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Is there anything good about the battery be soldered on?

E

erandall38

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 24, 2007
463
1
I am so sick of people always seeing my iPhone and the first thing they say is "oh that thing sucks because the battery is soldered on"
I agree it does suck that it is like that.... but everything else that is great about the phone far out weighs that one negative thing.

But I was wondering, is there some benefit to the phone or battery by having it soldered on?
 
You can't lose it? :p

Actually, I don't change out batteries so it doesn't bother me that the battery is soldered on. The iPhone lasts me through the day and I just charge it every night, just like my old phone.
 
HAHAHA

I guess the point they are making is that if you do get a BAD battery and have to turn it in for repair you have the 3 day wait and have to PAY for a replacement.

Is there anything that is helps though, besides not loosing it;)? Does it help the life of the battery or the strength for some reason?? what was the whole point for it being soldered. Did apple just not want to have a removable battery because it was more moving, or possible breaking, parts?
 
Connectors would take up much more space. Soldered connections can be more reliable, depending on the application.

edit: having a removable battery would make the phone bigger too. There would be the connector, a shield for the internal components, and mechanisms for the removable back. The iPod has never had an official user replaceable battery, and I don't think it's hurt sales any... ;)
 
The main benefit is less resistance. When ever you introduce a plug or a switch it adds resistance. Can't say it would be enough of a difference to cause Apple to solder them on, but who knows.
 
gr8tfly said:
Connectors would take up much more space. Soldered connections can be more reliable, depending on the application.

edit: having a removable battery would make the phone bigger too. There would be the connector, a shield for the internal components, and mechanisms for the removable back. The iPod has never had an official user replaceable battery, and I don't think it's hurt sales any... ;)
Click to expand...


great answer... I was more looking for a reply to give to these people. Most of them end up asking me why this is like this and what is the idea behind it, this is what I will have to tell them.
 
When I got my iPhone last month, it replaced a crappy old LG I was nursing til my contract with Verizon ran out.

I charged the thing all the time, every day, in the car, in the house -- for 2 years.

Number of times I replaced the battery: zero.

Number of times when having a non-soldered battery helped me in any way? zero.

I have owned 3 other cell phones.

Number of times I have had to replace a battery = zero.

This is a non issue, drummed up by people who want it to be an issue.

Get over it.
 
People are looking for reasons to hate on this phone. It doesn't do this, it won't do that, battery this, battery that. I can't even believe the media reports that just go off on simple issues like the recent security/safari situation and proclaim how "the iphone may not be all it's cracked up to be..new security flaws leave the iphone very vulnerable". I think that was on the freaking Today show as a leading story. It is a ridiculously great concept and I'm 99% happy with it and I can't even compare it to any previous device. iPods weren't that big of a deal initially at all and now I can't even go to the dentist without seeing white headphones everywhere.

I don't really care that I can't take my battery off honestly and how is that a negative when I was charging my other phone every night no matter what..or else. I expect apple to change something about the loaner phone/charge fee to mitigate some of the complaining/lawsuits.
 
synth3tik said:
The main benefit is less resistance. When ever you introduce a plug or a switch it adds resistance. Can't say it would be enough of a difference to cause Apple to solder them on, but who knows.
Click to expand...

Resistance can be a factor, but more with high-current applications (well, like the battery). The problem is the more current, the bigger the connector needs to be. I use a couple of different connectors that can handle dozens of amps. They use swaged on pins, not soldered.

Most MIL (and aviation) connectors use swaged pins in their connectors. They actually are more reliable than soldered in this case, since there isn't any tinned/non-tinned transition in the wire which can create stress points when the wires are moved due to shock or vibration.

I'm not making a case for or against soldering. It's really application specific. Anyway, using a soldered connection in the iPhone makes sense, given the alternative of a large enough connector to handle the current. Since the wires are strain relieved by some sort of glue, the vibration issue noted above is taken care of (the tinned/non-tinned transition).
 
I never understand people who say "I don't need this" or "I never had a use for that" and think an option should not be available to anyone else. That's like saying you never use the Fade control on a car stereo, therefore it's useless.

I like having the choice, myself. I like being able to put in a higher capacity battery on my video cam, phone, PDA, etc. I like being able to carry charged spares on transoceanic flights and camping trips. I like not being treated like a consumer idiot.

If Apple made wristwatches, they'd solder in the battery and claim it's a feature :rolleyes:
 
kdarling said:
That's like saying you never use the Fade control on a car stereo, therefore it's useless.
Click to expand...

Hey now... Fade is useless. Especially with Time Alignment. Shoot I wish Treble/Mid/Bass controls would go away and be replaced with a proper EQ. :)
 
diamond.g said:
Hey now... Fade is useless. Especially with Time Alignment. Shoot I wish Treble/Mid/Bass controls would go away and be replaced with a proper EQ. :)
Click to expand...

*laughing*

Hey, I remember my father asking me back in the late '60s, why the heck anyone needed TWO speakers in a car... ONE should be good enough. Especially when I had to cut into soldered speaker wires to add another speaker. (Decades later, I pointed out that all his new cars now had almost a dozen speakers.)

Anyway, his comment made me thrust my fist at the sky and declare, "As God is my witness, I'll never buy soldered together again!"

Or something like that...
 
My last Motorola flip phone would cut out if you pressed it to your ear too firmly. The battery didn't make the best of contacts with the terminals, so the power would just shut off in the middle of a conversation. I guess it was a fairly common problem with that handset. It would also cut off if it was set down too hard. I never heard the media complain about that. :)

I even had a second battery for my previous phone, and I found that I never used it. It was so much easier to just plug it in.... (moto chargers are abundant) and since the iPhone can be charged with any iPod charger, I can charge my phone at just about any of my friend's houses.

Personally, I'm all for the soldered battery.
 
kdarling said:
I never understand people who say "I don't need this" or "I never had a use for that" and think an option should not be available to anyone else. That's like saying you never use the Fade control on a car stereo, therefore it's useless.

I like having the choice, myself. I like being able to put in a higher capacity battery on my video cam, phone, PDA, etc. I like being able to carry charged spares on transoceanic flights and camping trips. I like not being treated like a consumer idiot.

If Apple made wristwatches, they'd solder in the battery and claim it's a feature :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Luckily for you, we do not have laws mandating your purchase of Apple products.

People don't just want choice. They want *their* choices.

I would say that near 95% of the grumbling you hear about the iPhone is was people want it to do that it cannot, rather than problems with what it actually does.

This is like your girlfriend telling you she wants to get married but never wants kids...then you marry her and bitch and whine because she doesn't want kids. What the hell did you expect?
 
I have had a Nokia, 3 Motorola's, and an LG and I have never replaced my battery because it was dying or had a problem. I actually like the idea of having my battery stuck to the phone, on my LG the battery used to just come off the back of the phone about once a week for no reason.
From my experience with cell phones, no matter how expensive the phone is, people buy a new phone somewhere around every 2 years. I know the longest I have had a phone was my Razr that I had for 2 years. If the iPhone battery really only loses 20% of its life over 400 complete charge cycles I will have no problem. Even if I had the battery for 2.5 or 3 years I would probably just be getting to equivalent of 400 complete charge cycles. The way I see it, by the time I am to a point where the battery might need replaced I will be ready for a new phone. The argument everyone has made over the iPhone battery not being user replaceable is dumb. It is more about people wanting to find something to complain about than an actual problem.
 
chr1s60 said:
If the iPhone battery really only loses 20% of its life over 400 complete charge cycles I will have no problem. Even if I had the battery for 2.5 or 3 years I would probably just be getting to equivalent of 400 complete charge cycles.
Click to expand...

That's not the way it works. The battery decides how many cycles it has left, depending on its usage, age and temperature.

Example: you keep the battery charged up, at less than 70 degrees, and lightly use the phone functions each day. Result: your battery could still have 80% capacity after a little more than a year, 65% after the next year, and last up to 500 total cycles.

Example: you talk a lot, and keep the unit fairly warm, say in a case. Result: the battery has 60-70% capacity after a year, and will allow 400 total cycles.

Example: you surf the web a lot, at the beach, with the battery temp reaching 120+ degrees in the sun. Result: in six months, the battery only holds 50%, and has just a hundred cycles left at that diminished capacity.

All rough examples, but you get the idea. Your cycling doesn't diminish it, your treatment reduces the remaining cycles.
 
I had my last LG phone for 2 1/2 years (waiting for a new phone to become available like the iPhone). In the past I don't think I ever replaced my battery on any phone. However, after 2 1/2 years I was having to charge way too often. So I contacted Verizon to get a new battery and since my phone was so old they no longer carried my battery so I could not replace. I did do a Google search I found I could get after market batteries but just didn't. As you can see I think this is a non-issue.
 
kdarling said:
I never understand people who say "I don't need this" or "I never had a use for that" and think an option should not be available to anyone else. That's like saying you never use the Fade control on a car stereo, therefore it's useless.

I like having the choice, myself. I like being able to put in a higher capacity battery on my video cam, phone, PDA, etc. I like being able to carry charged spares on transoceanic flights and camping trips. I like not being treated like a consumer idiot.

If Apple made wristwatches, they'd solder in the battery and claim it's a feature :rolleyes:
Click to expand...


Most soldered battery advocates (myself included) aren't saying that having a replaceable iPhone battery would be useless, just that the tradeoffs of increased size and lower reliability aren't worth the minimal advantages to most people. Apple apparently (and rightfully, I think) decided that this was a choice that would be sacrificed in favor of a sleeker and lighter phone.

There are many features Apple could have included in the iPhone to give people more choice, but including all of them would have resulted in an iPhone the size of a DVD case. Instead, Apple did what they do better than just about everyone: Decide what features were essential or highly desirable by most people (a replaceable battery clearly isn't), and implement those very, very well.
 
Tell people...that 3 soldered points is not hard. My guess is that the wiring is 20 gauge or something. It's not like you are using 30 gauge. Come on people...the battery replacement is pretty simple as long as we can open up the phone without much effort. I think for people who know how to solder, it's pretty simple, but pretty scary for first time solderers.

But i think if everyone is careful, switching battery should be pretty easy.
 
Sobe said:
When I got my iPhone last month, it replaced a crappy old LG I was nursing til my contract with Verizon ran out.

I charged the thing all the time, every day, in the car, in the house -- for 2 years.

Number of times I replaced the battery: zero.

Number of times when having a non-soldered battery helped me in any way? zero.

I have owned 3 other cell phones.

Number of times I have had to replace a battery = zero.

This is a non issue, drummed up by people who want it to be an issue.

Get over it.
Click to expand...

Amen to that!! ;)

I've gone through four phones myself in the past five years. The first was an old Motorola flip phone, then a LG that was free, a RAZR, a SLVR, and now the iPhone. I've never had a problem with the first four in terms of battery life or having to replace the battery.
 
Off the top of my head:

1) Removable battery would require larger phone design, and the removable cover (and battery) could get loose and come off by itself (I've seen this happen with a couple of Motorola phones).

2) Battery contacts can oxidize over time, requiring cleaning (had this happen with two of my phones).

3) Battery contacts could get bent/damaged while you're fumbling with the battery (happened to one phone, but I was able to bend the contacts back without breaking them).

Having said all that, would I prefer a removable battery? Maybe. Only if Apple could address #2 to my satisfaction.

It looks to me like replacing the battery should be fairly simple (for me, anyway).
 
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