Who's going to pay 30%-50% of a new version to replace his airpods or apple watch battery ? [0]

It's the same with all these hi tech gadgets relying on tiny glued/soldered batteries. You can't replace them yourself because it's either proprietary hardware or you need to literally break the product to get to the battery. And companies either don't offer replacements or charge insane amount of money for them.

Apple can boast all day long about ecology and using 100% recycled aluminium, at the end of the day they're shipping unfixable gadgets. [1][2] But it's thin and slick looking so I guess most people don't give a damn.

The first time I saw a bose QC25 with AA batteries I almost burst out laughing but it's actually much more convenient than proprietary battery packs. Compare that to the new QC35: > As you were correctly advised, battery replacement is not a service that is offered. [3]

We'll drown in these gadgets way before we drown due to the sea level rising.

[0] > Run through your battery, and it’ll likely cost you $138 to replace both year-old batteries, which is nearly the cost of a new pair.

https://www.inverse.com/article/49363-airpods-battery-warran...

[1] https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Apple+Watch+Battery+Replacement...

[2] https://ifixit.org/blog/8690/airpods-are-disposable/

[3] https://community.bose.com/t5/Headphones-Archive/Bose-Quietc...

Unserviceable laptop and cellphone batteries are terrible and apple is by far the biggest offender.

disclaimer: typed from a macbook :(

I have used them 5 days a week, for ~2 hours a day for almost the entirety of those 7 years, I charge them approximately once per month.

They cost £400 at the time and have been by far the best consumer electronic investment I have ever made. When the battery becomes unusable I'll find a replacement and fit it my self, but I have no plans to replace them until they are deader than dead.

I don't care much for "fashion" and they already have more features than I need (I use the physical switch to toggle off the NFC because I never need to use it), they do high enough quality audio (AAC/AptX) for streaming 320/16/44.1 and the battery life is better than any other battery powered device I own (barring the TV remote) even after all this time.

Honestly if you regularly write code in an open office like I suspect many here do; a serious, professional pair of headphones are one of the best things you can get. Wireless with active noise cancelling that are comfortable and have a robust battery life. The Sony model mentioned by another poster appear to be quite nice as well.

Smart management would make sure these things are available to their employees no questions asked.

My experience with this made me laugh. I had a company that had the right idea when they moved everyone to open floor plans; buy them "premium" headphones. The headphones they bought were expensive (valued around $150 new), but were utter garbage. I can't tell the difference audio between $5 earbuds, and $100 earbuds ... but I can tell when these beats headphones have the sizing for children. Nearly everyone ended up selling theirs and letting them collect dust.

I convinced my manager to get us all Bose headphones.

Several people from other teams (all of which had private offices) raised a stink to the CEO, who refused to approve the purchase, leaving my boss to foot the bill by himself.

https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/30055-49077-999-Air...

This is a metal-cased cell, like an AAA battery, only smaller. They could simply make the "stem" of the AirPod unscrew from the top to access the battery. They came up with an unserviceable design because they didn't want to, not because they couldn't. Think of things like quartz watches too --- they have just as small if not smaller dimensions, and yet you can still replace the batteries in them. (And if you think threads of that size are impossible for Apple... look at the few screws that hold iPhones together.)

I really don't think that's the case. I was really quite tempted by them, but was put off by the lifespan.

$50 per airpod for new batteries.

I'm guessing they don't literally give you yours back with new batteries, but instead give you replacements and then send yours for refurbishing.

Are there any tips to make the batteries last longer?

$100 < $200. I wouldn't call half the price "approaches."

Extend battery life by substituting them with wired earpods when possible.

I had a call yesterday and the Airpods were beeping that they were dying at the 20min mark, and didn't make it to 30min on the call.

I love the form factor, and I just ordered the "new" Airpods, because I am hoping the battery life has improved - the old ones are basically a disposable item after the first year, from my experience.

Most days, however, I don't have calls all day long, and I can just wear both no problem and not run into the low battery beep.

This afternoon I had a call while walking my dog.

It’s a new world.

Well, that and the fact that I'd definitely lose one in the first month of ownership.

I do use them for conference calls but I know they have limited capabilities. My 14 hour Jabra headset will do just fine and have noise cancellation.

If only. At this price, you have hundreds of options with much better sound quality

    1. Sennheiser HD650 w/ Schiit Magni2/Modi2
    2. Sony MDR1000x
    3. Airpods

Requirement: in-ear and no wires or over ear hook thing.

Give it a rest, Apple makes great hardware with great software. That's why people buy it, nothing to do with being cool.

Like everything in life -- you use the right tool for the job.

If you're on a lot of conference calls, then you buy a headset or something else suited to that task. AirPods are not that item. They're for listening to music while running, or at work, and answering the occasional phone call.

I don't complain that my Hello Kitty-branded eeePC 701 can't run the latest AI framework.

If you want to do business, you buy a business tool.

> I love the form factor, and I just ordered the "new" Airpods, because I am hoping the battery life has improved - the old ones are basically a disposable item after the first year, from my experience.

The OP complained about battery life and the $200 "disposable" headphones he bought a year ago, but happily bought the next iteration, hence my comment.

Fool me once...

Even if they aren't, and I had to buy a pair every year, that's like 50 cents a day for something that I enjoy using (until the battery dies)

Also, OP said they purchased them in 2016 - not a year ago.

They’re also the only earphones I can stand while exercising. Before the AirPods, the annoyance of the wire flopping around or on my skin, etc. made me mostly just not listen to anything. So, I don’t really compare them to anything wired, because I don’t consider them an actual alternative. I just won’t listen anymore.

Love them in general though, they are good enough for the price & what they do.

The audio quality is also massively improved because of the better fit. The downside is you have to take the skins off before putting the AirPods back in the case. I also bought one of these pouches to keep the AirPod case and EarSkinz in. Works well, all in all

I've had mine almost two years. I listen at work M-F, 8am-11:30am, then let them recharge at lunch, then use them 1:00pm-4:00pm. So far, so issues.

How long do you think I have before the batteries start to degrade?

Except the original post said to "count the time you spend untangling the cord" (which, for most good, flat-wire headphones is almost zero). Habit or not, charging takes more time than properly rolling the cord on wired buds.

To this old fart, this sounds like the thousand other cases of "why learn a simple and generally useful skill, when we can use modern technology to avoid this one specific case?"

Learning a basic transferable skill is the scalable solution to this problem. You're not using wireless power cables, wireless rope to tie things to your car, wireless thread in your sewing machine, etc.

Also there's a lot of time spent fiddling with the cables in use that I didn't realize I was doing until I used wireless and went back for a week.

Only one of us have to coil and uncoil wires, and put wires where we want them and keep wires where we want them when they shift or are moved by external forces. Only one of us can use our headphones with a smartwatch.

AirPods aren't perfect: I've probably had connection issues ~5 times which seem to have gone away with the latest update. I haven't lost them, but they are really small and it seems like it would be easy to lose them. $170 is a lot tougher to lose than $8 (though there are also wired earbuds in the same price neighborhood). I do have to charge the case, but with my use-pattern I haven't yet run into a spot where I wanted to keep using my AirPods and didn't have charge available. Using them one ear at a time while the other charges for longer use is non-ideal, but that's mitigated by how quickly they charge.

Until I had to go back to wired earbuds for a week after using wireless for a while I didn't fully appreciate how nice wireless is.

I have a laptop, desktop, iPad and iPhone - for wired I would need USB-C->3.5mm, Lightning->3.5mm, and a 3.5mm extension cord for my desktop. AirPods "just work" with each of those with only a single click or tap. So no cord tangles and no bluetooth connect/disconnect dance every time you swap devices. To me that makes them easily worth the $170 cost.

As an aside, this is the most HN justification possible for these. "Just estimate your time spent coiling headphones and multiply it by your hourly rate then you will see how $160 is fair." Absurd.

Even still, I ordered the new ones. The convenience is easily worth it for me since I am primarily in the Apple ecosystem.

[edit: Really? You guys expect 3 years life out of your socks and underwear too? If you use the hell out of it, even a wired pair that's a year old doesn't sound as good as a pair fresh out of the box.]

I really, honestly believe that in a decade we're going to look back at AirPods as our generation's bell-bottoms. Only bell-bottomed trousers at least have some function: AirPods are a style & sustainability own goal.

0: https://wwf.panda.org/knowledge_hub/where_we_work/borneo_for...

First, the form factor of AirPods are integral to their function. There is no separating them. Wires are a major design tradeoff.

Also, the function (multiple actually) -- social communication, gaining knowledge, entertainment -- is of high importance to many. So even small improvements are valuable.

I really don't think you're understanding this correctly.