Among the many changes, the new rules would require batteries in consumer devices like smartphones to be easily removable and replaceable. That's far from the case today...
While that’s great, what I’m more concerned about is pricing for original replacement batteries. I don’t really care if I have to send my phone in for 2 to 3 days (which is what it took last time I sent an iPhone 11 Pro to Apple), what concerns me more is pricing. Especially with older phones, having to pay $69 to $89 for battery repair (plus shipping) is quite a lot. Self-service parts cost the exact same price from Apple currently.
The EU should forbid charging more for replacement or repair parts than the cost to manufacture them plus a small (!) markup.
Also, please extend this law to include all kinds of electronics (smartwatches, laptops, tablets etc.).
Especially AirPods and other true wireless earbuds should have replaceable batteries, as they are basically dead after 3 to 5 years, which just feels wrong considering everything except the batteries probably lasts a lot longer and when you get an expensive “battery repair” they just give you new AirPods.
It’s not that I disagree with you entirely. It’s just personally, knowing how to solder, and having had to replace batteries for both external and internal battery laptops recently, I’d rather not have this extend to laptops. As it is now with modern laptops, you just open up the housing, desolder the old battery, get just about any lithium battery from anything (those cheap USB power packs are great), and solder some wires from that to the control board. Going back to detachable batteries means having to deal with every single manufacturer’s proprietary awful housing and pinout slots. You either buy an OEM part from the manufacturer (if they still sell them) or risk a fire with third party batteries in awful housing. Detachable batteries is also how you end up with things like Lenovo using firmware to disallow third party batteries from charging on their laptops.
I feel it’s more important that housings should be user openable with normal tools (guitar pick, razor blade, screwdriver) without damaging the housing. HP is genuinely awful for this on laptops.
I’d imagine you’d have a hard time using USB power banks to form a battery that resembles (for example) a MacBook Air battery:
Considering most power banks use 18650 cells or similar (but even if they are thinner), I can’t really see how you’d form a battery pack that fills the space effectively on most notebooks anyway.
It’s also a lot of work finding the correct cells to use (form and size wise), ordering them, if it’s in a power bank prying that apart, desoldering the old and soldering in the new cells. >= 99% of all people would purchase complete, fitting battery packs for their model of laptop.
Oh wow, I went and looked up the MacBook Air, it looks like you could snap it being so thin. I’ll have to keep an eye out for one of those at the junk stores, I’ve not disassembled a laptop nearly that thin yet. Personally, I’d probably just end up taping a battery to the bottom of that if it came to it. Most of the laptops I’ve got are at least an inch thick, so it’s generally not a problem finding some space in them.
I recently picked up a T430, which turns out is an absolutely awful crapshoot with third party batteries that may just not charge thanks to Lenovo, or that just might stop holding any charge after a few cycles, or at worst manage to catch fire. Lenovo no longer sells new OEM batteries for these older machines, and as they get even older, finding new third party batteries will only become more difficult.
I think I might have left my thoughts a bit unfinished in my original comment. I think where I was trying to go with my issue with laptops being included in here is that requiring the batteries to be easily detachable won’t stop manufacturers from trying to lock you into something evil, something along the lines of a battery subscription like it’s printer ink. If anything it may encourage them to, and that’s a scary thought. What happens when they stop producing batteries for your locked down hardware? Can’t use “non-genuine” batteries, they won’t be allowed to charge. The average user is likely just going to toss it and buy another one, creating more e-waste.
What I feel should be regulated is the interchangeability of parts like batteries, similarly to how USB-C has been enforced. Innovation is great, but proprietary major components that are destined to fail prematurely to the rest of the device from normal wear and tear don’t benefit repairability, even if they are easily replaceable. Eventually that part will no longer be manufactured, and a consumable part that no-one else is allowed to sell to your users encourages you as the OEM to design that part to have a mean time to failure that’s as short as possible.
Sorry if this reads a bit disheveled, I wrote it kind of sporadically.
undefined> The EU should forbid charging more for replacement or repair parts than the cost to manufacture them plus a small (!) markup.
I mean 100€ with labour and parts is not that unfair for a business in a western country. I assume that you need to work on a phone for at least 30 mins to to get everything done. And 100-200€ an hour for a working professional is not that outrageous.
I agree with you that the repair service can be expensive to offer, but the replacement part should still cost next to nothing. I can’t imagine a phone battery costing any more than $10 to manufacture.
What I’m concerned about is that this law is pretty useless without cheaper prices for original batteries to go with it.
While that’s great, what I’m more concerned about is pricing for original replacement batteries. I don’t really care if I have to send my phone in for 2 to 3 days (which is what it took last time I sent an iPhone 11 Pro to Apple), what concerns me more is pricing. Especially with older phones, having to pay $69 to $89 for battery repair (plus shipping) is quite a lot. Self-service parts cost the exact same price from Apple currently.
The EU should forbid charging more for replacement or repair parts than the cost to manufacture them plus a small (!) markup.
Also, please extend this law to include all kinds of electronics (smartwatches, laptops, tablets etc.).
Especially AirPods and other true wireless earbuds should have replaceable batteries, as they are basically dead after 3 to 5 years, which just feels wrong considering everything except the batteries probably lasts a lot longer and when you get an expensive “battery repair” they just give you new AirPods.
It’s not that I disagree with you entirely. It’s just personally, knowing how to solder, and having had to replace batteries for both external and internal battery laptops recently, I’d rather not have this extend to laptops. As it is now with modern laptops, you just open up the housing, desolder the old battery, get just about any lithium battery from anything (those cheap USB power packs are great), and solder some wires from that to the control board. Going back to detachable batteries means having to deal with every single manufacturer’s proprietary awful housing and pinout slots. You either buy an OEM part from the manufacturer (if they still sell them) or risk a fire with third party batteries in awful housing. Detachable batteries is also how you end up with things like Lenovo using firmware to disallow third party batteries from charging on their laptops.
I feel it’s more important that housings should be user openable with normal tools (guitar pick, razor blade, screwdriver) without damaging the housing. HP is genuinely awful for this on laptops.
I’d imagine you’d have a hard time using USB power banks to form a battery that resembles (for example) a MacBook Air battery:
Considering most power banks use 18650 cells or similar (but even if they are thinner), I can’t really see how you’d form a battery pack that fills the space effectively on most notebooks anyway.
It’s also a lot of work finding the correct cells to use (form and size wise), ordering them, if it’s in a power bank prying that apart, desoldering the old and soldering in the new cells. >= 99% of all people would purchase complete, fitting battery packs for their model of laptop.
Oh wow, I went and looked up the MacBook Air, it looks like you could snap it being so thin. I’ll have to keep an eye out for one of those at the junk stores, I’ve not disassembled a laptop nearly that thin yet. Personally, I’d probably just end up taping a battery to the bottom of that if it came to it. Most of the laptops I’ve got are at least an inch thick, so it’s generally not a problem finding some space in them.
I recently picked up a T430, which turns out is an absolutely awful crapshoot with third party batteries that may just not charge thanks to Lenovo, or that just might stop holding any charge after a few cycles, or at worst manage to catch fire. Lenovo no longer sells new OEM batteries for these older machines, and as they get even older, finding new third party batteries will only become more difficult.
I think I might have left my thoughts a bit unfinished in my original comment. I think where I was trying to go with my issue with laptops being included in here is that requiring the batteries to be easily detachable won’t stop manufacturers from trying to lock you into something evil, something along the lines of a battery subscription like it’s printer ink. If anything it may encourage them to, and that’s a scary thought. What happens when they stop producing batteries for your locked down hardware? Can’t use “non-genuine” batteries, they won’t be allowed to charge. The average user is likely just going to toss it and buy another one, creating more e-waste.
What I feel should be regulated is the interchangeability of parts like batteries, similarly to how USB-C has been enforced. Innovation is great, but proprietary major components that are destined to fail prematurely to the rest of the device from normal wear and tear don’t benefit repairability, even if they are easily replaceable. Eventually that part will no longer be manufactured, and a consumable part that no-one else is allowed to sell to your users encourages you as the OEM to design that part to have a mean time to failure that’s as short as possible.
Sorry if this reads a bit disheveled, I wrote it kind of sporadically.
Stuff that 2 or 3 days with no phone just to change a battery!
undefined> The EU should forbid charging more for replacement or repair parts than the cost to manufacture them plus a small (!) markup.
I mean 100€ with labour and parts is not that unfair for a business in a western country. I assume that you need to work on a phone for at least 30 mins to to get everything done. And 100-200€ an hour for a working professional is not that outrageous.
I agree with you that the repair service can be expensive to offer, but the replacement part should still cost next to nothing. I can’t imagine a phone battery costing any more than $10 to manufacture.
What I’m concerned about is that this law is pretty useless without cheaper prices for original batteries to go with it.