> The batteries I looked at through ifixit are $20. No-name goes below $10.
The cheapest for my phone is $35, and Apple will do it for $90 or third parties for a bit less. If you’re seeing different numbers for your phone, I’m sure that’s true but don’t think it’s fundamentally changing the cost into a number which changes the average phone buyer’s decision. Again, I’m not saying it’s trivial but that people pay hundreds of dollars upfront and usually thousands over the life of the device. There just don’t seem to be that many people who intend to own the same phone for many years and factor the cost of installing a replacement battery into their decision.
> You can be pretty water-resistant while also having a cover normal people can remove.
Yes, nobody has said otherwise. It’s just more expensive and makes a physically larger device if you are making an equivalently durable device because you need to add screws, seals, etc. and make a mechanically more complex case.
Again, my point is simply that the entire phone market had removable batteries but shifted away over roughly a decade and it’s usually a mistake to look at a durable consumer preference and dismiss it as marketing or some kind of conspiracy. Apple is a single vendor so maybe they’re a lost cause but there have been many Android phone makers and their buyers also followed the same trend despite a vocal minority urging otherwise.
I'm not trying to say that more than half of people care, I'm saying that a lot of people care, but it's a situation where "vote with your wallet" would only work if it was a very strong preference, because the competition for good phones is limited and too many features are bundled together. So millions of people have their desire unmet despite the technology being able to meet it with a small size penalty and at negligible dollar cost.
It's not a conspiracy that manufacturers will all make a choice that saves 50 cents if 99.9% of people that care will suck it up for other reasons. But if two phones were offered with everything else equal except battery replacement, half a millimeter, and $1 on price, I'm confident that a very significant fraction of people would pick the replaceable battery option.
The batteries I looked at through ifixit are $20. No-name goes below $10.
$80 is a significant fraction of a new phone. It definitely affects my purchasing decisions.
> Those fell out over time
I have never heard of this. Do you have a good source?
> and consistently, overwhelmingly picked the sealed phones.
I don't remember high end phones offering much choice in the issue.
> Things like waterproofing are a good example
You can be pretty water-resistant while also having a cover normal people can remove.
Some of the phones rated 9-10 on ifixit have water protection 4 (splashing from any direction for 10 minutes) or 5 (low pressure jets of water).