Every week there are too many developments in the world of repair for any mere mortal to keep track of. Fortunately, the folks over at the Fight to Repair newsletter are here to help: recapping the most important repair news for iFixit readers. As a special offer, iFixit.com readers can claim a free, 60-day premium membership to the Fight to Repair newsletter. Visit fighttorepair.substack.com/ifixit.
The arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic pushed school districts across the world into a massive, uncontrolled experiment in distance learning. With in-person gathering discouraged, school districts rushed to purchase computers for their students—hundreds or thousands at a time, depending on the size of the district.
By and large, Chromebooks were the platform of choice. The inexpensive, lightweight devices offered districts much of what they needed: a common software platform, and access to Internet-based applications for viewing lessons, email, and chat, and so on. Shipments of Chromebooks set records in 2020, reaching 11.2 million units in Q4 2020, a 287% increase over Q4 2019. In all, more than 30.6 million units were sold that year.
Three years later, however, many of those devices are nearing the end of their support. That may, in short order, force districts to discard perfectly functioning hardware and replace it for no other reason than that the manufacturer has made a business decision not to support it beyond a certain date.
As PIRG notes in a report this week on Chromebook “churn,” that has massive consequences for both cash-strapped local school districts and the planet. The report highlights some jarring statistics:
- 1.8 billion is the amount of money, measured in US Dollars, that school districts in the country would save if the lifespan of Chromebooks currently in use were doubled.
- 900 thousand represents the number of cars that would have to come off the road for an entire year to equal the amount of pollution that will be created to replace rather than (repair and) extend the life of the Chromebooks in use.
- 3.3/20 was the average parts availability rating (using the French repairability index) received based on a review of 11 Chromebooks. That’s much lower than the average non-Chromebook laptop, which averaged out to 9 out of 20.
PIRG said the looming crisis around Chromebook replacement is largely avoidable. Chromebooks fall out of use because of an end of support date set by Google. Once laptops have exceeded their support life, they don’t receive updates and can’t access secure websites. For example, instructors have reported that expired laptops can’t access online state testing websites, PIRG reports.
The other issue is that manufacturers do not build Chromebooks to be repairable, with designs that frustrate repairs and few spare parts produced by manufacturers. As it stands, schools need to purchase parts from third-parties or scavenge them from broken machines to complete repairs. That scarcity can contribute to the high price for parts, making repair uneconomical.
PIRG has called on Google to extend the support of the Chrome OS software from the current average of about 4 years to 10 years or more. It has also called on hardware makers to make their devices more repairable: offering replacement parts and making design decisions that support repairability.
Other News
- Telematics remain contentious: Some are predicting that tensions between consumer rights organizations and manufacturers will continue to flare up, particularly over what is emerging as the most contentious issue–telematics. In their attempt to maximize subscription revenue or limit long-term maintenance costs for obsolete products, many manufacturers are doing a fantastic job of generating the worst kind of bad publicity when it comes to their cringeworthy telematics policies.
- Massachusetts AG calls out opponents over repair telematics law: Massachusetts’ new Attorney General Andrea Campbell is pushing ahead with her stated intention to enforce a November 2020 ballot measure to extend the state’s automobile right to repair law to include access to vehicle telematics data. In March, Campbell terminated a non-enforcement stipulation of the Data Access Law agreed to by former AG Maura Healey that had been in place since Dec. 3, 2020. “The remaining claims to be decided in this case are the Alliance’s preemption claims under the federal Motor Vehicle Safety Act (‘MVSA’) and the federal Clean Air Act (‘CAA’),” Campbell wrote in her April 14 brief.
- Tesla’s 4680 battery is almost impossible to repair: Due to the pink potting material that prevents the individual cell connections from falling apart, the Tesla 4680 battery is not serviceable, according to Gruber Motor Company CEO Pete Gruber and Munro & Associates CEO Sandy Munro. Even with ways to perform battery pack surgery on a resistive cell without having to replace the entire battery pack, replacements can cost between $13,000 and $20,000, including labor.
- Less than 40% of e-waste in the European Union is recycled: Within the EU, Croatia is the best recycler at 81.3% and Malta is the worst at 20.8%, Large household appliances make up over half of all collected e-waste, while IT and telecom equipment, consumer equipment, and small household appliances follow. USB Type-C will become the common charger for most electronic devices in the EU by the end of 2024.
- Farm groups push Indiana following Colorado’s ag repair bill: Now that lawmakers in Colorado have passed a bill that will allow farmers to fix their own equipment, several farm groups are encouraging Indiana lawmakers to follow suit. “We feel like there’s a real fairness issue in agriculture. Farmers really need the right to fix their own stuff,” says Aaron Shier, government relations director for the National Farmers Union.
- Agricultural legislation pending in Vermont: Lawmakers in the Green Mountain State are seeking to establish the right to repair agricultural and forestry equipment by requiring manufacturers to make parts, tools, and documentation available to equipment owners and independent repair shops on fair financial terms.
Один комментарий
I think the biggest problem with Chromebooks in general is that they are made to be really inexpensive while also being put through a ton of wear and tear. The biggest points of failure for a lot of Acer Chromebooks in an education setting is going to be the display and the motherboard.
Jacob Mehnert - Ответить