It's as weird as those rabid fans for a trillion dollar company that doesn't actually care about them but still will defend them at every fucking turn
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It's as weird as those rabid fans for a trillion dollar company that doesn't actually care about them but still will defend them at every fucking turn
It's just that every time that Apple releases a product, and this one pretty much every reviews agrees that is great the anti-Apple crown nitpicks the thing into oblivion trying to find every possible reason to be offended.
Why can't people just appreciate cool tech?
The "tech" isn't much cooler than anything else on the market, its just this is wrapped in an inpenetrable casing. In any case the % of actually recycled components/materials is often massively overstated, so chances are high a lot will simply be discarded. The same applies to Airpods (which I love), they're destined for a dusty old tech drawer or the bin one day when all they need is a new battery.
Being this environmentally irresponsible to fatten your bottom line as one of the most valuable companies in the world is unconscionable.
Being this environmentally irresponsible to fatten your bottom line as one of the most valuable companies in the world is unconscionable.
call me anti-apple again, I dare you
edit: this came off a little too hostile for resetera
I'mma just say that I'm not anti-apple, daily drive a 2014 mbp and own an embarrassing amount of old apple crap
Actually, Apple is of the big tech company that puts a lot of effort in it's environmental impact, whatever the anti-Apple crown believes it or not. Every year they publish a 80-ish pages environmental repport, it's public an accessible on their apple.com/environnement page as well as the steps they are taking to achieving carbon neutrality.
I'm just tired of people playing armchair manager and getting outraged over every thing without having a single clue of the decisions and trade offs needed to design a product.
"There's no such thing as ethical consumption" used to JUSTIFY unethical creation is the most liberal thing I've ever seen.
"There's no such thing as ethical consumption" is meant to, relatively, absolve consumers of guilt for participating in capitalism, not to absolve capitalists from doing bad things.
Their energy efficiency in one area doesn't excuse it in another.
Hmm, I've read the stuff on Apple's recycling and their efforts to be green/carbon neutral. I've no doubt they've made great strides toward cleaner/greener data centres and supply chain (which their pdf refers to the main). However, with regards to their actual products, global recycling efforts vary vastly (especially in Asia) so if there is no immediate method of repair its far easier to discard. They make efforts to point out their new Macbooks are 40% recycled but I don't see stats with regards to any other product line.
Seems a bit hypocritical to me to be keeping your house in order to get the environmentalists patting you on the back while pumping out products like Airpods that have a finite lifespan (and no means of extension) purely to ensure your next refresh sells.
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Apple rectifying this would go a long way to quell people's criticisms. The airpods are one of their biggest sellers, if not the biggest. It'd be a step in the right direction to look into dealing with them in terms of redesigning (replaceable battery) and/or a recycling/trade-in program made just for them. Going forward, the airpods need a new design is the way I see it. Two years, then dead – is abysmal for headphones/IEMs.
They also make products that force people to get a new one instead of repairing. They are a slimy company that continues to screw over people.
whoa whoa whoa, there's some repairable apple hardware
the phones are decent, for example. some macs too
Counterpoint: You buy the tech you like, and let people buy the tech that they like.
Comments like this would catch a ban as "console wars" over on the other side.
you're acting like every apple product is a plastic coffin for batteries and PCBs when that just isn't the case
how many devices have you taken apart and/or repaired?
Well I've traditionally bought android phones with swappable batteries since that is the main thing holding tech back from being reusable
ah yeah, that's ideal
you can still totally replace the batteries in iPhones though, as well as the screens (which I've done several times). it'd be better if the batteries were more end user replaceable, but we shouldn't conflate that with airpod batteries which are pretty much impossible to replace
User Banned (3 Days): Hostility toward another member
Fuck you and fuck Apple
I don't particularly care about repairability for $99 things, but that also means that I'm agnostic: in a vacuum, repairability is always better than the alternative. Unless there's actually an engineering reason for not allowing it, of course.
But I think expectations are at issue here, and that's creeped in the wrong direction. For instance, if I were going to buy the next iteration of whatever the Mac desktop computer is, I'd want user-replaceable SDDs and RAM. But I doubt that's happening. If it's a new MacBook Air, I think I'm conditioned at this point to treating the thing as vacuum-sealed and only repairable with special tools or at a repair shop.
That's not particularly great. Hell, my main computer is an OG MacBook that I've replaced the HDD with a SDD, upgraded the RAM, and swapped a new battery in.
I'd personally love for the Pro line of things to have user-swappable parts, but that's because I care less about an extra few millimeters saved on thickness. Granted, it won't prevent me from upgrading this thing to the next M1-chipped MacBook Pro in a few years, but I also know that if I want something customizable, I've got to go elsewhere.
But I think expectations are at issue here, and that's creeped in the wrong direction. For instance, if I were going to buy the next iteration of whatever the Mac desktop computer is, I'd want user-replaceable SDDs and RAM. But I doubt that's happening. If it's a new MacBook Air, I think I'm conditioned at this point to treating the thing as vacuum-sealed and only repairable with special tools or at a repair shop.
That's not particularly great. Hell, my main computer is an OG MacBook that I've replaced the HDD with a SDD, upgraded the RAM, and swapped a new battery in.
I'd personally love for the Pro line of things to have user-swappable parts, but that's because I care less about an extra few millimeters saved on thickness. Granted, it won't prevent me from upgrading this thing to the next M1-chipped MacBook Pro in a few years, but I also know that if I want something customizable, I've got to go elsewhere.
I heard if we also have even the slightest amount of gun control we will end up with all guns being banned.
People are always worried about the slippery slope without understanding that it actually does end somewhere.
But TBH,their products tend to get better the more locked down they become. Waterproofing on mobile devices, and now look at the M1 MacBooks where you can't fix anything. They are amazing because of the changes they made which necessitated them to be impossible to replace storage or ram.
I agree with this in theory, but evidently the M1 mini RAM might not be on the die (take it with a grain of salt of course)
also, c'mon. this thread is about a speaker, with a side of airpods. surely they could devise a way to get the batteries out of airpods without ruining their simplicity
I mean, it's a design principle
you should be able to disassemble stuff, we shouldn't be manufacturing plastic coffins for rare earth metals and shit to decay in
what if the integrated power supply in that thing blew a capacitor? easy fix, but the claim here is that you basically have to cut the thing open to get in there
personally I don't even think the homepod mini is that bad but repairability is very good
I'd agree, but I don't see the claim in the linked article that you have to cut into the HomePod Mini to take it apart. If you're referring to the iFixit teardown for the full-sized HomePod, that also links to a subsequent teardown where someone figured out a non-destructive approach. Seems like you do have to melt some glue in both cases, which isn't great, but can be dealt with.
I think the difference is that this is less hypothetical what if, and more an indication of what Apple is already doing. Its no secret they're against right to repair. Of course its not only just an Apple thing, or limited to electronics. The makers of other products are doing this as well, and try to get legislation passed against it.
Of course there's also different levels of how easy something is to repair. Something like the homepod this thread is about, or airpods, were basically designed to be used and thrown away. Modern phones are hard to repair because they're sealed, but you can still take them apart and replace components without destroying it. Even on a Mac you can re-solder new components to the board. Though Apple won't let you buy any parts so you have to salvage them from other dead units, but they are repairable if you can get those parts. The problem is Apple is making it harder for anyone but them or other authorized places to replace components.
oh shoot, my reading comprehension is bad
I'm not 100% sure what the complaint is then, I thought it was the outer housing
Discussion of this general topic is a positive thing, but the specific article that spawned the thread mostly just seems to me like some dumb/sensational editorializing by 9to5mac.
yeah, shoot
this should've been an airpods thread
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how did I forget all of the progress I made in this thread lmao
What at that price tag. Why not just buy a new one at that point. Makes no sense.
Well, I mentioned it earlier in the thread, but at $79 for a repair, the repair is probably them just them giving you a new one. They already made the profit off you from the initial purchase, and at $79, they're probably still making a small amount off the cost of the unit.
Yeah that's pretty =/ ridiculously wasteful.
I think the only apple thing I own is a 4th gen Ipad. It still works too even despite having a hairline crack in the screen (the bottom is a mess though. I'm surprised it didn't completely shatter). (I remember laughing at the price they wanted to fix that and decided to live with the screen). I believe it was enough I would've been better off buying a new Ipad come to think of it xD