Apple Stepping Up Environmental Friendliness with New Halogen-Free Cables

[JoeG4]

kaista I've always wondered the point of the glass cover too XD If they wanted to be eco friendly they could've skipped the glass all together and the machine would have consumed less material. Woot!

Also: I've seen the jacket of apple cables "pop off" the plug as shown on the last page many times - it's usually because the rubber or pvc shrinks and thus that breaks off. One of our iMac G4s had that kinda cable and it eventually 'broke' the exact same way, yet it was never touched!.. there wasn't even stress on it. lol.

 

[something3153]

Sorry if you were offended. I merely stated my personal experience with at least a dozen such connectors and, what your damage looked like. Only you know how they have been handled.

For what it's worth, the cable that came with my 3Gs was failing like that within a year, also sitting on my desk and being treated as well as every other cable I've ever had, none of which failed like that.

 

[kalsta]

I've seen the jacket of apple cables "pop off" the plug as shown on the last page many times - it's usually because the rubber or pvc shrinks and thus that breaks off.

I suppose that's possible… Many materials shrink and expand under different conditions. If the outer insulating layer shrinks a little, but the wire inside does not, that would put the outer layer under some pressure, where it might fail at the weakest point. Good call!

 

[Patriotic1776]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

Anyone else think its funny that Apple was named one of the least green tech company in the world last year and that Al Gore is on Apple's Board. So it is ok to not be green if you are Al Gore, but us cattle must be. Check this out before you get brainwashed by your college professors: http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp

 

[mutantteenager]

Mac Mini is a low range Mac, which means it's probably still a mid range computer. It should count.

The mac mini is a POS, and has always been. Low end processors, hard drives and graphics, none of which could even compete with most low end PC's in any of it's iterations, as they (the PC's) were always generally cheaper to buy and had more performance.

It's low end and overpriced, accept it.

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Fairly impressive for "low range", I'll say.

The server version, even more so.

http://www.apple.com/ca/macmini/server/specs.html

To call this a server is laughable. Just because Apple call it that, doesn't make it one. I don't know one server that is sold as a sealed unit or doesn't have user serviceable parts.

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I remember the firewire cable that shipped with the first-generation iPod being incredibly well built.

Image

That's when Apple used to make products that were truly superior, and were as much about build quality as form and function.

They're in the consumer biz now, squeeze those margins, get everything out as quick as possible, but still charge as much if not more. Just look at some of the responses here, their followers, I mean customers will always believe it was poor handling and not cheap/poor design that made the item fail.

 

[systole]

It'll be interesting to see of this changes the rigidity of the cables, as well as how may materials will have changed in the new tooling.

On another note,

To call this a server is laughable. Just because Apple call it that, doesn't make it one. I don't know one server that is sold as a sealed unit or doesn't have user serviceable parts.

While I'll agree that the mini server is more of a soho server, at least there is the Sonnet RackMac till we get a rackmount Mac Pro? (hopes)

 

[Grimsrud]

I dunno how you all get away with it. It's happened to the majority of the cables I own. Here's my desk at work, right now:

Image

That cable sits on my desk its entire life. It doesn't travel or go in and out of bags. I never pull it out of the phone by tugging the cable. It just sits there. And yet, that happens.

I've never had trouble with the USB iPod/iPhone cables, but I've gone through hell with the MagSafe power adapters on two laptops (MacBook and MacBook Pro). I've had at least 5 of them, every time they slowly go out as they begin to refuse to work at certain angles/positions before breaking completely. MagSafe adapters are the only Apple product I've used that I hate.

 

[JoeG4]

To be honest, if you have to replace a power brick and/or battery that's sorta normal. I'd rather the power brick need replacing, than a part inside the laptop - which is usually what happens with PC laptops. lol.

 

[gnasher729]

Apple always claims to be super green, but when you look at charts of the most Green computer manufacturers, Apple is usually somewhere in the middle. The products themselves are fairly green, but from what I can gather, the manufacturing process is not.

Apple doesn't care about their share price. Apple doesn't care how they are judged by Greenpeace and similar organisations. And just like Apple doesn't care about their share price and managed to become the second most valuable company in the USA, they don't spend effort on gaming they way how they are judged, but they spend effort on actually producing green products. There are plenty of things that don't make it into these charts. For example, longevity of products. If you have two computers, and one is used for many years, while the other is thrown away and replaced when it is slowed down by viruses, then the first computer is a lot more environmentally friendly without any effect on these charts. These cables that Apple start replacing, you can bet that they won't turn up in any of these charts. To get good ratings in these charts, you don't need to be environmentally friendly, but you need a big department producing plans and promises what you are going to do in the future. Because this gives you good ratings, but doesn't do anything for the customers or for the environment, Apple refuses to do this.

 

[doug0613]

Halogen

I hate articles like these, they such give great weight to the most insignificant details with miniscule results.

I'll try and keep this simple. Halogen isn't a specific substance it's a name given to a group of substances used in the manufacture of PVC in this case the jacket of computer cables. The environmental concern is when your computer cables catch on fire and burn, while this may be common on a MAC I've never seen this happen on a PC.

In manufacturing materials go on and off lists as contaminates constantly. These substances are perfectly fine as long as you don't burn them, keep in mind burning wood is more toxic to "Mother Earth". Now think about everything in your house and car made of PVC. In the "Global" scheme of things yeah OK making cables with chemicals that don't release hydrogen chloride when you set them afire is a swell idea if the replacement material works. But if it doesn't work and it seldom does what's the environmental impact from cradle to grave of replacing your stuff more frequently.

IF YOU THINK YOUR CABLES ARE CRAPPY NOW WAIT TIL YOU GET THE ENVIRO-FRIENDLY REPLACEMENTS. That's what's coming at you...

 

[Rodimus Prime]

Apple doesn't care about their share price. Apple doesn't care how they are judged by Greenpeace and similar organisations. And just like Apple doesn't care about their share price and managed to become the second most valuable company in the USA, they don't spend effort on gaming they way how they are judged, but they spend effort on actually producing green products. There are plenty of things that don't make it into these charts. For example, longevity of products. If you have two computers, and one is used for many years, while the other is thrown away and replaced when it is slowed down by viruses, then the first computer is a lot more environmentally friendly without any effect on these charts. These cables that Apple start replacing, you can bet that they won't turn up in any of these charts. To get good ratings in these charts, you don't need to be environmentally friendly, but you need a big department producing plans and promises what you are going to do in the future. Because this gives you good ratings, but doesn't do anything for the customers or for the environment, Apple refuses to do this.

You know there are some weak arguments in there.
First you got the BS standard virus argument.
Besides I have noticed Macs and PC seem to last around the same amount of time. Around 4-5 years and they both tend to get replaced. At that point their just to out dated.

But the virus argument was just bad and BS and besides to keep that from happening takes some basic standard practices. That is keep your your upto date. Do not download and or open unknown files and do not surf around porn sights.

Since most of the "viruses" as you put it are trogans OSX and Windows are just as easy to nail. They both go threw the biggest security hole in any OS and that is the user.

 

[Oletros]

To get good ratings in these charts, you don't need to be environmentally friendly, but you need a big department producing plans and promises what you are going to do in the future.

Anything to back this claim?

 

[Wrathwitch]

What is their business model?

They don't have one, they are anarchists, and I am against your being against rainbows, and whiskers on kittens etc!

 

[ncaissie]

Have you actually checked with ALL your friends before suggesting that none of them have had this problem?

I always pull them out by the plug (never by the cable), but I think it's just the way the cable bends at that point, unless you are very careful to always lay your device down so the cable is straight, and never use your device while it's charging. (We sometimes do this.) IMO we shouldn't have to be quite so precious about these cables. Apple is known for clever design solutions, so I find it perplexing that they still haven't addressed this long-standing issue. They did it with their laptop charger cables—in response to a lawsuit if memory serves me correctly.

I have the same problems with all my cables. It sucks and I think it is not just and apple problem. Although it seems worse for my apple cables.

 

[JAT]

You know there are some weak arguments in there.
First you got the BS standard virus argument.
Besides I have noticed Macs and PC seem to last around the same amount of time. Around 4-5 years and they both tend to get replaced. At that point their just to out dated.

But the virus argument was just bad and BS and besides to keep that from happening takes some basic standard practices. That is keep your your upto date. Do not download and or open unknown files and do not surf around porn sights.

Since most of the "viruses" as you put it are trogans OSX and Windows are just as easy to nail. They both go threw the biggest security hole in any OS and that is the user.

What's a "your"?

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IF YOU THINK YOUR CABLES ARE CRAPPY NOW WAIT TIL YOU GET THE ENVIRO-FRIENDLY REPLACEMENTS. That's what's coming at you...

Thank you. Saved me the trouble. We'll probably find the "friendly" substances cause cancer. (actually, they are also well known, chloride-free cables have been around for ages, but cost much more, plan to spend even more on Apple cables)

Hell, let me correct myself again. The "other" cables are usually FEP (Teflon) instead of PVC. Which is still including a halogen. So...expect the prices to REALLY go up.

 

[DESNOS]

What's a "your"?

Yah... Rodimus Prime is not the most literate of the people on here. I don't enjoy reading his posts.