EU rules for durable, energy-efficient and repairable smartphones and tablets

I've bought smartphone replacement batteries in the past, so it's not really an issue. Most popular models have alternative vendors unless the manufacturer goes out of their way to prevent it.

Also the battery in my previous phone was at 83% of its nominal capacity 5.5 years after purchase, so I think this part is already durable enough.

The way I'm cycling the battery in my current phone it could last 8 years before it reaches that level.

If they have to supply them for 5 years after they sell them, it will make more sense for them to use standard sizes. So hopefully this will naturally move in that direction.

Laptop battery packs used to use standardized metric battery cells (tool batteries often still do.) Those aren't very space efficient though.

Still. The cells they do use are all going to be the same voltage since the chemistry is the same. In theory you could swap them out with a set of same size or smaller lithium cells.

At the same time I can run the latest OS on my 10-year-old ThinkPad brick. It's slow and ugly, but it works for the purposes I want to use it for.

It's absolutely crazy how we're basically forced to accept that mobile devices just expire when the OEM decides so. Unless you go into extreme lengths to build your own custom ROM, which might not even be properly doable (when the device becomes EOL).

Isn't it obvious that the solution is to decouple the software from the manufacturer? They have every incentive to not let old devices be used, even though it works just fine for old-school computers.

FWIW things have dramatically improved in recent years. For example, latest Pixels claim to have 7 years of support [1].

I wonder how it will work in practice though, as often the quality of QA for system updates for old phones drops over time, and major bugs and perf regressions are being shipped.

[1] https://endoflife.date/pixel

I think they should have a larger responsibility than that, but yeah I absolutely agree that once devices are no longer "supported", the manufacturer should be required to relinquish control to owners in a safe manner (e.g. Android unlockable and relockable bootloaders).

Same goes with multiplayer game developers. If they wanna stop hosting servers, they should be required to release the server software in a manner that makes it possible for me to set it up for myself to keep playing the game.

This is not the same issue you are talking about.

Cars are repairable, phones are not, this is why this regulation is coming about.

There are modules that need replacement in whole, but same is true for this regulation regarding to phones: display and touchscreen modules are replaced as whole, not per component. Not great, but not too shabby, given the only other choice was to toss it.

The bigger part is manufacturers have to provide OS support for 5 years after the last phone was sold.

Hope carmakers are forced to give 15 years warranty. Current Japanese models can meet it. They could use accelerometers to reduce warranties for track and heavy offroad use and let the driver know they are warranted for 5100 instead of 5475 days. And they should publish costs and time for various body repairs like slow rear ending, swipes etc. Sure, it will make cars slower and uglier but give more peace of mind.

You are looking at the wrong legislation. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, Ashton Schottler was discussing the E.U. right to repair legislation this last weekend.

* https://youtube.com/watch?v=K_lAdaecL30&t=484

Unfortunately, among all the wonders the European Union has brought to us, the cars is where it failed in my opinion.

Cheap cars are not permitted any more in the EU. Lots and lots of non-essential electronics are required to satisfy European norms, and you putting your hands on your car is frowned upon.

> because they want the new shiny ones

I don't believe that. I think the desire for a new phone is mostly triggered by some unhappiness with the current one. For example because the battery doesn't last a full day anymore, the screen is cracked, it doesn't get security updates anymore or performance feels sluggish (because new OS and apps are more demanding or wasteful).

If replacing the battery or screen is expensive, buying a new phone becomes more attractive, since you might also get a better camera, more performance, larger display or other benefits. On the other hand, if I can order a new battery for cheap and swap it out in five minutes, I might just do that and keep my old phone for a few years longer.

Maybe teenagers still do that, but I feel there are no real shiny new features anymore. I've upgraded my broken 5 year old phone and sure enough, the photos it takes are better and its a bit smoother overall, but otherwise I don't see a truly major improvement.

Major innovations (from the user pov) are happening mostly in software these days, not in hardware.

So I don't see how a little bit of regulation keeping hardware alive a little longer is political handwaving at all. It doesn't matter if any 'deep and complex issues' are not addressed, whatever they are, its still a valid improvement over the status quo, however small. Yes, mandating 5 years of security updates isn't going to solve climate change or fix the economy, but it would extend the safe lifetime of most mid range phone by around two years and for the vast majority of users, that will be just fine.

I know it is not that interesting to talk about small improvements, but a lot of politics is exactly about that: improving society with many thousands of very marginal steps. They are not a distraction, they are the work.

I'm not a conservative, but this kind of pragmatism is what I feel used to be the true value of old school conservative politics, and it is deeply lacking its current form. Conservatism needs to be boring again.

This is not true for most people. They get comfortable with their phones and they don't see any reason to change something that works.

My friend has had her phone for 7 years and she's being pushed off it because apps are refusing to run on it now. No other reason than that.

Not everyone has the financial capability to change their phone to follow trends, some people only buy second-hand, some people fall back on cheaper phones but change less often, some people rely on charity because their situation just doesn't allow them to fork the expense. Some people just want to keep their phone for long periods, I kept my last one 6 years and I only changed it because it died. I think all these people deserve to have a phone platform that doesn't abandon them because they can't or won't buy a flagship every year of two.

Wanting the latest and greatest was a thing back in 2010s, when there was a lot of progress and a lot of experiments by the phone manufacturers. Today, me and most of my friends are pushing our phones as long as we can (4+ years). My parents hate when they have to change phones, because they then have to adjust to a new UI. If battery and screen could be easily replaceable + security updates, many people would not be changing their phones for 5+ years.

In most European countries we tend to use pre-paid phones, not contracts that including replacing the phone every three years.

Those do exist, but I doubt they much adopted in Southern Europe, outside the packages that include mobile phones, Internet and cable TV together, and not everyone is into them either.

I want my current phone, but with a new battery.