Why the hell did that stop

Might is the key word. I honestly doubt it will be like in the old days where you just pop the lid and put a new one. EU requires replaceable battery by the end user but it doesn't state how simply that can be done. Am expecting to see something like few screws at the bottom of the phone and stuff like that. But even that will be awesome.

People misunderstand this rule.

It's not about popping batteries out, but instead about making them more easily replaceable (so no gluing them in place kinda thing)

But even then it only applies if the battery degrades by more than a certain amount over the course of 2 years. If it doesn't, or if it's over a certain capacity, they don't need to do anything different.

What phones even still do? Sonys? Low end Samsungs? Fairphone?

Why

I think it is because the EU listened to the people. This is what you get when elected representatives are not bankrolled by big business, and are allowed to enact legislation that doesn't only benefit one side.

It's also 10x easier to achieve IP67 water resistance with the battery sealed off. Having a removable battery would require more engineering contrary to shareholders' wishes.

Because we still fucking buy them

My phone is a 2021 model and still has a 3.5mm jack and a memory card slot.

I'm finding plenty use in my phone without those things.

i haven’t used wired headphones since a few years before jacks went away, and i have never missed that effing cable

IR blasters are fine, so few TVs even use them now. Storage, eh, 512 is default these days and I'm only using 25% of that (assuming you meant storage and not memory).

Headphone jacks and replaceable batteries are huge though. I'm still pissed about that.

I still keep my old phone on my desk and put it in my bag because is has weeklong battery when i dont use it and it has an ir blaster.

OP up in here learning about late-stage capitalism like 😲

Who needs a micro SD when you can pay a subscription cloud service for the rest of your life???? - morons responding to me every time I lament the need for an SD card

Not to mention if your screen gets fucked you can remove the card and have all your photos / movies instantly

This drives me crazy. An iPhone 15 pro max with 256gb of storage is 1199 and the 512gb is 1399.

So $200 for an extra 256gb. Meanwhile a fast, name brand, 1tb micro SD card is about $100.

They still do. My 2021 model phone has dual SIM, with one of the slots being enabled for either a SIM card or a SD card.

Phones that use those are still relatively easy to find tho.

Unfortunately we still see too many people push the "but my IP rating" narrative without realising that engineers are perfectly able to design gaskets for all kinds of applications.

Some phones with removable batteries even had them and were (to a certain degree) waterproof.

The ONLY reason phones are no longer servicable is profits. Why extend a product's lifespan if you can just frustrate the consumer to the point where they will just buy another one?

The Galaxy S5 was IP67 waterproof and had a removable battery and a headphone jack.

My casio watch is waterproof. [100M Water Resistant] And it has a user replacable battery. With a gasket inside and cool looking screws. (yes, I consider screws to be cool) Also, it costs less than $20

I'm not even sure thinness was something consumers ever would have demanded (at the sacrifice of battery life) if the mfrs hadn't pushed it as a selling point.

In the flipphone days I didn't know many people who didn't have at least one spare battery, so they could swap to a fresh one on the go without having to charge, or bought extra thick batteries with higher capacity, extending the back of the phone.

Then when smartphones had removable batteries, lots of people still did those things. And all during that time I remember many reviewers and consumers reacting to many of the "thinness" claims with "I'd really like a bigger battery instead."

I also remember it being proven that apple's removal of the headphone jack impacted neither waterproofing nor thinness, despite their claims. (But then of course one by one others started following suit.)

I think it's better for mfrs and that's the only reason. It saves them money on mfr, or gets phones tossed in the bin faster. Possibly both.

I'd still take 2 or 3 more mm of thickness for an amazing battery.

You can have ip68 removable battery phones. Check out samsung xcover

Same here

They say stuff like repairability, durability, not using child slavery, yada yada not important

the easily replaceable battery is what really caught my eye and brought me to the yard!

I kinda hate the fact they took of the headphone jack. Conveniently, they started selling their own buds with that launch

If you don't mind me asking, what country are you in?

I know murena sells in the US, but I've always avoided it because it seems like buying parts is still going to be a PITA, and what's the point of a repairable phone if you can't get parts?

It really sucks that they charge so much money for the storage difference. Why are the pricing tiers based on the storage? It's so strange.

Anyways, I recall having a lot of issues with external storage in the past. Like Android just didn't integrate that shit properly. It was kinda painful having the phone data and photos in separate places. Don't remember specifics, I just know I constantly wished they were a single location.

I blame Apple. They slowly got rid of features and still sold a shit ton of phones. This is obviously more profitable so other companies followed.

I ended up buying a Motorola razr because at least the fucking thing fits in my pocket for once. That's honestly the biggest tangible benefit I've gotten out of a phone purchase in a while.

Each iteration of phone seems more like something I don't want to even be involved with. Maybe I'll just buy a light phone next time.

So you're telling me that capitalism works, and that it's working as intended.

I agree that this is a result of capitalism. But I would surmise that this is exactly the standard by which capitalism is based. Reduce complexity, reduce operating costs. That generally means that whatever you're making is going to be generic with no customizability and no ability to be repaired or changed by the end user. Complete vertical integration with optimizations in productivity, materials cost, and other operating expenses, all while charging "as much as the market will bear"

All Fairphones, not just the 3, of course.

Awesome! Now plug in a set of wired headphones without using a dongle. Oh, wait...

Ah yes, the software battery.

The stupid part is that they will buy phone cause it's 0.1mm thinner and then slap on 3mm phone case on top.

I never met anyone that said they wanted a thinner lighter phone.

I've met tons of people that would take a half inch thick brick of a phone if it came with an equally big battery that could last days between charges.

You could plug one into the USBC port.

Apple did it. The rest followed.

More like, "what if it cuts our incessant growth in sales?!"

Likely being provided to a business rather than a consumer means that there's incentive to make a product with what the purchaser wants.

Capitalism removed!

I wish capitalism was removed.

Also so that phones require more frequent replacement. Usually the battery goes first. It doesn't hold a charge or undervolts and slows down the phone. They want you to buy a new phone every two years.

I feel like the parts separating had a lot to do with saving the phone as a whole. It must be absorbing and dissipating some of that energy from the fall rather than all that energy being directed into the phone when it stays together.

I remember my old phones would fly apart from a fall but they'd never suffer any meaningful damage.

But the biggest reason for non removable battery is protection from water damage soo.....

Come on, give us a name. I need to replace my phone and something repairable appeals.

Did they solve their quality problems in the newest iterations? I had a 2 and a 3, and boy were those pieces of crap. Not the 3 I had to replace so many modules over its life span of 5 years that it kind of defeat the purpose, as it probably was a total of electronics enough for three phones. And it had so many weird bugs which took months to fix (the mic stopping to work after using a certain app, the not working auto brightness, just to name the annoying ones).

I really, really like the idea behind the Fairphone, but I just could not see past the crappiness of the phone (especially at their price point).

Is fairphone compatible in the US? Or would another phone work with US carriers?

The EU, despite (valid) criticisms and pravacy mis-steps, is right now the only large, powerful organization fighting for consumer rights. I wish I, as an American, could support them, because the laws the EU is passing benefit me as well.

Go EU, indeed!

I've been using Google's keyboard for like...10 years now. When has it ever not been the best? I'd tried so many alternatives.

I mean it's not that crazy. If they're removable, you need to design the batteries themselves to be a bit more rugged and harder to puncture.

I.e. cladding the cells in a relatively thick metal casing rather than a thin pouch

What the fuck is a high powered toilet? I want one of those!

Fp 3?