Comment Broken screen; Blown battery? After years of being rigid about repairs when gadgets break, more and more consumer electronics companies are offering people the ability to fix these problems themselves, right at home. Samsung said this week that customers looking to try their hand at fixing gadgets can now buy genuine smartphone and tablet parts from repair site iFixit, as well as Samsung Experience stores across the country. The push to make at least some of its gadgets more easily repairable comes amid a broader national debate about the right to repair the products we buy, spurred largely by increased scrutiny by the Federal Trade Commission that began last year. Apple has since launched its own self-service repair program, while Google has partnered with iFixit to offer tools and genuine parts to would-be tinkerers. But like some of these other self-service programs, Samsung’s approach comes with a few quirks. Despite Samsung’s popularity in the United States — it accounted for nearly a third of all smartphone shipments in the first half of 2022, according to research firm Strategy Analytics — the company’s new self-service repair program is limited to a handful of higher-end models for now. Owners of the Galaxy S20 series and S21 series smartphones (launched in 2020 and 2021, respectively) will be able to purchase replacement screens, back glass and charging ports for at-home repairs. The same goes for people who own one of Samsung’s Galaxy S7 Plus tablets, though the same can’t be said for the rest of the company’s mobile products. “We plan to expand to more models as the program matures,” a Samsung spokesperson said. In providing the resources to make these repairs, however, Samsung highlighted the use of designs that make gadget repair more confusing than some might expect. You can’t, for example, just buy a screen to replace a broken one on your Galaxy phone. Instead, Samsung says you have to buy an entire display “assembly,” which includes the display itself, the metal frame surrounding it, and another battery. Essentially, this means replacing the entire front of the phone and then some. This also means that, for now, Samsung has no way to buy a genuine battery on its own to replace one that doesn’t hold much charge or swells — a common problem in devices that are used and charged regularly. A Samsung spokesperson told the Washington Post that “additional parts will be added as the program grows,” though co-founder and CEO Kyle Wiens says iFixit will continue to sell third-party replacement batteries. These kinds of self-repair programs are fairly new, so it’s no surprise that they don’t always feel fully integrated. And even when they offer a more comprehensive set of parts and guides, some of the processes involved can seem a little strange. Let’s say you had an iPhone 12 with a cracked screen, for example. You can very easily find the spare parts on the company’s self-service website. But if you want to follow every detail in Apple’s repair guide, that requires using a specific set of professional tools — tools that can be rented, but come in a series of heavy-duty Pelican cases and require a $1,200 credit card hold. (That said, you could just buy the part from Apple and open the phone with tools and guides found elsewhere.) So here’s our tip: If you’ve never done this before or don’t mind following dozens of step-by-step guides, you might want to avoid an at-home phone repair job. These kinds of fixes really benefit from a level of finesse and attention to detail that, let’s just say, isn’t everyone’s forte. And we’re not kidding about how weird these guides can be: according to iFixit, the process of replacing a Galaxy S20’s display assembly requires 41 steps, and that doesn’t include rewiring the phone. But now we’re left with a bigger question: If these companies are willing to let us repair the products they make, how about designing them to be easier to repair in the first place? For now, at least, that’s much easier said than done.
