planned obsolescence

[disassemblyline]

whats a good example of this? could be anything, doesnt have to be specific to / relate to the internet. define netscape, for example

i'll start: i bought a 25 watt soldering iron two days ago, took care of it and tinned it properly (dont worry if you have no idea what im talking about, its like changing your motor oil). im staring at the copper wire already...no amount of flux and tin and brass shavings works. the latter makes it worse somehow, lmfao. this thing cost $14 at ace hardware because i wanted to confirm something and as it turns out, its the same $3 soldering iron found at harbor freight. no surprises there

not trying to give a negative product review here, actually quite the opposite. i have used this thing well over its intended lifespan in the past two days thanks to a "dead" akai s900. cant say im surprised though https://www.forneyind.com/forney-59020-soldering-iron-25-watt

for comparison https://www.harborfreight.com/elect...30-watt-lightweight-soldering-iron-69060.html

 

[Viril.Feline.Wyyzrd]

whats a good example of this? could be anything, doesnt have to be specific to / relate to the internet. define netscape, for example

i'll start: i bought a 25 watt soldering iron two days ago, took care of it and tinned it properly (dont worry if you have no idea what im talking about, its like changing your motor oil). im staring at the copper wire already...no amount of flux and tin and brass shavings works. the latter makes it worse somehow, lmfao. this thing cost $14 at ace hardware because i wanted to confirm something and as it turns out, its the same $3 soldering iron found at harbor freight. no surprises there

not trying to give a negative product review here, actually quite the opposite. i have used this thing well over its intended lifespan in the past two days thanks to a "dead" akai s900. cant say im surprised though https://www.forneyind.com/forney-59020-soldering-iron-25-watt

for comparison https://www.harborfreight.com/elect...30-watt-lightweight-soldering-iron-69060.html

Phones.

 

[Maysam]

"planned obsolescence" would imply the designer invested some extra effort to make the product fail after a certain timespan. When people say "planned obsolescence" they are almost always talking about some China garbage that was specifically designed to have minimal production cost. Bad quality and short lifespan are just side effects of this design goal.
Real planned obsolescence would be a PCB counting off the warranty days after first use and bricking the device after that counter has finished. I believe some printers have something like that and maybe some old apple products?

 

[disassemblyline]

"planned obsolescence" would imply the designer invested some extra effort to make the product fail after a certain timespan

sir, define netscape

 

[Maysam]

sir, define netscape

you do it, idk what this is supposed to mean

 

[TinFoilHatGuy]

In the last few years on bicycles, the bottom bracket and crankset has been completely redesigned and the bearings they use now are exactly half the size that they used to be. There are more of them, and the new bearing cartridge diameter is dramatically increased, but the bearings still wear out in a year or less where I have seen the older design outlast the bicyclist's career riding bicycles in many instances. But hey, they are selling those bearings like hotcakes now.

 

[shishishi]

Easily the best example is Cuckpple devices, especially iphones. The fact that apps will not install (Even though the hardware can handle it) if the device isn't being updated anymore is scummy as fuck.

 

[Lovecraft]

"planned obsolescence" would imply the designer invested some extra effort to make the product fail after a certain timespan. When people say "planned obsolescence" they are almost always talking about some China garbage that was specifically designed to have minimal production cost. Bad quality and short lifespan are just side effects of this design goal.
Real planned obsolescence would be a PCB counting off the warranty days after first use and bricking the device after that counter has finished. I believe some printers have something like that and maybe some old apple products?

Restrictions on repair either by making parts hard or impossible to source or replace is another strategy, see Apple who locks parts to a specific device so broken devices cannot be broken down for spares nor third party parts be used without using their specific diagnostic programmer that is conveniently unavailable to repair shops that don't give Apple a huge cut of their fees. On MacBooks they also had a counter for battery charge cycles that would increment every time charging started. Accidentally pulled out your charger or unplugged it to untangle the wire or move across the room, that's a charge cycle despite maybe only running on battery for less than a minute. Battery warranty was for 1 year or 500 charge cycles, so you'd easily burn through the latter in weeks if you brought your shitebook on the go.
See also John Deere who have DRM on fucking cabin air filters.

The aviation industry have also gotten away with this shit for years and still do by invoking safety, thus turning a 3$ circuit board that blinks the wingtip marker lights on light aircraft into a 500$ black box of components with their markings sanded off and encased in resin to prevent repair.

 

[Crassmeister]

and if you catch the company bricking something they threaten to sue

Polish Train Manufacturer Threatens Hackers Who Unbricked Their Trains

A week ago we covered the story of a Polish train manufacturer who was caught using software to brick their products after they had been repaired by in independent railway workshop. Now 404 Media h…

hackaday.com

 

[SuperChongus]

Restrictions on repair either by making parts hard or impossible to source or replace is another strategy, see Apple who locks parts to a specific device so broken devices cannot be broken down for spares nor third party parts be used without using their specific diagnostic programmer that is conveniently unavailable to repair shops that don't give Apple a huge cut of their fees. On MacBooks they also had a counter for battery charge cycles that would increment every time charging started. Accidentally pulled out your charger or unplugged it to untangle the wire or move across the room, that's a charge cycle despite maybe only running on battery for less than a minute. Battery warranty was for 1 year or 500 charge cycles, so you'd easily burn through the latter in weeks if you brought your shitebook on the go.
See also John Deere who have DRM on fucking cabin air filters.

The aviation industry have also gotten away with this shit for years and still do by invoking safety, thus turning a 3$ circuit board that blinks the wingtip marker lights on light aircraft into a 500$ black box of components with their markings sanded off and encased in resin to prevent repair.

the aviation industry also gets away with it in part thanks to the faa

sir, define netscape

netscape wasn't planned a case of obsolescence, it was meant to be the monopoly

until internet explorer destroyed it

 

[Lovecraft]

the aviation industry also gets away with it in part thanks to the faa


netscape wasn't planned a case of obsolescence, it was meant to be the monopoly

until internet explorer destroyed it

Don't get me wrong, having stringent equipment standards in automotive or aviation is a good thing - but when it leads to complete monosourcing of either parts or services that allows the price to escalate stratospherically then it is a bad thing. The particular example I mentioned is from the mid to late eighties where some avionics refit shop reverse engineered a bunch of parts to show that they were nothing special that justified the exorbitant price premium. Paying 10 or even 30 times the item cost for something that has undergone stringent testing and verification can be justified, as testing is expensive. But charging 150++ times the retail part cost for a glorified blinker relay encased in resin to obfuscate the simplicity and low production cost is absurd.

 

[Likeicare]

The fact that apps will not install (Even though the hardware can handle it) if the device isn't being updated anymore is scummy as fuck.

Thats a security feature

 

[SuperChongus]

Don't get me wrong, having stringent equipment standards in automotive or aviation is a good thing - but when it leads to complete monosourcing of either parts or services that allows the price to escalate stratospherically then it is a bad thing. The particular example I mentioned is from the mid to late eighties where some avionics refit shop reverse engineered a bunch of parts to show that they were nothing special that justified the exorbitant price premium. Paying 10 or even 30 times the item cost for something that has undergone stringent testing and verification can be justified, as testing is expensive. But charging 150++ times the retail part cost for a glorified blinker relay encased in resin to obfuscate the simplicity and low production cost is absurd.

yeah the purposeful obfuscation is not a good one

Thats a security feature

obsoleting perfectly fine devices that can handle the software is not

 

[Likeicare]

obsoleting perfectly fine devices that can handle the software is not

The person said if the device is not being updated

 

[SuperChongus]

The person said if the device is not being updated

yes. but there's a difference between not giving updates to a 10 year old phone vs a 2 year old phone

 

[disassemblyline]

i know this post doesnt serve as anything useful (welcome to encyclopedia dramatica, everyone), but an outstanding soldering iron which will serve you, your children, and your chlidrens children just happens to be a hexacon. these sons of bitches make ridiculously overpowered bullshit but their 20w-25w-30w-35w irons are perfect and very difficult to kill. they simply work.

these are totally different from weller if anyone reading does understand electronics, specifically. you need specific flux for electronics, specific solder, etc. if you wanna play with that computer from the 80s you need a low wattage hexacon iron. trust me this one time, internet

i wanted to illustrate a very bad iron repairing very worthy audio equipment. it wasnt an ironic thing either, i figured "why not?". it took two shitty irons but it actually worked

edit: id strongly suggest a hexacon 25h or 26h to finish off the aforementioned shitty """"""""""forney""""""""" / chicago electric work if anyone somehow manages to read this off google search instead of another site such as gearsluts. literally touch the top of the pin for half a second and move to the next one, the tin will drop into the through-hole instantly. the circuit board needs to be upsidedown on a towel (obviously, because gravity and static electricity)

 

[Lovecraft]

i know this post doesnt serve as anything useful (welcome to encyclopedia dramatica, everyone), but an outstanding soldering iron which will serve you, your children, and your chlidrens children just happens to be a hexacon. these sons of bitches make ridiculously overpowered bullshit but their 20w-25w-30w-35w irons are perfect and very difficult to kill. they simply work.

these are totally different from weller if anyone reading does understand electronics, specifically. you need specific flux for electronics, specific solder, etc. if you wanna play with that computer from the 80s you need a low wattage hexacon iron. trust me this one time, internet

i wanted to illustrate a very bad iron repairing very worthy audio equipment. it wasnt an ironic thing either, i figured "why not?". it took two shitty irons but it actually worked

edit: id strongly suggest a hexacon 25h or 26h to finish off the aforementioned shitty """"""""""forney""""""""" / chicago electric work if anyone somehow manages to read this off google search instead of another site such as gearsluts. literally touch the top of the pin for half a second and move to the next one, the tin will drop into the through-hole instantly. the circuit board needs to be upsidedown on a towel (obviously, because gravity and static electricity)

Just get an ERSA RDS80 soldering station and you are set for life.
Got my ERSA kit twenty years ago and it is still going strong, heats up in seconda and maintains exact heat within a couple of degrees of whatever you set it to no matter how hard you push it. Basically replaces everything from 15-80W in one convenient package.

 

[Killerratte]

I had a pretty good Samsung monitor that randomly started to blink / shut off & restart after just 2-3 years. Tested it on several computers and the problem started happening there, too. Tried to bring it to a repair shop, but they couldn't figure it out either. Never had a monitor die on me like that before, maybe it was just bad luck.

 

[jiggabooboon]

Lightbulb cabal

 

[TinFoilHatGuy]

y'know what's worse than phones? PHONE CHARGING CORDS. You get a good one once in a while, lasts eight months or a year, mostly they seem to fail in four to six months and sometimes they fuck up straight out the damn box.

 

[Likeicare]

my charger port fails way before my cords do

 

[TinFoilHatGuy]

huh, I've had four phones and three tablets in the last few years and haven't had a charge port fail...
actually don't think I have ever had a charge port fail on a phone, they get a little shakey and the new shit is on the way anyway...


Thanks for helping me narrow that down....
Charge Ports: the one thing in my life that hasn't esploded, grenaded, brick'd, bounced or ghosted my ass in the New Millenium... 🤓

 

[Likeicare]

mine always get filled with metal dust and fail within a couple of months, i can only use wireless chargers

 

[Viril.Feline.Wyyzrd]

Me and Maysam were talking about this in the shoutbox discord. My laptop keeps crahsing, and it won’t run opera anymore. It’s one of those new fancy hp laptops.

the only reason I started using it is because my other computer, which was also an hp but was more sturdily built, got dented for some reason. I think I ran it over with my car, but I’m not entirely sure.

 

[TinFoilHatGuy]

mine always get filled with metal dust and fail within a couple of months, i can only use wireless chargers

maybe if you adjust your screenname to not be so sparkly, you won't get all that metal dust in your pocket