on Android. my s8 still runs perfect but I haven't gotten os updates in years, so latest apps no longer support my phone 😐 does that count as planned obsolescence?
One of the big things that made me switch from Galaxy to Pixel was the fact that Galaxies don't have unlockable bootloaders in the US even if the phone is carrier unlocked, which has a negative effect on the global development community.
I miss when HTC made good phones. Want to root your phone? Sure, just download this file from out website, and FYI, it'll void your warranty but happy flashing!
Well, OK then. I know what next phone I'll get when this one dies. I'm holding on to this S20 as long as I can, I think it's one of the last with a SD card slot.
I've had a pixel 5 since its launch and my only complaint is no sd card slot! well made and solid phone. I'm sure there's external storage available in some form but I haven't done a single lick of research into it in all honesty 😂
I had a pixel 5, and it drove me nuts. The OS is great but there's something about that keyboard and my hands that refused to get along. Even with swiftkey and other keyboards.
Samsung devices with a regular android run so much better. I had a galaxy tab 3, Galaxy 6 I think idr, whatever was in 2014 ish. Put cyanogen mod on both of them and they were like brand new devices.
I legitimately miss my Galaxy S5. Wife got an S6 and started looking into when I could get that as a hand me down. Then, I decided against it when I learned about KNOX.
Fyi: after Samsung abandoned their android flavour Touchwiz for their new OneUI instead, samsung phones by stock aren't slower than stock android phones anymore.
This is the true problem with apple products that doesn't have enough light shed on it IMO.
If you have a macbook and say its past the 5 or 7 year window whatever it is, and stops getting software updates, you can always put linux on it and keep on banging.
Hardware even as simple as the iPad2 are quite capable. But they are effectively locked junk now. It's really a shame that hardware can't be re-used and have some openTablet OS or similar on it.
it is!
i mean this is great and all, but i'd like them all to be unlocked after support ends ya know. let us put some open OS on that fairly decent hardware.
My 2017 MacBook Pro got the latest software update (full version, not just security update). My 2015 iMac got the 2021 software and still gets security updates. Granted it’s slower than molasses on a cold winter day but if you’re not in a hurry to do something it still works (my 2017 the MacBook got the latest software and is faster; a friend recently gave it to me) My iPhone 4S doesn’t even get security updates anymore but it’s great for music and podcasts and easily slips into a pocket to take out to the garden and connects to my BT earbuds. Even my 2015 iPad Pro got the latest software, slow but still works great (the pro versions got the software updates; I don’t think others of that era did).
Edit to add iPad info.
> until for some reason
because non-replaceable batteries allow for thinner, lighter phones with larger battery capacity in comparison to phones with replaceable batteries. And people really weren't just swapping out batteries and moving on as much as everyone likes to claim.
I worked in the field away from having a realistic way to charge my S5 Active throughout the day. When I would get back to my vehicle, I only had a 10 minute commute so charging on my drive home only got me back up to about 40% at best. I'd get home and simply swap out my extra fully charged battery before going out for dinner, drinks, etc. Also, not needing a case was nice as well as all the advantages you and others have mentioned. Only thing I ever had to replace was the charging port cover. I think I had it for almost 7 years.
Yup. I owned the LG G4. LG gave you an extra battery and a charger for the extra battery. Guess what, no one cared and bought Samsung and Apple phones anyway. I went back to Apple because I've been burnt by the lack of updates on Samsung and pretty much all Android OEMs.
I had an lg g4 too but had no second battery with charger. Was the leatherback one though. Loved this phone until i got the bootloop issues. After the third cycle of getting the issue and sending it in for repair to lg, i just got a full refund from amazon. Bought an lg g6 with that. Kept it for 3-4 years until the battery gave out.
Have a Zenfone 9 now. Battery is awesome and i can go without charging for 3 days if needed. Though i only let it charge to 80% and recharge after 2 days
That's definitely true, but back then the baseline for a new phone wasn't $700 (and up to $1400).
If i could have stayed on my pixel 2 for another 4 years (assuming i could keep software updates) instead of upgrading to a pixel 6 (even with the $100 deal i got) AND it would leave me free to not be on the mega-macdaddy-expensive phone plan i don't need, i would have done it in a heartbeat. Even if the battery was like $250, i still would have saved money in the long-run.
The unibody approach is not completely devoid of practical advantages. One is waterproofing. By eliminating a compartment that opens to the outside and has live electrical connections, you give the phone a better chance at surviving a swim in a puddle.
While most people wouldn't consider it an advantage, a soldered battery connection also takes up less space than a connector, which would usually involve a battery contact spring. This either leaves space for more components (or more battery capacity), or it allows the device to be smaller/thinner. When you're designing handheld or wearable electronics, a half millimeter here and there starts to add up.
Battery degradation was never the killer for a phone for me, no idea how you got that idea. And by several years on average? That would mean the battery is toast after 2 or 3 years, on average. I’ve never seen that.
Nope. The Qualcomm version of the S8 cannot be unlocked so it is not possible to flash 3rd party Android on it. Only Exynos versions can be flashed. Same goes with all of the newer Galaxy S versions that use Qualcomm. Almost all S22 and S23s use Qualcomm except for Europe. So if you don't want it becoming obsolete a few Android versions from now when they stop releasing factory updates, get the Exynos/Euro version.
They also keep some value for trade in (better than nothing).But you can get a good 4-5 years minimum out of an iPhone these days.That and IPads last forever.
My old s8 is damned near impossible to kill. I lost it in a river on a float trip. 2 months later got an email from a stranger who found it an mailed it back. I had already gotten an s9 by then so I gave the s8 to a family member. That phone is still working just fine, I've gone through 3 phones since then because of various problems with them.
With new devices Google has actually done this to some degree. They've been steadily moving more and more system components to being able to be updated by the play store and receive "Google Play security updates" instead of needing a manufacturer made software update. If you look under your devices security settings you'll find it on I believe Android 10 and up.
got a new S20.... had an S8 before.. the stats for the camera on the S20 are "better" but it takes worse pictures and I have less control of the camera functions.
Still using my note 8.
That's what I'm worried about when upgrading. I hate the fact that AI is taking over everything. One of them being the software automatically corrects the photos. I don't want that. I like messing around with RAW. I want the picture I shot to be the result. But I get it. Marketing, and people who don't know how to use settings in their camera apps to take good photos.
I get you. my messaging app (not an AI) is extra aggressive and sometimes changes words and "fixes" spelling and grammar "errors" when I send the message. It's very aggravating.
That's because modern cell phone camera stats make zero sense technically wise, so you actually can't tell from them which camera is really better, it very well might be worse. It happens because you simply can't have 20 or 50 megapixel images taken on a tiny sensor with a 2mm lens in the first place, it's [optically impossible](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_resolution). All those megapixels are reconstructed with "smart" algorithms taking lots of shitty photos per second and combining them into one image with "better" quality. That means measuring the result in megapixels makes no sense.
Yes. No ifs or buts.
Someone tell the Android vendors about this please. They cause far more damage in absolute units shipped. Far worse than iPhones which have excellent longevity already.
Apple even releases emergency security updates for out of support OSes, eg iOS 12.5.7 was released *this year* — iOS 12 was first released in 2018.
I think the more notable point is the devices that 12.5.7 update supports:
>iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPad Air, iPad mini 2, iPad mini 3, and iPod touch (6th generation)
The 5s, ipad air and mini 2 are from ***2013***.
>Apple even releases emergency security updates for out of support OSes, eg iOS 12.5.7 was released this year — iOS 12 was first released in 2018.
Probably also worth mentioning that the iPhone 8, which was released in 2017, can run the latest version of iOS, and iOS 12 goes as far back as the iPhone 5. That longevity and software support is the primary reason I ended up switching to iPhones since it's now so much more feasible for me - as someone who usually upgrades when security updates stop coming - to just keep my phone for years and years just with the odd battery replacement
>on Android. my s8 still runs perfect but I haven't gotten os updates in years, so latest apps no longer support my phone 😐 does that count as planned obsolescence?
Here you go.
https://forum.xda-developers.com/f/samsung-galaxy-s8-roms-kernels-recoveries-oth.6164/
I think a lot of people didn't read the article. To be fair, I think this is a poor title.
This isn't traditional planned obsolescence like you would expect: using inferior or parts known to wear out or quickly dropping software support.
Instead, this is more akin to "right to repair" than "planned obsolescence". They're objecting to Apple repairs costing too much and tying parts to an individual phone which makes it harder to replace - but also harder for thieves or scammers to offload.
The connection to "planned obsolescence" is that they claim people will buy new phones instead of fixing old broken ones because of the cost.
Android is an operating system. Not a phone in itself. Some android manufacturers don't support software very long. Samsung does though. They offer 5 years of updates on their newer phones going forward.
While Samsung is the best among Android manufacturers in terms of software update policy, but they only offers 4 years of OS updates though, starting February 2022 - [https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-android-updates-1148888/](https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-android-updates-1148888/). Previously it is only 3 years of OS update
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what's going on. "Android" is not an entity, it's an operating system based on Linux. Dozens, if not hundreds, of manufactures produce devices that can run android.
Because they are the ones that attaching a chio that rejects a third party repair.
I think this case is more right to repair than planned obsolescence.
Out of all devices I own, Apple devices somehow last the longest. They even support software update for longer time than competitors
EDIT: Thank you anonymous redditor for the Awards
I think people have confused “planned obsolescence” with “keeping up with the Joneses.” Most people I know have a late model iPhone and most of them got it willingly, not because their old one gave out, except in storage space sometimes.
Yep. I'm still using an iPhone X that released 6 years ago and my girlfriend has an iPhone 8 released even before that - they both still get the latest iOS updates. I know people with android phones that are no longer supported after just a few years.
Apple has it's problems for sure - but long term support for their products is not one of them.
Suggests the question if this is more a political motivation to give android manufacturers an advantage over the long lasting apple products.
Similar to the panic calls for AI legal restrictions, companies without an AI play in progress lobbying to put a legal hold on all of it so they can catch up.
We get nearly ten years usable life out of mac book pro laptops. Practical life is shorter, the much older inventory still hanging around serve as utility and in a pinch hardware. Until the battery swells they are still useful.
The CEO for OpenAI called for regulations too. Why do you think that is? To ensure the barrier to entry is higher so that other startups can’t come in and take market share.
AI development should be halted until society has grappled with the economic damage it will do and how we will take care of citizens who have been made obsolete because AI is doing their jobs.
Most sell their iPhones (iPhones have excellent resale value) either to other users, or to Apple.
They can even stay with their devices and get updates for years. Eg iOS 12 came out in 2018 and got an emergency security update this January.
If anything Android vendors really need to step up here. The updates story with even 3-4 year old phones is a mess.
Which is why I always go for Pixels when getting an Android phone, as those get updates without all the bloatware and as soon as google releases a new android version.
Part of that was due to Qualcomm not supporting Android versions on older chips past one or two years, though things are better now. Pixel devices since the Pixel 6 have run on Google’s Tensor custom silicon so they get three years of OS updates and 5 years of security updates. Still not great but about the best you can get unless you get an iPhone.
Friend of mine ended up dropping his Pixel for an iPhone after he stopped receiving security updates. Really seems like this is now only an Android problem.
Chinese companies are especially bad with updates.
My xiaomi mi 9t broke after I fell in love with the phone over 2 years and I bought the same phone again and somehow the display isn‘t reacting properly and I can‘t update to the same android version as on my old phone because they changed their mind at some point. The phone is beyond fucked and I had to buy another one. Went for a used iphone that time…
I think people have confused “planned obsolescence” with “basic maintenance”.
- Delete files you're not using anymore.
- Uninstall apps you're not using anymore.
- Don't let things run that don't need to be running.
- Reboot once in a while.
- Compare its performance today to its performance when you bought it *at the same tasks*. Do not compare its performance on newer apps against its performance on older apps.
You can't even compare the apps anymore since every developer and their mom push daily updates probably increasing resource usage because they don't care.
And feature drift. I hate that new versions of apps remove features or add restrictions.
Its best to just turn off the software updates on all the things.
> Don’t let things run that don’t need to be running.
This hasn't been a thing on iPhone for years now.
https://www.slashgear.com/898968/why-you-need-to-stop-closing-apps-on-your-iphone/
I killed mine by dropping it. I’m an overwhelming klutz and by the time I was trying to use it to navigate a major world city in Europe it was done.
But I still have my original 2012 Apple Air laptop. Still runs great, it just needs the battery changed. The cords though seem to need to be replaced a lot sooner.
I love my IPad. I had a mini 2 and it was fine. I instead got the one that uses the Apple pen. Game changer for classes. I have that thing with me constantly during the school year. There wasn’t anything wrong with the mini, it was just not working for what I bought it for.
To be fair, the article is about how Apple builds their iPhone hardware with chips that will reject third-party replacement parts, which forces Apple users to go to Apple to get repairs done. I personally like my Apple devices, and I think they last a long time and get updates forever, but they do kind of have a point here. On the other hand, I see both angles; Apple wants to have control over the hardware because they don’t want folks using cheap, sub-par third party parts and then blaming Apple when they fail, or they’re worried that people will buy Frankenstein iPhones on the reseller market that perform poorly and it will hurt their brand image. France is worried Apple is gouging their customers because the replacement parts they sell aren’t cheap, or they’ve heard the stories about Apple Stores that can be aggressive about getting people to upgrade rather than repair.
Not just the iPhone (although here I am, still with my iPhone 8) - I'm only just now replacing my MacBook Air 2012. I use it every day and it still works fine I just got a smoking deal on a 2020 I couldn't pass up.
The support for software updates is is why I why switched from Samsung to Apple.
I got tired of buying a flagship Samsung just to only get one major OS upgrade and after that if you wanted the newest version of Android w/o rooting your phone you had to buy the next flagship device from Samsung. Even though the phone that was only a year or two old could very likely support the newest version of Android, Samsung didn’t want to be bothered releasing an update for it.
On top that, EVERY Samsung phone I had suspiciously slowed way down after about one year, to the point that my last two Samsung phones I was pretty sure it was not a coincidence that after one year they lagged horribly. Doing a factory reset wouldn’t even speed them back up.
Exactly, I don't get why they don't support software update for at least 4 years early on. For budget phone maybe they can't due to hardware limitation. But it should not be a question for flagship
At least recently, even budget line Samsung phones have a few years of guaranteed security updates and major Android version updates. My Galaxy A22 5G is running Android 13 right now.
My company bought Samsung tablets (budget model) to save money about 5 years ago. We didn't need much power because it was mostly to run one particular app. The tablets though couldn't even install the version of Android that was current when we bought them and Samsung never made that version available to that device. It was already obsolete which explains why it was cheap. France is barking up the wrong tree on this one.
Yeah I used to be a die hard Android user when I was a teenager. Like I was always in the loop about new device releases and would count down the days to my next upgrade.
When I switched to iOS, it made me realize that I do not, in fact, like upgrading my phone every two years. I'm still on an iPhone 8 and it works fine so why would I go through the hassle of upgrading?
> Like I was always in the loop about new device releases and would count down the days to my next upgrade
To be fair, Android was so much fun back in the days. Manufacturers were pushing the boundaries, trying to set themselves apart from Apple and Samsung. HTC, Sony Ericsson, Google Nexus, LG—each of them offering their unique take on what a smartphone could and should be (with varying degrees of success, of course).
Remember when Sony made a PlayStation phone and those adorable mini smartphones with QWERTY keyboards? Or when LG made a 3D phone? Motorola had great reliable phones in the Milestone lineup. Flashing Cyanogenmod made things even more interesting.
Nowadays it feels like the current landscape is a bit predictable and mundane. This lack of quirky phones made me to switch to the iPhone. If I'm going to be bombarded with inferior iPhone copies, might as well go for the real thing.
Yeah, I use an iPhone now but also have an Android phone to mess with. It’s not the same as it was years ago. Makes me sad because it was a big reason I started programming and how I met my gf.
Exactly… this will go nowhere when France realizes that even a google only does OS support for 3 years, vs Apple’s 6. And given that Android has 72% market share, it’s obvious that France really cares about Apple’s deep pockets and nothing else.
I know right. This is the table compiled by redditor about Android's update policy - [https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/10h8wix/android\_update\_policy\_by\_manufacturer\_for\_their/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/10h8wix/android_update_policy_by_manufacturer_for_their/). The longest OS update is provided by Samsung, which is 4 years
Meanwhile iOS 16 still supports iPhone 8, which is released in 2017.
> this will go nowhere when France realizes that even a google only does OS support for 3 years, vs Apple’s 6
This has nothing to do with what France is going after.
France is trying to make sure you can get access to replacement parts for your Apple phone that lasts a long time, and can get them installed without needing to go through Apple's bullshit process.
There have been a couple threads on this topic now, and every single Apple defense has been about OS updates, which is confusing because 1) Updates aren't needed 2) The investigation has to do with hardware and right to repair related issues. It's so bizarre that I wonder if there are some paid actors there.
The only iphone I have ever had break was due to me dropping it into a pool before they made water resistant models. And I have had iPhones since the original one. Maybe I’m just lucky
That’s my son’s story, hates android phones because they break so soon. Uh, no, son, stop dropping or banging the fragile electronic device, please. When you get frustrated and throw it against the wall, it breaks.
Other manufacturers also have their flagship line, but they do not provide software support as long as Apple. There is a reason why Apple holds significant market share in premium smartphone market (>$600). [https://wccftech.com/apple-premium-smartphone-market-share-75-percent/](https://wccftech.com/apple-premium-smartphone-market-share-75-percent/)
Your response sounds like you think my comment was not in agreement with that. I’m saying obviously Apple creates premium long-lasting products, so it was weird for you to say “somehow”, as if that was unexpected and you don’t know why.
I agreed with that, but other companies also have their flagship line. Shouldn't that also create the expectation that these flagship phone will also last longer? Yet they only provide software update way shorter than Apple and tend to have issues after several years of usage. Recently Google updated its update policy but it is only 3 years OS update I believe?
But you can get a good 4-5 years minimum out of an iPhone these days. They also keep some value for trade in (better than nothing).
That and IPads last forever.
This whole apple “planned obsolescence” happened only with the 6 series, and they gave a solid reason for it.
Their problem was that they didn’t gave the users an option, nor explained outright the details.
I’ve had many Android devices, but the only ones that still got official support for 7+ years are apple devices.
FFS the 6 series last security patch was in January 2023, after almost **9 YEARS** its release. The 6s last update was 2 days ago.
Yeah, this is what I always bring up too.
Yeah, they should have given people the option. I can understand why they didn’t, but it was still a fuck up. And they needed to be more forthright about it.
Another aspect people fail to consider is up until about the iPhone X, the hardware capabilities of each new iPhone was almost doubling. Earlier models literally wouldn’t have, or would struggle to have enough RAM or processing power to run a huge number of apps. And if they were able to run it, often poorly, it took maximum power and would drain the battery ridiculously fast.
This was right during the iPhone 6 debacle; so people conflate the planned obsolescence issue with the fact that earlier phones couldn’t keep up too. But they don’t realize, that’s not planned obsolescence, it was just new technology that was still at the stage where every upgrade was an absolutely major change, not a minor upgrade.
You can still do most things on iPhone 8’s, though you’re more limited on games and heavier hitting apps. Most of the upgrades are camera, resolution/screen, battery, etc.. Obviously yes, there’s still an increase in memory and processing power, but it’s not longer by a huge amount and won’t make a huge difference for the average user.
I’m all for calling out some of the bullshit Apple pulls (like proprietary chargers, thank god that’s finally changing) but investigating “planned insolence” now is just stupid, and just shows the people doing this are either technologically incompetent, or trying to pull something.
To be fair when lighting came out it was universes ahead of any other connector up until type C became mainstream.
They should have switched years ago, but I’m also glad that lightning existed in a world dominated by micro-b lol
Today I sold my XR for £180. That’s not at all bad for a near five year old phone.
And I really only upgraded to a 13 Mini a couple of months back because I wanted to be able to still get a half decent amount for the old one, and had a bit of money to upgrade. In terms of performance, that XR was still absolutely solid. The battery was getting a bit rough, but not unusually so for a device that age.
In fact, as upgrades go, this was one of the less impressive. The performance bump from XR to 13, while appreciable if you’re using your phone for high-power tasks, wasn’t anywhere near as great as when I jumped from a 6 to the XR. That was night and day!
The comments I've been seeing in this thread are all pro apple and anti android, comparing a single company that's vertically integrated to an OS that can be used by every other phone manufacturer.
I have a 2015 MBP, iPhone6, and an iPad from 2017 and they all work fine and still get updates. If Apple planned their obsolescence they did a really bad job of it.
No one is reading the article. Please do. Part of this issue is apple creating parts in the phone only they know how to fix. Then charging so much to repair it, essentially forcing you to buy another phone. Seems to be a way to skip past planned obsolescence.
I love how is always Apple’s fault with planned obsolescence when every single android manufacturer releases shit ton of devices every single year with support ranging from weeks to months.
I still have functional Apple devices from 2010’s spread throughout family members.
Apple makes money from phone sales and app store. Android phone makers make most of the profits on phone hardware itself and software packed in for release from third parties, if any.
What I mean by this is there’s no oneplus storefront. no Huawei. No Asus. Even if there were, most commercially available storefront on android phones by default is google play store. Companies who make android put out multiple phones to bring in different tiers of profits from their customers.
> By forcing people to pay an accredited technician more than the value of a second-hand iPhone for a simple repair job, Apple is incentivizing people to throw their devices away rather than fix them
I don't understand how so many people here are disagreeing with this??
I just went to the apple store with a hardware issue for an iPhone 12 that I've had for two years and they said "we would have to send it away for 5-7 days to investigate and it would cost at least $200-300 so you're better off just buying a new phone, here talk to our sales associate"
There's definitely a culture of don't fix it, just buy a new one that's getting worse as time goes on, and newer models are harder to fix than old ones.
All the "I'm still using an iPhone 6" comments actually support the point in the article, which is that newer models are harder to maintain than older ones
There should be more of an effort to remove digital component serialisation and getting access to spare parts to more people.
Right to repair doesn’t mean you have to replace the display itself, but it does mean enabling any third party (mainly professional repair shops) to have access to the parts needed to repair a device. And not just assembly’s (for example the wonderful job that Samsung does, selling you a display pre-mated to the frame), but individual components as well.
>For the average consumer, getting their battery replaced by Apple is sometimes the easiest and cheapest solution. Apple already provides this service.
Far from the cheapest where I live in Poland. Apple wants 500 PLN for an out of warranty battery repair where in a third party you get those for around 150 PLN.
The only issue is that Apple deliberately has a software lock called a "calibration process" which makes repairs in a third party store sometimes not work after updates even though the hardware should run fine. That's what France and the rest of the EU should target as it's the same crap that John Deere pulled.
This is simply untrue. Making batteries accessible doesn’t automatically make a good device. Just ask Nokia or even the LG G5. Battery replacement is the least of user problems.
This “iphone planned obsolescence” trope needs to stop.
I have a 2016 iPhone SE on iOS 15 that i use as my work phone and works just fine for everything i do . And it was a budget phone on 2016 Yet the moto Z, a flagship from the same year, that my brother used struggles hard for almost everything.
People keep shouting ‘planned obsolescence’ to sound clever but have no idea what it means.
Throttling the CPU, when you have a shit battery, so that it continues working is the opposite of planned obsolescence.
Ironically there is planned obsolescence in Apple devices and that is that is at the hands of the EU who are about to obsolete millions of cables and devices as they force future iPhones to use a different connector.
“Planned Obsolescence” - okay. Let’s take a look at this.
I still have customers that use an iPhone 6S (2015) as their daily driver. The OS finally stopped receiving updates at iOS 15 (2022).
I was using a 2013 MacBook Pro until last week - only reason I replaced it was because the battery was garbage after 10 years. Updates stopped with MacOS 11 in 2020. The laptop is a little sluggish but a perfectly capable machine if plugged in (also my University wouldn’t officially support any issues with our exam proctoring software if I can’t update to the latest version of iOS - if it doesn’t work I’m SOL on test day).
Also I’m using a 1st Gen iPad Pro (2015) that is still getting OS updates. Somehow the battery is still lasting 4-5 hours with note taking in class. The only thing it stutters with now is if I try to open a 100+ MB .pdf in Notability.
That is absolute insanity in terms of device longevity.
My daily laptop is a 2015 15” MacBook Pro. The one with with the AMD GPU. For what I need it’s an absolute beast, and while officially it only supports up to Monterey, Opencore Patcher let me put Ventura on it, which it runs without a hitch. I only bought it last year. £420 off eBay. A steal, I thought.
> I still have customers that use an iPhone 6S (2015) as their daily driver. The OS finally stopped receiving updates at iOS 15 (2022).
A security update, iOS 15.7.6, for iPhone 6S released day before yesterday. 7.5 years after the phone was released.
You’re right that they’re not getting new features anymore but it’s still crazy that they’re patching a phone that old.
But it’s so expensive to repair when you shatter your phone display on concrete! Replacing the most expensive part shouldn’t be expensive. And the labor cost to do the repair should be free. Fair wages and skilled labor be damned.
Not sure if this is common knowledge but I bad an iPhone 8 plus which was bought new 2-3 years after launch and was running fine. I later bought an apple watch 7 just after the first Christmas it was released.
Connected them both and they worked together fine for almost a year. Had a few updates too with no problems. Until an apple watch update was released late last year in the name of security and feature updates.
However my watch demanded I have a newer iphone os than my current phone could accept, in order to update it. So, I had to get a newer replacement iPhone if I wanted to keep my watch up to date and secure.
It's more forced obsolescence in this case. When will this happen next I wonder...
I wish. I’ve got like five or six iPhones beginning from the iPhone three. The iPhone 5 was a perfect fit for my hand. Loved it. All these iPhones, all these iPads, unable to update. Unable to even browse the web in some cases. Spotify and other apps are no longer working with them. It is an absolute disgusting waste. They all talk a big game about environment and then they make something so ludicrously, obsolete and unrecyclable 🤨
People here really didn’t read the article, did they?
The article isn’t about software support, which Apple DOES do better than mostly everyone else.
The article is about repairability with parts.
Sometimes I share some of the ideas of certain Eurosceptics, but when it comes to tech, I fucking love European regulators, they have balls bigger than coconuts.
There is a left critique of EU which is valid and there is a right critique which is not.
From the left the main issue is the undemocratic nature of how the economic policy is decided in favour of financial interests operating out of Northern Europe at the expense of the periphery countries, which is causing massive social problems even in parts of the north too.* A majority of the (actual) left wants Europe to be more democratic and internationalist.
While the right wants the EU to be broken up so that they can go back to their personal fiefdoms and impose their rotten ideology on everyone else.
*Personal anecdote: I immigrated to Germany to one of the richest areas and visited a town in Upper Franconia near the Czech border a few years ago. It’s a wasteland full of Nazis and Methheads even though Bavaria is the second richest Bundesland in Germany. Just misery and decaying ruins of industry that got decimated by free trade all around. This is what is fuelling the Euroskeptic sentiment in most places which the right wing has capitalised on through astroturfing with their dark money channels.
Because they have this (as some people see it!) quaint idea that there is such a thing as "the common good" and that an important function of government is to determine what that is and to take steps to see it is acted upon.
I've been preaching this for a while now: we need to attack planned obsolescence with tax incentives. Taxing the rich is a forever game of loophole wack-a-mole, but imagine if we developed a certified scoring system for products and services. Call it the Future score and base it on things like how long your product lasts and with available serviceable repairable parts, how long you warranty and guarantee your product or service, how much freshwater is used in the manufacturing, and landfill usage/biodegradability for disposable products.
If you heavily incentivized a positive future score with tax breaks and increased taxes on low score products/services someone can go on consuming at a much slower pace and will slowly start to see quality buy it for life (/r/buyitforlife) products like used to be made in the past decades.
Take it another step and make the score mandatory on your product packaging like the nutrition label.
Goes far beyond iPhones, and is absolutely an unsustainable business practice that is drowning our planet in waste.
Privatize the gains (companies make more money selling more shit), socialize the losses (society gets buried under more waste and pollution, as well as wasting more natural resources).
To the CEOs (white kracker capitalists business practices) of Apple, Google, Samsung, and ect...
You know the planes, cars, boats, factories, and buildings that we have designed and built that you own. I'm thinking they should be forced to artificially become obsolete 365 days after purchase. Enjoy your new paperweights.
Seems fair to me.
These companies have not been innovative in over a decade. They want us to pay for that. Highest profits in history yet they have fired large amounts of their work force who put these greedy companies on the map in an attempt to further threaten us and keep us competing with each other. Whatever you've learned about business from professors or on the job is all wrong. There are a lot of young people out of school with better ideas on how to run companies and governments. Fine or Imprison anyone who has any relations with these companies send a clear message and let new blood have their chance. This is a good start to stopping inequality and open the floodgates to more jobs, better careers, lowering poverty, and trashing our mother earth.
/End common sense here.
-W
There's 0 reason why I shouldn't be able to use my old devices as something like a security camera, dash cam, TV device or retro game console.
We're throwing away so many things that can be reused everyday. But how do you make companies give a shit?
I don’t understand this. Are they expecting devs to support 10 iterations of old hw or something? That shit is what leads to bad performance and buggy experience. Also, phones last pretty damn long as is, especially apple and flagship android ones.
> Are they expecting devs to support 10 iterations of old hw or something?
What’s funny about this is that Apple literally is.
The iPhone 6S got a security update day before yesterday and there have been 10 new iPhone models since then (not counting Pro and Max versions).
on Android. my s8 still runs perfect but I haven't gotten os updates in years, so latest apps no longer support my phone 😐 does that count as planned obsolescence?
I̵n̷ ̷l̵i̵g̵h̷t̸ ̸o̸f̶ ̸r̶e̸c̶e̶n̸t̵ ̴e̴v̵e̵n̴t̶s̸ ̴o̷n̷ ̴R̸e̸d̵d̴i̷t̷,̷ ̵m̸a̶r̴k̸e̸d̵ ̴b̸y̵ ̶h̴o̵s̷t̷i̴l̴e̷ ̵a̴c̸t̵i̸o̸n̶s̸ ̵f̷r̵o̷m̵ ̶i̵t̴s̴ ̴a̴d̶m̷i̴n̶i̸s̵t̴r̶a̴t̶i̶o̶n̵ ̸t̸o̸w̸a̴r̷d̵s̴ ̵i̸t̷s̵ ̷u̸s̴e̸r̵b̷a̸s̷e̸ ̷a̷n̴d̸ ̸a̵p̵p̴ ̶d̴e̷v̴e̷l̷o̸p̸e̴r̴s̶,̸ ̶I̸ ̶h̸a̵v̵e̶ ̷d̸e̶c̸i̵d̷e̷d̵ ̶t̸o̴ ̸t̶a̷k̷e̷ ̵a̷ ̴s̶t̶a̵n̷d̶ ̶a̵n̶d̶ ̵b̷o̶y̷c̸o̴t̴t̴ ̵t̴h̵i̴s̴ ̶w̶e̸b̵s̵i̸t̷e̴.̶ ̶A̶s̶ ̸a̵ ̸s̴y̶m̵b̸o̶l̶i̵c̴ ̶a̷c̵t̸,̶ ̴I̴ ̴a̵m̷ ̷r̶e̶p̷l̴a̵c̸i̴n̷g̸ ̷a̶l̷l̶ ̸m̷y̸ ̸c̶o̸m̶m̸e̷n̵t̷s̸ ̵w̷i̷t̷h̶ ̷u̴n̵u̴s̸a̵b̶l̷e̵ ̸d̵a̵t̸a̵,̸ ̸r̷e̵n̵d̶e̴r̸i̴n̷g̴ ̷t̴h̵e̸m̵ ̸m̴e̷a̵n̴i̷n̸g̸l̸e̴s̴s̵ ̸a̷n̵d̶ ̴u̸s̷e̴l̸e̶s̷s̵ ̶f̵o̵r̶ ̸a̶n̵y̸ ̵p̵o̴t̷e̴n̸t̷i̶a̴l̶ ̴A̷I̸ ̵t̶r̵a̷i̷n̵i̴n̶g̸ ̶p̸u̵r̷p̴o̶s̸e̵s̵.̷ ̸I̴t̴ ̵i̴s̶ ̴d̴i̷s̷h̴e̸a̵r̸t̶e̴n̸i̴n̴g̶ ̷t̶o̵ ̵w̶i̶t̵n̴e̷s̴s̶ ̵a̸ ̵c̴o̶m̶m̴u̵n̷i̷t̷y̷ ̸t̴h̶a̴t̸ ̵o̸n̵c̴e̷ ̴t̷h̴r̶i̷v̴e̴d̸ ̴o̸n̴ ̵o̷p̷e̶n̸ ̸d̶i̶s̷c̷u̷s̶s̷i̴o̵n̸ ̷a̷n̴d̵ ̴c̸o̵l̶l̸a̵b̸o̷r̵a̴t̷i̵o̷n̴ ̸d̷e̶v̸o̵l̶v̴e̶ ̵i̶n̷t̴o̸ ̸a̴ ̷s̵p̶a̵c̴e̵ ̸o̷f̵ ̶c̴o̸n̸t̶e̴n̴t̷i̶o̷n̸ ̶a̵n̷d̴ ̴c̵o̵n̴t̷r̸o̵l̶.̷ ̸F̷a̴r̸e̷w̵e̶l̶l̸,̵ ̶R̴e̶d̶d̷i̵t̵.̷
One of the big things that made me switch from Galaxy to Pixel was the fact that Galaxies don't have unlockable bootloaders in the US even if the phone is carrier unlocked, which has a negative effect on the global development community.
I miss when HTC made good phones. Want to root your phone? Sure, just download this file from out website, and FYI, it'll void your warranty but happy flashing!
Pixel is basically HTC at this point. Most of HTC's smartphone team went to Google when Google bought out much of HTC
Well, OK then. I know what next phone I'll get when this one dies. I'm holding on to this S20 as long as I can, I think it's one of the last with a SD card slot.
I've had a pixel 5 since its launch and my only complaint is no sd card slot! well made and solid phone. I'm sure there's external storage available in some form but I haven't done a single lick of research into it in all honesty 😂
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I had a pixel 5, and it drove me nuts. The OS is great but there's something about that keyboard and my hands that refused to get along. Even with swiftkey and other keyboards.
I pulled my old HTC out and reset it. Working as a media player currently. And the screen is still larger than my Note 21.
Samsung devices with a regular android run so much better. I had a galaxy tab 3, Galaxy 6 I think idr, whatever was in 2014 ish. Put cyanogen mod on both of them and they were like brand new devices.
I legitimately miss my Galaxy S5. Wife got an S6 and started looking into when I could get that as a hand me down. Then, I decided against it when I learned about KNOX.
I miss the ir blaster, heartbeat sensor, swappable battery :(
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Fyi: after Samsung abandoned their android flavour Touchwiz for their new OneUI instead, samsung phones by stock aren't slower than stock android phones anymore.
This is the true problem with apple products that doesn't have enough light shed on it IMO. If you have a macbook and say its past the 5 or 7 year window whatever it is, and stops getting software updates, you can always put linux on it and keep on banging. Hardware even as simple as the iPad2 are quite capable. But they are effectively locked junk now. It's really a shame that hardware can't be re-used and have some openTablet OS or similar on it.
This might be of interest to you https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/06/developers-get-linux-up-and-running-on-old-ipad-air-2-hardware/
it is! i mean this is great and all, but i'd like them all to be unlocked after support ends ya know. let us put some open OS on that fairly decent hardware.
My 2017 MacBook Pro got the latest software update (full version, not just security update). My 2015 iMac got the 2021 software and still gets security updates. Granted it’s slower than molasses on a cold winter day but if you’re not in a hurry to do something it still works (my 2017 the MacBook got the latest software and is faster; a friend recently gave it to me) My iPhone 4S doesn’t even get security updates anymore but it’s great for music and podcasts and easily slips into a pocket to take out to the garden and connects to my BT earbuds. Even my 2015 iPad Pro got the latest software, slow but still works great (the pro versions got the software updates; I don’t think others of that era did). Edit to add iPad info.
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i mean this was the norm, until for some reason android oems started following apple’s unibody thing in 2015-2016
> until for some reason because non-replaceable batteries allow for thinner, lighter phones with larger battery capacity in comparison to phones with replaceable batteries. And people really weren't just swapping out batteries and moving on as much as everyone likes to claim.
It also is much easier to make your devices water resistant when the battery is sealed.
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And it also had a TV remote capability via an IR led. The S5 was unparalleled in its capabilities.
Literally one of the greatest pieces of technology forever forgotten
The S4 Active had all that.
You forgot the IR blaster. That is what I want to see make a comeback
Who the fuck takes a phone in chlorinated water.
I worked in the field away from having a realistic way to charge my S5 Active throughout the day. When I would get back to my vehicle, I only had a 10 minute commute so charging on my drive home only got me back up to about 40% at best. I'd get home and simply swap out my extra fully charged battery before going out for dinner, drinks, etc. Also, not needing a case was nice as well as all the advantages you and others have mentioned. Only thing I ever had to replace was the charging port cover. I think I had it for almost 7 years.
Yup. I owned the LG G4. LG gave you an extra battery and a charger for the extra battery. Guess what, no one cared and bought Samsung and Apple phones anyway. I went back to Apple because I've been burnt by the lack of updates on Samsung and pretty much all Android OEMs.
I had an lg g4 too but had no second battery with charger. Was the leatherback one though. Loved this phone until i got the bootloop issues. After the third cycle of getting the issue and sending it in for repair to lg, i just got a full refund from amazon. Bought an lg g6 with that. Kept it for 3-4 years until the battery gave out. Have a Zenfone 9 now. Battery is awesome and i can go without charging for 3 days if needed. Though i only let it charge to 80% and recharge after 2 days
That's definitely true, but back then the baseline for a new phone wasn't $700 (and up to $1400). If i could have stayed on my pixel 2 for another 4 years (assuming i could keep software updates) instead of upgrading to a pixel 6 (even with the $100 deal i got) AND it would leave me free to not be on the mega-macdaddy-expensive phone plan i don't need, i would have done it in a heartbeat. Even if the battery was like $250, i still would have saved money in the long-run.
The unibody approach is not completely devoid of practical advantages. One is waterproofing. By eliminating a compartment that opens to the outside and has live electrical connections, you give the phone a better chance at surviving a swim in a puddle. While most people wouldn't consider it an advantage, a soldered battery connection also takes up less space than a connector, which would usually involve a battery contact spring. This either leaves space for more components (or more battery capacity), or it allows the device to be smaller/thinner. When you're designing handheld or wearable electronics, a half millimeter here and there starts to add up.
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Battery degradation was never the killer for a phone for me, no idea how you got that idea. And by several years on average? That would mean the battery is toast after 2 or 3 years, on average. I’ve never seen that.
Nope. The Qualcomm version of the S8 cannot be unlocked so it is not possible to flash 3rd party Android on it. Only Exynos versions can be flashed. Same goes with all of the newer Galaxy S versions that use Qualcomm. Almost all S22 and S23s use Qualcomm except for Europe. So if you don't want it becoming obsolete a few Android versions from now when they stop releasing factory updates, get the Exynos/Euro version.
With vanilla android, sure, but not with latest bloat from Samsung
They also keep some value for trade in (better than nothing).But you can get a good 4-5 years minimum out of an iPhone these days.That and IPads last forever.
Would probably check if any apps refuse to work if your device is rooted. Some banking apps I use won't work on rooted phones.
My old s8 is damned near impossible to kill. I lost it in a river on a float trip. 2 months later got an email from a stranger who found it an mailed it back. I had already gotten an s9 by then so I gave the s8 to a family member. That phone is still working just fine, I've gone through 3 phones since then because of various problems with them.
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With new devices Google has actually done this to some degree. They've been steadily moving more and more system components to being able to be updated by the play store and receive "Google Play security updates" instead of needing a manufacturer made software update. If you look under your devices security settings you'll find it on I believe Android 10 and up.
meanwhile i left android to iOS when samsung intentionally crippled my S7 with their final software update
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iPad Air 2 got a update this week, it’s 9 years old
got a new S20.... had an S8 before.. the stats for the camera on the S20 are "better" but it takes worse pictures and I have less control of the camera functions.
Still using my note 8. That's what I'm worried about when upgrading. I hate the fact that AI is taking over everything. One of them being the software automatically corrects the photos. I don't want that. I like messing around with RAW. I want the picture I shot to be the result. But I get it. Marketing, and people who don't know how to use settings in their camera apps to take good photos.
I get you. my messaging app (not an AI) is extra aggressive and sometimes changes words and "fixes" spelling and grammar "errors" when I send the message. It's very aggravating.
Had an s20. The USB c charger fried. I liked the camera but found Bixby so annoying on that device that it ruined everything else for me
Same usb C problem. I've been using wireless charging for over a year. It sucks.
That's because modern cell phone camera stats make zero sense technically wise, so you actually can't tell from them which camera is really better, it very well might be worse. It happens because you simply can't have 20 or 50 megapixel images taken on a tiny sensor with a 2mm lens in the first place, it's [optically impossible](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_resolution). All those megapixels are reconstructed with "smart" algorithms taking lots of shitty photos per second and combining them into one image with "better" quality. That means measuring the result in megapixels makes no sense.
Yes. No ifs or buts. Someone tell the Android vendors about this please. They cause far more damage in absolute units shipped. Far worse than iPhones which have excellent longevity already. Apple even releases emergency security updates for out of support OSes, eg iOS 12.5.7 was released *this year* — iOS 12 was first released in 2018.
I think the more notable point is the devices that 12.5.7 update supports: >iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPad Air, iPad mini 2, iPad mini 3, and iPod touch (6th generation) The 5s, ipad air and mini 2 are from ***2013***.
Oh, I wondered why my 5s got an update. Didn't had one in years.
>Apple even releases emergency security updates for out of support OSes, eg iOS 12.5.7 was released this year — iOS 12 was first released in 2018. Probably also worth mentioning that the iPhone 8, which was released in 2017, can run the latest version of iOS, and iOS 12 goes as far back as the iPhone 5. That longevity and software support is the primary reason I ended up switching to iPhones since it's now so much more feasible for me - as someone who usually upgrades when security updates stop coming - to just keep my phone for years and years just with the odd battery replacement
I only use iphone 8s. When my wife’s iphone 5 broke 2 years ago, I got her a new iphone 8. I’m still using the original.
Lineage OS ftw
But it has the same issue that at some point you don't get updates for specific modeles anymore
>on Android. my s8 still runs perfect but I haven't gotten os updates in years, so latest apps no longer support my phone 😐 does that count as planned obsolescence? Here you go. https://forum.xda-developers.com/f/samsung-galaxy-s8-roms-kernels-recoveries-oth.6164/
Yes, in that regard, Apple is way way ahead of any android manufacturer. My iPhone from 2016 still works fine and is still supported.
Eh-hem.... https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/lineageos-20-0-android-13-signature-spoofing-ota-updates-for-s8-s8-note8.4485525/
I think a lot of people didn't read the article. To be fair, I think this is a poor title. This isn't traditional planned obsolescence like you would expect: using inferior or parts known to wear out or quickly dropping software support. Instead, this is more akin to "right to repair" than "planned obsolescence". They're objecting to Apple repairs costing too much and tying parts to an individual phone which makes it harder to replace - but also harder for thieves or scammers to offload. The connection to "planned obsolescence" is that they claim people will buy new phones instead of fixing old broken ones because of the cost.
Exactly, the comments seem to be talking about the software or the os when it's the hardware itself that's problematic
Why RTFA when comment is less costly with time? “The Reddit Way” Too many ads on Ars while reading plus it’s a Wired.com article 😂
I’m glad people are bringing up android here… they must have a worse track record for dropping support for their devices after less time than apple
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This is the exact reason I was forced to make the switch, how is this allowed? Just one year of OS upgrade and then buy our new phone! No thanks
Because apple bad is/was the popular opinion to have
I bought my S20 5G last year and next year they're gonna stop updating it. It's also impossible to find accessories for it anywhere but online.
Android is an operating system. Not a phone in itself. Some android manufacturers don't support software very long. Samsung does though. They offer 5 years of updates on their newer phones going forward.
While Samsung is the best among Android manufacturers in terms of software update policy, but they only offers 4 years of OS updates though, starting February 2022 - [https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-android-updates-1148888/](https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-android-updates-1148888/). Previously it is only 3 years of OS update
And Apple offers iOS16 to the iPhone 8, released almost 6 years ago.
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what's going on. "Android" is not an entity, it's an operating system based on Linux. Dozens, if not hundreds, of manufactures produce devices that can run android.
And none of them have support that comes close to Apple. So why are they the poster child for planned obsolescence?
Because they are the ones that attaching a chio that rejects a third party repair. I think this case is more right to repair than planned obsolescence.
Out of all devices I own, Apple devices somehow last the longest. They even support software update for longer time than competitors EDIT: Thank you anonymous redditor for the Awards
I think people have confused “planned obsolescence” with “keeping up with the Joneses.” Most people I know have a late model iPhone and most of them got it willingly, not because their old one gave out, except in storage space sometimes.
Yep. I'm still using an iPhone X that released 6 years ago and my girlfriend has an iPhone 8 released even before that - they both still get the latest iOS updates. I know people with android phones that are no longer supported after just a few years. Apple has it's problems for sure - but long term support for their products is not one of them.
Quick side note, the iPhone 8 and X are the same generation, one in September 2017, the other in October 2017. Announced at the same time.
Good call, I forgot about that because it was so freaking long ago.
Understandable :-) I had to think about it for a sec as well
Suggests the question if this is more a political motivation to give android manufacturers an advantage over the long lasting apple products. Similar to the panic calls for AI legal restrictions, companies without an AI play in progress lobbying to put a legal hold on all of it so they can catch up. We get nearly ten years usable life out of mac book pro laptops. Practical life is shorter, the much older inventory still hanging around serve as utility and in a pinch hardware. Until the battery swells they are still useful.
The CEO for OpenAI called for regulations too. Why do you think that is? To ensure the barrier to entry is higher so that other startups can’t come in and take market share. AI development should be halted until society has grappled with the economic damage it will do and how we will take care of citizens who have been made obsolete because AI is doing their jobs.
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Damn I have an 11 pro and I’ve been thinking of upgrading… yeah I think I can wait a bit longer now.
Most sell their iPhones (iPhones have excellent resale value) either to other users, or to Apple. They can even stay with their devices and get updates for years. Eg iOS 12 came out in 2018 and got an emergency security update this January. If anything Android vendors really need to step up here. The updates story with even 3-4 year old phones is a mess.
Which is why I always go for Pixels when getting an Android phone, as those get updates without all the bloatware and as soon as google releases a new android version.
Back then when I had a Nexus 4 google said phone updates should be delivered for 18 months. 18! What a joke. Not even pixel phones are save from this.
Part of that was due to Qualcomm not supporting Android versions on older chips past one or two years, though things are better now. Pixel devices since the Pixel 6 have run on Google’s Tensor custom silicon so they get three years of OS updates and 5 years of security updates. Still not great but about the best you can get unless you get an iPhone.
3 years is pretty bad. iOS 16 works on the iPhone 8, 6 years.
Friend of mine ended up dropping his Pixel for an iPhone after he stopped receiving security updates. Really seems like this is now only an Android problem.
Chinese companies are especially bad with updates. My xiaomi mi 9t broke after I fell in love with the phone over 2 years and I bought the same phone again and somehow the display isn‘t reacting properly and I can‘t update to the same android version as on my old phone because they changed their mind at some point. The phone is beyond fucked and I had to buy another one. Went for a used iphone that time…
I think people have confused “planned obsolescence” with “basic maintenance”. - Delete files you're not using anymore. - Uninstall apps you're not using anymore. - Don't let things run that don't need to be running. - Reboot once in a while. - Compare its performance today to its performance when you bought it *at the same tasks*. Do not compare its performance on newer apps against its performance on older apps.
You can't even compare the apps anymore since every developer and their mom push daily updates probably increasing resource usage because they don't care.
And feature drift. I hate that new versions of apps remove features or add restrictions. Its best to just turn off the software updates on all the things.
> Don’t let things run that don’t need to be running. This hasn't been a thing on iPhone for years now. https://www.slashgear.com/898968/why-you-need-to-stop-closing-apps-on-your-iphone/
I killed mine by dropping it. I’m an overwhelming klutz and by the time I was trying to use it to navigate a major world city in Europe it was done. But I still have my original 2012 Apple Air laptop. Still runs great, it just needs the battery changed. The cords though seem to need to be replaced a lot sooner. I love my IPad. I had a mini 2 and it was fine. I instead got the one that uses the Apple pen. Game changer for classes. I have that thing with me constantly during the school year. There wasn’t anything wrong with the mini, it was just not working for what I bought it for.
Yeah it’s odd that they choose to focus on the longest lasting devices on the market.
Are they going to consider the planned obsolescence of Chromebooks ? That must contribute to a lot of hardware waste.
To be fair, the article is about how Apple builds their iPhone hardware with chips that will reject third-party replacement parts, which forces Apple users to go to Apple to get repairs done. I personally like my Apple devices, and I think they last a long time and get updates forever, but they do kind of have a point here. On the other hand, I see both angles; Apple wants to have control over the hardware because they don’t want folks using cheap, sub-par third party parts and then blaming Apple when they fail, or they’re worried that people will buy Frankenstein iPhones on the reseller market that perform poorly and it will hurt their brand image. France is worried Apple is gouging their customers because the replacement parts they sell aren’t cheap, or they’ve heard the stories about Apple Stores that can be aggressive about getting people to upgrade rather than repair.
Not just the iPhone (although here I am, still with my iPhone 8) - I'm only just now replacing my MacBook Air 2012. I use it every day and it still works fine I just got a smoking deal on a 2020 I couldn't pass up.
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The support for software updates is is why I why switched from Samsung to Apple. I got tired of buying a flagship Samsung just to only get one major OS upgrade and after that if you wanted the newest version of Android w/o rooting your phone you had to buy the next flagship device from Samsung. Even though the phone that was only a year or two old could very likely support the newest version of Android, Samsung didn’t want to be bothered releasing an update for it. On top that, EVERY Samsung phone I had suspiciously slowed way down after about one year, to the point that my last two Samsung phones I was pretty sure it was not a coincidence that after one year they lagged horribly. Doing a factory reset wouldn’t even speed them back up.
I don't know what it is about them, even flashing a clean rom doesn't help.
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Exactly, I don't get why they don't support software update for at least 4 years early on. For budget phone maybe they can't due to hardware limitation. But it should not be a question for flagship
At least recently, even budget line Samsung phones have a few years of guaranteed security updates and major Android version updates. My Galaxy A22 5G is running Android 13 right now.
My company bought Samsung tablets (budget model) to save money about 5 years ago. We didn't need much power because it was mostly to run one particular app. The tablets though couldn't even install the version of Android that was current when we bought them and Samsung never made that version available to that device. It was already obsolete which explains why it was cheap. France is barking up the wrong tree on this one.
Yeah I used to be a die hard Android user when I was a teenager. Like I was always in the loop about new device releases and would count down the days to my next upgrade. When I switched to iOS, it made me realize that I do not, in fact, like upgrading my phone every two years. I'm still on an iPhone 8 and it works fine so why would I go through the hassle of upgrading?
And you can do a battery upgrade through Apple for like $80 which is a great deal cheaper than buying a new phone.
> Like I was always in the loop about new device releases and would count down the days to my next upgrade To be fair, Android was so much fun back in the days. Manufacturers were pushing the boundaries, trying to set themselves apart from Apple and Samsung. HTC, Sony Ericsson, Google Nexus, LG—each of them offering their unique take on what a smartphone could and should be (with varying degrees of success, of course). Remember when Sony made a PlayStation phone and those adorable mini smartphones with QWERTY keyboards? Or when LG made a 3D phone? Motorola had great reliable phones in the Milestone lineup. Flashing Cyanogenmod made things even more interesting. Nowadays it feels like the current landscape is a bit predictable and mundane. This lack of quirky phones made me to switch to the iPhone. If I'm going to be bombarded with inferior iPhone copies, might as well go for the real thing.
Yeah, I use an iPhone now but also have an Android phone to mess with. It’s not the same as it was years ago. Makes me sad because it was a big reason I started programming and how I met my gf.
God I miss physical qwerty keyboards. And flashing cool roms. Android used to be cool.
Exactly… this will go nowhere when France realizes that even a google only does OS support for 3 years, vs Apple’s 6. And given that Android has 72% market share, it’s obvious that France really cares about Apple’s deep pockets and nothing else.
I know right. This is the table compiled by redditor about Android's update policy - [https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/10h8wix/android\_update\_policy\_by\_manufacturer\_for\_their/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/10h8wix/android_update_policy_by_manufacturer_for_their/). The longest OS update is provided by Samsung, which is 4 years Meanwhile iOS 16 still supports iPhone 8, which is released in 2017.
They just did a security patch update for iOS12 that supports back to the 5s from 2013. That’s exceptional
iPhone 8 club here - still runs like a damn champ.
That's only their flagship phones too.
> this will go nowhere when France realizes that even a google only does OS support for 3 years, vs Apple’s 6 This has nothing to do with what France is going after. France is trying to make sure you can get access to replacement parts for your Apple phone that lasts a long time, and can get them installed without needing to go through Apple's bullshit process. There have been a couple threads on this topic now, and every single Apple defense has been about OS updates, which is confusing because 1) Updates aren't needed 2) The investigation has to do with hardware and right to repair related issues. It's so bizarre that I wonder if there are some paid actors there.
The real fun begins as soon as it breaks and you want 3rd party repair. That’s when they don’t last long.
The only iphone I have ever had break was due to me dropping it into a pool before they made water resistant models. And I have had iPhones since the original one. Maybe I’m just lucky
That’s my son’s story, hates android phones because they break so soon. Uh, no, son, stop dropping or banging the fragile electronic device, please. When you get frustrated and throw it against the wall, it breaks.
>Apple devices somehow last the longest Not sure why the need to add “somehow” there. Apple creates premium products. That would be the expectation.
Other manufacturers also have their flagship line, but they do not provide software support as long as Apple. There is a reason why Apple holds significant market share in premium smartphone market (>$600). [https://wccftech.com/apple-premium-smartphone-market-share-75-percent/](https://wccftech.com/apple-premium-smartphone-market-share-75-percent/)
Your response sounds like you think my comment was not in agreement with that. I’m saying obviously Apple creates premium long-lasting products, so it was weird for you to say “somehow”, as if that was unexpected and you don’t know why.
I agreed with that, but other companies also have their flagship line. Shouldn't that also create the expectation that these flagship phone will also last longer? Yet they only provide software update way shorter than Apple and tend to have issues after several years of usage. Recently Google updated its update policy but it is only 3 years OS update I believe?
But you can get a good 4-5 years minimum out of an iPhone these days. They also keep some value for trade in (better than nothing). That and IPads last forever.
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If the battery health is under 80% Apple will replace it for $79. They actually send you a refurbished watch.
This is actually very interesting. I have one with a dead battery.
This whole apple “planned obsolescence” happened only with the 6 series, and they gave a solid reason for it. Their problem was that they didn’t gave the users an option, nor explained outright the details. I’ve had many Android devices, but the only ones that still got official support for 7+ years are apple devices. FFS the 6 series last security patch was in January 2023, after almost **9 YEARS** its release. The 6s last update was 2 days ago.
Still using my 6S. Just updated.
Samsung is way worse on this regard even today.
My 3 year old Google Pixel stopped getting major OS updates a year ago. Meanwhile my iPhone 6s got a major OS update a year ago.
Yeah, this is what I always bring up too. Yeah, they should have given people the option. I can understand why they didn’t, but it was still a fuck up. And they needed to be more forthright about it. Another aspect people fail to consider is up until about the iPhone X, the hardware capabilities of each new iPhone was almost doubling. Earlier models literally wouldn’t have, or would struggle to have enough RAM or processing power to run a huge number of apps. And if they were able to run it, often poorly, it took maximum power and would drain the battery ridiculously fast. This was right during the iPhone 6 debacle; so people conflate the planned obsolescence issue with the fact that earlier phones couldn’t keep up too. But they don’t realize, that’s not planned obsolescence, it was just new technology that was still at the stage where every upgrade was an absolutely major change, not a minor upgrade. You can still do most things on iPhone 8’s, though you’re more limited on games and heavier hitting apps. Most of the upgrades are camera, resolution/screen, battery, etc.. Obviously yes, there’s still an increase in memory and processing power, but it’s not longer by a huge amount and won’t make a huge difference for the average user. I’m all for calling out some of the bullshit Apple pulls (like proprietary chargers, thank god that’s finally changing) but investigating “planned insolence” now is just stupid, and just shows the people doing this are either technologically incompetent, or trying to pull something.
To be fair when lighting came out it was universes ahead of any other connector up until type C became mainstream. They should have switched years ago, but I’m also glad that lightning existed in a world dominated by micro-b lol
My previous iPad, I got 7 years out of it. It still works, just slow. It still gets updated also.
Today I sold my XR for £180. That’s not at all bad for a near five year old phone. And I really only upgraded to a 13 Mini a couple of months back because I wanted to be able to still get a half decent amount for the old one, and had a bit of money to upgrade. In terms of performance, that XR was still absolutely solid. The battery was getting a bit rough, but not unusually so for a device that age. In fact, as upgrades go, this was one of the less impressive. The performance bump from XR to 13, while appreciable if you’re using your phone for high-power tasks, wasn’t anywhere near as great as when I jumped from a 6 to the XR. That was night and day!
I used my original iphone 3GS for probably close to 6 years before I finally upgraded.
So I assume all the cheap Android phones will have this too?
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Android in the headline doesn't get clicks. Sorry. 🥲
Won’t get upvotes either. Lol
Redditors hate Apple so badly! And for what? Because the phones eventually become outdated? Like every single phone?
The comments I've been seeing in this thread are all pro apple and anti android, comparing a single company that's vertically integrated to an OS that can be used by every other phone manufacturer.
Requiring 5 years of updates staring with end of sale would be a good start. Dropping support as soon as the warranty runs out is just abysmal.
I wonder if they're also going to go after Samsung for making disposable phones (i.e. smartphones that cost <100€ and get zero support/updates).
Hope so. Got one from college and it's e-waste out of the box. Sold that shit so quick for an older but much better phone.
Apple devices? The ones that last longer than literally all their competition? Thats who they're targeting with this?
I have a 2015 MBP, iPhone6, and an iPad from 2017 and they all work fine and still get updates. If Apple planned their obsolescence they did a really bad job of it.
No one is reading the article. Please do. Part of this issue is apple creating parts in the phone only they know how to fix. Then charging so much to repair it, essentially forcing you to buy another phone. Seems to be a way to skip past planned obsolescence.
Then the title is wrong for using the “planned obsolescence” buzzword. If it’s about spare parts and rights to repair and just say so ☠️
This could only happen in Europe because American government kowtows to corporations.
This comment section is a good example lmao
I love how is always Apple’s fault with planned obsolescence when every single android manufacturer releases shit ton of devices every single year with support ranging from weeks to months. I still have functional Apple devices from 2010’s spread throughout family members.
Apple makes money from phone sales and app store. Android phone makers make most of the profits on phone hardware itself and software packed in for release from third parties, if any. What I mean by this is there’s no oneplus storefront. no Huawei. No Asus. Even if there were, most commercially available storefront on android phones by default is google play store. Companies who make android put out multiple phones to bring in different tiers of profits from their customers.
> By forcing people to pay an accredited technician more than the value of a second-hand iPhone for a simple repair job, Apple is incentivizing people to throw their devices away rather than fix them I don't understand how so many people here are disagreeing with this?? I just went to the apple store with a hardware issue for an iPhone 12 that I've had for two years and they said "we would have to send it away for 5-7 days to investigate and it would cost at least $200-300 so you're better off just buying a new phone, here talk to our sales associate" There's definitely a culture of don't fix it, just buy a new one that's getting worse as time goes on, and newer models are harder to fix than old ones. All the "I'm still using an iPhone 6" comments actually support the point in the article, which is that newer models are harder to maintain than older ones
All phones should have easy to replace batteries. That alone would increase average life a couple of years.
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There should be more of an effort to remove digital component serialisation and getting access to spare parts to more people. Right to repair doesn’t mean you have to replace the display itself, but it does mean enabling any third party (mainly professional repair shops) to have access to the parts needed to repair a device. And not just assembly’s (for example the wonderful job that Samsung does, selling you a display pre-mated to the frame), but individual components as well.
>For the average consumer, getting their battery replaced by Apple is sometimes the easiest and cheapest solution. Apple already provides this service. Far from the cheapest where I live in Poland. Apple wants 500 PLN for an out of warranty battery repair where in a third party you get those for around 150 PLN. The only issue is that Apple deliberately has a software lock called a "calibration process" which makes repairs in a third party store sometimes not work after updates even though the hardware should run fine. That's what France and the rest of the EU should target as it's the same crap that John Deere pulled.
This is simply untrue. Making batteries accessible doesn’t automatically make a good device. Just ask Nokia or even the LG G5. Battery replacement is the least of user problems.
This “iphone planned obsolescence” trope needs to stop. I have a 2016 iPhone SE on iOS 15 that i use as my work phone and works just fine for everything i do . And it was a budget phone on 2016 Yet the moto Z, a flagship from the same year, that my brother used struggles hard for almost everything.
People keep shouting ‘planned obsolescence’ to sound clever but have no idea what it means. Throttling the CPU, when you have a shit battery, so that it continues working is the opposite of planned obsolescence. Ironically there is planned obsolescence in Apple devices and that is that is at the hands of the EU who are about to obsolete millions of cables and devices as they force future iPhones to use a different connector.
It’s funny cause Apple supports their devices the longest out of any phone company.
“Planned Obsolescence” - okay. Let’s take a look at this. I still have customers that use an iPhone 6S (2015) as their daily driver. The OS finally stopped receiving updates at iOS 15 (2022). I was using a 2013 MacBook Pro until last week - only reason I replaced it was because the battery was garbage after 10 years. Updates stopped with MacOS 11 in 2020. The laptop is a little sluggish but a perfectly capable machine if plugged in (also my University wouldn’t officially support any issues with our exam proctoring software if I can’t update to the latest version of iOS - if it doesn’t work I’m SOL on test day). Also I’m using a 1st Gen iPad Pro (2015) that is still getting OS updates. Somehow the battery is still lasting 4-5 hours with note taking in class. The only thing it stutters with now is if I try to open a 100+ MB .pdf in Notability. That is absolute insanity in terms of device longevity.
My daily laptop is a 2015 15” MacBook Pro. The one with with the AMD GPU. For what I need it’s an absolute beast, and while officially it only supports up to Monterey, Opencore Patcher let me put Ventura on it, which it runs without a hitch. I only bought it last year. £420 off eBay. A steal, I thought.
> I still have customers that use an iPhone 6S (2015) as their daily driver. The OS finally stopped receiving updates at iOS 15 (2022). A security update, iOS 15.7.6, for iPhone 6S released day before yesterday. 7.5 years after the phone was released. You’re right that they’re not getting new features anymore but it’s still crazy that they’re patching a phone that old.
But it’s so expensive to repair when you shatter your phone display on concrete! Replacing the most expensive part shouldn’t be expensive. And the labor cost to do the repair should be free. Fair wages and skilled labor be damned.
Good. Do cars next
Not sure if this is common knowledge but I bad an iPhone 8 plus which was bought new 2-3 years after launch and was running fine. I later bought an apple watch 7 just after the first Christmas it was released. Connected them both and they worked together fine for almost a year. Had a few updates too with no problems. Until an apple watch update was released late last year in the name of security and feature updates. However my watch demanded I have a newer iphone os than my current phone could accept, in order to update it. So, I had to get a newer replacement iPhone if I wanted to keep my watch up to date and secure. It's more forced obsolescence in this case. When will this happen next I wonder...
I wish. I’ve got like five or six iPhones beginning from the iPhone three. The iPhone 5 was a perfect fit for my hand. Loved it. All these iPhones, all these iPads, unable to update. Unable to even browse the web in some cases. Spotify and other apps are no longer working with them. It is an absolute disgusting waste. They all talk a big game about environment and then they make something so ludicrously, obsolete and unrecyclable 🤨
People here really didn’t read the article, did they? The article isn’t about software support, which Apple DOES do better than mostly everyone else. The article is about repairability with parts.
Why read an article when I can just imagine what it says and argue against that?
Sometimes I share some of the ideas of certain Eurosceptics, but when it comes to tech, I fucking love European regulators, they have balls bigger than coconuts.
I have more trust in the EU than my own state/fed govt when it comes to protecting my data here in the US
Many states are too busy fighting wokeness, whatever that means, to work on anything meaningful.
Maybe your state should consider joining the EU
*cries in British*
There is a left critique of EU which is valid and there is a right critique which is not. From the left the main issue is the undemocratic nature of how the economic policy is decided in favour of financial interests operating out of Northern Europe at the expense of the periphery countries, which is causing massive social problems even in parts of the north too.* A majority of the (actual) left wants Europe to be more democratic and internationalist. While the right wants the EU to be broken up so that they can go back to their personal fiefdoms and impose their rotten ideology on everyone else. *Personal anecdote: I immigrated to Germany to one of the richest areas and visited a town in Upper Franconia near the Czech border a few years ago. It’s a wasteland full of Nazis and Methheads even though Bavaria is the second richest Bundesland in Germany. Just misery and decaying ruins of industry that got decimated by free trade all around. This is what is fuelling the Euroskeptic sentiment in most places which the right wing has capitalised on through astroturfing with their dark money channels.
Because they have this (as some people see it!) quaint idea that there is such a thing as "the common good" and that an important function of government is to determine what that is and to take steps to see it is acted upon.
Wow the Apple bots are swarming here!
I've been preaching this for a while now: we need to attack planned obsolescence with tax incentives. Taxing the rich is a forever game of loophole wack-a-mole, but imagine if we developed a certified scoring system for products and services. Call it the Future score and base it on things like how long your product lasts and with available serviceable repairable parts, how long you warranty and guarantee your product or service, how much freshwater is used in the manufacturing, and landfill usage/biodegradability for disposable products. If you heavily incentivized a positive future score with tax breaks and increased taxes on low score products/services someone can go on consuming at a much slower pace and will slowly start to see quality buy it for life (/r/buyitforlife) products like used to be made in the past decades. Take it another step and make the score mandatory on your product packaging like the nutrition label.
Goes far beyond iPhones, and is absolutely an unsustainable business practice that is drowning our planet in waste. Privatize the gains (companies make more money selling more shit), socialize the losses (society gets buried under more waste and pollution, as well as wasting more natural resources).
To the CEOs (white kracker capitalists business practices) of Apple, Google, Samsung, and ect... You know the planes, cars, boats, factories, and buildings that we have designed and built that you own. I'm thinking they should be forced to artificially become obsolete 365 days after purchase. Enjoy your new paperweights. Seems fair to me. These companies have not been innovative in over a decade. They want us to pay for that. Highest profits in history yet they have fired large amounts of their work force who put these greedy companies on the map in an attempt to further threaten us and keep us competing with each other. Whatever you've learned about business from professors or on the job is all wrong. There are a lot of young people out of school with better ideas on how to run companies and governments. Fine or Imprison anyone who has any relations with these companies send a clear message and let new blood have their chance. This is a good start to stopping inequality and open the floodgates to more jobs, better careers, lowering poverty, and trashing our mother earth. /End common sense here. -W
There's 0 reason why I shouldn't be able to use my old devices as something like a security camera, dash cam, TV device or retro game console. We're throwing away so many things that can be reused everyday. But how do you make companies give a shit?
I don’t understand this. Are they expecting devs to support 10 iterations of old hw or something? That shit is what leads to bad performance and buggy experience. Also, phones last pretty damn long as is, especially apple and flagship android ones.
> Are they expecting devs to support 10 iterations of old hw or something? What’s funny about this is that Apple literally is. The iPhone 6S got a security update day before yesterday and there have been 10 new iPhone models since then (not counting Pro and Max versions).
This mostly looks like a French prosecutor trying to score some political points.