[HN Gopher] Tearing down Apple's display opener [video]
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Tearing down Apple's display opener [video]
Author : tambourine_man
Score : 37 points
Date : 2023-03-19 12:35 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
| elzbardico wrote:
| What an over-engineered piece of junk. I am convinced one of the
| requirements was that the design should be intentionally over-
| complicated. It is a f** heating plate with a suction device. Why
| the hell do you need all those different cartridges, an RFID
| chip, and a giant touchscreen for that?
| crazygringo wrote:
| So that employees can use it with minimal training and be
| guaranteed it won't damage the phone because they misaligned it
| or used the wrong temperature or for the wrong length of time.
|
| This isn't meant for occasional boutique repairs, it's meant to
| work perfectly a thousand times a month for many, many months.
| kevingadd wrote:
| It's interesting that the YouTube comments have multiple
| supposed AASPs saying that the display opener breaks due to
| software failures on a regular basis.
| elzbardico wrote:
| Can't you imagine a few ways to reach the same requirements
| with a significantly simpler and less wasteful design?
|
| What is the point of this giant touchscreen, for example? It
| doesn't even show descriptive error messages. And once you
| have this useless display, it will drive more complexity into
| the design.
|
| The fact is, you don't even need a CPU to meet the
| requirements. A simple microcontroller would be cheaper and
| less fragile while saving you the trouble of designing a
| complex digital circuit out of simpler timers, op-amps, and
| flip-flops.
|
| Really, I refuse to believe that the best way to realize this
| design is by packing it with probably more computational
| power than what you had in Apollo's Guidance Computer.
| tverbeure wrote:
| You are trying to optimize the cost of something that
| doesn't need cost optimizing.
|
| "Hey boss, shall I spend a week to reduce the cost of a low
| volume $1000 device by $2? Or shall I reuse stuff that we
| already have?"
|
| As for the RFID part: I've been involved in creating setups
| for a production environment. You want to avoid an operator
| to make decisions because they will mistakes otherwise. The
| RFID solution is elegant and prevents an operator from
| accidentally cooking a $1000 device.
| crazygringo wrote:
| I mean maybe, but why even care?
|
| This is low volume manufacturing. There are probably
| 1,000's of these, not 100,000's. They probably selected the
| components that were easiest to purchase in small
| quantities and assemble, and whatever the engineer was most
| familiar with. Maybe there's a touchscreen in case they
| want to do a firmware update someday to improve it.
|
| But at low volumes, why be bothered even if it _is_
| overengineered? All this stuff is cheap. It 's not a big
| deal. It's not even for consumers.
| fwlr wrote:
| Yeah, you could skip the NFID+hotpockets system and just
| have adjustable heating elements and use the touchscreen to
| select the appropriate program.
|
| Now if you adjust the heat elements wrongly, you can fail
| to weaken the glue in some spots, and the screen will break
| when you're removing it. Also you might select the wrong
| program and insufficiently weaken the glue (broken screen
| again), or damage a phone not able to take the higher heat
| a different model can. Also it doesn't prevent you from
| using this device on a phone that's changed in dimensions
| due to battery expansion - now you're heating an already
| expanding battery, good recipe for a battery fire.
|
| The presence of a touchscreen that doesn't utilize the
| touch functionality tells me they have learned some of
| these lessons the hard way.
| detourdog wrote:
| The iPhone itself outshines the Apollo guidance computer.
| The tool to repair a tool may require sophisticated
| tooling. Apple doesn't need to design tools for part time
| installers. Apple already has one that works well and was
| forged on the front lines. For a reasonable fee Apple will
| let you borrow it and Apple expects you to be happy with
| your results.
|
| If there is such a big market for the supply of these
| sophisticated but in-expensive tools it will be exploited
| by someone.
| dzikimarian wrote:
| Literally any modern computer outshines Apollo guidance
| computer. It's 50 years old.
| detourdog wrote:
| Yes, my point was the sophistication of Apollo guidance
| computer is a poor yard stick, although it may outshine
| the D-17B.
| quijoteuniv wrote:
| I find surprising that comments are aimed to discourage people
| fixing phone themselves and still somehow justifying apple bad
| appleness.
| runlevel1 wrote:
| They certainly didn't skimp on the components. That thing looks
| expensive inside and out.
| rubatuga wrote:
| The connectors are beautiful
| jerlam wrote:
| A pity the reviewer doesn't get it to work.
|
| The reviewer falls into the same trap as others regarding repair
| equipment like this; they think it's too complicated and durable
| and want to compare it to their hobbyist equipment. They're
| forgetting that the official equipment is meant to be used
| thousands of times, by minimally trained and overworked staff,
| with the least amount of damages. Hence the whole setup for each
| phone model have a special phone cradle, that has an RFID chip
| that sets up the recommended heating temperature and time,
| because the tech is going to put the phone into the heater and
| then walk away to do something else, and doesn't want to come
| back to a damaged mess like if they used the "cheap" hobby
| heating plate for too hot or too long.
|
| One of YouTube comments is like "whoa, it costs $100 for each new
| heating plate, what a ripoff" which is absurd when you amortize
| that cost over the hundreds of phones it will service and how
| much each screen costs.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| The official repair equipment is also an evolution of assembly
| equipment. If you need a jig to hold a phone, it is easier to
| start with the solid metal jig design used by the machine that
| built the phone in the first place.
| sohtym wrote:
| > The official repair equipment is also an evolution of
| assembly equipment.
|
| Are you saying that as a fact or is it speculation?
| joezydeco wrote:
| I've worked for companies where this was a fact. Why would
| you design the same fixture twice?
| sohtym wrote:
| Because they are potentially completely different
| processes. It is certainly possible, but what I see is a
| test fixture that could be made completely separate.
| Therefore it would be interesting to know if it wasn't,
| how they know that it wasn't and why Apple wouldn't on
| production lines costing many millions to billions.
| amelius wrote:
| > like if they used the "cheap" hobby heating plate for too hot
| or too long.
|
| So a simple timer should cost hundreds of dollars?
| reaperducer wrote:
| _So a simple timer should cost hundreds of dollars?_
|
| If it was a simple timer, your sarcasm would make sense. But
| as noted by the person you replied to, it's not a simple
| timer. It's part of a more complex solution intended for a
| different environment than social media outrage bait
| hobbyists.
|
| In no world can I imagine Apple putting out a tool with
| instructions like "Wave your mom's hair dyer at this a few
| times back-and-forth and guess when it might be just about
| hot enough, but not too hot. You'll know it by smell, after
| you destroy enough devices."
| userbinator wrote:
| _They 're forgetting that the official equipment is meant to be
| used thousands of times, by minimally trained and overworked
| staff, with the least amount of damages._
|
| The various repair shops you can find in parts of China and
| East Asia in general can do the same if not even more in-depth
| (i.e. component-level) repairs, and they certainly don't need
| expensive specialist equipment like this either.
| blacksmith_tb wrote:
| But I expect those shops have a small number of very
| experienced staff? If you trained at the knee of a master,
| I'm sure you can soften those adhesives with a heat gun
| without overdoing it, but it's hard to just box that
| knowledge up and send it to someone green.
| sohtym wrote:
| It is fair to judge it as a self repair tool when it is
| presented as such by Apple.
| chiph wrote:
| Apple got strong-armed into making this available.
|
| As to why they didn't create a hobbyist-grade tool for the
| self-repair program - all it would take is a couple of $900
| phones damaged (followed by the outrage social media posts)
| by non-technical end-users to negate any savings. Better to
| make it bullet-proof.
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(page generated 2023-03-19 23:03 UTC)