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HTC, Motorola Say They Don't Slow Old Phones Like Apple Does (theverge.com)
After Apple confirmed last week that it reduces the performance of older iPhones to improve battery life, it has left many wondering whether or not other smartphone manufacturers do the same. HTC and Motorola are the two most recent OEMs to say they don't throttle their phones' processor speeds as their batteries age. The Verge reports: In emails to The Verge, both companies said they do not employ similar practices with their smartphones. An HTC spokesperson said that designing phones to slow down their processor as their battery ages "is not something we do." A Motorola spokesperson said, "We do not throttle CPU performance based on older batteries." The Verge also reached out to Google, Samsung, LG, and Sony for comment on whether their phone processors are throttled in response to aging batteries. A Sony spokesperson said a response would be delayed by the holidays, and a Samsung spokesperson said the company was looking into it. The responses begin to clarify whether or not throttling processor speeds is typical behavior in smartphones -- as of last week, we knew that Apple was doing it, but not whether it was common practice among competitors. HTC and Motorola's responses start to suggest that it's not.
So while the vendor may not be slowing your old phone down to encourage you to buy a new one, any hacker with the right exploit can compromise your device via SMS and make all sorts of trouble.
You want the latest Android? You should buy a new phone from us. Your HTC M7 with purple camera is old. Why would you want new software on it?
It's hard to slow down old hardware if you stop supporting it the second I buy it.
So what if Apple throttles the phone. From a technical standpoint, it makes sense.
All they had to do was inform the user of it, and/or allow it to be disabled.
If this was any other maker, it wouldn't be nearly as big of a story.
The issue two-fold, and many vendor are guilty of the first one:
1) They aren't sizing the batteries in such a way so that the peak voltage can be sustained more than two years from release under normal use.
2) They didn't provide details of WHY the phones were slowing down, so people would understand that a cheaper battery replacement would restore performance.
The fact that they slowed it down without detailing why tells me it was a play to get more sales AND to prevent warranty work. The Nexus 6p had a similar issue where after the battery wore down, it was causing the phone to turn off due to low voltage. Google usually replaced the phone, often with a new Pixel phone as well. Apple was trying to make sure this didn't happen with this change, and by the way, once it got slower, people would tend to BUY the upgrade, not send it in for repairs.
"I guess what this means is if you want your phone to still last a solid day in a year or two, better not buy Motorola!"
With Turbo Charging, who cares? I can top up in minutes, not hours.
Good-bye
Apple will replace your battery for you for $80, and you can get a battery replacement kit from iFixit for $25 if you want to go that way. The battery is very unlikely to need replacement more than every two years, so whether the battery can be easily replaced by the user is not that important.
I don't know what you mean by the CPU not running at its rated clock speed. I don't measure the usefulness of a phone by its rated CPU clock speed. I measure that it does what I want it to do fast, and my four-year-old iPhone 5S is doing OK. I'm thinking of replacing the battery, or maybe getting an SE. (I don't want a larger iPhone.)
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Apple had the choice between limiting current draw, allowing the phone to crash, or changing the laws of physics.
Or allowing people to easily replace their batteries. God forbid!
No you don't want to have an option for every damn thing on the phone. I want a senible set of well tested choices made for me then present me with the most useful ones.
not having my batttery run out or having it make it to the next upgrade cycle is great priority over the absolutely fastest iphone. if I need fast computing I'll use a computer or replace my battery.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.