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…
I’ve missed swappable batteries so much. The convenience of having another loaded battery with you, increased drop resistance due to parts flying, replaceability. So good.
If you’re worried of water resistance, get a water-proof case or be more careful with the device costing you possibly hundreds of dollars.
I’ve never lost a phone to water damage in my lifetime either before or after batteries became more difficult to swap.
I have bought some old used electronics lately. Having an easily accessible and replaceable battery in the Game Boy Advance SP and the Nintendo DSi is very nice though.
I’d probably replace the battery on my phone right now if I could.
I’m all in for replaceable batteries. But don’t think swappable batteries are possible with modern devices.
It’s a question how “modern” you need your device to be as well. Despite being a small company, Fairphone is capable of producing fully repairable devices that are working great by my standards at least.
It’s another thing engineers need to think about when designing phones, but most advances the last few years have been in terms of pointless gimmicks anyway. If they can produce phones with foldable screens, chances are they could manage replaceable batteries as well if only they wanted to.
Fairphone is awsome but it also has 4000mAh battery for a fairly heavy device. Nowdays Android phones come with 5000mAh batteries and 50W+ charging.
As someone who tends to hang onto my phone for ages, I like being able to get replacement batteries… but I wish they would just take everything fairphone does (removable battery + lineage + and especially right-to-repair stuff) and base new standards on that.
OTOH, I also believe that would not be impossible to engineer a phone that could be taken apart where you could have replacement parts for both the battery and seals (e.g. while many companies currently frame things as “removable batteries OR water resistance”, I see no technology reasons why BOTH couldn’t exist in the same device) … There just hasn’t been a big push for businesses to develop something like that bc everyone buys their products without them needing to put that much effort into it.
If companies stopped auto-voiding warranties over users opening a phone and stopped treating everyone as incapable of doing their own repairs, I could totally see user-replaceable seals being a thing. You can basically look at other markets that do have right-to-repair. Sure, replacing seals on a phone might be a bit much for grandma. But grandma is also probably going to call either a repair shop or someone in the family who is good with it. Really not much different than upgrading laptop ram/hdd or doing your own plumbing or changing the oil on a car today… pretty damn easy if you know what you’re doing, but not something everyone is going to know how to or want to do.
When Samsung and Apple are seemingly incapable of producing repairable devices while Fairphone comes out of nowhere and are doing it just fine, it’s not a question of it being difficult. It’s a question of it being profitable. If Fairphone managed to make a repairable device, Apple or Samsung would have managed to create one that is both fully waterproof and repairable if they considered it a priority.
From the view of the industry, the logic is that “if you’re not going to have your phone break down in heavy rain, at least make sure you’ll have to replace it in three years because the battery starts sucking”. There’s absolutely no incentive to make a product that will actually last.
IDK about this one, removable batteries will generally mean less water resistance won’t it? Also, these days batteries are custom built for every phone so that they can be as large as possible. Forcing them to be easily replaceable might screw that up.
I love the EU’s approach to consumer repair rights, but I think this one might do more harm than good.
My phone’s with removable batteries always needed new batteries. And the replacements were junk (nothing good on Amazon or eBay).
But the last 2-3 phones have been sealed. And they’ve outlasted the phone.
Only one that had a problem was my grandma’s (who wireless charged it 24/7) and it became swollen.
Seems like you could just mandate manufacturers to make sure replacement batteries are available on the market as well?
I’m a few years into my Fairphone 3, it still lasts two days of normal use without charging, and the battery can be replaced in seconds. If I need a new one I can buy it straight from the producer.