I also want something that’s supported more than 3 years so there’s a point to repairing it. Ideally, support should come from the community so it can be infinite as long as someone is willing to do the work.
I crossed them off the list after they ditched the headphone jack and the CEO tried to blow smoke up everyone’s ass as to why. Then they introduced their new Bluetooth headphones.
Unfortunately, that’s the cost you pay for a more “ethical” phone. Apple, Samsung, and all the mainstream phones are cheaper because they are subsidized by underpaid labor and sometimes even child labor.
(Not judging people who buy mainstream phones, just stating the reality.)
Thanks! I didn’t know that was part of their thing. I just thought they made the phones repairable. Has their supply chain been audited by a third party?
Yea, but with the De Minimis rule overturned by the trump administration, importing it to the US is gonna have import fees. And also a lot of fees for each part you import, making the whole “repairability” thing pointless as it cost so much.
OK, so that’s a possibility, but when you start adding a ~$30 fee on top of the cost of the part and shipping from Fairphone you’re looking at about $100 per repair, which stops making sense pretty quickly. You’re better off spending a little more money on a good device that is dust- and moisture-sealed and taking care of it for a few years.
Makes sense. But you can offset part of the shipping from the fact that you can easily do the repair yourself.
Another possibility would be the HMD Skyline. Less repairable than Fairphones, but still far easier than most other smartphones. Only 2 years of updates though.
But starting from 2027, a removable battery will be mandatory for all smartphone in the EU, which mean most, if not all smartphone will switch to removable battery. This may also make repair a lot easier.
I am of two minds on this. I love repairing electronic equipment, it’s what I do for a living, and I buy old tech to fix up all the time.
Replaceable batteries seem like a good thing, in terms of reducing waste for devices that are otherwise still useful… theoretically.
Realistically, the charge management circuitry and the battery chemistry in phones has gotten so good today that most batteries have a useful lifespan that is longer than the useful life of the device. Three years is easily doable for any mid-range phone on the market.
At five years you’re probably going to be disappointed with the battery performance, but how many people are continuing to use a 5-year-old phone? At that point the internal technology has changed substantially and there might even be a new network standard that you want to use, so you’re probably replacing the whole device even if replacing only the battery is an option.
On top of that, giving the user access to the battery means the phone body can’t be fully sealed against moisture and dust, plus the access panel is a big mechanical weakpoint which means the body will be less rigid than a fully enclosed device and thus more prone to breaking when dropped or sat on. Adding those weaknesses back into mobile devices will make them more fragile and (I predict) will lead to more frequent failure and replacement of the entire device, which will offset any waste-saving benefit from the replaceable battery.
Plus, the addional space required to fit in the replaceable battery casing, the removable access panel and the contact points for the battery means either the whole device will have to be bulkier or the battery will have to be smaller (than it would otherwise be with a permanent internal battery).
Replaceable batteries made a lot more sense in 2010 when the batteries were shit (and sometimes still NiCad) and the charge management was basically nonexistent (so the battery cycling wore it out faster). Today it’s weight and bulk, plus fragility that will probably lead to equivalent or increased e-waste.
At five years you’re probably going to be disappointed with the battery performance, but how many people are continuing to use a 5-year-old phone?
My brother has a 6+ years old Iphone, my parents both have a 5 years old Samsung Galaxy Phone (S21 and A51). None of them complains.
On top of that, giving the user access to the battery means the phone body can’t be fully sealed against moisture and dust
Do you think computer waterblocks are sealed using glue? They aren’t. Screws and a good old o-ring are all you need to make a repairable AND waterproof phone. But they don’t want a repairable phone, they want you to buy a new one whenever possible.
plus the access panel is a big mechanical weakpoint which means the body will be less rigid than a fully enclosed device and thus more prone to breaking when dropped or sat on.
I dropped my FP5 multiple time. He never broke.
My brother IPhone got a shatered back, and he had to replace the screen once for falling from a distance the FP5 just shrug off.
Plus, the addional space required to fit in the replaceable battery casing, the removable access panel and the contact points for the battery means either the whole device will have to be bulkier or the battery will have to be smaller (than it would otherwise be with a permanent internal battery).
True, but ot also don’t have to be the old pogo pin way. Any currently available battery is a removable battery given it is user accessible and isn’t glued to the board.
Today it’s weight and bulk, plus fragility that will probably lead to equivalent or increased e-waste.
I wonder… What would be the biggest e-waste? A dead battery or a dead battery with a whole perfectly functional phone attached to it?
I’m curious, how repairable? Like comfortable with a solder iron or slots and what not like a PC?
Repairable phones would be great but the demand for them hasn’t undone the cost of design for them. There’s a lot of tech in an incredibly small package, so repairable phone would still require people to have specialty equipment to repair.
Like very few people own an oven for working with BGA chips. And if we go with socket based chips, the thickness of the phone has to increase or the battery has to decrease.
Don’t get me wrong, I think an open and repairable phone would be great. But having one is an engineering challenge that most phone makers have opted to just skip putting dollars into because the demand for one doesn’t justify the cost. Your average buyer is just chasing shiny and doesn’t see repairing their dinosaur as valuable.
But yeah, I’m sure there’s plenty here that would love such a device. Sadly we are not the majority.
Imo I don’t think the goal is/should be “every part is repairable by any average person without tools” tbh. Like that would be awesome but it also isn’t realistic, like you said phones are super complicated. But making simple repairs – stuff like swapping a battery – possible for anybody is realistic imo, and then the rest should be as easy to repair as possible for local shops or someone who does have the necessary skills and equipment. At least personally I feel like that’s a good spot to aim for.
HMD (Nokia) Skyline has a cool feature where you unscrew 1 screw and can change various things like battery. Unfortunately phone itself is not impressive especially from OS update standpoint (only 2 year support for major Android versions). I would love to see this idea being copied by other manufacturers.
Unfortunately phone itself is not impressive especially from OS update standpoint
I swear to god manufacturers do this on purpose so that they can point to the low volume of sales and claim “See! People don’t really want these features” when in reality they’ve just slapped a couple good features onto a completely dog shit device.
I want a repairable phone. A phone where I can replace the battery
And screen. And buttons.
I also want something that’s supported more than 3 years so there’s a point to repairing it. Ideally, support should come from the community so it can be infinite as long as someone is willing to do the work.
Based on https://postmarketos.org/install/ the Nokia N900 can run the latest stable release of PostmarketOS.
Nokia N900 was a proper Linux-powered phone released in November 2009.
So yeah, it’s been getting over 15 years of community support so far.
Edit: Fixed typo
What’s wrong with Fairphone then? Think I’m gonna buy FP 6 when it arrives
I’ve also been looking at FP but I believe there are some issues of getting one outside of Europe.
We only get FF 4 here (US), and through a reseller (Murena). And my understanding is that there are caveats in the bands it supports.
I am in the US, and bought my FP5 through clove technologies in the UK. I’m on T-Mobile and get 5G and everything.
I crossed them off the list after they ditched the headphone jack and the CEO tried to blow smoke up everyone’s ass as to why. Then they introduced their new Bluetooth headphones.
No Jack.
They are pretty expensive for the hardware.
Unless I’m misremembering don’t they charge flagship prices but have midrange specs?
Unfortunately, that’s the cost you pay for a more “ethical” phone. Apple, Samsung, and all the mainstream phones are cheaper because they are subsidized by underpaid labor and sometimes even child labor.
(Not judging people who buy mainstream phones, just stating the reality.)
Thanks! I didn’t know that was part of their thing. I just thought they made the phones repairable. Has their supply chain been audited by a third party?
Hum… So Fairphone ?
I really wanted to buy the Fairphone 5, but they don’t ship replacement parts to where I live which makes the entire concept pointless.
Forward shipping exists.
Yea, but with the De Minimis rule overturned by the trump administration, importing it to the US is gonna have import fees. And also a lot of fees for each part you import, making the whole “repairability” thing pointless as it cost so much.
OK, so that’s a possibility, but when you start adding a ~$30 fee on top of the cost of the part and shipping from Fairphone you’re looking at about $100 per repair, which stops making sense pretty quickly. You’re better off spending a little more money on a good device that is dust- and moisture-sealed and taking care of it for a few years.
Makes sense. But you can offset part of the shipping from the fact that you can easily do the repair yourself.
Another possibility would be the HMD Skyline. Less repairable than Fairphones, but still far easier than most other smartphones. Only 2 years of updates though.
But starting from 2027, a removable battery will be mandatory for all smartphone in the EU, which mean most, if not all smartphone will switch to removable battery. This may also make repair a lot easier.
I am of two minds on this. I love repairing electronic equipment, it’s what I do for a living, and I buy old tech to fix up all the time.
Replaceable batteries seem like a good thing, in terms of reducing waste for devices that are otherwise still useful… theoretically.
Realistically, the charge management circuitry and the battery chemistry in phones has gotten so good today that most batteries have a useful lifespan that is longer than the useful life of the device. Three years is easily doable for any mid-range phone on the market.
At five years you’re probably going to be disappointed with the battery performance, but how many people are continuing to use a 5-year-old phone? At that point the internal technology has changed substantially and there might even be a new network standard that you want to use, so you’re probably replacing the whole device even if replacing only the battery is an option.
On top of that, giving the user access to the battery means the phone body can’t be fully sealed against moisture and dust, plus the access panel is a big mechanical weakpoint which means the body will be less rigid than a fully enclosed device and thus more prone to breaking when dropped or sat on. Adding those weaknesses back into mobile devices will make them more fragile and (I predict) will lead to more frequent failure and replacement of the entire device, which will offset any waste-saving benefit from the replaceable battery.
Plus, the addional space required to fit in the replaceable battery casing, the removable access panel and the contact points for the battery means either the whole device will have to be bulkier or the battery will have to be smaller (than it would otherwise be with a permanent internal battery).
Replaceable batteries made a lot more sense in 2010 when the batteries were shit (and sometimes still NiCad) and the charge management was basically nonexistent (so the battery cycling wore it out faster). Today it’s weight and bulk, plus fragility that will probably lead to equivalent or increased e-waste.
My brother has a 6+ years old Iphone, my parents both have a 5 years old Samsung Galaxy Phone (S21 and A51). None of them complains.
Do you think computer waterblocks are sealed using glue? They aren’t. Screws and a good old o-ring are all you need to make a repairable AND waterproof phone. But they don’t want a repairable phone, they want you to buy a new one whenever possible.
I dropped my FP5 multiple time. He never broke. My brother IPhone got a shatered back, and he had to replace the screen once for falling from a distance the FP5 just shrug off.
True, but ot also don’t have to be the old pogo pin way. Any currently available battery is a removable battery given it is user accessible and isn’t glued to the board.
I wonder… What would be the biggest e-waste? A dead battery or a dead battery with a whole perfectly functional phone attached to it?
For the US, its not just shipping, but also an import fee on top of that, since the De Minimis rule just got overturned by the trump administration.
I’m curious, how repairable? Like comfortable with a solder iron or slots and what not like a PC?
Repairable phones would be great but the demand for them hasn’t undone the cost of design for them. There’s a lot of tech in an incredibly small package, so repairable phone would still require people to have specialty equipment to repair.
Like very few people own an oven for working with BGA chips. And if we go with socket based chips, the thickness of the phone has to increase or the battery has to decrease.
Don’t get me wrong, I think an open and repairable phone would be great. But having one is an engineering challenge that most phone makers have opted to just skip putting dollars into because the demand for one doesn’t justify the cost. Your average buyer is just chasing shiny and doesn’t see repairing their dinosaur as valuable.
But yeah, I’m sure there’s plenty here that would love such a device. Sadly we are not the majority.
Imo I don’t think the goal is/should be “every part is repairable by any average person without tools” tbh. Like that would be awesome but it also isn’t realistic, like you said phones are super complicated. But making simple repairs – stuff like swapping a battery – possible for anybody is realistic imo, and then the rest should be as easy to repair as possible for local shops or someone who does have the necessary skills and equipment. At least personally I feel like that’s a good spot to aim for.
HMD (Nokia) Skyline has a cool feature where you unscrew 1 screw and can change various things like battery. Unfortunately phone itself is not impressive especially from OS update standpoint (only 2 year support for major Android versions). I would love to see this idea being copied by other manufacturers.
I swear to god manufacturers do this on purpose so that they can point to the low volume of sales and claim “See! People don’t really want these features” when in reality they’ve just slapped a couple good features onto a completely dog shit device.