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This seems to be Apple's new motto - "sure, we'll comply... but on our terms."

It's just like how Apple only added wireless charging when the EU threatened to mandate USB-C on all phones sold in Europe.

My guess is Apple made this repair process intentionally and needlessly complicated, specifically to dissuade customers from going the DIY route. I bet in most cases, Apple is hoping that customers will simply abandon their "broken" device and opt to just replace it with a shiny brand new unit, rather than deal with the hassle of repairing it (DIY or repair center).
 
But you would change the batteries in a remote control, right?
That’s because they’re designed to be user replaceable. If Apple did the same…? They could and they used to, but they choose not to.
This is an absurd comparison.

Apple chooses not is suggesting they have to flip a switch and it’s done without any trade offs. But there are lots of trade offs and so they made a 100 different choices that led to a non user replaceable battery. Completely different engineering question than a remote control.
 
Oh no! I have to do some reading before I repair a complex electronic device!

Apple is giving people exactly what they wanted. These are the same tools, same parts, same procedures that Apple themselves use.

Remember that iFixit it is competing with Apple here. They sell their own tools and provide their own manuals. So when they come out with stuff like this, that's the context.
I think that replacing a battery shouldn't be considered a repair. It shouldn't be a complex task. Remember when Apple's laptop had removable batteries?
 
This is an absurd comparison.

Apple chooses not is suggesting they have to flip a switch and it’s done without any trade offs. But there are lots of trade offs and so they made a 100 different choices that led to a non user replaceable battery. Completely different engineering question than a remote control.
Back in the day, all mobile phones had user replaceable batteries! Even custom covers!
 
iFixit is full of crap, as usual. Removing a glued-on battery can be quite dangerous. I've accidentally punctured batteries a few times, and I've been disassembling and reassembling equipment for 40 years or so.

Unlike iFixIt, Apple has to worry about liability. One person burning their house down because they popped a battery would cost Apple millions. Nobody's going to bother suing iFixIt (or any of the people who sell batteries).
 
Thin laptops are popular for some users -- not all users. While hot swappable batteries may no longer be a great solution as Apple battery life has improved so much, Apple designing a laptop where the batteries cannot be changed for less than $200 (and a week of lost time if professionally done by Apple) is a ridiculous compromise of form over function.
They'll be popular with most users, but yes definitely not all users.

I don't disagree that the wait time's a pain, but if you want to take it to a non-Apple repairer, you can.
 

Surely you are capable of replacing a car battery. The main point is that a phone battery should be mandated that it is easily replaced like a few years back. Likely a laptop battery could be similarly done if Apple was forced to make it so.
I have no problem with people disagreeing with comments I make. But it would be informative to me and others if the person disagreeing made one or more statements as to why they disagree. So @Alfredo_Delgado the floor is yours...
 
My point wasn’t reading …my point was people expecting a simple set of instructions for something complicated. My kids have Lego sets with 162 pages of steps because sometimes things are complicated.
What people terrified of screwdrivers are also missing is that these guides (and this one is no different) are often truly needlessly specific on each individual thing you need to do including intense amounts of detail for steps that are super obvious. You could likely edit this one down to less than a dozen pages if you removed the listing of every part, photo of every part, explanation of what keyboard layouts are, etc.

It's usually a good thing that guides are this detailed though, I'd love to see how people react around here to the way fixing things used to be where all you got was a single page exploded view that had been xeroxed so many times all the detail is gone and you just had to figure it out.
 
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This is an absurd comparison.

Apple chooses not is suggesting they have to flip a switch and it’s done without any trade offs. But there are lots of trade offs and so they made a 100 different choices that led to a non user replaceable battery. Completely different engineering question than a remote control.
A battery in a Mac doesn't have to be designed to be swapped out as easily as one would on a remote. However, gluing a battery down when it could be screwed in place or forcing you to remove several fragile components to get to the battery is not good design.

The underlying issue here is that electronics need to start being built to be more easily repairable. This era we live in where you can buy a replacement every other year and throw your old device in the trash is just not going to last.
 
There's a difference between "right to repair" and "right to an easy repair". iFixit is already moving the goal posts.
If something as simple as a battery replacement is needlessly complicated, then that isn't Right to Repair. That's social engineering to try to discourage users from fixing their device they bought, paid for, and own.
 
I wouldn’t dream of opening up any Mac to repair it , I wouldn’t service a car why on earth would I do the same for a computer ?

Somethings are best left to the experts
Running with the car analogy, imagine there were no independent repair shops. You had to go back to the dealer for an oil change, and it was $500 every three months. Now, they offer the option to do it yourself too, but they require you to take out the engine and pay them $2000 for the supplies. For $50 of oil and a $20 filter. That's what this is really about: Apple wants to prevent you from going to an independent shop for that sub-$100 oil change.
 
This is an absurd comparison.

Apple chooses not is suggesting they have to flip a switch and it’s done without any trade offs. But there are lots of trade offs and so they made a 100 different choices that led to a non user replaceable battery. Completely different engineering question than a remote control.
Lol, do you actually believe yourself? Cause it sounds like you almost do..
 
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Being that Tesla batteries cost $23,000 to replace (from what I have heard), if there is an alternative that saves a significant amount of money, I'd consider it.
There is, it's called other EVs. There are better all electric cars than Tesla that are a lot better to repair. Cheaper too.
 
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Compared to the iPhone 12/13 part prices I was actually quite shocked how reasonable the prices were. For my 16” M1 Max unit, both the logic board and screen were $500-$600/ea after the core return. That’s not bad considering those are 3/4 of the machine, which originally cost $3500. All the small things like USB ports, MagSafe board, fans, are like $15-$20. And unlike the iPhone you don’t risk cracking your display trying to open the thing.

I think it’s quite fair, and I assume the battery itself will be coming soon at a much more reasonable price than $500+.
 
The sad part is, older MacBooks like the MacBook Pro 2012 were already very repairable, and upgradable. Apple's "genius" and "design prowess" painted it into a repairability and upgradability sink hole.

Apple: just go back to what you used to do back in 2012 before you glued everything down. Let users repair/upgrade the RAM, SSD, and battery. If the RAM needs to be soldered down due to unified memory concerns, then at least let users upgrade/repair the SSD and battery storage. They used to do it before, and so they can do it again!
 
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