Samsung Galaxy Fold: Yep, We Tore It Down

You may have to wait to get your hands on the Samsung Galaxy Fold, but iFixit’s got your back with a fresh teardown! Unfold a chair and strap in—this one’s a doozy.

The big takeaway? This thing is Fragile with a capital ‘F.’ As expected, there are a ton of entry points for dust and other foreign matter to make their way inside, and there are so many different ways for the screen to break. In our case, it was something borrowed and blue—click through to see for yourself!

Samsung Galaxy Fold Teardown Highlights:

• There are two batteries in this thing. And not just a dual-cell battery (like in the iPhone X), but two, completely separate batteries good for 16.87 Wh of total juice.
• These bezels are super slim—they barely cover two millimeters of the display, while leaving a 7 mm gap at the top and bottom. That doesn’t seem like much protection to us.
• Two sliding hinges, a central geared hinge, and four spring-loaded clasps put the fold in this Fold. The display’s own rigidity provides the springy feeling when opening the phone.

Here’s Why We Think Galaxy Folds Are Failing

Who could have guessed that Samsung’s Galaxy Fold would be such a fragile PR nightmare? The iFixit folks who take apart and investigate mobile devices for a living, that’s who.

We’ve watched as Galaxy Fold review units broke for The Verge, CNBC, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal, and YouTube reviewer Marques Brownlee, each in interesting ways. And while it’s a new device, maybe even an all-new category, there’s still some aspects of the Fold’s brutal first act that we recognize.

I spoke with iFixit’s Lead Teardown Engineer Sam Lionheart about the Fold and the broken units we’d seen glimpses of thus far. I also talked with Dieter Bohn of The Verge about his experiences with his broken review unit. We talked about some potential problems with Samsung’s nearly $2,000 potential trendsetter. What follows are guesses at how the Fold is failing―informed guesses, based on more than a decade of examining the guts of similar devices, but guesses nonetheless.

First Off: OLED Screens Are Really Fragile

Samsung is the world’s leading maker of OLED displays, both by experience and market share. It makes the OLED displays for the iPhone X series, its own Galaxy phones, and about 89 percent of the world’s AMOLED displays as of 2017. OLED displays have many advantages over more typical LCD displays: they work without backlights, they’re more power efficient, they can create brilliant colors. Most importantly, they’re the only kind of display that you can use in this kind of folding, hinged phablet.

But OLED screens are also far more delicate than LCDs, and prone to complete screen failure rather than localized damage. Any small crack in the encapsulation layer around the OLED layer can fatally damage the organic materials inside the display. As industry-watching site OLED-info notes, “OLEDS are very sensitive to oxygen and moisture and so the encapsulation layer is critical.” You get a sense of their brittleness from seeing repair techs and enthusiasts talk about OLED fixes on Reddit.

The edges of OLED displays, in particular, are something Lionheart and other iFixit techs find challenging to disassemble or repair without damage. “We’ve definitely damaged those displays more when tearing them down, especially when curved,” Lionheart said. “It’s really easy to separate the OLED from the glass, and once that happens, that’s usually it for the screen.” Curved displays are particularly tough to fix, as shown in our Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge teardown.

OLED displays are like tiny, extremely thin cleanrooms you carry around, and any intrusion or stress on them is likely to kill their delicately balanced work. You might be able to see where we’re going with this.

OLED Plus Particles Equals Death

Knowing how OLEDs react to prying, moisture, oxygen, or nearly anything, it’s plain to see—from reviewers’ photos alone—that the Fold is literally inviting trouble into its fragile innards.

In pictures posted in The Verge’s hands-on impressions (before their Fold review unit broke), you can clearly see gaps at the top and bottom of the hinge when the full screen is open. A close-up of the hinge on its side, with accumulated pocket detritus, makes it even clearer. And the back of the Fold, even with the hinge closed or partially open, doesn’t look airtight.

“These are some of the biggest ingress points I’ve seen on a modern phone,” Lionheart said. “Unless there’s some kind of magic membrane in there, dust will absolutely get in the back.” It’s important to note, too, that Samsung has offered no IP rating for the Fold.

Bohn finds it baffling the way his Fold unit broke. Especially because the first time he saw a “bump” under the Fold screen was late one night. After consulting with Samsung, he closed the phone and put it aside until the morning. The next day, examining the phone, Bohn saw two bumps under the screen.

“It seems odd to me that it appeared where it did,” Bohn said. “It’s hard to believe that I would not have noticed a piece of debris inching its way up from the bottom.” To us, this suggests the debris, both pieces, may have gotten in from the back hinge. Backing this up is German reviewer Lorenz Keller, who tweeted at Bohn that his Fold also developed a bump, at a point that was the mirror opposite of Bohn’s defects. Keller’s bump eventually went away, which may be the result of the hinge being open enough to allow debris back out.

Photos make it clear that while the screen is supported on its left and right panels, there’s flex room between the panels, as there must be for the device to bend with such a tight radius. That means a thinly-encased OLED screen bends inward and potentially presses against objects that got inside. The inside of the device shows three hinges along the spine. If dirt can get into the spine of the Fold, it could also accumulate around those hinges, bringing them in contact with the fallible OLED layer, and that might explain the similarity between the bumps on Bohn and Keller’s review devices.

Why make a device with a fragile OLED layer, so little tolerance between screen and spine, and so many ways for dirt and moisture, to get in? Hubris? Testing with robots instead of real humans, with pockets and fingers and different ways of opening and closing things? These are questions that may go unanswered, even if we learn the cause of the defects.

Why Pre-Installed Screen Protectors Went So Wrong

Three of the review units that broke were due to the removal of a protective polymer layer that Samsung never intended for people to remove, as captured by Marques Brownlee.

PSA: There’s a layer that appears to be a screen protector on the Galaxy Fold’s display. It’s NOT a screen protector. Do NOT remove it.

I got this far peeling it off before the display spazzed and blacked out. Started over with a replacement. pic.twitter.com/ZhEG2Bqulr

— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) April 17, 2019

Samsung states that the layer is not for human hands to remove, nor will it support additional sreensavers. That tells you something about the display underneath. Pre-installed protective layers are not new; Samsung’s S10 series sports them. But because the flexible display is so fragile, people removing the protective layer—conditioned by years of removing the shipping plastic on their brand-new phones—are pressing their fingers and fingernails against the underlying surface, as well as applying uneven pressure across it. RIP OLED.

Robot Folding Versus Human Folding

What’s the difference between robots built by Samsung, Lewis from UnboxTherapy, and Dieter Bohn from The Verge? They all close the Fold with different gestures. Samsung’s robots, which the company states folded test devices 200,000 times, are pressing with perfectly even pressure across the phone’s outer plates, and opening with a similar even-force grace. In most situations, Dieter and Lewis press somewhere inside the display, on the display, to push the hinge out of its stay-open state and close the phone, then opening the phone up like a book, with their thumbs. Dieter tends to press near the bottom center of the Fold’s left panel, while Lewis, in opening and closing the Fold 1,000 times, hits a few different points in the middle and bottom. Yet another reviewer, Soldier Knows Best, closes the phone with a press in the upper-left of the inside display.

While no media review devices have yet failed due to folding issues, it’s worth noting that if any debris is inside the Fold’s hinge, or underneath the screen protector, pressing on the screen to close it could damage or aggravate the OLED enough to cause failures or problems. Neither reviewers nor yourself are likely to press very hard to close it, but uneven force, applied over thousands of instances, can lead to problems makers don’t always test for, Lionheart said. Samsung’s robots are running inside a cleanroom, while humans are using these devices in real-world conditions: lunch tables, outdoors, and in a hurry on the subway.

A Few More Potential Problems

From what we can tell, the Fold doesn’t seem to have a pre-scored line down the middle of the display to guide the screen when it folds. This is likely a benefit to the aesthetics of the device, so the screen resembles one big display instead of two distinct panels. But without a scored line, the pressure from folding is applied in many different places, instead of down one uniform line.

Lionheart, who majored in graphic communication at college and spent considerable time around printing presses and label applicators, wonders if the crease in the Fold “can wiggle a bit, if you push on one side or another.” That kind of uneven pressure could cause kinks or puckers on the display, which might be an alternate explanation for the damage seen in the Verge review phone.

Both Bohn and Lionheart said that the Fold’s display would seem to need some kind of “play” or “float” to keep the screen from pressing against the edges of the display when opening or closing. “Like a carpet threshold, maybe,” Bohn said. Carpeting can stand to be pushed around a bit inside a container, but, as noted, OLED displays are not made to be bunched up or pressed upon by anything other than fingers.

We look forward to having more pictures and insights from the Fold as soon as we can take one apart. It’s a device with a lot of stories to tell.

Photos courtesy of The Verge.

Independent Repair Shops Aren’t As Risky As People Think

As the Right to Repair movement reaches an all-time fever pitch, tech manufacturers are focusing on one big lie in order to halt our progress: That you can’t trust independent repair shops, only the manufacturers themselves. This argument is a pile of manure.

Corporate lobbyists paint a bleak picture of third-party shops, arguing that these places use low-quality parts, install them improperly, and grift their customers. This couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality, most independent repair shops are no different than your friendly, local auto mechanic whom you recommend to your friends and family any chance you get. And many of them are fully capable of performing the same repairs that manufacturers do—plus some repairs the manufacturers won’t do.

Independent Shops Are Often as Good as the Manufacturers—If Not Better

Manufacturers constantly tell us that those who are properly trained and authorized by said manufacturers are the only ones who should be repairing our devices. But more often than not, independent repair shops are just as “properly trained” as anyone to fix your broken stuff.

Many independent repair technicians have gone through the same training and certification processes that manufacturers require out of their own technicians. It’s also not uncommon for independent repair shops to have former technicians from big manufacturers on staff, especially from companies like Apple, HP, Microsoft, and others. We even have our own MasterTech certification that independent repair technicians can earn to prove their proficiency.

What’s more, many common repairs don’t require extensive expertise. You don’t need years and years of training to replace a smartphone battery or a cracked screen. In fact, we constantly receive success stories from folks all over the world who have fixed their own device without any former training or knowledge. Obviously, you want your professional repair technician to be competent, but we’re just saying you don’t need a master’s degree in engineering and a handful of certifications to be good at fixing stuff.

Image by Ben Hannam/iFixit

Gabriel, who has been in the industry since 2002 and is currently the Operations Manager at The Computer Cellar in Durham, NC, can attest to this. “We’ve met teenagers that have walked into the shop and started discussing computers and technology with us and we’ve said to each other, ‘that kid could do our job,’” he says.

This is true even of those more complex repairs the manufacturers won’t tackle. “One of our ex-techs joined us at 19 with only hobbyist experience,” Gabriel says. “When he left, he was teaching himself board-level repairs. He’s now, at 22, pulling a better salary than me, plus some stellar benefits, working for a university.”

“Board-level” repairs involve fixing the circuit board itself by replacing individual components,   instead of replacing the entire expensive circuit board. These advanced repairs require microsoldering skills, specialized equipment, and a very steady hand.

So what about those repair parts that manufacturers keep harping on? Well, your local shop has a reputation to uphold. It’s in their interest to use a reliable part that meets your high expectations. While it can be difficult (or impossible) to source genuine OEM parts (most cell phone manufacturers, with the notable exception of Motorola, don’t sell their parts to anyone), it’s not too difficult to find aftermarket components that come from the same suppliers that manufacturers use.

“As surprising at it seems, you can buy an original Apple LCD,” says Alexandre Isaac of Phone Repair Toulouse in France. “You need the right contact in China. They usually buy it directly from the factory, as Apple can’t really control perfectly these millions of screens, so Foxconn still sells a few on the side.”

Furthermore, a lot of shops will harvest the good parts out of other broken devices in order to get that coveted OEM logo. “When appropriately refurbished with good tools, these are great and are the best solution,” says Isaac.

In fact, we know that a lot of repair shops use high-quality parts, because in some cases, we’re the ones that supply those parts! Through our iFixit Pro wholesale parts program, we partner with independent repair shops and offer our parts, tools, and support so that those repair shops can offer their customers a great experience. All of our parts are sourced from reputable, trustworthy suppliers, and we do extensive in-house testing on everything to make sure it’s up to snuff.

Independent Shops Can Perform Repairs That Some Manufacturers Won’t

Most manufacturers focus their repair training on the most frequent repairs. Apple, for example, won’t replace lightning ports in their stores—getting this service requires shipping your device to a dedicated Apple service center. It’s not uncommon for manufacturers to turn away repair jobs, either because it’s not worth their time and effort, or because they don’t have the proper tools and expertise to do the repair. Independent repair shops, however, are much more willing to do these more challenging jobs.

Isaac can attest to this, explaining that manufacturer technicians “are usually ‘good repairmen,’ but they don’t have the level that people repairing boards have, and will never have unless they train. So the Genius from Apple is even worse. He only knows how to use software that says a few things about the phone.”

Josephine and Dave Billard’s experience with their water-damaged iPhone is a great example. Here’s the short version: the couple wanted their photos recovered from an unresponsive iPhone, but Apple said they couldn’t help. They were able to find an independent repair shop (iPad Rehab near Rochester, NY) that could perform more complex board-level repairs, getting the phone up and running just long enough to back up the photos. Apple doesn’t have the necessary tools for jobs like this, so without this independent repair shop, Josephine and Dave would’ve lost their vacation photos forever.

We could spend all day sharing stories of manufacturers’ inability to perform repairs. Odds are you’ve run into this yourself! My own father-in-law, for example, experienced an unresponsive screen one random day with his 5th-generation iPod Touch. Apple said they couldn’t fix it, so he ended up just buying a new iPod Touch. This kind of repair is definitely possible, and a whole new screen assembly is just $40. A local repair shop could perform this repair for much less than the cost of a new iPod Touch.

Is There Any Risk Involved with Independent Repair Shops?

No matter what the situation is, there’s always going to be some risk involved during a repair, whether it’s a phone, car, refrigerator, or toaster. But for the most part, that risk is pretty low.

For starters, taking your broken device to an independent repair shop won’t void the device’s warranty with the manufacturer. Contrary to popular belief, it’s actually illegal for a company to void your warranty just because it was opened up and repaired by you or someone else. So don’t worry: Those warranty-voiding stickers are completely unenforceable and should be ignored.

Secondly, going to a reputable and trustworthy independent repair shop is perhaps no riskier than bringing the device to the manufacturer itself. Again, many shops are highly trained and use high-quality parts in their repairs. Plus, any good shop worth its salt will offer their own warranty on both the repair and the parts.

Of course, there are absolutely some shady repair shops out there, just like how there are shady mechanics (and dentists, surprisingly) who will try to rip you off. And there are also repair shops who may mean well, but are out of their skill level with certain repairs. Which is why you should take some time to find a reputable repair shop.

How to Find a Trustworthy Independent Repair Shop

Before you take your device into an independent repair shop, you first have to find a trustworthy and reputable shop to handle your repair, which is perhaps the most difficult part of the process.

Image by Steve Song/Flickr

It’s no different than finding a good, reputable auto mechanic. Ask for recommendations from friends and family who have patronised independent repair shops in the past—this is probably the best way to find a good shop that can service your broken device, as those who have gone through the same thing as you’re about to go through can provide valuable insight into a shop’s trustworthiness and level of customer service. We have found that pros who contribute to iFixit tend to run pretty fantastic businesses, and we have a directory of them.

You can also scour review sites like Yelp, or look at ratings and reviews on Facebook and Google. Even though online reviews can be gamed, they’re generally a decent indicator of whether a repair shop is terrible or not.

Once you narrow your choices down to a couple of shops, don’t be afraid to ask questions about their credentials and the quality of their parts. And especially ask them how much experience they have repairing your specific device.

Word of mouth is a powerful thing. And asking the right questions can give you a good idea whether or not a certain repair shop is a good fit.

Title image by TFix

If You Can Repair a Fridge, You Can Repair a Phone

“Dryers aren’t all that different than phones,” I say to the phone repair techs riding in the truck with me. They’re nervous. A few weeks ago, I fired off a quick late-night email, inviting them to tag along on an appliance repair call. Right now they’re focused on mobile phone repair, but I told them they needed to diversify their skills into other new and fast-growing verticals.

“Repair is constant problem solving,” I wrote. “If you’re not learning and growing, you’re setting yourself up to fail.” They believe it. Now we’re on our way to look at a fridge that’s stopped cooling food.

One tech, Dan, can fix most phone issues in about 15 or 20 minutes, but he’s never touched an appliance before. He tells me that his dishwasher has been out for a few months, but he’s too timid to open it up. As we approach the customer’s house, I reassure him fridges are just like the phones he cracks open every day. The only difference is that the device is about 50 pounds heavier and the screws are 10 times as big. Other than that, it’s not that different—these days, the fridge and the iPhone X he just fixed cost the same.

As we walk in, the customer explains when it started happening (two days ago) and what led up to the failure (clicking every three to five minutes). I hold the fridge open and listen. Nothing. We pull the fridge away from the wall a couple of feet and unscrew the back panel, revealing something that looks like the air compressor my dad used to fill my bike tires. I inspect a small black triangular box attached to the compressor and, based on the reported clicking sound, decide to pull it off to test it. Dan, the appliance-averse tech, brings out a Fluke multimeter, then connects the leads to check for resistance. Nothing.

Our customer has a failed compressor relay switch on their refrigerator. This component listens to the main control board of the fridge, which monitors a thermostat inside to determine when more cold air is needed. The board sends the signal, and this little triangle relays to the compressor that it’s time to circulate refrigerant and cool things down.

“Here’s our culprit!” I say, showing the customer the switch. “It’s not working, so even though the fridge has power, it doesn’t have the capability to cool itself. The part will set you back about $30-50.” Dan installs the new compressor relay we brought along. This time, when he holds the fridge door open: Click. Bzzzzhmmmmmmmm. All systems normal, another patient saved.

Repair is messy. It’s fickle. Spiteful. Frustrating. Exhilarating. Rewarding. Empowering. Repair can make you feel every one of these things all at once and then make you come begging for more. As consumers, it’s a fundamental right we have: to fix (or have others fix) the things we own. Unfortunately, it’s a right that we don’t exercise enough.

Photo by Petar Milošević/Wikipedia

Manufacturers take an increasingly aggressive stance against DIY or third-party repair, especially in the realm of computers and electronics. They wield murky legalese and questionable intellectual property claims to stifle the rights of people worldwide to fix what’s theirs. They lead us to believe these devices aren’t made to be repaired. When your phone cracks, it’s just a fact of life. You’re being conditioned by aggressive sales, contract pricing, and obscure repair detailsinto thinking that an iPhone or a Galaxy only has two or three years before it’s obsolete.

But when your washer starts having issues cleaning your undies, it’s not disposable, is it? It’s an emergency that must be fixed right away. You don’t run down to Sears (RIP) and buy a new one, you figure out what needs fixing. Most modern appliances are built to last about 10 years, and the dirty manufacturing secret is that most electronics are capable of lasting the same amount of time.

Manufacturers like Samsung and LG sell both phones and appliances. If an appliance of yours is broken, a quick Google search for the model number and the symptom pulls up thousands of results. You’ll find out how the device is assembled, wiring schematics, troubleshooting basics, and an array of readily available original parts for purchase. These parts are often generic and cross-compatible between devices. Unfortunately, the same amenities don’t exist for their phones—finding OEM parts, guides, schematics, and troubleshooting answers can sometimes be impossible. That’s because these manufacturers have chosen to support their appliances with third-party partnerships that provide necessary materials—but not their phones.

Last year, when some Samsung washing machines saw their lids pop off violently during use, the company partnered with DISH Network technicians to fix the issue, rather than rely on their limited number of in-house technicians. But when Samsung’s’s flagship smartphones were literally lighting on fire, customers were advised to put their phones in a fireproof box and…wait?

What makes a 50 pound refrigerator different, in repairability, than a smartphone? Both have fuses and capacitors. Both have computer chips and main control boards. Nobody wants to replace either one because of a slight defect. Yet manufacturers take much stronger stances against third parties for electronic repair than for appliances, even their own.

Here’s the rub: Everything breaks eventually, but in many cases, people are throwing away things that can actually be repaired. Phones and appliances are designed in relatively similar ways because the fundamentals are much the same. Both itemshave to deal with heat, insulate components against outside elements, and allow the user to issue commands. New models of each even cost about the same. So there’s no reason that we should accept that one is obsolete after two years while the other simply needs a tune-up.

Repair isn’t a dirty word. Obsolete is. To claim an old device is “sad” or “vintage,” and then actively work to discourage repair and reuse, is a heinous way to sell you something. All of these nefarious tactics are why we need Right to Repair legislation that protects the rights of everyday consumers—to either repair their own things or to find a trusted third party of their choosing to do the job for them. Society shouldn’t be relegated by manufacturers to consumerist pollyannas. As Apple’s  battery-gate exploits and subsequent finger-pointing for poor revenues exposed, manufacturers do not always have your best interests at heart.

Top image by Naval Surface Warriors/Flickr

Apple’s Daisy Robot Is Still a Stunt, But Their Other Recycling Ideas Are Good

Apple announced Thursday, four days short of Earth Day, that it is expanding its recycling programs by adding another phone-recycling robot, recovering more cobalt from phones, and building a research lab for electronics recycling. All of that is fine and good, but the robot is still a recycling PR move. Allowing the world to keep iPhones working, delaying recycling even further, would have a more meaningful impact.

Apple’s Recycling More Cobalt. That’s a Good Thing.

Let’s start with the broadly good news about cobalt reuse. Cobalt is a critical metal used in the electrodes of lithium-ion batteries. Demand for cobalt tripled between 2011 and 2016, according to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, and is projected to quadruple by 2029. The 6.6 grams of cobalt in an iPhone 6 is roughly 5 percent of the phone’s weight, according to The One Device: The Secret History of the iPhone by Brian Merchant, and worth about 23 cents at the time of this writing. Combined with the other raw materials in the phone, that’s enough money to make it economically viable to attempt to recycle it.

60 percent of the world’s cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and a lot of it—up to 40 percent—is mined by hand, sometimes by children, in cramped, dangerous holes. An investigation by the Washington Post found that such “artisanal” cobalt is often washed in the same water used for fishing and irrigation, leading to extremely unhealthy metal concentrations in residents. While Apple and other battery-buying companies have pledged to audit their supply chains for cobalt and other problematic metals, it’s extremely difficult to do so in environments with guarded depots, bribery, and byzantine international markets.

So any recycling of cobalt, instead of more mining, is worth some praise. And because it’s so valuable, recyclers go out of their way to recover it. What Apple announced today isn’t an innovative recycling process—it’s a method of tracking to make sure that cobalt from the batteries they recycle makes it back into their own products. It’s paperwork, but it’s important paperwork.

Apple’s press release states that the company has created “a true closed loop” for cobalt. As iFixit’s CEO Kyle Wiens told Reuters, “Cobalt is mined in horrific conditions … Reducing cobalt consumption is a good thing across the board.” For this closed loop to be credible, though, it should be backed up by a third party audit by a credible firm like UL Environment. It’s very possible they did that, and we encourage Apple to release the results of these audits.

Daisy the Recycling Robot Makes No Economic Sense

Now for the showiest portion of the announcement: Apple’s expansion of its press-friendly, proprietary recycling robot, Daisy. Given Apple’s own numbers, Daisy cannot possibly keep up with the scale of their manufacturing output, especially with newer Apple devices’ increasingly shortened lifespan and repair problems. Apple states that each Daisy machine (there are seemingly two of them) can disassemble 15 different iPhone models at a rate of 200 per hour, hypothetically 1.2 million a year. But theoretical throughput is a silly way to describe the process. In recycling, all that matters are real-world results. If you drive your car sixteen hours a day, you could hypothetically go 350,000 miles a year. That doesn’t mean you will—or that you have that many places to go.

How many phones has Daisy recycled? Apple hasn’t told us, only how many devices they have received: 1 million in the last year. Even if Daisy was bullet-proof enough to operate at that sustained rate of 200 phones per hour, though, supply is going to be a problem: Apple doesn’t get that many iPhones back.

Why? People aren’t giving Apple back their phones, because old iPhones are worth dramatically more on the used market than the material cost or Apple’s trade-in value. On Swappa, the 4-plus-year-old iPhone 6 still sells for $100, while Apple will give you a $90 gift card. Even the iPhone 4 nets $40, while Apple offers nothing. You’d be crazy to destroy a perfectly functional $100 product to recover $0.23 worth of cobalt. The recyclers we regularly speak with rarely see newer-model iPhones, and when they do, they repair and resell them. They certainly don’t grind them up for raw materials. Even non-functional phones are parted out and sold to people like us, who are in desperate need of original iPhone service parts.

Putting aside the supply logistics, the idea behind Daisy is compelling: with perfect knowledge of how a device is put together, you can build a machine that reverses the process and separates all the raw components. It’s easy to see why Apple, who excels at mass manufacturing, was drawn to a centralized approach. Just run the Foxconn assembly line in reverse, and use robots!

But, as with so many amazing ideas dreamed up in laboratories, the concept falls short in the real world. While manufacturing is centralized, recycling is not. At end of life, iPhones are more likely to end up at one of the many thousands of recycling facilities around the world than at one of Apple’s 500 stores. Recyclers handle a dizzying variety of products, from smartphones to CRT televisions to plastic Rock Band guitars. Without government or manufacturer subsidies, using a different specialized machine to recycle each model of product is economically impossible.

I asked Kelley Keogh, co-founder of Greeneye Partners, an electronics recycling auditing firm, what she thought of the project. “Without knowing/seeing their AI capabilities and robotics it’d be hard to judge.” But Koegh defended human disassembly: “I have seen very sophisticated facilities do this manually and quite well.”

Daisy’s fatal flaw is its model specificity. Recycling is a challenging business with slim margins. Recyclers need processes that can handle a broad array of tens of thousands of products. An expensive machine that can only disassemble 15 products just doesn’t make economic sense today.

Apple’s New Real-World Recycling Lab Has Promise

After the robot and cobalt news, Apple also announced that they launched a Material Recovery Lab. The 9,000-square-foot facility in Austin, Tex., “will look for innovative solutions involving robotics and machine learning to improve on traditional methods” of recycling. The lab, Apple says, will combine academics and Apple engineers to “propose solutions to today’s industry recycling challenges.”

Robots like Daisy are a radical approach to recycling that does not integrate well with traditional recycling systems. If Apple is going to provide their technical expertise to suggest incremental improvements existing recycling operations, that would be welcome news. Real-world recyclers need cost-effective technologies that they can integrate into their existing facilities.

It’s clear from the size and exceptionally clean sorting machinery Apple is showing off that their space is a lab, not an active sorting facility. If Apple shares their recycling finds with the wider industry, as the release claims they might, that’s a good thing. For this to be effective, this knowledge should be made publicly available for peer review by academics and adoption by recyclers around the world, in contrast with the secretive approach they have taken with Daisy so far.

But while improvements are welcome, the recycling industry has not been idly waiting for input. “I think often [manufacturing engineers] look at the materials recovery space and feel it has lacked effective R&D investment,” wrote Craig Boswell, president and co-founder of asset management firm HOBI International, in an email to iFixit. “This is far from the truth. There has been a tremendous amount of research on material shredding, separation, and cleaning techniques over the past 50 years. There have been a lot of advancements but some of the remaining issues represent tremendous technical challenges. I wish them the best.”

Envisioning a Greener Apple

Apple also touts refurbishing 7.8 million Apple devices in 2018, or about 3.6 percent of the 217.7 million iPhones sold that year. That’s great—reducing and reusing is better than recycling—but we think they could be doing a lot more to make their devices last longer outside their proprietary restoration system. They could allow the home buttons on phones to be replaced and reprogrammed without needing a secretive machine that locks out third-party or DIY repair. They could stop making MacBooks all but unrepairable, with keyboards that necessitate expensive replacements. And they could offer some kind of low-cost recycling approach for AirPods, Apple Pencils, Magic Keyboards, and the rest of their devices with built-in batteries sealed with impenetrable glue.

Hidden behind the chrome glamour of a recycling robot, Apple’s announcements have the glimmer of some positive changes. The recycling lab is a great idea—a little late, but seemingly a move in a good direction. But they are avoiding the larger product design changes that would really benefit the earth. Recycling is good, but repair is noble.

Children at artisanal mine image by Julien Harneis/Wikimedia. Images of Apple’s Daisy and recycling lab via Apple.

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Books can make, break, or elevate a brand. And author blunders destroy a book. A book is the ultimate business card and a creative way to expand your voice. Most of all, publishing a book is a powerful way to share your story and expertise in a way that can change someone’s life. As someone […]

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Huawei P30 Pro Teardown Wallpaper

The Huawei P30 Pro is here, but it wasn’t going to get past us without a teardown first, as well as a sweet teardown wallpaper to go with it.

The P30 Pro didn’t surprise us much, as there are a lot of assembly tricks that we’ve seen many times in the past (although the use of Phillips screws throughout is nice to see). The phone comes with an in-display fingerprint sensor, as well as an interesting new piece of tech called Acoustic Display Technology, which sends sound vibrations through the display, rather than relying on a traditional earpiece speaker.

Overall, screen repairs are tricky with this one, but don’t let that stop you from seeing what’s inside your own P30 Pro. We have an awesome teardown wallpaper for you to download and stick on your home screen. Just open up this page on your phone and click on the photo to view it at full resolution. Then, save the image to your phone and set it as your wallpaper.

P.S. This is just our first stab at wallpapers for the P30 Pro. We’re working on more and we’ll publish them next week—but since you asked for them now, we figured we should give the people what they want.

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