Good. Non-replaceable batteries benefit no one but device manufacturers and miners of lithium, cobalt, etc.
I don’t think it would really benefit or harm the lithium miners and battery manufacturers - in fact it might benefit them more if they could sell their batteries directly to consumers and skip the middleman, keeping those profits for themselves.
Yeah, you’re right. I didn’t think that through properly.
Ha yeah, I’ll just buy more batteries so I can always be able to pop in a spare, sigh.
EU doing all the heavy regulatory lifting that American politicians are too afraid to touch. As both an American and an avid Apple enthusiast, I sincerely appreciate it.
Apple will do something to ensure only batteries from them work right, mark my words.
Apple will do something to ensure only batteries from them work right, mark my words.
They tried doing this with the upcoming USB C cables but EU stepped in by making sure that every cable will work without any limitations on transfer and charging speeds.
I fully expect Apple claim that the EU is an environmental terrorist by having “disposable batteries being thrown out after their charge is depleted” and that somehow having batteries being certified by Apple prevents that.
Apple will do something to ensure only batteries from them work right, mark my words.
Still a slight win though!
Well if only official Apple batteries will work, then that means Apple will jack up the price to something ridiculous, because they’ll be the only option for a battery.
So hopefully third party batteries would work as well. I think third party batteries work in iPhones at the moment. So if we’re able to install them much more easily then that would be very good.
The EU is also working on Right To Repair legislation that iirc has something to say about reasonable prices for repair supplies and spare parts. In that case, even if only Apple-made batteries work, they’d still be affordable, or at least within a reasonable percentage of what they actually cost and not marked up enormously.
Certainly. But I hope the EU regulators do the same trick as they did with the USB C port rregulation. It is against the rules to make it a walled garden.
wonder how apple will react to this. lack of user repairability is a considerable source of revenue for them.
I wouldn’t be surprised if they tried to do the same thing as the printer companies. and install authentication chips in the battery modules so that only official apple batteries could be installed in Apple devices - then sell their batteries at marked up prices
“We made them easily available and replaceable, what more could you want?”
They are already matching serial numbers in software to verify if a part is still the original one, so I guess the next logical step would be indeed to switch to authentication modules. With that they would allow users to change the parts on their own while still making lots of money
I don’t like Apple but battery is the one thing I wouldn’t mess around with and buy from a cheap 3rd party vendor. Batteries tend to go boom and if it’s a cheap knock-off you increase your chances. Since it will be law we will most likely get a bunch of 3rd party vendors, I would maybe see myself buying from an established battery manufacturer but not from a quick Amazon search or from the small repair shop on the corner.
While you have a point there, I wouldn’t be surprised if we had reputable third party battery companies sell phone batteries as well
- Especially if the smartphone battery size is standardized to a set of standards (I doubt that will happen, but it’s nice to dream) hell if this happened Energizer and Duracell might also jump on the lithium bandwagon.
Lots of whining probs
They need to hit the final nail on the head. All smart phones sold in Europe must have fully documented and open source hardware including the entire chipset, all peripherals, and the modem, with all registers and interfaces documented, the full API, and all programing documentation along with a public toolchain that can reproduce the software as shipped with the device and updated with any changes made to future iterations as soon as the updated software is made available.
This law would make these devices lifetime devices, if you choose; as in your lifetime. It would murder the disposable hardware culture, and it should happen now. Moore’s law is dead. The race is over.
At least we can start with unlockable bootloader. Or at least, the second you’re discontinuing OS updates, you must give a bootloader unlocking tool + kernel sources. Including apple, shame that a device like an iPhone X is “e-waste” now that won’t receive updates
I doubt manufacturers would want to put millions upon millions into research and development if they’d have to open source it all anyways.
They want to sell to every large market and will do what they are required to do in order to access this market. All of these companies have the ability to completely reverse engineer any competing hardware. There are no secrets. Proprietary is not about protecting business or IP. It only exists to exploit the end user. All of these tools and documentation already exist. In the past they were public. The only reason they are not public now is because corporations realized the can get away with it. Capitalism ruins everything you allow it to touch. The only way to stop it is by force. Corporations are the worthless sludge of humanity. You are what matters, not them. They have no rights.
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Governments already have requirements like this for military and government hardware. All it takes is altering a few lines to existing requirements. Ultimately, you should expect more from both the manufacturer and the government. This is about ownership. You either buy what you pay for you you rent it. Anyone selling you anything should have no further ownership of any kind, digital rights included. Anything less is theft. This blind spot is leading to digital feudalism and it is criminal. Don’t allow anyone to steal from you. This is a fundamental human right.
I briefly worked in safety critical software, so adjacent to defence and aeronautical in the UK. I recall that when the UK was asking for the source code for windows running on the trident subs at the time (which is terrifying thought at the best of times. A whole new meaning to blue screen of death) that UK gov had asked to inspect the source code but was told to swivel. IIRC US and China were both allowed to look. That was all on the grapevine though, and I was still a kid so obv take with a pinch of salt, but I’m inclined to believe it.
I had more direct experience in my role validating software to run on military aircraft. We were contracted in to “prove” that the software was up to do-178b security stand and bug free via line by line inspection and some other techniques (which was a joy as you can imagine). I never got the impression that the source would be shared with the government, only that it had to meet the standard.
Interesting sidenote there, was that because it was for defence, being up to the standard was really marketing more than legal requirement. We’d find bugs that would trigger hard reboots of the hardware and the message was always “thanks for letting us know, but it’s too expensive to get the original contractors back to fix it so we’ll just ignore it”. I think they’d have been legally obliged to do something for civilian aircraft but military is a different game.
(Again should emphasise these are vague memories from working a gap year before my masters, so take with pinch of salt.)
Thank you EU for actually having functional legal protections.
The European Parliament just caused a major headache for smartphone and tablet manufacturers.
Laughs in Fairphone.
Man i wish i would not have been a cheapo and gotten myself a fairphone.
I wish I could use one in America.
it’s sad that replaceable batteries got extinct in just a few years. In my opinion replaceable battery is a great selling point and I know I’m not the only one so I’m surprised that the market are not able to provide this…
Especially now a days when phones have stagnated and having a 5 year old phone is nothing strange anymore.I used to have a replaceable battery to my old LG G3 and it was great to just swap batteries and directly having a fully charged phone. Now I always have to have power banks or try to charge up during train rides or whatever and having to worry that I don’t have enough juice
I have an old phone that works fine except it cannot be charged. Was looking into charging the battery in a friend’s identical phone, and putting the charged battery into mine.
I would have to dismantle the entire phone and remove the screen just to get to the battery. Absolutely ridiculous.
I replaced it with a Fairphone, which I promote every time I get the chance to.
Is this (article 11 on page 55) the approved text? It seems kind of vague on what constitutes “readily removable and replaceable.”
No, this is the adopted text. Its basically an update of the text you linked, which is the regulation from 2020. The relevant part you want might be (38) and (39):
(38) […] A portable battery should be considered to be removable by the end-user when it can be removed with the use of commercially available tools and without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless they are provided free of charge, or proprietary tools, thermal energy or solvents to disassemble it […]
(39) To ensure the safety of end-users, this Regulation should provide for a limited derogation for portable batteries from the removability and replaceability requirements set for portable batteries concerning appliances that incorporate portable batteries and that are specifically designed to be used, for the majority of the active service of the appliance, in an environment that is regularly subject to splashing water, water streams or water immersion and that are intended to be washable or rinseable. This derogation should only apply when it is not possible, by way of redesign of the appliance, to ensure the safety of the end-user and the safe continued use of the appliance after the end-user has correctly followed the instructions to remove and replace the battery. Where the derogation applies, the product should be designed in such a way as to make the battery removable and replaceable only by independent professionals, and not by end-users.
Good post, thanks.
with the use of commercially available tools and without requiring the use of specialised tools
It’s contradictory, what about commercially available specialized tools? Who defines what’s specialized and not?
I mean…you can be pedantic about it, but to me this reads fairly clearly as “If it can’t be removed with a screwdriver, it’s not allowed.”
The evil is always in details, thats why with their Incandescent light bulb ban, these are now sold as heating devices/lamps, so much for their bans/rules. That’s why I pointed out commercially available tools can be at same time specialized tools, they should rather mention something like it must be tools owned by 50% households according stats and do simple survey about screwdrivers.
I’m going to be honest, I think that this is a case where companies will always dodge the rules unless the consequences are so severe they’re unwilling to risk it. Something like forced downsizing, or a fine proportional to annual revenue. That would make companies significantly more hesitant to try and tread the line.
Thank you EU. Both my laptop and phone have non-replaceable batteries. It’s ridiculous I have to buy a whole new device when the battery wears out A Li-Ion batter lasts three years, I can easily get double that off the device itself. It’s anti-consumer and bad for the environment, replacing a whole device and disposing of it rather than replacing the battery.
I mean pretty much all batteries even now are user replaceable, it just depends on skill of the user, but I know they mention EASILY replacable, so I am very curious about their definition of “easily” since it means something different for everyone.
The term “user” has some implied level of technical skill (or lack).
If have to use the binocular microscope and soldering station at work (as I did for headphones last month) then I don’t count that as “user replaceable”.
it’s sad that replaceable batteries got extinct in just a few years. In my opinion replaceable battery is a great selling point and I know I’m not the only one so I’m surprised that the market are not able to provide this…
Especially now a days when phones have stagnated and having a 5 year old phone is nothing strange anymore.I used to have a replaceable battery to my old LG G3 and it was great to just swap batteries and directly having a fully charged phone. Now I always have to have power banks or try to charge up during train rides or whatever and having to worry that I don’t have enough juice
I used to have two batteries for my first phone, a Nokia 5110. It was a hand-me-down from my mum. I don’t know why we even had two batteries for it since the batteries used to last forever.
At some point, the industry became obsessed with making phones as thin as possible, removing standard things like removable batteries and the 3.5mm audio jack in the process. I wouldn’t mind if my phone was a big thicker in exchange for those features. :(
I most definitely agree. I really want my 3.5 back as I do not like wireless ear buds, too damned fiddly and I know I will misplace one. Give me a £20 pair of House of Marley and I am good to go.
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2027 seems kinda weak sauce. Maybe it is more reasonable than I feel given I don’t know much about hardware design timelines, but I honestly was hoping for more of a middle finger to companies that have embraced the anti-consumer practice of using non-replaceable batteries.
Well if the deadline was 2025, then the EU just probably wouldn’t have any new smart phones until 2027 anyway. I think its a decent compromise that gives manufacturers a chance to redesign their new models.
Yeah, as I said IDK what device timelines are, but for some reason I can’t imagine apple not releasing an iPhone in the EU for 4 years… the charge port mandate was not super impactful/difficult for Apple to comply with. I am still not convinced Apple isn’t going to drop the charge port entirely in favor of their magsafe wireless thing (again, anti-consumer IMO), or at the very least will be putting out an EU-only SKU with USB-C.
I’ve replaced a lot of iPhone batteries at this point. I wouldn’t call it easy, but it’s definitely not non-replaceable. Takes about 15-20 min and Amazon is filled with kits that even include tools.
Still I miss the Nokia days when we could carry an extra to swap when the first started to die, not for the “battery can’t hold a charge” issues.
I feel like these are two different categories that will be argued.
I’ve replaced a lot of iPhone batteries at this point. I wouldn’t call it easy, but it’s definitely not non-replaceable. Takes about 15-20 min and Amazon is filled with kits that even include tools.
Takes me 10 secs on my fairphone 3. No tools required.
Yes ! I loved that. My previous phone has a dead battery, and I can’t get it replaced because the manufacturer doesn’t make the battery anymore.
what phone?
Brilliant! I miss the days of being able to slap on a massive oversize battery to get you through the day! :-D Carrying around powerbanks and cables is such a huge step back!
