It's time to talk about the elephant in the room
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 19 พ.ค. 2024
- There's a worrying trend that affects an alarming number of tech devices each year, and it's only getting worse with policies and technologies that make devices harder to use and repair as they age. Today we'll go over the stages of our devices and how they contribute to this growing problem, as well as what we can do to stop it!
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This is why Right To Repair is so important. These huge companies love to green-wash their designs in ad speak to try and portray themselves as "caring for the environment"... but they also intentionally make them to be e-waste as quickly as they can possibly get away with- so you have to replace with new. This is true of laptops, phones, cars, vacuum cleaners, tvs, etc. MANY items get junked because a simple small part is broken and could have been easily fixed if the parts were available and the product not intentionally designed to be unrepairable (like unnecessarily gluing parts so you have to destroy a TV to take it apart). Louis Rossmann was right all along.
Louis spot on creating awareness for right to repair legislation.
A big part of repair difficulty simply comes down to labor cost. Say you have a computer that's worth $400, and needs a part that costs $150, but it takes 4 hours to replace the part because repairability was not part of the design specification. At $50/hr for the technician, plus the store overhead, you've probably exceeded the value of the computer. The more tech-savvy among us would certainly attempt the repair, but we aren't the average consumer, now are we?
How old can it be? M first smartphone gone. Because WhatsApp wasn't supported anymore. Next... Banking app ot supported anymore. So repairing is ok but software is the bottleneck.
Cars are going the same way. When's the last time you tried to change a fan belt on a modern car?
even if you take right to repair out of it be nice if there was a law that required them to make EOL Products open source, like you have to let go of ownership of that model once you stop supporting it (we'd be able to reuse and recycle sooo much better if we got access to old apple tools for them devices etc, so many diagnose programs etc lost to time or still hidden at apple HQ
absolutely hate how win 11 has turned all pre 2018 pc's into e-waste, tpm workarounds break after a few updates, mindboggling move against sustainability and the one trait you DONT want to imitate from apple
Me running windows 11 on my MacBook Pro 2012 laughing at other laptops 😂. That thing is a value beast. Still using mine as a main computer to this day.
Bro try Tiny11 and then speak again, (almost) no TPM, CPU, GPU or ram requirements, receives official upgrades and doesn't remove any essential programs or functionality. All that and it is smaller and faster.
I mean, that implies anybody's actually using Windows 11 willingly.
That and other things made me switch to linux. Still some kinks to iron, but overall a very good experience.
What? I deploy Windows 11 onto lots of 6th and 7th gen computers at my org, oldest one is a T520. I thought MS only asked for the TPM at install time, and most 6th and 7th gen business PC's have TPM 1.0 that could be upgraded.
My company utilizes 42 total Mac for our day to day. Guess what? None of them are past mid-2012! Most are 2010 Mac Pros running OCLP and are up to date running perfectly on Sonoma 14.5. I'm typing on one now. Lots of Mid-2012 MacBook Pro i7s also. All upgraded with fast SSD and 16 GB ram. If you're not in video editing, there is almost zero need to run anything newer. We have saved over a million dollars on upgrading these. It's just takes a little work. You're a great man, Luke. Thank you for talking about important things and keeping these perfectly good macs in service.
Mid-2012 Unibody MacBook Pro Gang, rise!
@@half-qilin i own one for two weeks now and i love it. it’s my first ever mac and i bought it because i needed firewire
Here at our studio we still have around 15 mac pros from 2013 (trash can) and the rest is running 2014-2015 macbook pros.
We have around 35 macs and only 5 of them are past 2015, in this case they are mac studios and are only used for the ones that need the real working power.
My beautiful mid 2012 mbp’s board finally just died.. 😢 that thing was an absolute beast! I am so sad.
If this is true, it’s cool.
The other reason why old tech can fetch high prices is because the supply is so low, because the number of actual devices that have been kept in working and good condition after that many years is really low.
So true. I have a 13 years old Acer laptop, the USB and VGA ports are now rusty and the rubber feet starts melting. Keeping the good condition for many years is extremely difficult
It's a mix of scarcity and nostalgia, but mostly the latter. There's examples of non-scarce things as well fetching extremely high prices (like certain pokemon games).
Yeah I found on Amazon, Refurbished iPad Air 4's are only $50 less than a new condition M1 iPad Air. Prices are nuts nowadays. Wasn't like this pre-2020's.
Perfectly answer!!!!
This seems partially cultural, too. Go into a secondhand store in Japan and lots of items have been kept in good condition, whereas in a lot of thrift stores in America, stuff is just absolutely trashed and clearly wasn't taken care of.
We got a sneak peek into Luke’s recording process that he forgot to cut at the end. Luke, if you see this, don’t re-edit. Kind of a cool behind the scene look at your process
Agreed Luke. These are fun little easter eggs, I like it when this happens in audio books as well.
I like it, honestly comes across as more authentic
Yes it's very funny and I love it! I'm not a huge fan of video's that are cut constantly. Seeing something like Luke struggle to find the right words makes the video feel more like a real conversation, like he's really talking to us and is a human and not a robot. It's beautiful.
where
@@YourEyes-wl8ke 9:14
"Destroying the value of their computers" - is what Apple did to itself by removing any upgradability on their machines.
Not true, because Apple customers buy based on fashion, style and peer pressure.... SIGH
@@edwardfletcher7790 Which is really starting to make a growing number of us who buy for performance and the macOS environment unimpressed these days
9:15 seems like the Luke bot might also be nearing e-waste
Hahah he was probably just trying to get a better take and forgot to edit it out. It happens!
At least he didn't lose his cool through the false starts
I noticed that too
I hear a new battery returns the Luke bot to original peak performance.
I grew up in 70s and I don’t remember people talking about recycling except for collecting aluminum cans and returning empty Coca Cola bottles back to the supermarket but people were much less wasteful then than they are now. I remember my dad talking about growing up during the Great Depression and they didn’t waste anything.
It's all about companies pushing single-use plastics and shit that you can't repair or fix. All they want is money - they don't give a single shit about anything else unless they're forced to.
We live in an era of blind consumerism. The goal is for you to buy buy buy and keep buying. To keep to money floating. Doesn't matter the cost.
If you reuse and recycle the old stuff, that means you cannot consume as much of the new stuff they keep selling you. So ofcourse the companies don't want that.
I think it's also worth noting that when color was added to TV broadcasts here in the States, we did what we could to make it in such a way that monochrome sets were still usable. These days, phone makers stop supporting their devices with security updates after what, 3 years? Maybe 7 if you find a good one? There isn't a lot of demand for old internet tech because the old stuff is going to have these vulnerabilities with them forever.
While people have a LOT of nostalgia for Windows XP, it's only receiving official support for operators of critical infrastructure, and unless you have a Pro X64 build you're going to have to change a LOT of your usage habits to comfortably use it when all you have is 4 gigs of RAM.
@@ZeldagigafanMatthew that's not a reasonable comparison, no black and white tv supportted subtitles, or remote controls etc....a fair comparison would be that up until 2021 all new iphones supported 2G phone networks, a technology rolled out in 1991
Companies of consumer electronics have removed the ability to use their products for any more than 10 years. Laptops have a shelf life of about 7 years, desktops are around 10 years unless you build one yourself and are willing to replace components yourself, and cellphones are abysmal, dropping support in as little as 2 years in some cases. They purposely build in planned obsolescence. Apple won’t keep parts on hand for their iPhone for more than 3 years, then you have to go 3rd party, but unfortunately, no only is there not much money in it, so very few companies do this, but apple serialized the critical components of their phones, so your ability to fix an old iphone for continued use becomes expensive and in some cases, impossible.
Many companies also make a point of changing their devices year over year, making them thicker or thinner, changing the shape in some way, making the part interoperability an impossibility as well. They also sandbag features, holding on to certain innovations to keep consumers coming back for the newest version.
I myself have fallen victim of this, at one point, buying a new phone every 2 years. I’ve had my current phone for 4 years and I’ll try to sell it to someone who will actually continue using it if I can. Hopefully Apple still has batteries for it as that’s all it would need to breath new life into it since they are the only ones that support their phones for up to 5 years i believe.
I'm writing this on a former business device. A HP 8460p from 2011 to be exact, but since everything in this device is upgradeable (even the CPU is socketed and I upgraded it to a 4 core 8 thread i7 2670qm ) it is still perfectly usable with linux mint. Since apple devices aren't repairable and upgradeable at all they will end up in the landfill. They're disposable because even the NAND chips are soldered to the mainboard...
I have the same laptop. Got an i7 for $1, upped the RAM to 16GB. It runs W10 just fine. And Manjaro as well.
Sounds like a solid Linux machine for everyday tasks. Can't knock good hardware if it's still running. Wish new tech was built to that standard, my Asus FA506 is barely 3 years old and I've already had to buy replacement fans.
The awful state of modern software, in particular the web stack, is in part to blame.
We’ve gone from computers being barely capable of running tiny, optimised programs weighing in at a few kb, to modern multi core, multi GHz super computers being brought to their knees by bloated, buggy applications doing next to nothing, thrown together by developers who just don’t care about performance. So we need faster phones, tablets and PCs to run software that is less capable and more expensive than what we had a decade ago.
And the machines they replace go to landfill.
So true! I'm running 32-bit Debian 12 with LXQt + backports on my AOA150 first generation Acer Aspire One (updated the battery, changed HD to SSD and added RAM to 1.5 Gbytes). Besides the fact that modern software is rarely built with 32-bit support, the only modern thing it really struggles with is Web. I can easily watch TH-cam videos in a full-screen resolution on it using SMTube. But good luck getting even 144p when using even a "small and efficient" Falcon browser. Even opening the web interface of my router (Asus with Merlin firmware) is a pain. Web stack is growing yearly and becoming more and more complex (IIRC it is one volume of text equivalent to POSIX in size being added to web specifications every year), and also more and more developers prefer making glorified web apps on Electron, because they are so easy to make and port to different systems, rather than writing real software.
It’s honestly infuriating even on modern hardware. Many apps run on Electron and consume lots of memory. Many websites these days need ~500 MB of RAM for no reason. My M1 MacBook Air with 8 GB of memory frequently bottlenecks really hard even on tasks that should be light, but aren’t for some reason.
Heck, my old i7 laptop struggled with VS Code, to the point where it sometimes took like 10 seconds to register that I have pressed the backspace button (which is handled separately from the other keys for some reason, and the key press order gets messed up when it lags). It’s a frigging text editor. We’ve been editing text effortlessly in the 90s, yet the crazy fast multi-core beasts of today just can’t keep up with all that bloat we have to deal with these days. :(
One of the problems with old iPads and iPhones especially is that even if you keep the hardware in top shape, the software support falls off a cliff. I had an old iPad I got from a relative, it worked fine, decent battery life, but the App Store was a wasteland, and not much could be done about that. If only there were open third party repositories you could install which provided builds of useful software for older iOS. Wouldn't that be something
iOS is the WORST platform ever in terms of old apps breaking. It's really, really bad.
That's why I only buy Android phones with unlocked bootloaders
@@AdamSmith-gs2dvas long as you don’t use Apple stuff, go ahead
@@budgetkeyboardistsure, if you use them on old unsupported devices
I have literal stacks of iPads that rot in a drawer, even the crappy old computers at this office can be repurposed into a server or something useful, but the iPads, not so much.
If they could be repurposed in IOT projects without the ever aging browser that keeps falling further out of date, like run a custom version of android or even Linux, I could use them for all sorts of neat projects, sadly they can’t live that second life.
Sadly the average consumer doesn't know about all the Greenwashing that happens and most I think also just don't care. Thanks for helping educate consumers.
the biggest issue I have with old macbooks is the battery, replace the battery and reinstall the OS and you're generally good. however with old ipads, many of the apps no longer function
And phones as well, the old macbooks are even more appealing because of opencore patcher utility, which allows you to upgrade those old mac computers to the latest os for as long as apple keeps supporting intel proccessors, and also if you have at least a 2008 and newer model.
I lead a club at my high school where people donate their old computers, tablets, etc, and we fix them and give them to schools in need. It sucks how much ewaste is generated when at the same time there are many people including students who do not have access to a computer. We are very proud of what we do though and through our club we also teach people how to fix them!
Great!! You guys are the example!! Btw: where do you live?
@@dirk6136Southwestern Virginia but used computer and tech is nonexistent. If I had the money to move to a better location I would definitely move.
We need a change in the law where devices that get placed at end of life/support - have to have their firmware/low level device code - released. Hopefully leading to OSs to be built for devices where the maker has deemed no further interest.
There is no good reason for android or linux not to have usable builds for older devices.
Right now, these devices have a collapsing value post their service life, and that's leading to huge amounts of kit being placed as E-WASTE to be disposed of, instead of being re-used.
I have literal stacks of first gen iPad minis begging to be used with a custom software that gives them purpose, outside of the ever growing narrow gap that IOS left them in.
I wish apple would do something about the millions of perfectly working / fixable iCloud locked devices
That is so true. I come across dozens of locked iPhones every week. I've had long discussions with Apple at as high a level as I can and they simply do not care. "Sell it for parts and buy a new iPhone." That's it. Sickening.
@@adamhutton4165if they are older phones, they are easy to unlock. Every iphone x and before that can be unlocked easily.
@@teamredstudio7012 bro just decided to sneak in the homophobia lol. Come on dude.
Apple doesn't care. They rather greenwash and gaslight their consumers.
@@harrydsgnit wasn’t a fear of sexuality diss. It more a motivational comment for the buyers
What’s even sadder is that the need for the materials going into these devices causes destabilization in regions with those minerals, like in Congo.
I still use a 2011 Macbook Pro 17" in 2024. Windows 11, USB 3.0 Expresscard modified with USB-C connectors, 2TB SSD, new motherboard with improved GPU cooling. This thing is a complete beast. However it did take me two weeks to finally hash out driver issues for Windows 11. I had to do a lot of work in that department but I got it 100% perfect now. Truly cannot see myself using another laptop. With the AMD GPU issue fixed, I expect this thing to run for a very long time.
Sacrilege. Time to upgrade that thing. You’re still stuck on WiFi 4 which is unusable
The GPU fails due to the underfill under the die itself softening and expanding because TSMC was dumb and didn't have a materials specialist see how low-Tg would work in a computer that runs at 70+ degrees. The new motherboard and better GPU cooling will probably *delay* the issue, but it will never get rid of it permanently unfortunately.
@@emilsecker7881not everyone has the money apple d rider
I wrote a blog post earlier this year about the flood of ewaste that will result from the Butterfly keyboard debacle. Countless machines that are still very viable, aside from the keyboard, which would normally be a small thing to deal with. It's terrible to think that a bunch of otherwise fantastically capable MBP will end up being crushed with no real options for continued use. So, so sad.
Zero ewaste in southwest Virginia. :(
@@isaacwright2247 Sorry, man. We don't have much in SoCal, either.
Win 11, I avoid on principle.
So many of these old machines could easily be send to 3rd world country's to help kids at school.
It's not that simple. There's a lot of logistics when it comes to just sending the devices over, let alone making sure they're in working condition. I think people forget there are people in need in their local communities that could use these devices.
We would rather use cheap devices than use old computer that will not last and we dont have how to repair, here in Costa Rica our equivalent to your elementary schools use those XO computers that were suposed to be $100, importing a Mac would cost that and would last less time
@@SolamenteTavo The olpc (the “xo laptop”) had a specialized os and an amd geode cpu that were weak and taught no real computing skills. Old computers (business laptop fleets from 3-4 years ago) will be better
It isn't just logistics, you have to make sure there is someone to help the devices keep running.
I believe there is enough devices that won't end up being used to be used for the local communities AND send wherever they could be needed.
Ofcourse that wouldn't be free, maybe not even cheap.
But the humanitarian organisations and funds are sourcing these devices anyway. Why not cooperate with them?
I think one of the major causes of people throwing out devices is batteries dying. Maybe we need some sort of user replaceable, and/or battery standardization mandate
It would be a lot better to make and sell and replace new batteries than keep replacing the whole device.
Software support too. My phone only gets 4 years of android support. Then it is less secure because no security updates.
I can't even count how many old HP and Surface devices Ive seen with bloated batteries, and while HP does at least let you open their devices (usually), official replacement batteries are like usually the first thing they stop selling on their partsurfer website. It's how I got a 2019-era Envy 17 laptop from work because the battery got bloated and there were no "official" replacements beyond no-name Chinese listings on amazon
Great video Luke! I often send big boxes to the Philippines, where my family lives. Trust me, they still love older devices. Many adults never had a laptop or even walk around with an Android 4 device or older... So wherever I can I collect/buy people's old tech, clean it up, fix it up, and make people happy... For most it's a lifechanger to be able to go online. They don't care if it's slower.
Again great that you bring attention to this problem and point out the greenwashing of companies like Apple...
These phones and laptops don’t end up in a landfill. At least not where I live. There are dozens of companies in my area alone who make good money recycling these devices. The aluminium is reusable, the other metals (gold, copper) are extracted, the batteries are taken apart and recycled (for about 80%). So it’s not all doom and gloom.
What country?
yeah like, I sometimes wonder if it's just a case of America or something. TH-camrs talking about it like as if people literally throw their computers and phones away to trashcan but like, do they just not recycling that much? 🤔
Watch the guy called Indigo Traveler. He shows 3 rd world nations recycling all kinds of stuff
@@dotapark a large majority probably is america I wouldn't be suprised
Does the country you live in represent the entire world?
Repairing and giving outdated electronics a second life is why I appreciate what people like you and Hugh Jeffreys are doing. We need to remember and hold onto the things that originally made these products great before those great things are no longer there and we're left with devices with no character.
Thanks Luke! And whatever you do: don’t be afraid to call Apple out for the pathetic iCloud locking that makes selling a newer Mac almost impossible. Sucks to be a buyer and find that the school or workplace that liquidated their supply did not properly address that issue and now you have a very nice aluminum doorstop.
To be honest, there should be a law to force companies to open-source their products and software when they decide to stop supporting it.
One way It will encourage them to keep the support way longer, the other it will encourage them to truly innovate, because their old products will immediately be revised, repaired and given support from open-source maintainers.
Their should be a law that says companies MUST give you a way to unlock the bootloader
@@AdamSmith-gs2dv There*
@@AdamSmith-gs2dv And that way must not have any restriction in any possible way so the only thing you need to do is to type "fastboot oem unlock"
Repairability of game consoles isn't talked about enough I feel. Since the Xbox 360, Xbox optical drives have been serialised and paired to specific consoles, making replacement of a dead drive really tedious. The same was even true of the HDD in the original Xbox. Its such a shame as well because there's plenty of great games for old consoles but we might get to a point where the original hardware needed to play them is hard to find.
Modding exists but we shouldn't have to resort to effectively running exploits in order to repair our machines.
It is pretty annoying how many hoops I have to jump through to replace a DVD drive in an Xbox 360. Beyond that though consoles are kind of a locked hardware set to begin with.
For real, I am a fervent proponent for repairable and expandable devices as much as I can. Not everyone is as savvy as yourself in repair and so companies like Frame work and Ratta are conscious of designing for future viability, not chasing insane profits *I hope.
I could see a collab between yourself and "This Doesn't Compute" channel btw. Keep it going and same can be said about BE Vehicles
Yes right to repair is a must. There are lots of people out there who just can’t afford the new stuff, but need something that works. I’m still using my 2012 13” MacBook Pro because it still works and does a decent job. I’ve upgraded it along the way to keep it running well, and I think it’s just nonsense that newer ones can’t do this.
I'm proud of the fact that I used a 2012 MPB all the way until she departed this earth due to an unforeseeable accident with shampoo in a luggage bag last month, and I just installed Big Sur and Kubuntu Linux on a 2013 MBP yesterday, which I am refurbishing myself (replacing the screen), and keeping it out of a landfill. My phone is now three generations old, and I have vowed to not upgrade until it dies too. That said, I'm really mad that starting in 2013, and through today, the only thing you can replace on any Apple laptop in the last 11 years is the SSD, if even that. I couldn't just buy any old 2013 Retina Mac, I had to pick one with 16GB of RAM already installed, because if I hope to squeak more than five years out of this thing, 8GB won't be enough, and it's f'ing soldered to the board. I love Apple products, but kinda hate Apple. Who TF is going to want an M1 MacBook Air with 8GB of RAM in 2034? The CPU will be plenty fast for web browsing, but you know Chrome alone will require 16GB by then. You talk about these companies handling the exit of their devices better, and upgradability 100% helps, but they refuse to offer it anymore, and the only explanation for not having RAM slots (or even SSD slots anymore) is forced obsolescence, and they really need to be punished for that behavior.
Time to upgrade that shit. Big Sur is unsupported
@@emilsecker7881 - I cannot care about this.
You forgot about the final stage, when the speculator market ruins the prices of collectibles and needs people to think that something that isn’t all that good is still worth $400.
I sold my old first gen Toyota MR2 for peanuts as it was old, had a ton of miles.
Now, I can't even find these old cars, and when I do, they're pricey AF.
I think it’s a cop-out to absolve consumers of any responsibility. The longer consumers keep using their products instead of buying new ones, the less e-waste there will be. Many people make completely unnecessary upgrades every few years. There are so many M1 Macs available for resale; how many of these people really need to upgrade from an M1 Mac?
I like buying old tech and giving it new life, but I also don't replace devices until they legitimately can't do what I need them to do anymore.
To be entirely fair, all M1 macs will be trashed eventually. Once their SSDs die - and they will - that's it, you only have an expensive brick. Sure, you can solder new memory on, but that requires a whole lot of more effort than how more sensible electronics have their storage configured.
@@elu9780 The overwhelming majority of consumers replace their electronics long before the hardware actually fails on them. In very few instances will SSD failure be the reason a MacBook is no longer used.
@@MayTheSchwartzBeWithYou But that is no excuse to design your products in ways that ensure short lives with a fixed cap on what it can do.
In my desktop, if my 32 gigs of RAM isn't enough for what I need, I can just get a bigger kit. If my storage isn't enough for my desires I can just buy more (or get a networked storage system). Slotting in a new graphics card is easy enough if I see a need for it, and if AMD continues to support the AM5 socket like they did for AM4, the same is true for my CPU (power limits of my board permitting)
At minimum, RAM and Storage need to be an easy replacement for me to even consider wanting a given laptop, and for a desktop I want full access to entire inner workings. Anything less and I might as well take it the landfill immediately because it's not worth the space it occupies in my rooms, or even the effort of taking my wallet out of my pocket.
No one needs to upgrade from M1
There is definitely a separation between unusable technology and collectible technology which are basically the same. An iPhone 6 for example isn’t usable today but if there’s a collectors market for them, be sure their prices will shoot up again. The iPod classics became collectors items just a few years ago despite iTunes becoming obsolete.
Great video, very important one to be making right now too.
I think the other big thing that don't get mention enough: manufacturers are making too much shit. Period.
You can slice the recycling problem all you want, as long as companies keep proposing 20M phones per company to replace their existing installed park, you can't solve this issue. It's like trying to find a better way to evacuate the water out of leaky toilet without addressing the leak in the first place.
The problem lies in software. Just like the TPM requirement of Win 11 when it came out, non tech-savvy person will think "well I can't update my PC so it's too old probably" when the current OS still just fine to use, but Microsoft being such an ass with their update stuff, it's made sure to remind you of that "pending" update every time it can. Seen that happen in person, perfectly working laptop gets thrown out because it won't run that trash Windows 11.
Apple has really long support for iPhones which I like, but damn their Mac support is just stupid, Ventura officially supports as example, MacBook Pros from 2018. That's only 6 years!.. Lifecycle of personal computer is usually way longer than 6 years.
Of course it's about money, would be pretty hard to have successful business if the tech you sell is never obsolete or never breaks. There are exceptions in music stuff, where you can have that old MIDI keyboard or MPC and it's still supported in latest versions of software meanwhile it's over 10 years old.
e-sim is going to accelerate this.... if you can't get the "current" release of an IOS so that a carriers app requires to be installed (i.e. an e-sim enablement app_) then they can pretty much brick any device from being added to a network in the future thru artificial software constraints.... i saw this writing on the wall when apps started to demand a certain level IOS, and now its repeating with ESIM being one such app.
I have a story with the same issue. my iPad (3rd or 4th gen) had its battery expanded and my whole family to just "put it in the bin since its worthless and probably not supported anymore". but I still have it in a box somewhere in my room since I don't wanna put an iPad in the bin which has personal info and files in it that'll possibly get fixed or thrown into some place that destroys electronics. im still dedicated to fix it up but I sadly don't have the set of screws it uses.
The only screwdriver you need is a Wihi Phillips #000, you will need a heatgun, the glass is held on by adhesive. If the battery is bowing the screen outwards, that may make getting the prying tool under the glass easier.
I imagine a generic electronics screwdriver set from Walmart would have the right one.
One thing that bothers me is Android phones. Most cases the manufacturer will stop providing updates or in some cases never provide any in the first place. There's no easy way to install a third-party OS unless someone adapts one for your specific phone. I have a Pentium 4 laptop that uses a standard bios, I was able to install Linux on it and was shocked to find it is fairly useable all these years later. Even able to play TH-cam videos. However, I got two years out of my old phone because Oukitel decided one security update was enough and there's no third-party support for the device. I believe smart phones should work like PCs. If they do not wish to support their own device, they must have a way for users to install their own software easily with easily assessable update Android version. I have other phones with very capable specs to run the latest versions of Android however are stuck with very outdated versions because of lack of support. Crazy to think how much E-waste is generated just because of poor software design.
I just bought a used 2012 MacBook Pro a few months ago for dirt cheap because I needed a Mac that could still run a few 32 bit programs I use. Have it set to run Mojave, upgraded to a SSD, more RAM and replaced the non-functioning Superdrive all for under $80, and as a basic browsing/email machine, It's plenty snappy enough and not that much slower in those regards compared to my main M1 iMac. Still lots of life in that 12 year old Mac and far more enjoyable to use than if I had spent that $ on a new Chromebook!
Keep it off the net
This is an important issue. The impact on people and places from the mining for the resources needed to keep the tech industry afloat alone is devastating. If the raw materials could be harvested and reused form older devices, it would add a level of sustainability at least. Not revealing how much of a device is recyclable is awful but, I'm sure they couldn't command those inflated prices if we knew it was just money for old rope.
Thanks for covering this important topic. A good way to extend the life of old unsupported Macs is Linux. I use Ubuntu on an 2011 MacBook Air and its a nice little machine for browsing the web that still gets updates.
Same, latest Ubuntu on a 4gb MacBook Air 2012.
Sacrilege. Time to upgrade that thing
@@AlistairGaletime to upgrade that thing. You’re stuck on WiFi 4
I'm an E-Waste Operative, you won't believe how many laptops i process in a given week. For more modern macbooks in particular the only things we can repurpose are the drives and the wifi cards as everything else is soldered on. These machines are in otherwise good condition but they're just too old to sell to the average person, so we have to recycle them. Same goes for desktops but there's a lot more we can extract and repurpose from them
The thinkpad is the same way, except its way more useable considering you can put a modern linux OS on it.
I hated it when Apple sealed off their laptops. Used to be so easy to switch out a bad battery when it got that battery bulge and was so easy to upgrade the ram by just opening that compartment.
Some days ago I was thinking like were does really old hardware goes! Well, now I know the answer!
I truly agree and support about three things discussed in videos and in the comments:
1) Make the recyclable products as much as possible.
2) Have great conditions to repair the products.
3) In case of software-firmware-hardware (like BIOS/UEFI chips), make it open source and publish possible documentation once the machine is not supported any more!
Thanks for the video!
We need more awareness put out in the public sphere. Make people aware that electronics can and should be recycled. Set up easier ways for people to deposit said items, the less effort required, the more likely we will comply.
The iPhone 2G and iPhone 6 are Terrible examples. The 2G was the one of First iPhones ever, with a lot of Problems, while the iPhone 6 is the most sold Phone EVER. Not most sold iPhone, not one of the most sold phones, the most sold smartphone in Existence. The 2G's 270,000 Units sold versus the 6's 222.4 million Units sold just can't be compared in Price. It's like saying "Sand is cheaper than Diamonds, thus no one cares about Sand"
Nokia 1110 sold 330 million copies.
@@kornaros96 should've clarified, most sold smartphone
iPhone 6 is the worst iPhone apple ever made. Worse than the 5c in my opinion. It's the lowest quality iPhone that they've ever made. Baseband issues, touch disease, bendgate, cheap volume buttons, screen that feels like it's gonna fall off. It brought pretty much nothing to the table when it was released too. It doesn't deserve to be the best seller. It's crazy how different the 6s is from the 6. The former possibly being the best iPhone they've ever made, and the latter being the worst.
Nostalgia is a hell of a drug.
I still have an old Macntosh that has signatures in it. I still have my old Cingular iPhone original. 3G, 4, 4s, 5, 5c, 6 (Battery popped out), 6s, 7, 7 Plus and so on. Most used for testing, so really good condition. I'm still using the 6s for the headphone jack. Battery replaced twice. I really love old tech and building a shelving unit on 2 walls to display it all.
Time to upgrade that crap. Get something that can run iOS 17
Watching and typing this comment on a 2014 Retina 15".
With Open Core... still prefectly usable for all kinds of things.
OK, the SD card reader doesn't work, and I need to patch the thunderbolt interface to prevent it from randomly shutting down, and the battery lasts for about half an hour...
Nice outtake in the end 😉
I seem to remember a time when most of your videos were about buying older apple products and bringing them into a usable condition for the current time. Mr Rossman was repairing and extending the life of what he was working with. Modular design allowed for all of this. What Apple have been doing over the last 4 years or so is about limiting the life of their products and forcing people to scrap them and buy new. The specs required for OS upgrades just goes further towards highlighting what their current agenda is.
Personally I won't buy into this. No M* Macs here. Still running a 2010 cMP 5,1, 2009 and 2019 MBP, 2015 MBA and a small cluster of various iMacs. With the help of the army of developers who work on patching the latest OS, all of these are on Monterey, except the 2009 MBP, which is now on Linux.
How about, going forward, a series of guides for people to repurpose their older Macs, where they have them using alternate OS's such as Linux. Let's face it. Most people don't need super speedy or mega powerful machines for everyday use. Just something that does the basics reliably.
I now appreciate why Louis is so passionate about the Right to Repair agenda.
I think about this quite often, I’m glad you are covering it, I really like things like Grid who take these broken items and tear them down then frame them, beautiful.
Incidentally the tibook was my for Mac laptop and I loved it soooo much, the day it died still haunts me lol
The "3 R's" (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) have to be used TOGETHER to make a difference, you cannot just rely on one part of the 3 and expect it to fix things. Reduce your consumption, Reuse your consumption, ANNND VERY LAST RESORT finally Recycle your consumption.
Don’t talk that way about my ex-wife!
Brooklyn T. Guy’s ex wife would be very proud of you after what you just did!
That is why I find locking the bootloader of a device such anti consumer concept.
Same dude. That's why I've only bought Pixel and OnePlus phones
@@AdamSmith-gs2dv ah a fellow pixel enjoyer.
i have a Pixel 6 with grapheneOS. i love degoogled android :P
Best video comment I've seen from you Luke. Congrats. I worked in recycling prior to retirement (green waste). They used to have e-waste recycle days where 20 ton bins were filled be people bringing old tech to dispose of at no charge. Not sure what happened to the stuff but suspect it went straight to land fill.
My first 'Apple' device was an iPhone 4s which I still have. As a musician I bought a midi keyboard that it slots into plus midi adaptor. Just bought a new M1 MacBook Air, ( age pensioner budget) which suits my needs for now. Still use my 2013 Retina MBP, mainly for the Firewire support for digital mixer. Even the M1 required me to install an earlier version of a midi keyboard controller software as the latest version does not support the keyboard I use with it. Not about to buy a new keyboard so that worked out well for me.
I still find it laughable that my 4s iPhone is now a collector item. Probably more so with the matching keyboard.
One point in closing: Before buying the MBP as my first Apple PC 11 years ago now, I had gone through 3 Windows laptops and 3 Windows desk tops over the preceding 10 years. The MBP was my ONLY computer for 10 years and still serves a useful function.
Those prototype airpods are nothing. Imagine multiple pallet crate boxes completely filled with HVT to DVT devices, plus PVT devices not running publicly released software, all headed to industrial shredders, several times a year. All these devices are made by the company that runs "How green we are" adverts on their streaming service (not Apple). Not gonna lie, I shed a tear for a beloved reading device that I read 100+ books on, but it had to be casually tossed into a shred bin due to it running a beta firmware that couldn't be downgraded. I know this is required to make much better devices for customers and it works, but the e-waste part has always bothered me...
Something else worth mentioning is using Linux on all those laptops. I only purchase new computers that can run Linux well without driver issues and have found that they remain useful for many more years without the inevitable creeping slowdowns of MacOS and Windows updates.
It’s just ludicrous that APPLE is the poster child for e-waste when they are the one company that consistently design their devices for durability and reliability. Apple devices more supported, work longer and better than any tech I have ever owned! TH-camrs are the MAIN drivers of e-waste. Every tech TH-camr ask the ridiculous question “should you upgrade FROM LAST YEAR?”
True that
Why are you so focused on Apple? Dell and HP create WAY MORE CORP WASTE each year while Apple supports their products longer. An individual creates less ewaste in a lifetime than any Top 500 Corp does in 1 year (Dell, Lenovo, HP).
I mostly agree, but Apple is becoming more common in workplaces, especially those doing software development. But they're also leading the way in lack of repairability and upgradability. Even if the Dell XPS or Lenovo X1 has the same soldered-on SSD and RAM as an Apple, the bulk of corporate Dells and Lenovos are more serviceable. It's much easier to get an old ThinkPad off eBay, throw in another stick of RAM and give it another 5 years
I still use the laptop I got back in 2013. It still works great with a 4-core i7 processor, 16 gb of RAM and a 1 tb SSD.
I don’t see the need to upgrade as long as it still works.
Time to upgrade that crap. If it’s a Mac it’s unsupported
My brother-in-law was a manager at Apple and I asked him what they do with all the old Apple stuff and he told me that some Apple stores are actually made of the metals from old Apple technology. Not sure if that’s true or not.
Only first world countries have this e-waste “problem”. Meanwhile my shthole country still has “people” trying to sell 2009 MacBook Pros for $800 “because it’s Apple, it holds its value forever”.
I’ve even seen them trying to sell USED base model M1 Airs for higher prices than they are NEW.
Quality is always coveted.The iPhone 6 and 7 looked like E-Waste the day they were released. I kept my 4 and 5 and waited those E-waste iPhones out. The Antena lines alone YIKES!. I still have my 4 and 5 even though they do not work anymore. They look too good to throw away.
iPhone 6 is the worst iPhone ever made.
@@SalivatingSteve yep.
No they didn’t
@@SalivatingStevewrong
my issue is, i love these older devices (i still use an iPod classic 5, iPhone 4S, and a mid-2009 MacBook Pro on the daily!), but the problem is living in canada! nobody around here seems to realize that an iPhone 6S isn't worth $150 anymore because all the listings on eBay cost that amount... i end up skipping out on so many listings because shipping or the original price is just more than the actual thing is worth.
I wonder if old Chromebooks will ever become collectors items. I've heard that some newer ones arent totally useless, but any of them released before like 2022 have no use other than browsing the web, and even that can't be done well since Google drops support for them so quickly.
I’ve been collecting old iPhones for years, now I use them to decorate my room! Lined them all up on 3 shelves - take them off the wall every 2 months to charge them up to keep their batteries from degrading
9:15 lol
What sucks the most is the pile of first and second gen iPad minis I have in a desk in my office, due to apples walled garden they hardly have any use. They can’t run anything new, I can’t flash a custom Linux or android on them, and they end up being left to rot as they grow further and further away from up to date security measures found in browsers, capping what they can still do.
At least with an old Mac, you can actually repurpose the hardware, even a headless Mac can be a server, but the iPads, nope.
Due to lack of official Apple support in my area I bought an iFixit battery for my iPhone SE 2020, unfortunately I didn’t read carefully their website so I wasn’t aware the kit didn’t include screen adhesive and I realised it only when the phone was opened on my desk, my lack of caution killed it while I was on holiday last week due to water damage. At first I thought of buying a new one but in the end I decided to endure 5 days without it and got my old 6s when I got back home (tried to revive SE opening it and cleaning every part but didn’t work). Battery sucks and iOS 15.8.2 does not support some apps I could use, but other than that the phone works quite well. Hope EU will introduce more laws like DMA and DSA to support right to repair and force corporations to ethical behaviours
You don't reply me 😮
😢
I did.
he's busy finding imacs in the trash
The answer is to keep current devices running in the hands of their current owners as long as possible. My daily driver laptop is from 2015 and my desktop is from 2012. Both still work great and are plenty fast for everything that I do with them. My needs haven't changed much, so I haven't needed to replace my hardware. The difference is that I run Linux, pretty much the only operating system that actually maintains hardware support. If something works with Linux, it will continue to work for the foreseeable future. Not only that, but it will actually end up working better with time.
Apple frequently switches architecture and deprecating old hardware. Luckily tools exist to install modern MacOS on unsupported hardware, if apple had their way none of that would be possible... think about that. So much ewaste. Terrible.
On the Windows side, you're completely at the mercy of hardware manufacturers to keep updating drivers. Depending on the vendor, some are good about it, some release one driver and never update it or release another, no matter how many versions of Windows come and go. With Windows 11, Microsoft has attempted to deprecate a ton of hardware, but luckily we can get around that too. But again, if they had their way... tons of ewaste.
None of this happens on Linux. I'm not saying that everyone should switch to Linux and stop buying new hardware (although that is a readily available solution.) I'm saying the concept of deprecated hardware in general is the problem. Apple, especially, wants their customers constantly buying their newest products and that is absolutely not compatible with any kind of conservation of resources.
I haven't even touched on Apple's efforts to make their products disposable and not repairable, but the right and ability to repair hardware is essential to keeping them running and out of the landfill. This goes for cars as well. Appliances too.... everything. We need to become a society fixes things.
Unfortunately none of that is compatible with capitalism. The reason such a simple and obvious solution is so hard to achieve is the "economy." There must always be profitability and growth! If we cannot move past that suicidal ideology then we're screwed, and Apple is one of the worst consumer-facing offenders (the medical field, and I'm sure others, are beyond next level compared to Apple.)
Great vid Luke, my first time seeing your channel! I like to keep all of my old devices too, its fun too look back at them sometimes and like you said better than putting them in a landfill. I made a video on framework/supernote/fairphone recently covering this topic.
I've always noticed the "tech inverted bell curve" effect...and have taken advantage of it. I have plenty of really valuable old tech that I got for free or very cheap when it bottomed out...and now they're valuable retro tech.
Another thing that can help is these recycling turn in companies (best buy/home depot) removing the turn in limit of 3 devices per day.
If you can't sell or trade your electronics. Try sending them to Apple, Samsung, or Best Buy, they will take them for free and recycle them.
I really thank you for putting Apple on the spot, since they have displayed a good amount of greenwashing.
What happened though to recycling, I was under the impression that they have a recycling program... I remember years ago they even had a video of a robot capable of disassembling the iphones, so that they could recycle as much as possible (mostly the alluminium would be smelted and reused - i thought?)
except, the vast majority of these being dumped onto the second hand market, they are Icloud locked. Or better yet MDM is not being removed. There is a VERY big problem here. Apple is just ignoring this.
Of course, the biggest issue of all is Apple refusing to unlock old devices that have been bought perfectly legitimately, meaning that perfectly good phones, computers and tablets end up as trash rather than being given that second lease of life at all. Some of what they're doing is borderline criminal.
Incidentally, I got an M3 MacBook Air the other day after finally surrendering my 2014 MacBook Air. Still, that 2014 is now being used as a Plex server. An older iPhone SE I have sitting around. I have hooked it up to a stereo system so basically works as an Apple Music machine. Then I use an old iPad as a cookbook. We definitely need to. There’s a certain kind of useful novelty to repurposing old devices as one purpose devices.
You should’ve surrendered it years ago. It’s been stuck on Big Sur
I found your channel mainly because I enjoyed restoring old Mac devices my friends were throwing out. I've restored a few laptops and iMacs, but beyond that, I have no idea what to do with them now. They're all from 2010/2011. I keep hoping the Firewire port will help me digitize some older content one day, but we'll see.
The sad part with these old machines that are considered “e waste,” most of the time these old devices like macbooks are still usable. I do have a 2012 unibody macbook pro 15 inch, sure its 12 years old but with an ssd and ram upgrade, its a very usable device and can still do a lot of tasks even video editing too. I think people should rather than buying a new device every few years, hold on to their device for as long as they can.
The worst part is that with newer macs, once these reach 12 years old, these might become e waste because of these stupid soldered parts. It’s not like the old days when a simple ssd and ram upgrade can fix these problems
When I was a kid my family had a black and gray Dell Dimension desktop computer running Windows XP (Windows XP was my first computer OS that I've used and I'm getting nostalgic for it). For a long time that computer was just sitting in my parents basement and I would use it time to time mostly for emulating old Pokemon games. Eventualy, my mom was thinking about getting rid of that computer and in hindsight, I really wish I would have asked her if I could have the computer instead. This is what made me keep my hands on some of my old video game consoles like my Nintendo DS and PS3. Also, I'm thinking about getting the Google Pixel 9 when it comes out later this year and I remember trading in my original Pixel when I got the pixel 3 and then trading in my Pixel 3 when I got the pixel 6, but i told myself that from now on, I am going to keep my old phones/tech for nostalgia but also because I love old tech and there is something about having old tech that was your exact device back in the day rather then just going on eBay and picking up the same device you got rid of all those years ago.
Good job identifying the problems. Expecting manufacturers to deal with e-waste is laughable though. Not only are they not going to take any real action without strong regulatory rules or incentives, but a good number of the devices in my drawer are from companies that don't exist anymore. No manufacturer focused effort can help with those.
We need a robust national e-waste education and recycling effort. It has to be government run and led entirely. There is no other way. It needs to be painless and free for consumers or way too many toxic devices will be in landfills leaching into our water. It will be expensive but we need to pay for it at some point other than disposal or it won't work. Taxes/fees on manufacturers seems like the answer, with maybe some giant fines against the biggest producers to kick things off and get them to pay for all the costs they've already externalized to us.
The issue is most these Apple devices are locked. As the people selling them never had them prepared for resell. And you could call Apple to reset it till chickens grow teeth. As it's not going to happen..
This is a great video and FINALLY a TH-camr covering this. Apple makes WILD assertions about their company being great for the environment but they seem to have a short memory when it comes to how much tech cannot be sold on or used for repair. Here's one for you Luke, if you haven't done it already, what is the cheapest high spec M1 machine you can find and repair?
One huge problems when it comes to phones and tablets are the update models of the OS's. You can perfectly have a 2012 laptop which still runs a modern up-to-date OS (which is exactly what I do) but for phones this is just impossible since the OS updates HAVE to come from the manufacturers themselves and aren't designed in modular way as desktop/laptop operating systems are.. I never understood why we as consumers never question this, as it would be perfectly possible to have the same kind of update model and standards on phones/tablets.. Manufacturers have money intensives to NOT have to any other way than how it is now, where everyone constantly have to buy new devices...
People really need to start questioning these things more...
I bought a 2012 i5 Mac Mini for $60 from a recycle center on ebay just for fun and I used OCLP to update MacOS. It came with a mechanical drive and 4GB of RAM. I threw in a cheap SSD and 16GB of RAM. It's not fast but it is super reliable and could be used in an office environment. When I received the Mac Mini, the device looked brand new and had little to no scuffs. The inside of the Mac Mini was very clean and had no signs of use, even the single fan was completely free of dust. My determination is, the device I got was hardly ever used and I got really lucky. If Apple really cared about the planet and wanted to keep computers out of landfills, they would allow my Mac Mini to be updated to the lasted version of Sonoma. I will say, the 2012 Mac is on the slower side for 2024 standards, even with 16GB of dual channel RAM and an SSD, but it still works and it can do most everyday computer task with ease. Great video Luke
Time up upgrade that crap. It’s obsolete
Windows 11 and the existence of the steam deck have pushed me to entirely cut windows out from my non-work life
Easy to count the number of new IMEIs out there, and how many were decommissioned in any given time period. Then go with that as the number of devices heading for landfill.
I still daily a 2014 MBA and a 2009 MacBook with maxxed out RAM, an SSD and Linux. People throw things away way too quickly.
I had a Retina Pro, bought used on eBay in 2019. If I'd seen Louis Rossman's video on Apple's history of horrible engineering decisions, I probably wouldn't have bought it. It was made after the transition to lead-free solder (So Green!) and the solder couldn't take the internal temperatures generated by editing high resolution photos (the only reason I use Mac or Windows at all). The graphics chip fell off. I took the machine took my local repair shop, but--Oops!--it now was 2020 and Santa Clara County's lockdown order ("First in the nation to lock down!" So proud!) shut the shop and forced them out of business entirely: they delivered the unrepaired machine to me at my home. It would have cost a young fortune to ship it anywhere for repair. It collected dust in my closet until I sold it for scrap a couple of years ago.
Not everything, even scarce, becomes valuable. For every collectable piece of tech, there's dozens from the same era that are near worthless. Being able to repair these devices easily and donate them to your LOCAL community to extend their life spans is about as much as we can really ask for. This is why it's such a shame when companies these days make their products manufactured e-waste from the onset.
They regularly kill a lot of devices with not providing any security updates or making the App Store apps incompatible. It always annoys me.
In most European countries (including Russia and Belarus) the WEEE disposal applies in law and there are start up subsidies for companies which disassemble and grade parts for spares and multiple use.
We cannot expect manufacturers to take back old, wrecked products when the onus is really with the purchaser/owner.
Imagine if Luke's idea were to be applied to motor vehicles.
Perhaps the federal USA needs to apply appropriate laws quickly. Or maybe it would be a salutary gesture to reserve the Potomac Valley and swamps to national disposal of waste.
That's a great topic to talk about, Mac, PC, Smartphone, whatever device. It's great getting to upgrade, repair, and extend the life of our items and keeping devices for a long time helps, but you're right in that an EOL that's more friendly or product conscious should be considered rather than just adding to outright waste. Last phone I had I kept for 8 years, PC, 6.
I don’t understand why people just stop using devices… I had a MacBook Pro from 2013 that worked fantastically until the motherboard went out recently. I then switched to a 2012 Optiplex… Upgraded to a 1TB SSD and bumped to 16GB RAM… moved it to Windows 10… and then added an RX6400… it’s an absolute BEAST. Starts in 8 seconds and plays most games at a decent level.
OCLP is really doing wonders for the environment in ways that people don't think about. Creating a way for new software to be ran on ancient Macs allows us to run these machines for an even longer period of time thus extending the time before the device is thrown out. Currently running Monterey on a 4GB ram Air from 2012 and this laptop doesn't even budge a bit for day to day tasks such as web browsing and word processing. I literally got this laptop for free and am $20 into it for a battery and I absolutely love this little thing and am gonna squeeze every drop out of it until it literally doesn't turn on anymore. And even then I might fix it. Extending the life of something in my opinion will always be substantially more affordable and sometimes more fun than buying the shiniest new gadget.
I snagged a 13" Macbook Air from 2017 with 8GB of RAM and I put a 2TB SSD in it and threw Linux Mint on it....
LOVE IT!
Sacrilege. Time to upgrade that thing
@@emilsecker7881Wtf bro hell no. If it works, why buy a new one? It does the job, you'll keep it. Don't buy new when you don't need to.