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"iPod's Dirty Secret"
akpoff writes "Have you ever made a promise while in tech-support hell to let everyone know how bad the product is? The Neistat brothers followed through after the batteries in an iPod died and Apple told them it would cost US$250 to replace them. The tech rep told the guys they might as well buy a new iPod. The brothers thought differently and made a movie showing how they got the word out in a large metro area. Of course it was made on a Mac with iMovie." Their statement is a bit misleading: many people have iPods that have lasted a lot longer than 18 months (the iPod was released over two years ago). But the batteries don't last forever. What is their life expectancy? Does Apple notify consumers of a life expectancy?
Batteries don't last for ever and it costs money to replace them!
Seriously, what were they expecting? When I bought my iPod, I don't remember Apple ever saying they would replace the batteries for free, and I'm sure I don't recall them saying used magical batteries that never die.
Apple's iPod support page says you can get your battery replaced for $99 - not cheap but not $250 either.
PDA Smart offers $69 replacement service or a do-it-yourself kit for $59. Which Geek.com raved about
If the guys can't Google, they shouldn't buy expensive toys.
Quite honestly, if someone insists upon Authentic Apple Parts for everything, when there are commodity parts available -- this goes especially for RAM, and now also apparently for iPod batteries -- I don't see how they've got a leg to stand on whilst griping and moaning about how unfair life is.
While I have heard of these issues, the battery does not die on all cases. I have a first gen ipod that I got almost two years ago and have noticed perhaps a 10% drop in charge duration. Part of this problem was addressed by a software update a few months back. My ipod had slipped to about 5 hours of battery life and jumped back up to 8-9 hours after the firmware update.
Yawn.
The site was created in the last week.
Days after Apple announced the $99 battery replacement policy.
Months after www.ipodbattery.com offered $50 battery replacements.
Like anyone thought that Apple could summons the power of the Almighty and create a Lithium-ion battery that lasts forever...
The product has a one-year warranty. That means- you guessed it- Apple will back it up for one year. Want more? Lay out the $59 and buy an AppleCare Protection Plan- the service and support extends to 2-years.
Tech Support is a business, boys and girls, not a public service. Apple has to compete with illegal abuses of monopoly power, and yet they still offer top-notch support and quality products. Don't bitch about them not doing more than they said they would.
What is the matter with you? You include the goatse guy AND the video! Seriously, step away from the keyboard and get a life.
Trevor
As a rule, consumer electronics factory repair prices have been at or near replacement cost for all but high end gear (ie. >$2000US) for years. Consumers with enough brains to program their VCR who want to flog their gear a little longer have long been buying DIY books. As others have pointed out, Google is the friend of modern man.
Luke, help me take this mask off
Does anyone else find it amusing that they use and advertise Quicktime on a website meant to put down an Apple product?
Maybe I had better buy a new car?
If you are one in a million, then there are six thousand people who are just like you.
If you provide an iPod with power from outside will it still run as normal even with a dead battery? If so, there are going to be some cool-looking firewire HDD arrays in the future.
Apparently "we" can't spell vandal.
Oops!
Disclaimer: Mac user since OS7/LC III and I want an iPod once it becomes videoPod
I think it's great. If this doesn't wake Apple up, nothing will. Seriously, how hard would it have been to design the thing with an easily replaceable battery? That's one of the things you look for when buying things like digital cameras: how much does a replacement battery cost?
I love the iPod and I want one but here's to hoping that Gen 4 pods have easily replaceable batteries. Remember, the guys that did the vid are solid Mac users too. They're just righteously pissed off. More power to them.
When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
First of all, as many have said before me, the battery costs $99, not $250. Also, the site went up days *after* the announcement, which means they were irresponsible enough to keep it on.
Second, batteries don't last forever. There can't be a life expectancy because that number is dependent on number of charges, hours used, length of time used, and other factors. If they said "13000 hours" and some fool's iPod went dead before that, then he'd be compelled to put it on a site like these people did, which IMO, is ridiculous.
It is very possible their tech support guy was a moron, but they shouldn't tarnish the reputation of iPod or Apple. It's so pathetic how they always go for the most successful products and attempt to break them to pieces.
A blog like any other.
1. Vandalize many Apple signs. ...
2. Make video showing clearly your face and your acts of vandalism.
3. Put audio into video that clearly reproduces call to Apple for easy identification.
4. Put same on Internet.
7. PROFIT!
I don't think he's a vandal (or vandle), since he's disfiguring posters that Apple just throws up all over town, probably without a specific permit. He's just modifying it. Might be legal in some places but not in others; I don't think it's open-and-shut.
I don't understand why everyone is so quick to jump to Apple's defense. If you are paying $400 or more for a music player, you shouldn't have to pay another $100 every year to replace the freaking battery. I started having battery probs with my 10GB second gen. model a few weeks after i bought it. the replacement they eventually sent me (it took more than a month.) crapped out a few months later. and apparently that's all you get for $400. Two broken ipods and a years worth of headaches. If I had known the batteries would die so soon I wouldn't have bought an ipod in the first place. It was a really big financial sacrifice in the first place which i justified because music is my life and i thought i was buying the greatest device ever. But even $50 dollars is too much for me to spend right now, and i'm afraid i'll just get another bad battery. $400 is a hell of a lot of money, and it should buy you a product that works for longer than a year. I feel like I deserve a better solution.
When you race electric R/C cars on a serious level, you become quite adapt at building and servicing your own packs.
:)
Popping the back off my iPod and installing a fresh battery, bought off the net for less than US$75.00, is nothing... I look forward to the day
It is not acceptible design for a device with a part that will wear out during the useful life of the device not having that part serviceable. This is as bad as the old V-8 Mustang-IIs that required the engine be dropped to replace the back two spark plugs. Even the game boy advance has a user replaceable battery (albeit behind a screw).
While Apple might not be guilty of any crime in their handling of this, they are definately guilty of:
o Very poor design
o Very poor handing of the problem.
Apple relies on very high customer satisfaction to justify their premium products. This type of incident does not bode well.
I ordered an iPod a few hours after the first ones were announced in 2001. Still have it. Battery still works fine.
That's a 2 year old iPod for those who are curious.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Toshiba unit, no less. I don't see how anecdotal 'evidence' supported by a biased movie-rant is the basis for an assault on Apple's integrity. I have been an Apple user for decades, and have only had great experiences (except once, that damn 1400c, which while being a peice of crap, was still replaced immediately with an alternate 3400c, IIRC).
Again, It's anecdotal, but I could just as easily go make some lame "Underground, rebelious" movie about how great my experiences have been, but I'm a little busier than those worthless college dweebs with too much time on their hands and too much of their parents money...
Shit breaks, grow up. Probably mistreated the thing anyways and are trying to get something for nothing...
We apologise for the fault in this post. Those responsible have been sacked. -- Signed RICHARD M. NIXON
Not taking the first no for the final answer, and working a bit with the company, goes a long way towards fixing most issues.
Get off my launchpad!
The cost for repairing an iPod is $250, however if the battery is the only problem it costs $100. So either:
1. There was something wrong with the iPod other than the battery (maybe it fell our of their pocket one too many times?)
2. Or, the tech support rep from Apple goofed and forgot that battery service is cheaper. Heck, not all of the Apple tech support reps can be stellar. If you don't like what you hear, call back.
The iPod is not the only device to use built in rechargeable batteries. Other examples of such devices are cell phones and Palm PDAs. Cell phones usually have easy access to the batteries, but the high end Palm PDAs don't. Does anyone know in comparison how easy it is to change these batteries, how much they cost and what is their life span?
I think the issue may need to be making people aware of the lifespan of 'integrated' rechargeable batteries, no matter the product.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
I saw the solution to this months ago when researching my purchase of a ipod... ya know this is something that you do when you spend hundreds of dollars on something... I mean come on, I saw the ipod for sale and saw that there was no option for buying a battery... so i did a google search and ta da... http://www.ipodbattery.com these guys should have spend as much time typing "replacement ipod battery" in google as they did carving out those stupid letters in their graffiti templete... an Idiot is born every day i guess
I got a 5 GB the day they were announced (well, I ordered it that day). Never had a battery problem with it, and it continues to play just fine as my backup iPod. However, the FireWire chip in it fried when I connected it to my Mac back in March. I pulled it apart and checked everything and verified that the chip was the culprit. It still works, it just will never sync again.
I bought a 15 GB to replace it, but paid more than I needed to just to get it at Best Buy and get the $40 extended warranty. I NEVER buy extended warranties, but in this case, Best Buy is crazy - for $40, I guarantee the life of my iPod to 3 years. iPods are great, but I would never put their average lifespan as that long.
2) I have an original 5 gig, and the batteries have yet to wear out, and my normal use is about 3-4 times a week.
honestly any time you have a embeded battery system, your going to have burnout trouble. It was less than a year when my rommies iomega MP3 player burned the battery. His was much easier to replace than the iPods but it still cost him like 79 bucks
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
So basically, if I go out and buy a new portable CD player, a pair of AA batteries to go with it, and start feeding it CDs for me to listen to, I should expect to get more than 18 months out of the batteries? If that's the case, then we all need to be suing the Energizer, and Duracell makers.
I typically listen to my iPod for about 6-8 hours a day. I charge it up every two days. I've had it for almost a year now. The battery is fine for me. But of course, being an audio engineer, I don't listen at earsplitting levels so my battery isn't used up by driving the output amplifier.
Let's do a little basic math here. I spend $3 on some batteries...long life Duracell or Energizer. I go through a pair in two days at my usual listening rate of 6-8 hours per day. So that's $1.50 a day in batteries. In a month, I've spent $30 (an average of 20 work days a month, at $1.50 per day). In a year, I will spend $360 in batteries. If you stretch that out to the 18 months the guy is complaining about, you end up spending $540.
So, in 18 months, he can spend $540 on batteries, or $499 on a new iPod and $41 on music from the iTMS.
Or, he could spend $499 on a new iPod, and in 18 months, for only an additional $10 investment, get a new battery. So he now spends $550 and get's an iPod for 36 months.
This is utter silliness.
Plant a tree in a developing country.
I know the iPod's other dirty little secret. Sometimes people do things with their hands, then touch the iPod without washing themselves. I guess you could call those people "Palm Pilots".
Apple has recently started selling iPods through Target, CompUSA, Best Buy and Circuit City and all 3 offer insurance that basically replaces your iPod with a new one if issues happen to it. Most are offering 3yrs for $30.00 approx. and 4yrs for $40.00 approx. Also Apple now offers AppleCare for all new iPods and for iPods under a yr old like mine. This is 2yr deal from the the date you bought your iPod. This includes tech support which now has tips to help improve your battery charges. The price is $59.00 or $46.00 with edu. discount. Apple has also a battery replacement program for $99.00 for users with original iPods or iPods out of warranty. There is also many 3rd party battery service now available to iPod users that either gives them DIY kit or they actually do all the work for you type service. Most places are charging between $25-50 dollars range depending on what you get. So stop complaining and use one of the above services. Also if you don't want to mess with any of it get creative and make nice firewire external HD out of it. I currently have 40GB iPod and had no problems with it at all. I plan on buying the new vPod as soon as it comes out next yr.
A little while ago (11/11) I was reading a blog of some girl who lives in NYC and she had these pictures of where someone had spray painted over tons and tons of iPod ads in NYC.
I thought nothing of it, seeing as how I could understand how some stupid people could take something the wrong way and do something stupid about it. Now... there's a slashdot article and a little movie about it...
I am almost ashamed to call myself an iPod user. First there was yelling about how the older iPods didn't get the features from software v3.x. Boo Hoo Hoo.
Now they're complaining that the battery doesn't last forever. I find it amazing that after Li-ION batteries have been out for years that people don't understand that these things don't last forever.
When i purchased my Powerbook G4, i was told by the reseller that i would go through about a battery every year. I opted for the Applecare and they have given me a new battery every year. My first battery dropped to about 50% life after a year and now i'm on number 2. While this isn't great, it's certainly better than my fathers Dell laptop that has about 20mins of life after about 1 year. For those of you who don't understand why Apple will not repair things like powersupplies, it's because it would cost more to fix one, than buying a new one.
As for batteries, has anyone looked the market full of portable electronics lately. A large share of PDAs do not have replacable batteries. Once your Clio battery dies, you have a $200 paperweight.
Unfortunately, i have yet to find a battery that lasts forever. You have to change the battery in your car every 3-5 years, and it's only really used to start the car. PDA, Laptops, Cellphones, none of these devices have batteries that last more than a couple years, yet it is the iPod that gets complained about.
People need to realize that every device has a "cost of ownership." With most devices this consists of purchase cost, maintanence costs, repair costs and so on. Having a battery fail in a device after 18 months is not out of the ordinary, especially with heavy use. You have to change the oil in your car, rotate the tires, and tune it up every 60,000 miles, yet none of these things anger people as much as the battery failing in the ipod.
Just sit down, shut up, and stop blaming Apple for the simple fact that their hardware makes it through the warrenty period without issue.
I believe there are some relevant issues with lithium batteries and product safety. If the iPod is only designed to work safely and reliably with Apple specified and tested batteries, they may want to prevent end-users from mucking with the battery. Nokia has been blamed for catastrophic battery failures that were caused by sub-standard counterfeit battery packs. Apple may have decided that making it a user-replaceable part wasn't worth the risk. Plus, it avoids the added cost and reliability issues of a case with a user-accessible battery compartment.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
I don't think these guys had all the info, or were possibly led astray by the Apple rep. But really, as big an issue as this has become, Apple would do well to offer a 4G iPod with an external battery pack. I mean, c'mon, Ives and crew are more than up to it. If the design was more or less exactly like the PowerBook design is, it would make no difference at all to daily use (i.e. battery flush with the body, like a cell phone).
In fact one of the unexpected bonuses to this kind of design I've observed, on my T68i, is that if I drop it the phone has tended to land on one of the bottom corners, or scrape the back - which is the battery itself. I can remove the cosmetic damage to the phone by changing that battery.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
The first thing I did when I got my first iPod, was go to CompUSA and get the extended warrenty. You don't even need to buy it there to get it. Cost me $39.99 and I was able to get it replaced for free the next year when the wheel broke...Then again 6mos later when the battery life started sucking...then again when the next one started crashing. I use the CRAP out of mine, and am on my 4th iPod. (new, 30gb one) and have only ever spent $39.00 each time I get it replaced. Yeah, I've spent $160.00, but I've also been able to upgrade to the latest and greatest every year for less than $50. I'll take that deal ANY day...
My
If you call ANY hardware support line for ANY company, they will ask for information, and if you don't give them the information they need to properly troubleshoot the issue, then you aren't going to get help.
In addition to that, if you are under the published system requirements, they have every right to tell you to sod off, as there are reasons the minumums are set there. Reasons such as driver support, performance considerations, and more likely in Apple's case, chipset support and removing the god-awful backwards compatibility engineering costs of supporting machines that are 6+ years old.
It's not just Apple that does this. Go buy ANY hardware OR software that you don't meet the minimum requirements for and call support saying it doesn't work, and see what response you get.
Oh, and nice blast at the end about people making money where others didn't have the vision to see what they had. I seem to recall Xerox executives voluntarily showing Jobs & Co the Smalltalk systems, above the protests of the PARC employees at the time.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Well isn't that just dandy? I guess we should all go out and race R/C cars!!! Sounds like so much fun!! And it's so popular, I bet tons of people on my street race R/C cars!!! They could probably fix my iPod battery! Yeah!
Oh god this is great. R/C car enthusiasts are here to save US! Joy! Bless you, R/C car enthusiasts, bless you!
Some other "not that big a deal for some's":
Metalworkers:
"When you work with sheet metal on a serious level, you become quite adept at remounting your Pinto's rear bumper to the frame."
EMTs:
"When you work with saving lives on a serious level, you become quite adept at removing those small plastic parts from choking children's throats."
Waitresses:
"When you work with coffee on a serious level, you become quite adept at not dumping scalding coffee on your lap."
Hairstylists:
"When you work with shampoo on a serious level, you become quite adept at not eating the shampoo."
This is as bad as the old V-8 Mustang-IIs that required the engine be dropped to replace the back two spark plugs. Even the game boy advance has a user replaceable battery (albeit behind a screw).
;^) There's nasty bolt in the top of my Jeep's Tremec T-150 tranny that's a real bear to get to, so I just busted a hole in the body big enough for a rachet wrench, and voila!
There some reason you feel you always need to hit on all cylinders? Or that you can't rip a couple of holes in the firewall?
Which is the whole issue here, of course. I still haven't quite finished bolting my iBook up after upgrading the hard drive (and it's trivially worse for the wear). I wonder where the PRAM battery is on that monster; shoulda checked while I had the chance. And the PRAM on my Powerbook 1400 required flipping off the lid/screen and cracking the "body" in two. Nobody wants duct tape holding together their iBook body for easy hard drive access or 1400 for PRAM replacements.
I've often wondered if the way autos are put together isn't a result of some mechanics' union to get business "where it should be". It looks like Apple's doing the same thing [as my conspiracy theory] -- uncessarily difficult tasks which, to them, equal pure profit. Great analogy if Pony II's really had to have the engine dropped. That's madness.
It's all 0s and 1s. Or it's not.
Only with ni-cad, and to a lesser extent ni-mh.
Behaviour like this kills li-ion, lots.