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To be clear, all the mentioned Nintendo products are already designed for battery replacement, with well-contained battery units and easy connectors, and the batteries are available and problem-free to replace unlike for a certain fruit company.

The redesign is because the ease of accessing the batteries did not comply with the new rules. The pro controller in particular requires almost complete disassembly to get to the module, and the Switch 2's battery uses double-sided adhesive which is finicky. Joycons can also be a bit finicky to navigate for the uninitiated.

Also, as the device is Japanese, it uses JIS screws rather than Philips (in addition to triwing), which could surprise some. These are superior for service - Philips screws are specifically designed to strip during assembly to prevent over-torquing - but they do require you to have the right, "exotic" screwdriver. As JIS screwdrivers are compatible with and superior in bite even for Philips screws, it's a good habit to just always use those instead for electronics. iFixit kits and such include them.

I think the more likely explanation is that there was not sufficient market motiviation to include the additional requirement of a user-swappable battery. ie. people care, but they don't care enough or in enough volume for Nintendo to decide it's required.

I celebrate user-swappable batteries and I think I like the battery regulations. I just don't think the Ghost of Iwata is under your bed twirling a Wario moustache while thinking about how to screw you over. The current Switch battery situation is simply a result of user-swappable not being a requirement, among the countless other requirements already in contention.

I don't think that's it for console manufacturers. They make the majority of their money on game sales, so they want the console itself to be used for as long as possible.

I don't understand why battery failure is a "when". The only batteries I've ever had fail in rechargeable electronic devices were replaceable packs where water got into the compartment. Perhaps I've just gotten lucky?

My take is they didn't optimize for something that a small percentage of users would have problems with.

We are talking about plastic parts and metal tabs. I'd be shocked if the actual impact on per unit price was above $0.10.

Perhaps the most expensive part of this whole process is then engineering time to figure out how to place a replaceable battery.

5 years later, after a battery swap, the model with a replaceable battery has a longer battery life than the one stuck with a degraded battery.

Is it?

>Battery capacity: 5172mAh, approximately 1% smaller than current version (5220mAh)

This is not true. There are old replaceable-battery dumbphones that were rated in feet of submersion.

I'm baffled that we still are thinking that we want thin phones. We have a gigantic camera bump that would be removed if the phone was thicker. Who wants a razor in their pocket, like really?

They could've just designed it that way to begin with.

Thanks to this regulation, they will the next time around.

You mean an up-to-5% increase in capacity, and slightly decreased weight, depending on the product?

The truth is that the product with the 16% reduced capacity (Switch 2 Pro controller) is 7g lighter and the one with the 5% increased capacity (Gamecube controller) is 5g heavier.

Besides those two, the general idea is that the capacity is the same with 2-3% extra weight.

How do those stats look 5 years later, when one is stuck with a degraded battery, and the other has had an easy battery swap?

The 16% is for the Pro Controller though, to be fair.

The Switch 2 itself loses 1% of battery capacity, most other products none at all.

Your framing seems a bit selective to the point of being misleading.

seeing as the product itself already advertises that it's best to not charge it to 100% feel like nothing's being lost here no matter how one tries to spin it

The higher margin is mostly coming from assembly costs, right? I can't imagine it comes from the actual cost of the battery being so much higher. I hope that once they start pushing these out and retool factories for them they can sell them more broadly.

My day 1 Switch battery was definitely significantly degraded when I did a DIY battery swap a couple of years back.

Battery longevity varies based on usage patterns and likely other factors (temperature?), but it's normal to notice a significant reduction in capacity within 4-5 years.

And the amount of adhesive holding the old battery in made replacing it an unnecessarily hard and actually dangerous (risk of battery fire due to physical damage) process.

EU also forced Nintendo to provide lifetime free repairs on drifty joycons since Nintendo chooses not to address the issue.

https://www.euroconsumers.org/game-over-for-faulty-nintendo-...

It's easier for Nintendo of Europe to switch over everyone than to stock and supply 2 versions of every product. Also I'd bet most of their sales come from the EU countries where the replaceable battery requirement is forcing this new SKU deployment anyways.

Norway is in the ECC together with Iceland, but for some reason Iceland is not on the list where these SKUs will be available.

It's everywhere Nintendo of Europe (the subsidiary in the EU) operates.

Storage, and distribution costs.

Or a new switch being bought by the parent for the distressed child

Shorter battery life is just fine

I had an Apple laptop that had two bays, one on the left and one on the right. Usually, you'd have the battery on the left and the CD drive on the right. But for lots of people, battery life was more important than a CD drive on a laptop, so you could double your battery life by putting in a battery on both sides.

Tech used to be fricken cool :-)

Compulsory Apple-defending post is compulsory.

Non-replaceable batteries are worse for consumers and worse for the environment. The fact that you "do not miss" a better world, does not mean it is not better.

Phones used to work like that too. I think all my feature phones and first Android phone worked if it was plugged in with the battery removed.

Please keep the conversation merit based.

Also, third party batteries vary wildly in quality -- I've replaced the battery in my Nintendo switch twice, both times using brands I've heard of, and neither battery is as good as the original OEM battery was when i first got it.

I will agree with you! Just release it for all. Also now they have to make 2 devices, which it should probably be more hassle.

It’s equal parts funny and frustrating to see how deep into the ”a few hypothetical percent of profits for corporations matters more than customer rights and less e-waste” some are.

And just like everything moving to USB-C, they won't get credit for the Switch 3 et al having replaceable batteries world-wide.

I'm preparing to release my first app to the App Store and they're currently requiring me to dox myself if I want to sell in the EU. Which facts am I missing that makes this not very inconvenient for me?

It's not about games consoles. It's about reducing the mountains of e-waste.

We shouldn't be throwing away laptops, smartphones, or consoles - or soon, entire EVs, just because the battery has degraded.

Nothing should be improved unless it solves world hunger.