this post was submitted on 18 Jun 2023
81 points (95.5% liked)

Android

28246 readers
342 users here now

DROID DOES

Welcome to the droidymcdroidface-iest, Lemmyest (Lemmiest), test, bestest, phoniest, pluckiest, snarkiest, and spiciest Android community on Lemmy (Do not respond)! Here you can participate in amazing discussions and events relating to all things Android.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules


1. All posts must be relevant to Android devices/operating system.


2. Posts cannot be illegal or NSFW material.


3. No spam, self promotion, or upvote farming. Sources engaging in these behavior will be added to the Blacklist.


4. Non-whitelisted bots will be banned.


5. Engage respectfully: Harassment, flamebaiting, bad faith engagement, or agenda posting will result in your posts being removed. Excessive violations will result in temporary or permanent ban, depending on severity.


6. Memes are not allowed to be posts, but are allowed in the comments.


7. Posts from clickbait sources are heavily discouraged. Please de-clickbait titles if it needs to be submitted.


8. Submission statements of any length composed of your own thoughts inside the post text field are mandatory for any microblog posts, and are optional but recommended for article/image/video posts.


Community Resources:


We are Android girls*,

In our Lemmy.world.

The back is plastic,

It's fantastic.

*Well, not just girls: people of all gender identities are welcomed here.


Our Partner Communities:

!android@lemmy.ml


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Wander@yiffit.net 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Hooray! Younger generations will finally be able to experience the joy of dropping their phone and having to pick up three to four different pieces! /s

(I'm all for this change, by the way)

[–] _MoveSwiftly@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

Oh I remember that with Nokias. It's like shock absorbing for cars lol.

[–] Graphine@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Honestly, with Apple making it incredibly fucking hard to take out their batteries with excessive amounts of glue, I'm okay with this.

[–] Killer@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Do they not have the tabs you can pull out anymore?

[–] Graphine@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

They do, but they're incredibly prone to breaking when you pull and sometimes they're just hard as shit to grip so you have to use a screwdriver to twist and pull.

I don't think I need to explain why that's so dangerous.

[–] JCreazy@midwest.social 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

As someone who has changed hundreds of iphone batteries, the adhesive sucks. At least they changed to a different adhesive around iphone 8 because alcohol does wonders on it. I don't even attempt to pull the tabs on those anymore.

[–] Graphine@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

May I ask how you do that? Do you just...douse the battery in alcohol? There isn't much of a gap between the adhesive and the battery in my experience, so it just sits inside the chasis and rolls around. I haven't had any luck with that but I'm probably doing it wrong.

[–] JCreazy@midwest.social 1 points 2 years ago

I drizzle some in the corner and then use a sturdy tool to gently pry up on the battery to allow the alcohol to get deeper under. Since the adhesive patches are small to fit around the wireless charging coil, it doesn't take much. Once you get one side of the battery loose the other will easily come with it, especially if the alcohol got to them.

[–] got2best@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Do y'all remember the days when you dropped your phone and it exploded into 3 or 4 pieces? 🤣 Those were the good days.

[–] dustojnikhummer@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Three. Battery, cover and the rest. Weirdly, no damage to the plastic display. How? I guess it was the ~~weather~~ bezel

[–] overzeetop@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

And when you scratched up the back you bought a new one for $12. No $200 glass or machined aluminum cases that we put $35 covers on just to protect them from every day use.

[–] 666dollarfootlong@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

Well, it was plastic. Pretty hard to crack plastic like glass

[–] guy@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

Excellent! Batteries in modern phones are surprisingly definitely removable and replaceable. I've done it multiple times. However, the unfriendly barrier to entry is glue and clips that require careful prying with spugers. It's quite clear manufacturers are happy blocking you getting in; plenty people just buy new phones when the battery gets too old.

[–] NightOwl@lemmy.one 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (4 children)

Phones are getting more expensive so people are holding on to them longer, so it's a nice quality of life improvement to remove the barriers to battery replacement so less people have to go down to a phone repair store to get it changed. The more of a hassle battery replacement is seen the more likely people are to just upgrade and create e-waste.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] hyorvenn@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Fairphone 3 user here. My main reason to choose this phone a few years ago was because the battery could easily be replaced. Too many phones are perfectly functional but the battery is half dead. Another boon of non-glued batteries : You can carry two (or more) batteries to easily switch when the first one is KO. Meaning no need for portable charger and useless cables in your pocket. Phone at 10% ? Just change it, bam 100% in a second. Easy as that.

I'll probably not be the target of such regulations because I wouldn't choose an anti-consumer phone brand anyway, but at least it's going in the right direction.

[–] quortez@kbin.social 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Fingers crossed that this will be implemented well, im tired of having sleek electronics be irrelevant in 2 years when the silicon could go for 5 or six

[–] j4k3@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

The silicon could go on for decades if both the modem and processor were fully documented hardware that the community can access and support in the Linux kernel.

I can run a secure and current form of Linux on 30+ year old hardware if I want to, because the hardware documentation was expected by everyone at the time even if some end users were oblivious to what this meant. The whole reason google pushes Android is because they provide a base Linux kernel that hardware manufacturers can easily slip their proprietary junk into without requiring them to add the kind of open source code needed for mainline kernel support by the community. This is the mechanism that depreciates your device. It is totally artificial and an end user exploitation by design.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] C8H10N4O2@kbin.social 1 points 2 years ago

I might be in the minority here, but I feel this is actually a step back.

In the 5 years I've had my phone, there have been two times I've ever really needed to pull the battery, and still the hard reset sequence still eventually worked in both cases.

Anyone remember how some phones had issues with the battery door becoming somewhat loose over time, causing any slight bump to turn the phone off? Many have already commented on how they explode into multiple pieces when dropped. Traditionally the battery covers are incredibly flimsy plastic, even on flagship devices (cough Samsung). Waterproofing is a common concern too, however it actually can be done with a removable battery (e.g. Galaxy S5).

What really needed to be addressed here was how cumbersome it is to get into these devices to replace the battery, and how often people are price gouged to replace them. I believe this could have been better written to allow for either a removable battery, or a standardized and affordable built-in battery replacement process.

[–] arseneau@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

This is awesome. Thank god for EU legislation that directly benefits me as an American consumer. Now I can microwave lithium ion batteries in peace!

[–] boo@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I do miss being able to swap out a phone battery and this will certainly be a step in the right direction in terms ewaste and device longevity.

One thing that I wonder about is waterproofing or water resistance. Some phones are basically waterproof in shallow water. How achievable is this with a device with a trivial way to remove the battery?

[–] HubbleST@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

The Galaxy S5 sport had a battery door and water resistance. They just used gaskets.

[–] rms1990@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

People make this argument and barely anyone really uses the waterprooding features of a phone

[–] Someology@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

You know, I really like my Essential Ph-1. It was a lovely little phone. I had the little 360 camera accessory that snapped on magentically and everything. It was so cool! Then, 1.5 seconds, dropped into water from which I grabbed it instantly, and it was done. No warranty coverage for dropping it in water, and zero waterproofing, and toasted phone. So, yes, more of us "use" waterproofing on our phones than you would think. The thing is that it didn't need to be this way. There were waterproof phones back before everything was glued glass slabs all the time. Galaxy S5 Sport as mentioned by @HubbleST@lemm.ee above (and other "sport" edition phones). We have a lot of hygrophobic coatings and tech we didn't have in the day of the Galaxy S5 series. We can do better now, if manufacturers are forced to.

[–] thesanewriter@vlemmy.net 1 points 2 years ago

If this goes through, I think it would be really good news. Battery failure is one of the leading things that force people to replace their smartphones, and having them be replaceable would go a long way towards making smartphones last longer.

[–] M_Reimer@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

And now they just have to force manufacturers to either at least security patch devices for, let's say 10 years, or force them to open source everything the community needs to continue supporting this device. It never happened to me that the battery died before support ended.

Just had that issue with my Pixel 3a XL. No more security updates. Had to replace it with a Pixel 6a but I liked the 3a XL more. It there was any community support for the 3a XL, I would rather sell my 6a again.

[–] konalt@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I actually love all these regulations on smartphones (mainly by the EU), like the recent USB-C standard. That one in particular makes it so much easier to share chargers around the house!

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] scarabic@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

I can’t wait to hear the Apple marketing word for this feature. They’ll add some gimmick like the battery is held in with magnets and say “We call it MagPack and we think you’re going to love it.”

[–] seriousslayerguy@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

This is great.

[–] Brkdncr@kbin.social 0 points 2 years ago (8 children)

How is this a win? My non-Android device is at 89% health after 5 years. I’m not going to replace the battery, I’m going to replace the device.

I’d prefer that we get paid $20 to recycle an old phone so that they actually get recycled.

[–] NathanielWyvern@mastodon.social 1 points 2 years ago

@Brkdncr @Roman0 Why not both?

Easily replaceable for those who burn through capacity through heavy use. Which would also make recycling easier funny enough.

And pushing to make recycling encouraged. These aren't opposing ideas.

[–] SkyNTP@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 years ago

Opposite boat. My perfectly good device gets replaced after about 4 years because it struggles to hold a charge. I don't give a shit about iterative phone specs, and I say that as a tech enthusiast.

[–] killall-q@kbin.social 1 points 2 years ago

Because not everyone has the same anecdotal experience as you?

load more comments (5 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›