> Looking like a bulked-up first-gen iPhone, the case is milled out of a single chunk of aluminum, and the lid snaps into place with firm perimeter clips, leaving little to no seam for us to pry at. We needed a hammer and chisel to open it up! Adhesive also lines the lid, just to make sure you get the message: this pack is not designed to be opened.
> Currently, iFixit engineering intern Chayton Ritter has Apple’s proprietary battery cable splayed out on a breadboard, and is trying to determine what sort of electronic handshakes are required to make the Vision Pro accept battery packs.
Apple really dropped the bar on this one. It's high time the EU forces companies to design their hardware in a way that allows the user (or a recycling company!) to replace the batteries inside without destroying it in the process, and for fucks sake what happened to the USB-C requirement for electronic devices?
The brick/battery charges via USB-C from what I have seen. Casey Neistat ran that into a battery pack for extended use. I think that makes them plenty compliant.
I asusme the custom connector on the head unit is better fit for purpose (comfort, not getting snagged) than USB-C would be.
Or, to put it even more simply -- the battery pack is the replaceable battery. Which is fine; it's little different from the similarly sealed battery packs on electric power tools, for instance.
The battery charges via USB-C. The battery connects to the headset with a weird side-snap connector that's rather flat. As designed, there's not anywhere obvious that a USB-C port could really fit on the headset and assuming they hope to make it smaller in future years, the problem only amplifies. I think other headsets have cables coming out of them when they need to connect to other things, rather than relying on a port. It's not particularly aesthetic.
> It's high time the EU forces companies to design their hardware in a way that allows the user (or a recycling company!) to replace the batteries inside without destroying it in the process
Why? The battery pack is external. I have not ever seen a requirement that battery packs themselves need to be repairable. Not many devices come with external batteries these days, but do you really want to open them up to replace the cells? Where are you going to source reputable prismatic cells to use with such a device? They are also pretty delicate, you don't want most people handling them. If it used standard 18650 cells I could kind of see the point, but it would be much larger.
A recycling company can destructively open it up to recover the material.
A better 'mandate' would be to require it to accept third party power supplies.
> for fucks sake what happened to the USB-C requirement for electronic devices
USB-C would suck for this application. It already does for headsets like Meta's Quest, where you can use a link cable to a PC. You need to secure any USB-C cables pretty well if you don't want to risk damaging the port.
> I have not ever seen a requirement that battery packs themselves need to be repairable.
Indeed it is, but it would make the life of recyclers way easier. Having to use a hammer and pin to open it risks puncturing the pouches.
> Not many devices come with external batteries these days, but do you really want to open them up to replace the cells?
Uhhh... yes? That was the state of the art for decades before removable batteries were sacrificed for optics. You can even do watertight devices that way, Samsung's Active Tab 3 is watertight and supports swapping batteries.
> Where are you going to source reputable prismatic cells to use with such a device?
The aftermarket supply chain for devices has gotten pretty well in serving that market, although I'd also love some standardization effort in that space.
You already can replace the batteries. Apple will gladly sell you another battery: https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MW283LL/A/apple-vision-pr... But there's no use case for a consumer to disassemble the battery or to replace parts inside the battery.
> Currently, iFixit engineering intern Chayton Ritter has Apple’s proprietary battery cable splayed out on a breadboard, and is trying to determine what sort of electronic handshakes are required to make the Vision Pro accept battery packs.
Apple really dropped the bar on this one. It's high time the EU forces companies to design their hardware in a way that allows the user (or a recycling company!) to replace the batteries inside without destroying it in the process, and for fucks sake what happened to the USB-C requirement for electronic devices?