Maybe. Maybe not. If my local phone and phone accessories shop can do it for little money in 15 minutes then the current calculus changes for a heck of a lot of people.
Maybe. Maybe not. If my local phone and phone accessories shop can do it for little money in 15 minutes then the current calculus changes for a heck of a lot of people.
Isn't that already the case though?
No. I can't find a legit battery for my Samsung phone, only forgeries and "compatible with"s. Local repair shop said they could put a new OEM battery into this 4yo second-hand phone
So I pay them and they do it. The result:
- back cover becomes rather loose while it's warm e.g. from fast charging or a hot day out. No longer waterproof
- the battery is no better than the original and is (2y later now) degrading faster than the original. If you ask a lot of it, the last 35% are gone within minutes. I think it's a knock-off battery but that the repair person doesn't know that
If there had been commercially available repair parts and tool access, neither would have been a problem and I could just have done it myself
My mom has the same model and sent hers in to the manufacturer for a battery swap. Took a while and cost half the price of the phone (since it was a 2yo second-hand at that time). That could have been much faster, even if the manufacturer is free to set the same steep prices
A colleague got their phone back from Google for some repair last week, I don't remember if screen or battery swap. He asked and they said it wouldn't be reset. He put a sticker on it not to wipe the device. They wiped the device. He's now trying to piece together what's in various backup files that Android allows making. Fun fun fun. Also not necessary if you, or your techy nephew, can just do it at home
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The requirement for commercially availability of repair is so much better than the current state of what repair places can/are offering
I think the supply chain is pretty broken. I had just about the same experience as you with an iPhone 7 a few years back. I booked my replacement through Apple's website, so I was pretty confident I wouldn't get scammed. The new battery started bulging in less than two years, to the point that there was a serious gap between the screen and the body.
It was clearly worse than the battery that came with my refurbished (!) phone, which never did that; it just couldn't hold a decent charge anymore. I won't even go into the absolutely ridiculous experience I had with the repair shop, like not honoring booked times and whatnot and having me wait in line for ages, both to drop off and pick up my phone.
My current phone has lost some of its battery health as reported by the OS, but still gives me over a day of use, but when the time comes to fix it, I'll go directly to Apple.
Same with laptops btw. I once caught a seller where the webpage and sticker said 5200 mAh but acpi -i reported 4400 mAh. They provided a replacement free of charge, presumably their supplier scammed them in turn (it was a small local webshop), but that replacement also wasn't great even if now the chip reported the expected capacity. Never once have I had good experiences with replacement batteries, I really wonder what they do with the originals to make them so vastly superior
Also quite noticeable that the laptop battery market became much smaller once the batteries became an internal component (around 2015) that you can't see without opening it up completely. These also used to be behind a slider or two
People don't dare unscrew electronics, even if it's about as trivial as replacing a light bulb in a fixture that requires removing a screw. With phones having the battery inside as well now, not above the sim tray for example, I wonder how much such legislation is going to help the average person
Last time I checked I’d have to leave my phone for a couple of days and the glue factor meant they wouldn’t guarantee it would come back perfectly. My assumption is this might make it a more trivial change.
I don't see what change they can make, at least to an iPhone. The glue is necessary for water resistance.
There were models that were both waterproof and not glued (the only tools needed for a battery swap were the replacement battery and opposable thumbs). I never had/tested one myself though, this is just going off of the manufacturer's claims and IP (ingress protection) certification
I used to have a Galaxy S5, the model that usually comes up in these discussions. Now, I never went and threw it in a swimming pool, or pressure washed it, or whatever other ridiculous test you may come up with. But I did attach it to my motorbike's handlebars and rode around under heavy rain on more occasions than I care to remember.
It was often drenched to the point that the map on the screen was basically illegible without stopping and wiping off the water. But it never skipped a beat. Basically, I was the limiting factor and would eventually give up and find some hotel with a hot shower to pass the night.
This doesn't look very waterproof to me, sadly. A good attempt though.
Glue is not required. Gaskets and other methods exist.
So why can't I buy the glue?
If it is a special glue that needs to be heated (or something), I should be able to make/buy an oven the does the cure procedures.
Necessary? Gaskets and o-rings haven't been invented yet?
Why waste space for gaskets and o-rings when you can already get the battery changed out while you wait with glue? Glue is clearly the superior method, which is why almost the entire market has adopted it.
Heat pads exist even in the most basic repair shops. It's not advanced technology, no need to over-engineer it.
They have, and people preferred smaller phones.
People didn't prefer shit. This is a supply-driven market, vendors put out whatever they want, and we deal with it.
Did you forget how to not buy things?
And then they got larger again.
Due to the things inside them that people did want.
> They have, and people preferred smaller phones.
Are these smaller phones in room with use right now? Where can I buy an iPhone 8-sized iPhone? Or an iPhone 4-sized iPhone?
The only ones who "preferred" "smaller" aka thinner phones are Apple with their psychotic "it's thinner again" yearly presentations.
My last phone was all glued and the entry point was the screen. The repair guy said there was a 50% chance the screen would break in trying to unglue it so it was not worth the try. It was a shame, it was a decent phone killed prematurely by a faulty battery.
There are a number of phone designs that require special heating apparatus and very careful prying tools to get the back case off. And then extremely careful application of new glue to reassemble. Basically the whole thing is glued together at the factory. Google "phone heating pad for repair" for some examples...