My favorite is an old clock I got from an old cottage I was renovating. I broke the glass on it but it still worked so I propped it up on the wall to help me keep time. I worked for months with that clock on the wall, never changed the battery and just thought, I’ll keep it until the battery dies … I thought it was just some old cheap thing that wouldn’t last.
I renovated for two years and the clock kept ticking, I grew to appreciate Anne decided to keep it. It survived I don’t know how many -40, -50 degree winters frozen solid and it still kept time. In the spring I think I adjusted it for a ten or fifteen minute correction (allowing for daylight saving time).
I finished renos and now the clock is in the living room and I’ll never get rid of it, it’s part of the building now as far as I’m concerned.
20 years later and the clock is still there and I’ve only changed the batteries twice, maybe three times. I changed the batteries so few times, I can’t remember the last time I did.
Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 1 day ago
What’s the deal with the batteries that ship with a device last forever but the same band bought in stores leak after 2 years?
Pieisawesome@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
Same brand != same tier of battery.
There are different levels of battery quality. Adding a $1 battery versus $5 battery isn’t a big difference to OEMS who are buying millions to put in their 1000$ widget. Additionally economy of scale, and they want their remote to last a certain time so they pick a battery that will meet that standard.
For retailing sales, users want cheap batteries and aren’t really concerned with the batteries actual longevity or quality.
Check out project farm, I believe he reviewed some batteries a little while ago. You’ll see a massive difference between all of them
ugo@feddit.it 1 day ago
You’re right about battery quality / longevity varying a lot, but this makes me wonder if we live in different worlds
OEMS absolutely care about these costs. Hell $1 vs $5 is a massive difference, if you sold 1 million devices that’s a $4m difference. Now you may think that the cost difference being only 0.4% of the total sale value (assuming a $1000 widget) wouldn’t matter much, but you need to remember that, to a large degree, every corporation is obsessed with money. Most companies, and certainly big companies, do not care at all about quality, ethics, or any other kind of value except money. Everything else is contingent on making more money. And execs will be more than happy to put the saved 0.4% directly into their own pockets.
Hell if you look at the electronics sector it’s full of choices that save fractions of cents on the BoM. If you multiply those savings over hundreds / thousands of components on a pcb, and millions of units sold, it becomes a tangible difference.
I’m not at all on expert on these things, but even I notice them from time to time, that’s how pervasive this is.
Sorry for the rant, nothing against you, I just wish quality and capability and ethics of products was more often one of the selling points.
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 1 day ago
THE BATTERY BRAND X COMES IN A PACK OF FOUR! THE BATTERY BRAND X LASTED TWICE AS LONG! VERY IMPRESSIVE! THE BATTERY BRAND X COSTS $17!
rumschlumpel@feddit.org 22 hours ago
Lots of users definitely want quality, issue is that it’s hard to trust that the quality is actually that much better.
baldingpudenda@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Project Farm has been my go to before I buy a lot of things. Oil, heaters, automotive, car soaps, stain remover, etc.