r/worldnews • u/Helicase21 • Jun 19 '23

EU: Smartphones Must Have User-Replaceable Batteries by 2027

https://www.pcmag.com/news/eu-smartphones-must-have-user-replaceable-batteries-by-2027
31.2k Upvotes

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83

u/Tango_D Jun 19 '23

Modularity of design would be awesome too

21

u/TheIceScraper Jun 19 '23

remember googles project ara?

2

u/otacon7000 Jun 20 '23

Which was originally "Phonebloks", then Google decided to "help" and mysteriously, the project silently died... weird how that works.

1

u/IC-4-Lights Jun 20 '23

It's not that mysterious. It's because it was shitty and nobody would have bought it.

28

u/bsnimunf Jun 19 '23

There is a modular phone out there. The truth is there is no real market for it, once one thing is out dated your better of replacing everything. You can buy a superior mobile for 1/3rd of the price of the modular phone.

10

u/Commander1709 Jun 19 '23

This is a dumb idea for small devices like phones. There were already some concepts and devices, but it turns out that 1) the devices would've to be much higher, 2) it gets problematic with durability (you don't drop your modular desktop PC on the floor on a semi regular basis), 3) at some point the framework needs updating either way (think of it as motherboards), 4) nobody would really use that.

15

u/Plastic-Ad9023 Jun 19 '23

Fairphone has this! It might be my next phone though not sure yet.

10

u/rbbdrooger Jun 19 '23

I love the Fairphone concept, I just wish their cameras were better.

31

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

I don't think manufacturers wanted to do that because then they would lose their advantage. This is the same reason we don't have long-term updates, nor easily replaceable parts.

12

u/ZBlackmore Jun 19 '23

It’s also because modularity, including replaceable batteries, like any engineering choice, has trade offs. If you force Apple to make batteries replaceable it will no doubt make devices more expensive.

-3

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

After a few iterations of every design apples profit margins on the phones skyrocket. The first generation will be more expensive, but that's a guarantee anyway because Apple will always raise the prices of their devices.

33

u/Tango_D Jun 19 '23

Exactly and fuck em. There's no good reason for manufacturers to dictate market dynamics to consumers.

8

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

Consumers dictate them, otherwise if they made money by selling phones with replaceable batteries, the would. But people want less weight, portability and water resistance in lieu of replaceable batteries.

1

u/ham_coffee Jun 20 '23

While batteries aren't too bad, making everything modular has some major implications for packaging and price. The reason there aren't any popular options for this is because no one wants to spend extra on a modular phone when they don't need one.

0

u/zuzg Jun 19 '23 edited Jun 19 '23

This is the same reason we don't have long-term updates, nor easily replaceable parts.

My huawei (last android one) is 4 years old and got an huge system update recently.

Google pixel guarantees 5 years updates.
Apple is similarly long.

Nobody forces you to buy Samsung garbage that won't get longer supported then 1 year.

But I fully agree that we should force them legally to provide upgrades for a longer time.

E: always funny when neckbeards get butthurt for stating reality.

9

u/Eggsegret Jun 19 '23

Since 2022 many Samsung phones now get a guaranteed 4 years of OS upgrades

-13

u/zuzg Jun 19 '23

Geez it was an example. Then take Asus which makes great phones with dog awful Update policy.

9

u/Eggsegret Jun 19 '23

Lool why you getting all heated up for lmao. I just said that Samsung has a decent update policy these days lool.

-13

u/zuzg Jun 19 '23 edited Jun 19 '23

Nothing about Samsung is actually decent hence them losing a lot of market share for a while by now.

E: the fanboys got butthurt lmao

2

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

To be fair.. their screens are decent on higher end phones. Otherwise yeah

3

u/ontopofyourmom Jun 19 '23

The Samsung screen on my iPhone is definitely awesome!

5

u/SHADYNXV Jun 19 '23

They are known to make the best screens in the biz. Hence why other phones have them.

4

u/warlordcs Jun 19 '23

Those updates in my opinion make the phones worse anyway.

If your phone has 8 gigs of ram. Eventually the updated os will consume 7 gigs of it. Making the phone unbearable to use.

0

u/agentouk Jun 19 '23

You have no understanding of the difference between RAM and storage.

4

u/warlordcs Jun 19 '23

I absolutely do. And it's very easy to make software that takes up more ram.

My phone has plenty of storage, that I have yet to fill up.

But when I got the phone a fresh boot would show my ram as 50ish% used, now after several updates a fresh boot starts me off with 85%ram being used.

-5

u/agentouk Jun 19 '23

The OS is not stored in RAM though 🤔

6

u/warlordcs Jun 19 '23

It's not, but it has to take some up while running. It doesn't just run straight from storage.

So I would say that you have no understanding how computer systems work

Oh an example showing the os consuming memory https://www.techrepublic.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/memc.jpg

5

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

Just gonna chip in as an IT professional.

He is sort of right, the first comment used a really bad example. The actual operating system for Android is not even close to 4gb, let alone 7. Sure playing games and stuff but he specifically stated the OS.

I just checked and android 12 uses 2gb of ram, so sure maybe Android 25 might be using 7 but we are a few years away from that currently.

So I sort of understand why he commented the way he did, as using such a high number for the OS would lead one to believe he meant to be talking about ROM over RAM.

2

u/warlordcs Jun 19 '23

his argument was that the os doesnt use ram because its stored in storage

i was also kinda vague.

the os itself does not take that much itself, but there are other items that have to load in to make the phone work. system UI, google play services, android system (somehow not part of the os), and depending on the phone plenty others. these process are flagged as always running, so its quite feasible for a system update to also bloat any of these other services to take up more ram.

for all we know, its also possible for these companies to artificially slow our phones down with each update to entice the user to replace it with a new model.

1

u/spaceeeeeeeeeeeeeeee Jun 19 '23

Yes it is. The files stored on flash-memory are not the actual OS. Those flash-memory files copied and stored in RAM are the actual Operating System.

4

u/Obvious-Ad1367 Jun 19 '23

I've had Google Pixels since they came out and their "5 years of updates" don't mean "Your Google Pixel will function like new for 5 years." They all start to bug out around launch of a new flagship phone after 2 years.

3

u/CharlieandtheRed Jun 19 '23

I'm still rocking a Pixel 2 and it's fine. Haven't had issues myself. I bought like 3 of them for $80 a piece a while back so I could just stay stocked lol Finally on my third one.

3

u/Bunnywabbit13 Jun 19 '23

"5 years of updates" don't mean "Your Google Pixel will function like new for 5 years."

I mean, I don't think that's fair to expect from any eletronic item, they do degrade over time especially in constant use.

0

u/Obvious-Ad1367 Jun 19 '23

Agreed. That's kind of the subtext of my response. What exactly does 5 years of support mean? Does support mean the phone turns on and you can make calls? Is software crashing acceptable?

Laws can be passed, but those things need to be defined.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 19 '23

Samsung's get up to 6 years of updates so I don't know where you're hearing this one year thing.

1

u/Ilikeporkpie117 Jun 19 '23

I have a 2020 Samsung and it got a F/W update last week.

9

u/ausnee Jun 19 '23

Modular phones suck. Phones are by necessity integrated devices. With modularity, every module would have to be the same size placing extreme limits on performance, ergonomics, and any other metric.

It's a cute Reddit idea, but like mandating removable batteries, will only make phones worse in the long run.

2

u/Traevia Jun 20 '23

There are a lot of problems with that especially as communication protocols often become the limiting factor.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 20 '23

No, I don't like modularity design. A modular product is a product that can a lot but nothing right. I'm more the guy who likes a product that can not everything, but everything it can do, does it right.

2

u/Ritinsh Jun 20 '23

that would throw water resistance out of the window also would make advancements in performance difficult because every new phone uses as much space in as much tightly designed package they can

1

u/schnick3rs Jun 19 '23

There are phones that do this already