Apple Forces Recyclers To Shred All iPhones and MacBooks (vice.com) 224
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Apple released its Environmental Responsibility Report Wednesday, an annual grandstanding effort that the company uses to position itself as a progressive, environmentally friendly company. Behind the scenes, though, the company undermines attempts to prolong the lifespan of its products. Apple's new moonshot plan is to make iPhones and computers entirely out of recycled materials by putting pressure on the recycling industry to innovate. But documents obtained by Motherboard using Freedom of Information requests show that Apple's current practices prevent recyclers from doing the most environmentally friendly thing they could do: Salvage phones and computers from the scrap heap. Apple rejects current industry best practices by forcing the recyclers it works with to shred iPhones and MacBooks so they cannot be repaired or reused -- instead, they are turned into tiny shards of metal and glass. "Materials are manually and mechanically disassembled and shredded into commodity-sized fractions of metals, plastics, and glass," John Yeider, Apple's recycling program manager, wrote under a heading called "Takeback Program Report" in a 2013 report to Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. "All hard drives are shredded in confetti-sized pieces. The pieces are then sorted into commodities grade materials. After sorting, the materials are sold and used for production stock in new products. No reuse. No parts harvesting. No resale."
User's need to take responsibility too. (Score:4, Insightful)
This is, has been, and continues to be a problem. It's easy to blame Apple but it's an industry wide issue. It's so much more profitable to sell a new product than to repair and sell a used one. Also the industry's business model is to dump the old and get the new latest product. This model will not last long if the market is full of old products. So it's not surprising that they rather destroy than repair and sell.
The solution lies on the user. At some point we have to take blame on how the industry functions. Apple would not be the mammoth it is if we did not buy and support their business model.
What Apple is doing is to make a show of their recycling effort so that most people don't feel bad about getting a new Apple product but they can still continue to sell and make the most profits. Make no mistake profits will win over recycling.
To fix this, we could pressure the company to reform their ways by buying the competition's products that follow more sustainable practices. Not likely since they are so good at selling and there probably isn't a direct replacement. Or we can pressure our government representatives to do something about it. A good candidate solution since we have slowly increased what companies must do to protect the environment. We are not at the best point but we are getting there. We need to add pressure to our reps to continue. What they've done is not enough.
The best thing we can do is to resist the pressure to upgrade our gadgets. No we don't need to upgrade every year and no we don't need the new shiny gadget that will be put in the dump in a few months. The fix starts with us.
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Why blame Apple when you can blame Apple customers who feel they need a new model every year?
Re:User's need to take responsibility too. (Score:5, Insightful)
Most users of Apple products that I know personally do not buy each new model. And the one that I know does, always sells his old one used. In fact, I can't think of anyone who would just give a working device to Apple when buying a new one. The resale value of Apple hardware almost always makes the bother of finding a buyer worth it.
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Why blame Apple when you can blame Apple customers who feel they need a new model every year?
Your meme is pretty lame. I still see a lot of iPhone 5's in use, and even some 4's. On the other hand, I know several Android phone users who get new phones whenever they read what the hot new model is.
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There was a report from somewhere last year that when the new iphone models are announced that the number of accidentally broken or lost phones increased. It was surmised that perhaps this occured subconsciously so that there would be an excuse to get a new one. Possibly this applies to Android?
http://brobible.com/life/artic... [brobible.com]
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There was a report from somewhere last year that when the new iphone models are announced that the number of accidentally broken or lost phones increased. It was surmised that perhaps this occured subconsciously so that there would be an excuse to get a new one. Possibly this applies to Android? http://brobible.com/life/artic... [brobible.com]
Very possibly could be related. People are strange.
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On the other hand, I know several iPhone users who wait in line for hours on end in front of an Apple store for a new iPhone. I also see a lot of old Android phones, old enough to the point they don't get security updates old. So, what's your point?
My point is that the original assertion that Apple Customers who want a new phone every year are to blame for phone recycling is simply incorrect.
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Just to put your solution into real world perspective, where real people live.
Recently a certain auto maker was the front page occupant of many newspapers for a huge diesel scandal (I bet you can't guess who!)
You know something? I haven't seen so many goddamned Golfs and Jettas on the road since
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Just to put your solution into real world perspective, where real people live.
Recently a certain auto maker was the front page occupant of many newspapers for a huge diesel scandal (I bet you can't guess who!) You know something? I haven't seen so many goddamned Golfs and Jettas on the road since
So the coalroller crowd has checked in.
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The fuck is a coalroller? Why the hell treat me as such for stating an observation of mine?
Coalrolling is an activity performed by some deisel vehicle owners, who alter their (usually trucks) to put out large amounts of smoke when they see people in cars like the Prius, which gets good gas mileage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Apparently this puts the roller in a superior intellectual place.
I have no idea if you are a coal roller or not - I certainly hope not. But the concept of people going out of there way to use vehicles that put out more pollutants than is legal, just reminded me of
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The best thing we can do is to resist the pressure to upgrade our gadgets. No we don't need to upgrade every year and no we don't need the new shiny gadget that will be put in the dump in a few months. The fix starts with us.
I hate to say it, but I think we've already lost this battle.
I run a Galaxy Note 3, and have done so since about its release date back in Sept 2013. For me, it's flawless - 4 monster CPUs, a great OLED screen, thermometer, barometer, hygrometer, great camera (with 4k video), LTE/MiMo, running CM13 (Android 6.0.1). I have no reason or desire to upgrade. None. I'll still be using this phone for 3 or 4 more years unless I break or lose it.
Here's the trick: I'm on my third replacement battery.
This behavior costs the incumbent manufacturers money, and they have put a stop to it by gluing batteries into devices. They all do it now. It's disgusting. And we allow it. And don't be surprised if they start chipping and authenticating the batteries in the future.
This is the battleground, and very few people seem to understand it. Gluing batteries into phones encourages users to replace them at least every two years (as they typically start just long enough to last a day, and after two years, can't do that anymore). Replacement is mandatory, for many users, after 3. Forget about 5, 6, or 10 years.
The practice should be illegal as it is a huge waste of resources, recycling or not.
If Samsung would stop overcharging their batteries, they'd last longer. That's a fact.
My iPad 2 at 5 years old and HEAVY use daily, still has nearly 100% of the battery life it did brand new, nor has the charge time changed in any noticeable way.
My iPhone 4s (although I don't use it anymore), went into the drawer with no appreciable battery life or charge time difference from new.
My current iPhone 6 Plus, going on 3 years now (I think), still lasts about 4 days of general use, and again, I haven't noticed a
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Market forces: I can "trade-in" my iPhone for a pittance (because it will be shredded) or I can sell it, working or not, for more (because it's worth more as a phone and not as a pile of shreddings)
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You bet they were. Extending the usable life-cycle of electronics has been an issue since at least the early 1990s.
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You bet they were. Extending the usable life-cycle of electronics has been an issue since at least the early 1990s.
Of course. But the reason they are bitching now is because Apple.
I have my own lifecycle extension program. Installing Linux on older machines that are too slow for modern Windows, or when MacOS has bypassed them.
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It is not just "Apple".
It is the fact that Apple tries to present themselves as environmentally friendly and behind the scenes does things in direct contrast to their image.
Is there something environmentally unfriendly about recycling the phones?
Here's the interesting thing sparky. Android users like to brag about how Android is the master of the universe, the best phone ever made and use by so many more people thn Apple.
What is their recycling policy. Apple, who demands recycling- is only a drop in the bucket. Android manufacturers need to show how tht are more environmentally responsible.
Of course, the real answer that you have tried to turn ecycling into not recy
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Is there something environmentally unfriendly about recycling the phones?
That would be the ideal situation. It will be years if and until we see that happen, I fear.
Re: User's need to take responsibility too. (Score:2, Funny)
Name one other product that can run iOS and be a phone at the same time.
Re: User's need to take responsibility too. (Score:4, Insightful)
Not a direct replacement for an Apple product?
You're serious?
Only an Apple fanatic could think something like that, given that there are indeed direct replacements for every Apple product.
Name another product that can run OS X. The only other choices are Windows, which, Windows, or Linux, which isn't nearly as user-friendly. I have friends who use both of those systems - no thank you! Only OS X gives you a *nix system that is not only very stable and configurable, but incredibly easy to use. Android is a decent imitation of iOS, looks a lot like it, but the iPhone still kills it. I mean, why do you think Apple has fanatical users?
Hate on Apple all you want. I hate them, too. Always have. But no one can touch their products, even as they try to imitate them. That's just a fact. Whether they'll be able to keep this up with Jobs gone remains to be seen, but I am not about to start using Windows.
Re: User's need to take responsibility too. (Score:4, Interesting)
That is debatable. Having used Linux for around 13 years, and OS X for about 4, I personally find Linux easier to use. The number of times I've struggled to make something work in OS X, even something as simple as turn off mouse scroll wheel acceleration and make the mouse movement less jumpy.
OS X is probably easy to use if you're happy with the default configuration and all your applications can be installed via drag and drop, but the moment you start trying to do something else, or want a different music player to iTunes, then that user friendliness just seems to dwindle away. I still don't know how to make my mouse feel right, or stop many applications from looking horrible on a retina display. I find aptitude much easier than the mix of Mac Ports and manual installation / updating.
Frankly, if I didn't need access to Microsoft products for collaboration purposes and hadn't been given a MBP by my work, then I'd happily use Linux full time (btw no, I'm not an application developer or full time programmer, just a university researcher).
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I want to know what you use on Linux which makes dealing with resolutions and mice easier than a couple of clicks in OS X. If we accept your mouse thing as a realty, I could even follow along with you; however, saying you have applications which don't look ok on a Retina display is something which I simply cannot fathom.
Please explain.
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You can get incredibly fine control over your mouse on Linux with xinput. Yes, you have to use the command line, and it takes a little experimentation, but it's all there for you to customise. To turn off mouse acceleration on OS X you need to open up a terminal and type .GlobalPreferences com.apple.mouse.scaling -1
defaults write
Then log out and back in, and frankly it still feels off. There is no way at all, short of installing 3rd party software, of turning off mouse wheel acceleration.
Mac keyboards use s
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I mean, why do you think Apple has fanatical users?
Since I have to use Apple because of software that only they have, I gotta say that the integration of the iPhone and MacOS is pretty sweet. It doesn't take a fanboi to appreciate seamless integration.
I also use Android, Linux and Windows. No solutions on those that are as seamless.
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Might as well wipe shit all over your food, then wash it and say it's clean food.
The president likes your idea and wants to appoint you to head the USDA and FDA. The savings from less regulation will be HUGE.
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No we don't need to upgrade every year
With crap like forced updates and batteries that can't be replaced, the companies are certainly trying to rectify that little weakness in their plans.
Liar.
Apple does not force updates. I ran iOS 7 on my iPad for forever, and I still run OS X 10.9 on my MacBook Pro.
As for batteries: They are replaceable. Just not as easily as you would like.
Imagine that (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple is incredibly anti-consumer and anti-environment to milk tiny amounts of additional profit. I am so shocked...
Imagine this... (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, how about imagine this scenario. Let's say Apple's recyclers are allowed to recycle components. NAND flash chips from all sorts of devices are collected - how long before some very embarrassing, sensitive, or even damaging information thought deleted from someone's phone is recovered from one of those chips?
While I am no fan of Apple nor their business practices, their current recycling method represents the best they can do while taking the precautions they need to take to ensure safety. They can'
except the NAND is encrypted (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless they've been blatantly lying to everyone, the non-volatile memory is encrypted.
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No, but Apple does (so do others [protectstar.com]); they could easily bake this functionality into their devices.
But ignore this for a moment, shall we? The plain fact of the matter is most phones are just not that interesting. A factory reset is enough for the vast majority of users.
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You can install bleeding edge OS version (iOS 10.3 in this case) on a five year old iPhone (or iPod Touch) 5.
Try that on another smart phone, regardless of brand.
Yes, consumer is first at Apple. Because they dont serve the business well and even those old phones can still make iTunes purchase.
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In my experience, iPad 1 was obsolete pretty much in just 18 months.
iPad 4 (nearly 5 years old) still runs current iOS and is quite usable.
The ARM stuff just got so much faster early on.
The ecosystem/cloud/ubiquitous computing model is pretty good in this respect, as no-one can afford to bring out an update that renders all the other gadgets obsolete overnight, well, not too often anyway.
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The iPad 1 was obsolete pretty much the day it launched - they launched it extremely close to the iPhone 4, but they gave the iPhone 4 twice the amount of RAM, meaning that the flagship brand new Apple tablet already couldn't run all the apps available...
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You can roll back. You download the ipsw archives and install with iTunes.
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Not every device can or should be repaired. I've returned devices where the exact fault couldn't be determined. It is very much pro consumer to shred that machine instea
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Apple is incredibly anti-consumer and anti-environment to milk tiny amounts of additional profit. I am so shocked...
Yeah, that's why they keep winning customer satisfaction and environmental awards.
Green Policies (Score:5, Insightful)
Data Destruction (Score:2, Insightful)
Thank you Apple for ensuring the data on my old phone won't be compromised.
This won't really matter (Score:5, Insightful)
This doesn't change anything. The people who buy into Apple mindshare will continue to buy Apple, and the rest of us will continue to repurpose old hardware for new roles and pretty much ignore the shiny trendy things. And there will be enough Apple fans for Apple to continue to make boatloads of money. And many of those fans will be all hyped up to save the earth and recycle everything and battle global warming, while not even recognizing the irony of throwing away an $800 phone every 18 months.
But we will, apparently, continue to argue about it.
Yes, because Apple buyers aren't paranoid idiots. (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple doesn't do anything to prevent anyone from reselling or giving away an iPhone or Mac--there is a thriving reseller market for both. Macs hold their value much better than PCs do, for example; specifically because they last longer. Apple itself has a refurbishment program that resells pre-owned Macs & iPhones.
This is just about what happens when Apple sends some old device to an authorized recycler. Should Apple allow that recycler to piece out individual parts and sell them on a gray market? possibly selling hard drives with customer data still on them? Or should Apple insist that they shred the devices and recycle them.
Reasonable people could disagree about which strategy is more responsible--but in the grand scheme of things to get pissed about, this is pretty lame. Do you have any idea how many electronic devices don't get recycled at all? Who recycles your old cable box? Who recycles your shoes?
It's increasingly difficult to tell the difference between Slashdot and Breitbart--the same sort of manufactured outrage exist on both.
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The last three of my MBPs are all still in use with other members of my extended family. The oldest is now over six years old but, apart from the mechanical hard disk, is still reasonably performant. It plays Minecraft just fine.
I'm on my third iPad. Both of the previous two are in use by my parents.
People seem much happier to accept hand-me-down Apple gear than PCs. That's probably a function of price of new Macs and perceived desirability. Making a computer attractive for second hand buyers is probably th
Re: This won't really matter (Score:2)
Recycling data (Score:2, Interesting)
I really like when my personal data gets recycled and reused, by someone else!!!
I haven't had an iPhone since the 4 (Score:2)
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One UK MNVO is still offering the iPhone 5S on a 24 month deal.
Go figure!!!!!!!
Load of BS (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple doesn't force anybody to do anything here. People hired by Apple are expected to do what Apple hired them to do. Apple refurbs and resells tons of devices. what it can't it recycles. Every junkyard in the world crushes tons of cars with usable parts. there simply comes a point when they are not worth the work required to reclaim them.
Sounds like a market opportunity to me (Score:2)
As much as people are upset about this there is a very logical solution to this, get in the recycling business. I imagine that a lot of people out there can't just get in the recycling business themselves but they have the choice on how they recycle their aged and/or broken electronics. You don't have to send your old MacBook to Apple, find a recycler that will not simply shred it into confetti. A question comes to mind, how did we get ourselves in this interesting situation?
Here's a problem that I see.
The free market will solve global warming... (Score:2)
if that even exists.
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What parts in an iPad 2 are worth reclaiming? Nobody wants a tablet with iPad 2 vintage components in it. Also, getting them out of the device undamaged would probably be less efficient than shredding it and sorting the materials afterwards.
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"Nobody wants a tablet with iPad 2 vintage components in it. "
If that were true then Apple would not feel any motivation to specify that they be destroyed. If Apple did not see them as potentially valuable to competitors then they'd do nothing since it would avoid any friction from potential recycling contractors and also avoid any possibility of bad press if this contractual obligation got out. My guess is that there were many people at Apple that did this math but perhaps did not anticipate all the fact
Reuse materials (Score:3, Insightful)
It stands to reason, though, that if they want to make phones from reused materials then they have to strip everything down to the raw materials so they can reuse them, no?
> After sorting, the materials are sold and used for production stock in new products. No reuse. No parts harvesting. No resale.
Sounds like they're recycling the raw materials, just not the parts. Not 100% ideal, but it beats them winding up in a landfill.
Apples intention is clear (Score:2)
Hamper reusing older equipment anywhere in the world by forcing recyclers to make it unusable - shredding it into small pieces.
Corporate rape, goes the same route as this:
http://www.npr.org/sections/al... [npr.org]
Different strokes for different folks (Score:2)
How dare recyclers recycle! (Score:3)
If the devices can be repaired or reused, people wouldn't be sending them to recyclers.
"Grandstanding effort" indeed, just not grandstanding by Apple.
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If the devices can be repaired or reused, people wouldn't be sending them to recyclers.
Rubbish!
(see what I did there?) But seriously, you are just making stuff up. People throw out all sorts or working or repairable stuff.
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Apple will refurbish and resell devices that can be rescued.
I am going to stand up for Apple for once (Score:3)
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Prevent reuse of your data (Score:2, Insightful)
Apple does a good job to prevent some advertisement company or other cybercriminal gang to reuse data you left on the hard disk of broken notebook or flash memory of your phone.
Not surprising in the least... (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone who thinks Apple cares about recycling is completely blind to what is really happening behind the scenes.
Not only Apple does not recycle crap, they also are actively spending money via lobbying to kill stuff like the right to repair bill which would help independent repair shops to fix iPhones, Macs and whatnot and prolong their lives.
The "official repair" Apple does usually ammounts to throwing away easily repairable units to force costumers to buy refurbished models or newer ones, and they are constantly pushing towards strategies to block independent repair efforts with stuff like error 53 and the more recent software blocking of fingerprint reader replacement on the iPhone 7.
With crap like eliminating "legacy ports" like the headphone jack due to them being "corageous", they've effectively pushed more bluetooth headsets and more dongles into the market which has even more toxic and non-recyclable materials that will be purchased in greater number and will be replaced or lost in a more constant rate, instead of regular headphones that requires less electronic parts.
But the company couldn't care less as long as they are making truckloads of money, which is something most corporations do anyways. It's just damn insulting that they keep trying to push this bullshit and that parts of the press swallow it whole. F*cking predatory company that keeps feeding on public misinformation.
It's known that there are no easy ways of disassembling and reusing old phones component parts to make new ones because it just costs too much more to recover whatever materials were used, but they have no qualms on feeding on regular costumers lack of knowledge on this to paint themselves as a good company that is trying to do "something" about it. Protip for those who don't know about this: it'll result in nothing, and they already know it. It's a token effort. There are no good ways of harvesting raw materials for eWaste to make new components in a financially viable manner, because if there was everyone would be doing it.
Currently, anyone that is well informed or an active part of the problem know full well that the best way of generating less waste is to use electronics for as long as possible. If smartphone companies really wanted to generate less electronic waste, they'd change release schedules and development time to force consumers to keep their damn phones for a longer period of time, plus do as much as possible to keep older units working instead of making them useless after a certain ammount of OS updates. Another way is to make the architecture more open and standardized so that electronics can be used in multiple ways - like old desktops and laptops that you can install some Linux distro and use as an HTPC or something. Of course, Apple stuff is the harderst type of hardware to do something like that.
The only thing Apple really has on their favor is that even older laptops and desktops retain some value in the used market, and some of it's users keeps their stuff even years after they purchased it. But make no mistake. If Apple could find a way to avoid that without a huge fanbase backlash, they would.
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So let me get this straight ... we have tens of thousands of these devices going into the trash and it's the industry's fault, for making a shinier new phone available each year, instead of a "more responsible" five year or ten year delay?
Not a word for the besotted user who donates their old phone to a relative, or a friend, or sells it, or just plain gives it away, in order to get the shinier one with the force-touch or the better battery or the slightly different size?
Smartphones are hot stuff right now.
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Have you tried... not upgrading your phone?
So Apple is more maintenance hostile. (Score:2)
Not only do they want to make parts that much harder to work with, they also want to make sure that the parts remain out of reach.
Functional 2nd hand devices resold for reuse (Score:2)
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I'm sorry; you're just taking this news too reasonably. Get with the program here: Apple is sending hired goons to our houses to literally grab our old phones out of our hands and grind them into a fine spicy powder, forcing us to go out and buy them again. Their 100% recyclable materials and 100% renewable energy stance is mere posturing and they are no better than Halliburton, Shell Oil, and Blackwater. Boo, hiss, et cetera.
Not too bad, all things considered. (Score:2)
I remember buying wireless cards from a seller on ebay (10-15 years ago). Those were Netgear cards (PCMCIA mostly) and they would work most of the time but fail regularly (the longer the more often...).
Turns out that the guy had sources in Asia who literally pulled these out of trash-bins at some recycler.
Netgear refused to honor any kind of warranty or responsibility for those cards.
I believe, the best way to reduce waste is to carefully consider if you actually need the product in question - and start fro
The summary mentions hard drives at the bottom (Score:2)
The summary says this specifically with respect to hard drives, which actually makes some sense, especially in the age of SSDs.
I don't know how many articles I've read here on the subject of recycling computers and the number of commenters who have said the only way to do it is to take the platters out and drive a nail through them and such.
Would you not expect Apple to do the same?
SSDs are even trickier because you can't do something like the secure wipe procedures where you overwrite with 1s and then 0s r
Doctorine of first sale (Score:2)
Apple Certified Repair tech says Apple sucks (Score:2, Interesting)
Posting anon as I'm a certified Apple repair technician. But I hate them. So much.
The design choices they continue to make with each generation are getting progressively more anti-consumer for no good reason. Glued-in batteries. Keyboards that are part of the chassis and require full disassembly of the entire laptop plus $150 for the part. When keyboards and batteries are some of the most commonly-replaced items in the laptop. Soldered in memory, which is unnecessary... no Apple laptop is thinner than a SOD
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My 2010 MacBook Pro disagrees with you. Running the latest version of macOS very well thanks.
Your post was essentially fact free and biased garbage.
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My 2000 PC running Windows 10 disagrees with your 2010 Macbook Pro. As does my late '90's laptop running Mint.
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No, it doesn't. Because the 2010 Macbook is going to actually be usable with modern applications as long as they're not games requiring a newer CPU or GPU.
And so long as they don't require newer API functionality of a newer version of OSX. Oh, and I would avoid connecting it to the internet.
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What part of "Running the latest version of macOS very well thanks" did you not understand?
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Is there even one truthful statement in your comment, beyond the subject?
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The fact is, Apple is built on propoganda. Their total investment of an iPhone after it arrives in the store is only usd50.
The hardware is always 2 generations behind modern and the softwate is constricted to a seamless user interaction with software administrative privileges withheld from the owner or lessee.
Other non Apple manufacturers have tried this, like Samsung and LG claiming to own all data and the hardware itself, and they just look foolish when the software is 3rd party.
The original propoganda is that these are phones tgat can be searched under shitty "transmitting utility" codes that bring Unites States out of Washington DC. These are computers used less for communicating, a complete disrespect of concept even by Amateur Radio Relay League.standards.
100% LYING BULLSHIT.
FOAD.
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I installed Windows 10, Kodi and NextPVR on a 2006 Acer Aspire Idea 500 that came with a 32bit 1.83Ghz Intel Core Duo, not long ago.
Runs perfectly well - boots up in about 30-45 seconds from the HDD. No problems with multiple tabs in Edge, even handles the video decoding for live TV from the built-in tuner (with the drivers installed automatically).
Meanwhile my sister's struggling to open Finder on her 2015 MacBook Air (4GB RAM) because she has two windows open in Chrome and a dozen PDFs in preview.
Chrome is well-known to be the hog-of-all-resources.
I have 4 GB of RAM in the 2012 MacBook Pro, and, using Safari, I could have more than that open without any performance issues.
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Tell that to my mom who is running Windows 7 on my old 2006 Era Core Duo 1.66mhz Mac Mini.
Apple abandoned it years ago with 10.6 but it runs Windows 7 decently well.
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Core Duo 1.66mhz Mac Mini.
Damn, that's slow!
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It's not as bad as you would think. She has other computers she uses - a netbook, a 13 inch laptop and a 17 inch laptop, but the Mac Mini isn't bad for running Office 2010 or Chrome as long as an Adblock is installed.
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I think woosh is appropriate here. Technically, what you wrote was 1.66 milli hertz. Even if we assume you meant megahertz, it's still only on a par with 1980's vintage 8bit machines.
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Windows 7 was released a month after 10.6. It's not terribly surprising that it would run well enough on that hardware.
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I didn't think about it that way. But the difference is that Microsoft is still supporting Windows 7 with security patches and most new software is still supported for Windows 7. Very little software still supports 10.6.
10.6 was the last 32 bit capable OS that Apple shipped.
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Huh?
Someone made a point that Apple's hardware was designed to become obsolete faster than necessary and that you could install Windows 7 or Linux on old PC hardware. The point is, you can also install Windows 7 or Linux on old Macintosh hardware.
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MacOS support for older hardware is not terrible. While it may not stretch back a full decade, it wasn't until recently that you could say Windows worked on decade-old hardware.
And since you bring up Linux... Linux is a great way to bring modern software to old Mac hardware.
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I know that the *stated* minimum specs aren't always the *actual* minimum specs, but the ones on the box are the only ones you are going to get official support for.
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Dude, you've completely missed the point - on average, Macs running Mac OS last in active use longer than most Wintel hardware. I've seen organisations run fleets of Macs w/o upgrading the hardware, that exceed Windows XP's software lifetimes. The 10.8 comment is almost irrelevant - you know the Mac App Store automatically provides OLD versions to OLD OS versions that can't run the latest version of an App, don't you ?
This article is nothing to do with planned obsolescence - its about devices that are broke
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While it cannot run a recent version of OSX it does get updates for applications such as Safari and iTunes.
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Flamebait, really? The Apple fanbois must be trolling tonight.
I should have added the disclaimer, "in my experience."
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Recycling and reuse are completely different things. Macs have great resale value, compared to other hardware in the same categories.
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I'm pretty sure none of them want broken computers. Apple sells tons of computers as refurbs. if they can be fixed they're resold if they can't be they're recycled.
Re:Recyclers forced to recycle (Score:5, Insightful)
Say what?
Yup, the idea that components can be reused is absurd.
While re-using parts soldered onto PCB's is usually not practical, there certainly ARE components such as keyboards, displays, and drives that could well be re-used. But that's not even the real point - in may cases we're talking about fully functional devices that are being shredded. That's outright fucking criminal. Each device represents a huge investment of energy - therefore each device should be used as long as it works and someone wants it. Destroying fully functional equipment 'because business' or 'because shareholders' is stupid, shortsighted, and immoral.
Repair is likely to cost as much as buying a new one...
'Uneconomical to repair'? Most often these days, that's a pile of contrived bullshit. Manufacturers set it up that way. They do so partly by purposely making equipment difficult or impossible to service, and by charging scandalous prices for replacement parts. They also do it by having artificially low prices for their goods. If the REAL costs were factored in, (depletion of natural resources, environmental damage, climate change, the human costs of slave labour, etc.), goods would be much more expensive to purchase, as they should be. Repairability and longevity would then be not only cost-effective, but necessary, and the market for used equipment would be huge. Instead, we have companies fattening their bottom lines at the expense of future generations, in the service of a Ponzi scheme of an economy whose only guiding principle is "more growth is better, and unlimited growth is best". Which, incidentally, is the guiding principle of cancer, infections, and a whole host of other similar phenomena which rob human beings of life and dignity.
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This isn't true. Reusing your 20-year-old refrigerator is way worse than recycling it, for example. Old computers draw a lot more power than newer computers that do more work. Etc. Sure, if the thing still works and is relatively new, keep using it, but the idea that we should keep using 20-year-old computers rather than recycling them isn't true.
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Except that somebody misread the memo at Samsung and set it at 24 days.
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They make the model and serial numbers too small for a human to read.
Take a picture and zoom in. It's about the only way to read some coin-style battery numbers, cooking instructions on packages with small white text on orange backgrounds, etc. Sometimes you don't even need to take a picture - zooming in with the camera on your phone can be enough.
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I'm sufficiently nearsighted so that, with my glasses off, I can focus nicely at a distance just beyond the end of my nose. Who needs a magnifying glass?
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