The Right To Repair

[Loren Pechtel]

You can design any product to make it maintainable.

But that costs more and in many cases makes it bigger.

With the rise of large scale electronic manufacturing and automated PCB assembly repairing boards became uneconomical. Cheaper to just throw away failures as long as the rate was low.

The real problem here is that the skilled person required to diagnose what has failed on the board will cost more to find and fix the problem than the cost of buying a new board. Back in the days of the capacitor plague there were some people who made a business of replacing capacitors--but note that in that case there were no diagnostics involved, they were simply replacing all of the electrolytic capacitors.

 

[Bronzeage]

You can design any product to make it maintainable.

But that costs more and in many cases makes it bigger.

With the rise of large scale electronic manufacturing and automated PCB assembly repairing boards became uneconomical. Cheaper to just throw away failures as long as the rate was low.

The real problem here is that the skilled person required to diagnose what has failed on the board will cost more to find and fix the problem than the cost of buying a new board. Back in the days of the capacitor plague there were some people who made a business of replacing capacitors--but note that in that case there were no diagnostics involved, they were simply replacing all of the electrolytic capacitors.

You've hit upon the real dilemma of "right to repair" enthusiasts, which is diagnosis. Some parts are obvious when they fail, with smoke or flames being a dead giveaway. A circuit board tends to be a little more subtle. There might be a small scorch mark, but visual signs are very rare. One of the oldest and most reliable diagnostic techniques is called KGP, or "known good part". You just replace stuff until the problem goes away. This is also the most expensive, on average.

Toyota was one of the few manufacturers who put a regular fuse in their charging system circuit. I've known more than one time when the owner replaced the starter, the generator, and the battery, before discovering a blown fuse.

The real problem with KGP diagnosis is you can only diagnose things you heard of before.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

But that costs more and in many cases makes it bigger.



The real problem here is that the skilled person required to diagnose what has failed on the board will cost more to find and fix the problem than the cost of buying a new board. Back in the days of the capacitor plague there were some people who made a business of replacing capacitors--but note that in that case there were no diagnostics involved, they were simply replacing all of the electrolytic capacitors.

You've hit upon the real dilemma of "right to repair" enthusiasts, which is diagnosis. Some parts are obvious when they fail, with smoke or flames being a dead giveaway. A circuit board tends to be a little more subtle. There might be a small scorch mark, but visual signs are very rare. One of the oldest and most reliable diagnostic techniques is called KGP, or "known good part". You just replace stuff until the problem goes away. This is also the most expensive, on average.

Toyota was one of the few manufacturers who put a regular fuse in their charging system circuit. I've known more than one time when the owner replaced the starter, the generator, and the battery, before discovering a blown fuse.

The real problem with KGP diagnosis is you can only diagnose things you heard of before.

It would help if manufacturers were required to provide assembly diagrams listing every reasonably replaceable component. I've got a laptop around here, obsolete by now but otherwise functional--except the CMOS battery is dead. Despite taking it mostly apart and many hours spent scouring the internet I have no idea where the battery is, other than it is on a daughterboard I can't find. A CMOS battery certainly should be a field-replaceable component!

 

[Bronzeage]

But that costs more and in many cases makes it bigger.



The real problem here is that the skilled person required to diagnose what has failed on the board will cost more to find and fix the problem than the cost of buying a new board. Back in the days of the capacitor plague there were some people who made a business of replacing capacitors--but note that in that case there were no diagnostics involved, they were simply replacing all of the electrolytic capacitors.

You've hit upon the real dilemma of "right to repair" enthusiasts, which is diagnosis. Some parts are obvious when they fail, with smoke or flames being a dead giveaway. A circuit board tends to be a little more subtle. There might be a small scorch mark, but visual signs are very rare. One of the oldest and most reliable diagnostic techniques is called KGP, or "known good part". You just replace stuff until the problem goes away. This is also the most expensive, on average.

Toyota was one of the few manufacturers who put a regular fuse in their charging system circuit. I've known more than one time when the owner replaced the starter, the generator, and the battery, before discovering a blown fuse.

The real problem with KGP diagnosis is you can only diagnose things you heard of before.

It would help if manufacturers were required to provide assembly diagrams listing every reasonably replaceable component. I've got a laptop around here, obsolete by now but otherwise functional--except the CMOS battery is dead. Despite taking it mostly apart and many hours spent scouring the internet I have no idea where the battery is, other than it is on a daughterboard I can't find. A CMOS battery certainly should be a field-replaceable component!

Service manuals and wire diagrams for cars are available. They stopped printing paper versions in the 90s and converted to digital. Up to this time, service information was produced by the manufacturer's engineers. The digital versions were handed over to contractors. General Motors gave the job to Raytheon. All of this is available to the public, for a price. The quality of the information suffered considerably.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It would help if manufacturers were required to provide assembly diagrams listing every reasonably replaceable component. I've got a laptop around here, obsolete by now but otherwise functional--except the CMOS battery is dead. Despite taking it mostly apart and many hours spent scouring the internet I have no idea where the battery is, other than it is on a daughterboard I can't find. A CMOS battery certainly should be a field-replaceable component!

Service manuals and wire diagrams for cars are available. They stopped printing paper versions in the 90s and converted to digital. Up to this time, service information was produced by the manufacturer's engineers. The digital versions were handed over to contractors. General Motors gave the job to Raytheon. All of this is available to the public, for a price. The quality of the information suffered considerably.

I wouldn't require full service manuals--if the company doesn't consider it worth repairing they shouldn't be required to prepare documentation on how to repair it. However, I would require things like disassembly instructions for anything that can be disassembled (not everything can. I'm looking at a powered toothbrush--the manual explicitly states there's no way to take it apart. The housing is glued around the electronics, there are no openings of any kind so as to ensure it's immune to water damage) be available for free in a format that doesn't take anything esoteric to read it.

That laptop I mentioned earlier--I had a diagram of where the electronics were, it was enough to figure out the battery was on the daughterboard, but nothing showed how it was related to the housing, I wasn't able to find that daughterboard. If you don't know how it goes together you can easily end up pulling something apart that you didn't realize was there.

 

[barbos]

Weird, in all notebooks boards, I came across, batteries were clearly visible.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Weird, in all notebooks boards, I came across, batteries were clearly visible.

The CMOS battery, not the main battery.

 

[DBT]

Sealed all glass Samsung phone can't be pulled apart without specialist gear. Unless someone in town has the equipment, you have to send it away for a simple battery change...which is made to be not so simple.

 

[Bronzeage]

It would help if manufacturers were required to provide assembly diagrams listing every reasonably replaceable component. I've got a laptop around here, obsolete by now but otherwise functional--except the CMOS battery is dead. Despite taking it mostly apart and many hours spent scouring the internet I have no idea where the battery is, other than it is on a daughterboard I can't find. A CMOS battery certainly should be a field-replaceable component!

Service manuals and wire diagrams for cars are available. They stopped printing paper versions in the 90s and converted to digital. Up to this time, service information was produced by the manufacturer's engineers. The digital versions were handed over to contractors. General Motors gave the job to Raytheon. All of this is available to the public, for a price. The quality of the information suffered considerably.

I wouldn't require full service manuals--if the company doesn't consider it worth repairing they shouldn't be required to prepare documentation on how to repair it. However, I would require things like disassembly instructions for anything that can be disassembled (not everything can. I'm looking at a powered toothbrush--the manual explicitly states there's no way to take it apart. The housing is glued around the electronics, there are no openings of any kind so as to ensure it's immune to water damage) be available for free in a format that doesn't take anything esoteric to read it.

That laptop I mentioned earlier--I had a diagram of where the electronics were, it was enough to figure out the battery was on the daughterboard, but nothing showed how it was related to the housing, I wasn't able to find that daughterboard. If you don't know how it goes together you can easily end up pulling something apart that you didn't realize was there.

The old "No User Serviceable Parts" thing. This is the inevitable result of robotic assembly manufacturing. Anything assembled by a human can be disassembled by a human, but the reason robots do the job is so the product can be sold at a profit. Anything could be engineered to be serviceable, but if it can't be sold, what's the point?

 

[barbos]

Weird, in all notebooks boards, I came across, batteries were clearly visible.

The CMOS battery, not the main battery.

Yes, I was talking about CMOS battery.

In theory there're variants which look like normal chip, albeit a little bit thicker than normally. They combine RTC, CMOS and battery in one package.
But they are not common in ordinary computers.

 

[barbos]

Sealed all glass Samsung phone can't be pulled apart without specialist gear. Unless someone in town has the equipment, you have to send it away for a simple battery change...which is made to be not so simple.

They want you to buy a new phone when battery dies. That's the real reason for unreplaceable batteries.

 

[barbos]

In my view it's not so much right to repair. It's about need to repair. I don't understand why stuff has to break so much.
For example, Iron ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clothes_iron ). Most of them have horrible design. Cord which gets twisted and mechanical temperature regulator. Both of these two things breaks well before they should.
First, cord should be detachable and allow twisting
Second, mechanical regulator must go. It should be temperature sensor and actual relay or two with triac. with control circuit which detects failure
That way if one relay fails another one can be used. Such Iron could be virtually unbreakable.

Same with power supplied for notebooks. They must be sold separately from notebooks, have standard voltage and standard connector. And connector with cord should be detachable from the power supply with, again, standard connector on power supply itself. Replacement power supplies must be sold without any cords attached to it, just a brick with two sockets.

 

[steve_bank]

There are service companies that repair phones., lie replacing a display.

My flip phone costs $25 and my smart phone $65. I doubt if if I woud save money having them repaired.

On the other hand some people spend thousands of dollars on smart phones.

Dos Apple have an exchange program?

Surface mount chips can be replaced.

Another racket, expensive phones plus extended warranty fees.

As the story goes IBM fearing Apple competition tasked a group to go off and design a PC and printer. The requirement was robotic assembly.

These days PCBs are raely assembd and soldwered by hand. Most large cities have contract assembly companies and it can be done by mail/

A large scale plant has electronic parts on reels. A solder paste is screened on the PCB, and a pick and place machine places the parts on the board. It is all on a conveyor line. The board moves through a soldering chamber then goes to a 'bed of nails tester'. The board is sucked down onto a grid of small test probes connected to test equipment. If a problem is found te machine list parts to be changed and it is retested. If the boards are cheap enough failures are tossed.

Complex boards are near impossible to troubleshoot on a bench.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I wouldn't require full service manuals--if the company doesn't consider it worth repairing they shouldn't be required to prepare documentation on how to repair it. However, I would require things like disassembly instructions for anything that can be disassembled (not everything can. I'm looking at a powered toothbrush--the manual explicitly states there's no way to take it apart. The housing is glued around the electronics, there are no openings of any kind so as to ensure it's immune to water damage) be available for free in a format that doesn't take anything esoteric to read it.

That laptop I mentioned earlier--I had a diagram of where the electronics were, it was enough to figure out the battery was on the daughterboard, but nothing showed how it was related to the housing, I wasn't able to find that daughterboard. If you don't know how it goes together you can easily end up pulling something apart that you didn't realize was there.

The old "No User Serviceable Parts" thing. This is the inevitable result of robotic assembly manufacturing. Anything assembled by a human can be disassembled by a human, but the reason robots do the job is so the product can be sold at a profit. Anything could be engineered to be serviceable, but if it can't be sold, what's the point?

This has nothing to do with robot vs human assembly. There is a way to the battery, it's just that without an adequate understanding of what steps must be taken to reach it there's too high a chance of damage because you didn't know something was connected.

The toothbrush is a different case entirely and I don't object--there's always a tradeoff between ease of disassembly and protection against the elements. For a cheap tool that is expected to frequently encounter water I have no problem with them choosing a better seal over the ability to repair. Sometimes it's even an explicit tradeoff--consider Tile trackers. You can get the regular version with an IP55 rating and a replaceable battery, or the sealed version with an IP68 rating but it's not possible to replace the battery.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Weird, in all notebooks boards, I came across, batteries were clearly visible.

The CMOS battery, not the main battery.

Yes, I was talking about CMOS battery.

In theory there're variants which look like normal chip, albeit a little bit thicker than normally. They combine RTC, CMOS and battery in one package.
But they are not common in ordinary computers.

Sure, if the motherboard were lying on my desk I figure I could see the battery. The problem is that given what I saw on the diagram I'm sure I was missing something in disassembly, pulling the motherboard would not be safe.

 

[barbos]

Yes, I was talking about CMOS battery.

In theory there're variants which look like normal chip, albeit a little bit thicker than normally. They combine RTC, CMOS and battery in one package.
But they are not common in ordinary computers.

Sure, if the motherboard were lying on my desk I figure I could see the battery. The problem is that given what I saw on the diagram I'm sure I was missing something in disassembly, pulling the motherboard would not be safe.

You could not find battery on the diagram? Where did you get the diagram?
Anyway as I said, I have never had troubles seeing CMOS battery. I saw Cell Phones with CMOS batteries too, it's pretty tiny. Main battery is usually on.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Yes, I was talking about CMOS battery.

In theory there're variants which look like normal chip, albeit a little bit thicker than normally. They combine RTC, CMOS and battery in one package.
But they are not common in ordinary computers.

Sure, if the motherboard were lying on my desk I figure I could see the battery. The problem is that given what I saw on the diagram I'm sure I was missing something in disassembly, pulling the motherboard would not be safe.

You could not find battery on the diagram? Where did you get the diagram?
Anyway as I said, I have never had troubles seeing CMOS battery. I saw Cell Phones with CMOS batteries too, it's pretty tiny. Main battery is usually on.

I could figure out that the battery was on a daughterboard. I couldn't find said daughterboard. If I dismounted the motherboard there would be wires going from it to the daughterboard. I couldn't see any means of getting to the other side.

 

[barbos]

You could not find battery on the diagram? Where did you get the diagram?
Anyway as I said, I have never had troubles seeing CMOS battery. I saw Cell Phones with CMOS batteries too, it's pretty tiny. Main battery is usually on.

I could figure out that the battery was on a daughterboard. I couldn't find said daughterboard. If I dismounted the motherboard there would be wires going from it to the daughterboard. I couldn't see any means of getting to the other side.

We need pictures and name of the notebook. What you describe is some weird shit. daughterboard?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You could not find battery on the diagram? Where did you get the diagram?
Anyway as I said, I have never had troubles seeing CMOS battery. I saw Cell Phones with CMOS batteries too, it's pretty tiny. Main battery is usually on.

I could figure out that the battery was on a daughterboard. I couldn't find said daughterboard. If I dismounted the motherboard there would be wires going from it to the daughterboard. I couldn't see any means of getting to the other side.

We need pictures and name of the notebook. What you describe is some weird shit. daughterboard?

Yes, daughterboard. The page that showed the layout had a small separate board shown as connected to the main board with wires. Typically laptops have a board and then things like hard drives, batteries etc in another layer--I assume there was a gap in that layer and they put a small circuit board there. I couldn't see any way to access it, though, and I couldn't find disassembly instructions. It was very annoying to be thwarted by something so trivial.

 

[barbos]

If you need instructions for disassembling a notebook then you should not.