EU's new regulation requires replaceable batteries in smartphones

DukenukemX said:
The was voted in unanimously.

"European Union is moving ahead with new regulation that would require Apple to make iPhone batteries that are easily replaceable by users. The EU parliament has voted in favour of this plan."

https://www.techlusive.in/news/appl...rules-heres-how-it-will-impact-users-1384752/
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I love this.
It will end poorly but I love it all the same.
I have to assume they aren't making Apple the only company that needs to do this and the changes to phone manufacturing will be weird and wonderful and dog-shit ugly for a while I am sure.
I am all for the chaos that will ensue and I am wondering if I should add flavoring to the popcorn this go around. I'm thinking Dill and Cheddar, but part of me just loves the Peanut butter M&M's with too much butter... Oh man I am excited for this show.

I'm hoping they launch a slot in battery similar to what you see in DSLR cameras then have it go in via a removable port like the SIM card so you can pop them in and out as needed.
 
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Sometimes regulations can be good.

Non-removable batteries were really an attempt at making it difficult for people to fix their older phones, so they would be more likely to spend big bucks on a new phone.

As such this practice was kind of born out of market manipulation, and when all of the manufacturers have colluded on the same designs, there isn't much consumer choice or compe3ting in the free market can do about it, as you have to have a choice if your choice is going to amount to a hill of beans.

So, in this case, I am quite for this regulatory effort. I hope some of it rubs off on the U.S. market, as manufacturers are often reluctant to design multiple designs for different markets, as that costs more.

I wouldn't mind a regulation requiring expandable storage and audio ports as well :p

Heck, how about a regulation that mandates that computers cannot have typically user replaceable components (RAM, drives, etc) soldered to the board, requiring computers and laptops to be user upgradeable.

That would put an end to the unethical "upgrade to double the ram or SSD for 8x the price at sale, because you never know if you'll need it" bullshit that apple pulls with their MacBooks.

A regulation that stipulates that if an industry standard exists for a component you are using, you MUST use that form factor and it MUST be compatible for user upgrades would be a huge positive for consumers.
 
Apple's widely assumed (IIRC) to be replacing lightning with USB 2.0 instead of faster speeds. I would fully expect them to try to screw with this process, as well, although I don't know how they'd do it.

The article mentions "mobile devices", not iPhones specifically so it's possible this is a shot across the bow to Samsung and others as well. As it says,

There’s also the issue of whether or not Apple already follows this legislation. The company will likely claim that its Self Service Repair program already satisfies these requirements.

As of now, there is less clarity on what exactly it means for smartphone batteries to be “easily” replaceable by the user.
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Phone makers can still force obsolescence by withholding updates on older models, but I guess the users can jailbreak or mod...

But I'm a big fan of this because I assume it will force a market for more reliable OEM batteries? By the time I'm ready to swap a battery it's a sketchy brand or new old stock that's just as wore out for sitting for 4 years...
 
Something like this would never target only a specific brand.

I am not sure if I care about the battery itself much, but it would be nice if it would make stranger not having a slot for an memory card and make them more common ?

Zarathustra[H] said:
The thinness craze when it comes to devices has become silly.
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To be put in large protector immediately because those device cost a lot almost all the time anyway
 
LukeTbk said:
To be put in large protector immediately because those device cost a lot almost all the time anyway
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Yep. Those Otterboxes are unweildly IMHO.

I don't run mine naked, as I don't want to destroy them too quickly (but with the device protection plan, I bet it wouldn't be a huge deal) but I do have thin protective cases on my devices.

The otterbox style cases are just too much. It's even difficult to get them in and out of a pocket.
 
longblock454 said:
Totally agree, I want a phone/tablet/lappy that takes 18650s, easy to swap.
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I'd like that. I can see it being challenging to make it work form factor wise, but if they can pull it off, I'd like it.

I wouldn't mind just something like the old rectangular Ni-Cad and Li-ION we used to have in everything.

You know, something like this:

1687289725997.png


You know, it would be even better to take the opportunity to require that the battery is not only replaceable, but is a standard form factor such that there are only a handful of battery sizes industry wide, and they have to choose one of them. That way it would be much easier to find replacement batteries when you need them at a reasonable cost.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
Sometimes regulations can be good.

Non-removable batteries were really an attempt at making it difficult for people to fix their older phones, so they would be more likely to spend big bucks on a new phone.

As such this practice was kind of born out of market manipulation, and when all of the manufacturers have colluded on the same designs, there isn't much consumer choice or compe3ting in the free market can do about it, as you have to have a choice if your choice is going to amount to a hill of beans.

So, in this case, I am quite for this regulatory effort. I hope some of it rubs off on the U.S. market, as manufacturers are often reluctant to design multiple designs for different markets, as that costs more.

I wouldn't mind a regulation requiring expandable storage and audio ports as well :p

Heck, how about a regulation that mandates that computers cannot have typically user replaceable components (RAM, drives, etc) soldered to the board, requiring computers and laptops to be user upgradeable.

That would put an end to the unethical "upgrade to double the ram or SSD for 8x the price at sale, because you never know if you'll need it" bullshit that apple pulls with their MacBooks.

A regulation that stipulates that if an industry standard exists for a component you are using, you MUST use that form factor and it MUST be compatible for user upgrades would be a huge positive for consumers.
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Most of the time they're good, how did Turkey do without building regs? People just like to bitch about it because they want to cut corners and make garbage or engage in anti-consumer practices like apple and samsung.
 
wonder what protection will apple do against aftermarket batteries?
It will most likely be able to be used but they will make their phone work buggy with it.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
Might have been a mm thicker, but who cares?
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Reviewers, that's who. Reviewers are obsessed with thinness. To a reviewer, a sheet of paper would be the Platonic ideal.

Then you get people like Ron Amadeo of Arse Technica, who's notorious for commenting about phone bezel thickness. Guy probably expects the screen to wrap around all four sides to the back.
 
M76 said:
It wasn't that long ago when phones had removable back covers, they didn't look any worse than current phones.
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Yeah, but that was before they were expected to be at least IP68 rated for water resistance, it's not a coincidence that they all started removing the slip-back covers around 2012, a bunch of phone manufacturers got sued because the humidity from showers and such was leading to damaged phones and they weren't covering repairs for that under warranty.
Was that a convenient excuse, of course, there are ways they could have done it using pressure fit seals and such, but those would have added cost to the devices, simply removing the ability to open the devices solves the problems while cutting costs.

I welcome the return of the "easily" replaceable battery but I expect to see a number of janky crap-basket implementations alongside some holy-WTF over-engineered ones too.

I am sure if Apple wants they could easily make it so the bottom half of the back of the phone slides off with some sort of pinhole magnet release that they will partner with iFixit for a custom tool for that it "easily" obtained by the end user alongside the battery pack itself.

I mean honestly, I have a lot of iPhones in service here and they only ever have 2 things go consistently wrong, the microphone on the speaker phone shits itself, and the battery. A replaceable battery would solve a lot of my headaches so I am down, but if anybody knows a good fix for the absolutely shit microphone for the speakerphone I would appreciate you share that.
 
TheBuzzer said:
wonder what protection will apple do against aftermarket batteries?
It will most likely be able to be used but they will make their phone work buggy with it.
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"The installed battery may not be a Genuine Apple battery and may cause reduced functionality" popup every time you wake the phone up. Or disable Touch ID, which IIRC, they do now if you replace the screen.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
Yep. Those Otterboxes are unweildly IMHO.

I don't run mine naked, as I don't want to destroy them too quickly (but with the device protection plan, I bet it wouldn't be a huge deal) but I do have thin protective cases on my devices.

The otterbox style cases are just too much. It's even difficult to get them in and out of a pocket.
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This is fucking hilarious because it's so true, out of all the phones we assign here users with simple slipcovers or at the bulkiest the Otterbox Commuter series have the lowest damage rates, and the users who use the big Defender series cases have the worst.
Now you think that the Defender users who are mostly part of the Maintenance, Facilities, and Grounds crews are damaging them most because they are in the most damaging environments, but "work" is not causing the damage, the leading cause of them breaking their phones is they fumble the bulky bastards while they are taking them in or out of their pockets causing them to drop them off ladders or down flights of stairs and the likes.
 
Lakados said:
Now you think that the Defender users who are mostly part of the Maintenance, Facilities, and Grounds crews are damaging them most because they are in the most damaging environments, but "work" is not causing the damage, the leading cause of them breaking their phones is they fumble the bulky bastards while they are taking them in or out of their pockets causing them to drop them off ladders or down flights of stairs and the likes.
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Clearly, the solution is to mandate the phone be on a short chain attached to a belt loop.
 
Lakados said:
Yeah, but that was before they were expected to be at least IP68 rated for water resistance, it's not a coincidence that they all started removing the slip-back covers around 2012, a bunch of phone manufacturers got sued because the humidity from showers and such was leading to damaged phones and they weren't covering repairs for that under warranty.
Was that a convenient excuse, of course, there are ways they could have done it using pressure fit seals and such, but those would have added cost to the devices, simply removing the ability to open the devices solves the problems while cutting costs.
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Action cameras have sd card slots and removable batteries and they literally work 10m underwater, none of this IP67-8 crap.Putting a seal on the edge for pennies would not make phones too expensive.
Removing the cover has not solved the problem it made it a problem for the user. Plus the environment. Throwing out a phone just because the batter needs charging too often is a waste.
I'm glad they are being forced to do the right thing.

Lakados said:
I mean honestly, I have a lot of iPhones in service here and they only ever have 2 things go consistently wrong, the microphone on the speaker phone shits itself, and the battery. A replaceable battery would solve a lot of my headaches so I am down, but if anybody knows a good fix for the absolutely shit microphone for the speakerphone I would appreciate you share that.
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Making them easily replacable, modular. I had a Lenovo K920 and almost everything in that was rerplacable without glue or soldering. The only glue in it was a single strip of tape holding in the battery, which was easily removable. And since it is repairable I refurbished it when I got a new phone and it is still used in the family, not gone to a landfill.
 
1_rick said:
"The installed battery may not be a Genuine Apple battery and may cause reduced functionality" popup every time you wake the phone up. Or disable Touch ID, which IIRC, they do now if you replace the screen.
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I get why this is a thing and I hate it. I get it is part of the hardware security chain for device identifiers and such to ensure things aren't being tampered with but there should be a means for a user to approve the change in a way that it re-issues the hardware certificate trusts, but at the same time it needs to be done in a way that is secure so bad actors can't do it on others behalf.
 
M76 said:
Action cameras have sd card slots and removable batteries and they literally work 10m underwater, none of this IP67-8 crap.Putting a seal on the edge for pennies would not make phones too expensive.
Removing the cover has not solved the problem it made it a problem for the user. Plus the environment. Throwing out a phone just because the batter needs charging too often is a waste.
I'm glad they are being forced to do the right thing.


Making them easily replacable, modular. I had a Lenovo K920 and almost everything in that was rerplacable without glue or soldering. The only glue in it was a single strip of tape holding in the battery, which was easily removable. And since it is repairable I refurbished it when I got a new phone and it is still used in the family, not gone to a landfill.
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I am not saying it can't or couldn't be done, I said they used it as an excuse to not do all the very things that the Action Camera would have needed to make it work.
And the Lenovo K920 was a beautiful beast. The Android OS at that time was a disservice to that phone (I did not like KitKat).
 
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I think this is awesome. Free market be damned, it's never truly free. Big corps just work together to screw over the customers.

I'd keep my phone a lot longer if I could get a new battery for it. Unfortunately all I can get is nasty knockoffs that aren't worth the effort to install.
 
Why not just force phone makers to have to provide a much longer warranty on battery defects, seperate from the actual phone. Thus, if their is a battery related issue, they must take it back and fix it or replace said phone.
 
MrGuvernment said:
Why not just force phone makers to have to provide a much longer warranty on battery defects, seperate from the actual phone. Thus, if their is a battery related issue, they must take it back and fix it or replace said phone.
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Because it'll still end badly. Replaceable batteries is good for consumers and for the environment. If you care about the environment then keeping your old stuff is better than buying new stuff. Most people don't need to buy new phones, and if they do it's because the battery is worn out, which would be well past any warranty that phone manufacturers can conjure up.
 
MrGuvernment said:
Why not just force phone makers to have to provide a much longer warranty on battery defects, seperate from the actual phone. Thus, if their is a battery related issue, they must take it back and fix it or replace said phone.
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Honestly, battery wear is too hard to accurately predict and it's a serious PITA to accurately diagnose, and even if they did the existing design is a major pain to deal with, I used to do them frequently and I have had way more batteries blow up in my face than is healthy, lithium dust to the lungs is not fun.

Even if they did fix or replace it what would the turnaround look like, how long is "reasonable", if you were Apple or Samsung would you want some 16-year-old min wage mall kiosk worker deciding what is and isn't a valid warranty issue or would you want them sent off to a facility with a multi-week turn around time? No, none of those are good solutions, much easier to just make the batteries replaceable.
 
The reason most high end phones don’t have replaceable batteries has nothing to do with resisting water damage, or about having interesting materials like glass or metal, or about form factor. Nope, it’s all about greed…cause corporations. And don’t even get me started on the fascism that is glued in screens.
 
Lakados said:
Honestly, battery wear is too hard to accurately predict and it's a serious PITA to accurately diagnose, and even if they did the existing design is a major pain to deal with, I used to do them frequently and I have had way more batteries blow up in my face than is healthy, lithium dust to the lungs is not fun.

Even if they did fix or replace it what would the turnaround look like, how long is "reasonable", if you were Apple or Samsung would you want some 16-year-old min wage mall kiosk worker deciding what is and isn't a valid warranty issue or would you want them sent off to a facility with a multi-week turn around time? No, none of those are good solutions, much easier to just make the batteries replaceable.
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And let's not forget DIY. I would far rather just replace my own battery. I really don't want that 16 year old minimum wage kid touching my phone let alone doing any work on it and I'd rather not wait a few weeks for the factory to do the job. Most would buy a backup phone for that time defeating the purpose.

I'm far happier paying for a new battery and getting the job done myself quickly. Same goes for anything else, this is why I maintain my cats even under warranty. Just for a simple oil change I'm driving to the shop, waiting for them to do it, paying an inflated price and then time driving home. I do this on my own, oil and filter are cheap, disposal is free here and I'm done in 20 minutes at a time of my choosing.
 
Wait, aren't batteries already user replaceable!?......
Sure you might need tools open it up like a cross bit on most things, so what's with a few more like a hot plate, solder iron, glue, spudgers ect ect...... :p

THRESHIN said:
And let's not forget DIY. I would far rather just replace my own battery. I really don't want that 16 year old minimum wage kid touching my phone let alone doing any work on it and I'd rather not wait a few weeks for the factory to do the job. Most would buy a backup phone for that time defeating the purpose.

I'm far happier paying for a new battery and getting the job done myself quickly. Same goes for anything else, this is why I maintain my cats even under warranty. Just for a simple oil change I'm driving to the shop, waiting for them to do it, paying an inflated price and then time driving home. I do this on my own, oil and filter are cheap, disposal is free here and I'm done in 20 minutes at a time of my choosing.
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MeeeeOOOOW. lol
Same-ish but with my car, :p , did my own breaks, oil.
 
It's ok phone manufacturers can still pump updates to nerf older tech into obsolescence
 
The Mad Atheist said:
Wait, aren't batteries already user replaceable!?......
Sure you might need tools open it up like a cross bit on most things, so what's with a few more like a hot plate, solder iron, glue, spudgers ect ect...... :p


MeeeeOOOOW. lol
Same-ish but with my car, :p , did my own breaks, oil.
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Well that was an epic typo. But I do sorta maintain my cats :p B12 issue, one gets a monthly injection at home by me :)
 
only reason i upgraded my last phone was due to battery issues. i would have loved to swap a 30-40$ part instead of buying a new one

issues like the samsung exploding battery would have been a much easier fix.

i dont think things like USB-C and replaceable batteries are going to stifle creativity or slow down progress. they can greatly improve the customer experience.

imagine if there are 4-6 standards for batteries instead of every one being unique. you could swap them around when necessary. i am going camping. i will take an extra battery from my tablet at home and keep it on me if there is an emergency. i hate carrying around a battery pack and plugging my phone in to transfer from one battery to another.

i am also in to reducing e-waste. seems like a win. one down side is cheap batteries possible killing high end devices.
 
Love the idea but knowing manufacture's they will figure out a way to make it only allow official batteries and charge insane amounts for them.
$800 phone, replacement battery $400
 
Good. I’ve always found it rich how these big tech companies, popular with hipsters for their supposed high ESG scores, try to force users to throw away a perfectly good electronic device loaded with rare earth metals simply because a consumable item has been spent, all while pretending they care about the environment. This is common sense legislation and it’s about time.
 
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