so this is something that I find interesting.
every tech company was plagued with issues at one point or another, apple had their fair share and so did any other company. the thing is - when a flaw is found on apple products people blow it to huge dimensions. apple customers (me included) expect perfection, we expect a flawless product right out of the box, but when we don’t get it we judge apple quite harshly.this is some thing iv’e never noticed with any other tech company. why?
I think this comes down to marketing and reputation.
as an example, let’s compare Apples reputation with Google and Samsung - the companies making the leading android flagships in the iPhone pro line price range:
Google is known as software company, people see their pixel line as the only way to get the vanilla android experience without bloatware - as such, they don’t expect the pixel line to be in the forefront of hardware innovation - and indeed their tensor chips are extremely underwhelming. people buy pixel phones for vanilla android and have no other expectations.
Samsung always had a reputation for half-assing new technologies and rushing them in order to be the first with a product utilizing the new technologies in the market. this is evident back in the days of the galaxy s4 which had face unlock years before apple launched Face ID, and in some parts of the world used their own exynos chip which was the first octa core chip utilizing ARM’s big.little in a smartphone - problem was that the face unlock didn’t work more than 50% of the time, and the exynos chip had a design issue that allowed either the 4 performance cores to be active or the 4 efficiency cores, which resulted in the galaxy s4 running slower and hotter than the iPhone 4 with a dual core chip. this tradition continues over the years with the galaxy watch, curved displays, and foldable phones. as a result, while on paper the galaxy phones are technological marvels, this doesn’t translate well to real world use as they are full of gimmicks and bloatware and become sluggish after very little time.
now we get to Apple. apple always had the reputation of a high quality brand. they would be behind the competition in terms of features, then roll out a feature that would not work seamlessly and perfectly for the end user.
but not only that - unlike other tech bands, Apple also brands their products as a fashion statement and a status symbol. comparing an iPhone to to any other flagship phone is like comparing a Swatch to a Rolex, sure, both are watches and both tell the time, but a Rolex is made from premium materials, with utmost precision and regard to little details.
the way Apple markets their own brand causes their customer base to expect perfection from them.
obviously this affects how mistakes made by apple are blown out of proportion and remembered for years at a time while Samsung’s exploding battery fiasco has fizzled out and is largely forgotten by now.
but this also comes into play in what we expect when we buy an apple product:
- when people complain about cosmetic imperfections in their apple products the comments are encouraging them to replace it. since this is unacceptable for an expensive apple device to be imperfect, while for other manufacturers, the comments ae mostly “it’s a tool, use it and stop worrying”
- people are willing ro engage in endless replacement loops hoping to find their perfect unicorn device that has not even the smallest scratch, nick, dent, scuff, display unevenness or any other imperfection.
- even I, when I buy an apple product I inspect it the same way I would an expensive watch or piece of jewelry, and I always find some kind of blemish. I only recently learned to lower my standards as I come to realize that the perfect unicorn device does not exist and trying to endlessly replace devices will only waste my time and not bring me closer to getting said perfect unicorn device.
I think this could be solved in 2 ways:
- lowering expectations - change the marketing strategy so that the brand is no longer synonymous with premium quality, and lower prices. but this would of course hurt Apple’s brand image which differentiate them from other tech companies
- raise standards - implement stricter QC protocols, send Apple’s own QC engineers to oversee the process in factories, make warranty more flexible, maybe release devices that allow for certain cosmetic issues to be fixed on the spot, similar to how a watchmaker can polish watches. this would obviously cost a lot of money, and i’m not sure it is even possible at the large rates most apple products are manufactured at.
what do you think? is that even a problem? if so, how should it be addressed?
I will address your concerns in regard to both mobile and computer repairability:
repairability of mobiles - this is a universal problem - mobile phones have to be so portable that when you don’t use them you don’t even notice they’re here - that means that you have to pack as many components as possible in the least amount of space possible - that means that a lot of times components will be not only glued soldered together, but will actually be part of the same integrate circuit, to save space. this is universal - most phones receive a score of 4, only a few receive a higher than that, and they are mostly niche devices where this is the part of their premise. the reason iPhones do not receive a repairability score of 7 is because of the software lockdown, where apple limits the functionality of non-verified parts. I actually believe apple handles the software lockdown in a way that maintains a good balance between privacy and right to repair, where if a non-verified component is recognized, the user gets a notification and features related to that component that could have an impact on the users privacy are disabled.
repairability of computers - it’s true indeed that in the days of the intel “all-flash architecture” MacBooks repairability was abysmal because apple chose form over function - and you can see that best in the trash can Mac Pro where components that should have been upgradable we’re soldered to maintain the sleek and compact form factor. since then apple listened to it’s customers and today the situation is very different.
a lot of the reparability issues of the Mac lineup stems from the use of apple silicon - the apple silicon has what they call a unified memory architecture which basically demands that the RAM will be a part of the SOC’s integrated circuit, that’s true for even the Mac Pro which is extremely modular. the storage indeed soldered on the motherboard for laptops and Mac mini in order to save space, but for the Mac Studio and Mac Pro the storage is removable. other than that - overall all the Mac lineup is quite modular and easy to repair hardware wise but the software lockdown issue exists here as well.
overall, even if the move towards repairability was forced on apple by legislator, I still think it’s a move I the right direction and will allow for cheaper and quicker repairs as apple moves towards in-store repairs instead of replacements and allows 3rd parties and personal users to order genuine parts and repair manuals.