ifixit – SomeGadgetGuy

April 3, 2015

iFixIt Gives HTC One M9 a Low Score for Repairability

iFixIt is home to some of the most detailed (and humorous) gadget dis-assembly posts on the internet. Diving into the minutiae of what it takes to tear down, repair, and reconstruct our precious phones, tablets, and laptops.

The challenge for the iFixIt team was to see if HTC had improved upon the build of the M8 in being difficult to repair. It would seem that the hardware similarities between the M8 and M9 are more than just skin deep, as the M9 receives a “2 out of 10”, making it one of the more difficult phones to repair on the market today.

Highlights include a difficult to replace screen and a battery glued to the rear wall of the phone.

If you want to see what’s actually inside your magic glowing rectangle, I would highly recommend checking out one of their tear down guides.

HTC One M9 Teardown – iFixIt

January 1, 2014

iFixIt gives new Mac Pro 8 out of 10 for upgrades and repairs!

Good news everybody! Apple has apparently figured out how to manufacturer a powerful and compact workstation which is fairly easy to upgrade and repair! Someone should tell their laptop and tablet divisions, but I digress…

iFixIt tore the sucker down and found a refreshing lack glue or proprietary screws. Opening the casing allows you to easily get to the RAM. The SSD is proprietary but easy to swap out, which hopefully might encourage some companies to build 3rd party solutions. Even the CPU, while buried deep into the internals, is a stock Intel socket. iFixit estimates you could save almost $1000 buying a low end Mac Pro, and then swapping out the processor yourself.

Maybe the harshest criticism came from the proprietary graphics cards. Flanking the triangular heat sink, Apple had to design their own connectors and shape so they’d fit in the casing. iFixIt worries that this might prematurely age the system if Apple can’t keep up with newer graphics chipsets and offerings.

All in all though, this assuages most of the concerns I personally had over the construction of the Mac Pro. No machine badged a “pro” should ever lock out the user. A workstation is a MUCH longer term investment than a regular destop, and this radical new design from Apple looked like it might have followed in the same footsteps as their MacBooks, glued shut and with RAM soldered onto the logic board. Happily this is not the case, and I’m surprised that Apple themselves didn’t make more noise about it. The ability to improve the system over time larger destroys the perceived “Apple Tax” and should make homebrew OSX systems a little less cost/time effective for those looking at Bang for Buck.

If you’re shopping a high end workstation, I’d highly recommend checking out the iFixIt teardown guide, as they detail the whole process of stripping the machine with their usual wit and humor.

November 2, 2013November 1, 2013

iFixIt Tears down the iPad Air, Scores low for repair-ability

Not terribly surprising, but still something of a bummer.

Not for the Apple faint of heart, but iFixit has worked they’re dissecting tools over Apple’s newest iPad, and the results are somewhat poor. The new iPad Air scores a 2 out of 10 for repairing. It’s part of the trade off for having a powerful and sleek slate, cramming all of the guts into a package that slim is a serious feat of engineering. One which also requires the use of some pretty hardcore glue on the battery.

We should be able to count on a similar score and disassembly process with the new iPad Mini as well.

This continues Apple’s trend of gluing devices shut and locking the consumer out of hardware. It’s standard operating procedure for most tablets, though it’s a touch troubling on laptops and desktops, as their proper computers are becoming more difficult (if sometimes impossible) to upgrade.

Check out iFixit’s tear down, they do a great job of including a little wit while they eviscerate your favorite tech. They also posted this cute little video to show off the iPad’s new guts.