise that people “settled” for it - the majority a car when they were accustomed to riding horses.
But I will still point to the way the two surviving OS's are not so interoperable with each other, and a sealed slab is mainly not just the embodiment of planned obsolescence, but disposable electronics by intention. Apple really doubled down as an anti-reuse/anti-recycling company along the lines of Microsoft's influence.
The experience from horses to cars is a good amount of accurate hindsight, and it was only the early adopters who got cars for quite some time. I would say some equivalence is like with the older technology horse the rider could go places the car never will be able to, but the car did get people where most wanted to go and that's where the roads were because people were already going there.
What really did it was getting there faster and the stimulating feeling of speed like never before.
With the iPhone it was bigger more flexible screen real estate and the stimulating ability to "watch TV" anytime on a device you were going to carry all the time anyway.
Once the mainstream saw what the early adopters were doing there was nothing but envy until they were doing it themselves.
Maybe one thing to agree about settling for is the initial neglect for the environmental effect of both transitions.
If Apple doesn't like it, they can piss off back to California and give up 250 million iPhone users to Android.
I like the features that will have to trade off against replaceable batteries. I wish there were more opportunities for creative solutions to ewaste rather than the specific outcome being regulated.
1 - Without paying 4 times more. I don't think I can get it even paying 4 times more nowadays, but this was always how phone manufacturers lied about the features they wanted to push, by offering an alternative that costs 4 to 10 times more and using it to show nobody wants it.
Personally, I love the thin phones. I'd pay extra for it. It feels better and is easier carried. And the large screen makes it easily readable for my poor eyes.
They usually can resist some splashes. Not in any way comparable with modern phones.
https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xco...
Unfortunately, replacement parts are hard to come by for the Galaxy XCover6 Pro (Samsung doesn't sell them, iFixit doesn't sell them, and I can't even find certain parts from random sellers online), so it's arguably less repairable than other mainstream phones. An iPhone's battery is significantly more difficult to replace than that of the XCover6 Pro's, but if the screen, camera, speaker, port, buttons, etc. break on an iPhone, it's at least possible to replace them, unlike the XCover 6 Pro, so it's not the device for me and hard for me to recommend to others, as even if one doesn't do repairs themselves, with a more mainstream phone they can pay someone to repair their phone (either at an Apple Store if an iPhone, or some mobile repair shop for popular Android phones.)
I don't drop my phone often, but I've still had an optical image stabilizer that shook the camera violently, a vibration motor that worked sometimes, and a mute switch that worked sometimes, so replacement parts are very important.
But even still, the Galaxy XCover6 Pro is proof that you can have a waterproof phone with a headphone jack and replaceable battery that isn't very thick. If they sold replacement parts and committed to as many years of OS updates as Apple, I'd strongly consider it for my next phone.
There's also a clear exception for rinseable devices, I guess they mean shavers and toothbrushes, but potentially phones could come under it as well.
I don’t think that phones can count as being specifically designed to operate primarily in such environments, unless it’s specifically an underwater phone or similar.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/docs_autres_instituti...
The regulation isn't about one thing. It talks about everything from stationary battery energy storage system to portable appliances and yes transport too.
Those websites doing the cookie walls should have taken the hint to simply not do tracking. Instead, they chose to be annoying.
I think instead the regulation should focus on making parts available and phones reasonably easy to repair. This will most likely include switching out seals, which are needed for the protection from water.
You do not want water in your phone, seperating the battery compartment also increases thickness and complexity.
Are you sure? I've seen many phones that are both IP* rated and have a replacable battery.
Yes, there is a mechanical cover which keeps the very small battery away from moisture. The risk with these mechanical covers is that they deform under pressure and let water enter. It is difficult engineering challenge and anecdotally it didn't work that reliably.
Glueing phones makes the engineering simpler as it removes the need for any kind of screws and mechanical locking mechanism, instead all electrical conponents can be fit very tightly into the interior of the phone.
The next step should be to charge the true price of e-waste. People are entitled to their consumerist obsessions - they just need to pay for cleaning-up the pollution their create for the rest of us.
A phone with replaceable/ugradeable parts and software updates would probably last decades. The disposable culture must come to an end before it disposes all of us.
I guess. The fact is you really don't have a choice anymore, so what are you going to do? I'm not sure that counts as 'acceptance', more like 'resignation'.
What is needed is a way to easily replace the battery when it gets old. Now, need to take it to repair shop or take chances with DIY. It sounds like proposal includes internal batteries, easily removing back cover, and replacing the battery with connector.
I'm about to replace the swollen battery on 5 year old phone. It wasn't worth paying someone to do it. I'm worried cause I broke a previous phone doing the same repair.
Just let them ban glue in phones and they're done.
Interestingly, I had to physically remove the battery to be able to use it again when plugged into a wall, it wouldn't even turn on with a dead battery, even if connected to power source.
The new law seems to exempt some devices by article 11. But I now think the article might just be dated or wrong.
Here's the passage translated by DeepL:
> However, Article 11 explicitly leaves room for more specific rules that ensure a "higher level of environmental and health protection." For smartphones and tablets, the Commission and member states already adopted so-called ecodesign rules in November that give manufacturers a choice: Either they design their smartphones and tablets so that users can replace the battery. Or they install the battery permanently, in which case it must still have at least 83 percent of its capacity after 500 charging cycles and at least 80 percent after 1,000 charging cycles. Smartphones must then also be dustproof and waterproof.
> From the EU Commission's point of view, these special ecodesign rules for smartphones and tablets guarantee a higher level of environmental protection and health protection than the Battery Ordinance. This applies "in particular due to the durability requirements," the Commission informed c't in response to an inquiry. Therefore, the ecodesign rules are applicable, it said. These come into force after a transition period of 21 months and thus earlier than the Battery Ordinance.
From my limited reading, article 11 only applies to devices that are built to be used in wet environments though.
The original proposal: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...
Quote Article 11:
> 2. The obligations set out in paragraph 1 shall not apply where
> ...
> (b) the functioning of the battery is only possible when the battery is integrated into the structure of the appliance.
A smart lawyer could probably argue that a phone can not properly function when exposed to the elements without being integrated into the structure. But I don't know.
On apple devices specifically I've found battery life to be the showstopper. ifruits all the way back to 7 if not longer are still very usable....but that would be a 7 year old battery. Most lithiums start to fade after 2 years.
That's one of the reasons manufacturers have given up on (easily) replaceable batteries. It's simpler and allows for slicker design and anyway, most people will buy a new smartphone before the battery reaches its end of life.
The EU is fighting the wrong fight here. It'd be more useful to improve recyclability and actual recycling than to force more complicated phones where it's not needed.
It is probably the same as with PC. Initially each generation was way more powerful and allowed "better" and more powerful applications. But at some point your generic PC has become powerful enough to run nearly everything the average person wants and there are no more reasons to upgrade. Smartphones may have reached the same point.
I don’t want a thick ugly phone. And that’s what you get with a removable battery.
Ah yes. Europe still has a car industry whereas there is zero phone or computer industry left.
I don't think 500 kg batteries can ever be easily and quickly user-replaceable, no matter what the EU mandates.
You should complain about the laws of physics (or the weakness of humans) rather than make this ridiculous comparison.
You drive up. Battery bank is swapped and in 5 minutes you drive of fully charged.
It is coming. It won't happen overnight.
the chassis was drivetrain, and engine in one unit and body/cabin, a separate unit that anchored on.
there was to be few chassis types, and many body types.
How "ridiculous"!
Swappable EV batteries are not a new thing and Renault (an EU company, thus) has done it for a long time (with mixed success though) but it's totally incomparable with this law on phone batteries.