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New MacBook Pros Have Battery Pull Tabs for Easier Do-it-Yourself Battery Replacements, Says iFixit

needsomecoffee said:
I have done two of these (own two 2012 MBP). It takes about 30 minutes working very carefully/slowly. WTF did Apple do ?? More reason we need r2r laws. Anyway I have always been an advocate for not buying products which do not support battery replacement as this is a huge, huge impact on the environment. Glad to see Apple changing its way re: MBP. Also glad to see some celebrities bringing back wired headphones as a "fashion statement". Wish they would call Apple out on what is one of the greatest consumer-disposable wastes ever -- Airpods (where is Ed Begley when you need him). I guess a real-world, factual enivro piece on TikTok does not sell as well as "fashion" does. Well, whatever I guess as we need to focus on consumer-disposable products perfected to-date by Tim Apple.

2012 battery replacement link:
www.ifixit.com

MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Mid 2012 Battery Replacement

Use this guide to replace a worn-out battery. If your battery is swollen, take appropriate precautions.
www.ifixit.com www.ifixit.com
Click to expand...

I got a quote of 750€ back then but it was dropped to 0€ due to warranty. One of the reasons I got annual AppleCare+ this time around
 
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The M1 Air had the pull tabs as well and was easier because you don’t have to remove its trackpad first. The glued in batteries were pretty easy to deal with with a couple of drops of acetone/nail polish remover under the batteries to loosen the adhesive. Great news regardless.

Someone joked about it, but Apple could have easily mentioned it in the context of slightly supporting right to repair.
 
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This is great. I don’t NEED a laptop for my work at the moment, but it would be nice to have one. I have a 2015 MacBook Pro and the battery is in bad shape. Do I try and replace it myself and risk a laptop that works when plugged in, or do I spend $200 for a battery replacement on an outdated machine that may no longer receive updates? Either solution sucks, especially since the machine is still in great shape and runs everything I need just fine.

At this point, I’ll probably just get an Air. But do I wait for the new Airs that may or may not arrive in the spring, or just buy the current generation that matches my Mac Mini? Ugh….
 
eicca said:
Hell really has frozen over.
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According to Dante's Inferno, the lowest level of Hell has always been frozen.
eicca said:
Does this mean the next Mac Pro will be uber modular like the old cheesegraters??
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Dream the impossible dream.
Manzanito said:
What’s next? User replaceable storage? I like this trend.
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I'm hoping for user upgradable RAM, but replaceable storage is good too.

Man, the more I read about the new MBP, the more I want one. So far, the only knock against it is the notch.

A 5lbs laptop computer is featherweight to me. I like thicc.? As Sir Isaac Newton would say, "More mass equals more attraction."?
 
I hope iFixit’s preview isn’t hiding a nasty surprise in the final video. Their recent iPad mini teardown showed pull strips on the battery in there too, except they found that the battery was actually still glued down despite the strips! ?
 
This is good. It’s probably more for Apple’s own convenience, though. I mean, making things easier to service works for their own service people. If they give a crap about their own service people and are serious about actually being environmentally sound, this is the right choice. The side-benefit is users being able to do a replacement (and with having to remove the trackpad, it does not sound like an activity end users want to be doing).
 
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julianchan123 said:
The problem is, would it break AppleCare?
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Yes. But, if a user has AppleCare, they should just let Apple take care of it. If they don’t live anywhere near an Apple Store such that actually using AppleCare is a pain, then maybe they shouldn’t have AppleCare? I guess?
 
contacos said:
Good! As it should. I remember back in 2013, Apple had to replace the faulty battery of my 2012 retina MBP which means replacing the whole case and keyboard. Just to replace the battery! I almost could not believe it. Environmental my A
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That case and keyboard they took was environmentally recycled. Which actually may be better than what happens to the vast majority of Apple devices.

Apple can be as environmentally minded as they want, that still doesn’t force their users to bring back their devices for recycling. Apple will recycle them for free, of course, if the consumer is environmentally minded, but most consumers aren’t.
 
I can’t wait for the day that computer laptops have easily removable batteries so that they are easy to switch out. Imagine such a day! When technology reaches a point where we, the consumer, can switch out batteries ourselves! Alas, technology still has a long way to go, thus we are in the situation we are in until science can come up with a better way….
 
Watch them melt from heat of the battery lol.

In all seriousness, I’m nervous and kinda have some post traumatic anxiety doing anything to my MacBooks ever again lol. I had no clue that popping off the space bar on the gen 1 butterfly bulls**t keyboard would render it useless. It was not pressing down due to dust and I was trying to clean it. I don’t have an Apple store within 3 hours and a local authorized shop luckily “coded” it in a way that I guess looked like it was a manufacturing defect so it was covered by Apple. Was an honest mistake but I had no clue the MacBook keyboard were different from every other keyboard is existence and you couldn’t easily pop them on and off. Surprisingly they had to replace the entire bottom shell which I cannot fathom having to pay for simply for a spacebar cap.
 
Orange Bat said:
I can’t wait for the day that computer laptops have easily removable batteries so that they are easy to switch out. Imagine such a day! When technology reaches a point where we, the consumer, can switch out batteries ourselves! Alas, technology still has a long way to go, thus we are in the situation we are in until science can come up with a better way….
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I think only Apple made that design choice aside from a few outliers so you should have numerous non-Apple options to choose from if easily swapable batteries is important to you. That day came long ago.
 
Unfortunately even though it appears the battery is removable via adhesive tabs, Apple is still not replacing the batteries without top cases. It is still considered one part, so technicians still need to replace the whole thing.
 
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Orange Bat said:
I can’t wait for the day that computer laptops have easily removable batteries so that they are easy to switch out. Imagine such a day! When technology reaches a point where we, the consumer, can switch out batteries ourselves! Alas, technology still has a long way to go, thus we are in the situation we are in until science can come up with a better way….
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They already do! There are computer laptops that are quite widely configurable as well. Unfortunately, seems like such features aren’t very popular with your average consumers as vendors that offer them don’t generally do well with those models.
 
zorinlynx said:
One thing I wonder is, the new MBPs seems to have SIX separate batteries. Are these batteries connected directly to each other in a series/parallel arrangement, and thus have to be balanced with each other? Or does the system treat them as individual batteries, so if just one fails you can replace it without having to swap them all?

It would be amazing if the power controller could tell you which battery is bad, or even completely disable a battery if it fails so the laptop is still usable on the rest with reduced runtime.
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Although an individual bad cell is always a possibility, for most users all cells are likely to reach approximately the same level of wear/degradation at roughly the same time, because most battery failure is age-related. So, just how much engineering and parts should go into addressing the less-likely scenario?

From a standpoint of efficiency, is it better to change one cell this month, another two months from now, another six months after that... or change them all at once? A DIYer may be willing to open the case a few times, but the vast majority of users bring their equipment into a shop, which can result in days of downtime and a series of labor charges - each for doing essentially the same work over and over again - removing/replacing an individual cell is a small part of the job.

It's likely that a manufacturer would weigh the customer satisfaction consequences of executing a series of repairs vs. executing a single repair and conclude that replacing every cell will continue to be the way to go, even if there's a reasonable amount of life remaining in most of the cells.

Another consideration is the possible consequences of carrying around a laptop with bad lithium ion cells. Overall, it may be best to force users to address the issue sooner, rather than later.
 
UsernameAlreadyInUse said:
Guys, hold on. We have no confirmation yet if there is a warning/compatibility issue once you turn the machine back on after battery replacement by the user.

For all we know, the ease of servicing may have been intended for Apple repair employees.
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Has this ever been the case, assuming using Apple parts?
 
My assumptions are:
1. As noted by others, this will make it more simple for battery replacement support cases (less expensive).
2. Adhere with eventual right-to-repair policies.
 
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