Re:The Fight for the “Right to Repair”
by waterphone on Wednesday July 13, 2016 @04:08PM
(#12089240)
It's absolutely deserved. The things that are officially user serviceable now are very minimal, and the tamper-resistant screws and glues used aren't to protect devices from their users (which would also be a bad idea), they're to prevent people from taking advantage of a cheaper alternative to paying Apple for out of warranty repair service. You cannot buy things like batteries from Apple, and Apple will not provide you with tools to bypass their tamper-resistance efforts. Only third party sources will do that.
Apple definitely has that reputation, but I don't think its deserved in my experience. They user manuals for machines with replaceable parts often describe exactly how to do it. For other things that require a tiny bit of skill or where an unskilled person could easily mess things up, they put up a minor barrier like a different screw head, the tool for which will often ship with replacement parts.