this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2023
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It had been in the works for a while, but now it has formally been adopted. From the article:

The regulation provides that by 2027 portable batteries incorporated into appliances should be removable and replaceable by the end-user, leaving sufficient time for operators to adapt the design of their products to this requirement.

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

I miss replaceable batteries, but not just for sustainability. Having a spare battery with you is much, much, much,... better than carrying a power bank + cable with you, which also can't give your phone juice instantly. Also sometimes the batteries may randomly become universal, like the Nokia BL-5C currently used in many radio receivers.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Replaceable battery does not necesarily mean that they are easily swappable on the fly. This is more on the right to repair side: not using hot glue, proprietary screws or soldered-in batteries.

Quote:

A portable battery should be considered to be removable by the end-user when it can be removed with the use of commercially available tools and without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless they are provided free of charge, or proprietary tools, thermal energy or solvents to disassemble it. Commercially available tools are considered to be tools available on the market to all end-users without the need for them to provide evidence of any proprietary rights and that can be used with no restriction, except health and safety-related restrictions.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I think I'd still use a power bank, since it has a lot more charge.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

may randomly become universal, like the Nokia BL-5C

I still use a small light old Nok with no camera, with my use I can go a week between charge, and have a few more and took the batteries out a few days and recharged them all. I can probably hike in remote areas and have a month of talk time now :)

By hating android the only ones I have are friends' old phones and tablets whose batteries died and costed too much to have it replaced. I would love to try a pinephone though to install my own linux on it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

hating Android

Have you tried custom ROMs? Android is open-source project with bad shade thanks to phone manufacturers customizing it in their ways. Although in my opinion the last true Android experience was with Android 7. Since then there's been many features that got locked/removed breaking large amount of apps for security.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Have you tried custom ROMs?

No, even when I did try years ago, to break into one device to get another system in, just the concept of what it takes to do so upset my stomach. I don't even like secure-boot hoops and EFI and try to get to bios booting everything. I did try it for a while, efi, and hated it some more. Bios - mbr .. and my nearly 10y old PC is faster than I would ever need.

It is amazing what google and MS project as security, both providing dummy terminals to their supercomputer as operating systems. What is security for android if you don't trust google (same manner for MS).

One can take it further, to any hardware we use, since we really don't have open-source free hardware. Maybe pre-Ryzen AMD and possibly core2duo may have been the closest less evil alternatives to what goes around now as 99% of computing.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I dunno. Having to shutdown your phone to swap a battery is a very big negative in my mind.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I would much prefer having smaller/fewer things to carry and not having to keep my phone tethered to an extra box over having to wait like 15 seconds. How is 15 seconds without a phone a problem?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

When my battery gets low, I'm often in the middle of something. Watching a video, playing a game, chatting with people. Things I don't want to stop and have to try to resume a minute later when I could just plug in and not miss a beat.

Shutting down, swapping a battery, and restarting cannot be done in 15 seconds. I don't really think you were being literal, but you're making it seem like it would be entirely trivial. I don't think it is.

Carrying a second battery is carrying another box around

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Your battery doesn't drop from 80 to zero instantly. If you're going to be "playing a game" or "watching a video" for over an hour and your battery is already at like 40 percent, you can just swap it before you start. If you're burning through a full battery and can't be interrupted...

The reboot takes like 20. Swapping the battery with a full door does literally take 15. So yeah, maybe like 45 seconds? Is that really such an inconvenience?

And sure, a spare battery is a box. But a charging brick is a bigger box. And it needs a cable.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I support swappable batteries to avoid unnecessary e-waste or any other reason anyone has.

My arguing with you about the pros and cons of spare batteries vs chargers was misguided, because you're entitled to have your opinions and I don't see why I should care about your justifications for those opinions.