With Tech & Co, the Californian manufacturer explains how he reworked the design of the device, to simplify repairs.
It’s an unusual initiative at Apple: to reverse engineer its own smartphone, whose models are usually shown in their best light. With Tech&Co, the brand looks back on how the internal design of the iPhone 14 was imagined. With one objective: to make the change of component much easier, as the independent site could have noted. iFixit in September 2022, going so far as to refer to this evolution as the “better function” of the device.
To understand the work of the Apple teams, you have to go back to the design of all the iPhones since… the iPhone 4S, released more than a decade ago. Since then, all models have been designed by attaching all the main components to the rear face.
Opening on both sides
“Internally, we describe this organization as a bucket where the various components would be stored”, explains Richard Dinh, responsible for the design of the iPhone at Apple, to Tech&Co. With a problem that logically follows: to access it, you have to open the lid.
“So on the iPhone 13, all the components are attached to this rear part of the mobile. In fact, any repair involves removing the screen – at the front, editor’s note – to access the components, at the bottom, on the rear part” specifies Richard Dinh to Tech&Co.
With the iPhone 14, its teams offered repairers the possibility of opening the device on both sides, with a now independent rear window. Once deboned, it is thus divided into three parts: the two glass fronts (front and rear), as well as a central frame housing the electronic components likely to be repaired.
This easy access allowed the iPhone 14 to obtain the score of 7/10 on iFixit. The organization called the product “the most repairable iPhone in years”. A good point for the brand, often targeted by critics on this subject, but which nevertheless wants to include this approach in its environmental ambitions.
“Overall, our new design involves components that are more independent of each other,” welcomes the Apple executive.
The Pro version… for later
Efforts that allow the company to drastically reduce its repair costs. At least, some of them. In case of damage, Apple charges 199 euros to change the rear face for the iPhone 14, against 399 euros for the previous model, due to the attachment of many components to this slice of glass.
On the other hand, it is still as expensive to change a cracked screen (339 euros for the iPhone 14 as for the iPhone 13), and now more expensive to replace a battery to extend the life of the device (119 euros for the iPhone 14 against 75 euros for the iPhone 13).
During the exchange with Tech&Co, Apple did not, however, address the question of the iPhone 14 Pro. And for good reason, the latter, which still inherits the old internal architecture, is still as complex to repair, at least outside the Apple circuit.
If we can imagine that this more complex device – in particular with its very space-consuming triple photo sensor – represents a major challenge for Apple, we can only hope that it too will switch to this new era in 2023. When asked if this would be the case for the next high-end models, Apple very politely kicked in touch.
