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1 Are refurb phones as water resistant as the originals?
Most warranty phone repairs are done by swapping the original phone for a refurbished one. Who’s doing these refurbs? Are they maintaining factory-level water resistance? I think customers would be justifiably upset if they knew their original phone was water resistant but the repaired phone is not.
My iPhone 6S Plus recently met an untimely demise at the hands of about 2 tablespoons of water. I found this very odd since I’d seen many immersion tests on YouTube as well as your article about Apple’s clever new tech to keep water at bay.
Then I remembered that T-Mobile had replaced my factory original phone with a refurb.
PS: The main thrust of my question is about refurb phones in general - NOT about the iPhone 6S Plus in particular. I understand that this phone wasn't marketed as being water resistant.
Some people have said if the phone wasn’t marketed as water resistant then there’s no reason to be upset. I completely agree that Apple didn’t market the phone as water resistant. I'm not happy though that my fresh-from-the-factory iPhone was certainly far more water resistant than the refurb they later supplied me with. I want to make sure that, when I get a phone that's advertised as water resistant, it remains that way if it's swapped out under some form of warranty. Maybe SquareTrade is better at this?
A different question - which unfortunately is the one people are commenting on - might be is a customer entitled to "keep" a feature that's not advertised or is it OK for that to be gone in the device returned from the repair facility.
That's an interesting question too - but it's not the one I'm trying to ask here.
Thanks in any case for all replies!
Joe
Is this a good question?
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3 Comments
Earlier I had a bunch of stuff in my question supporting the behavior of 6S+'s being decently water resistant. That was muddying my real question so I moved that out here to the comments.
So here it is!
To me what matters is not what the marketing says but how the device actually behaves.
Wired has this cool article from Oct 2015 that says: Apple’s new iPhones really do hold up under water, thanks to a brilliant new technique that the company quietly pioneered.
I bought a device that, when new from the factory, was nearly waterproof. After a repair the device given to me was not at all waterproof. I find that unacceptable. I’m hoping you agree!
by Joe
@joefilmmaker Thanks for your kind words Joe, I wish you the same in your enterprises too. I've had around a few water damaged 6S and I can assure you liquids can and will eventually do overcome protections provided by the sponges and rosins, despite what mentioned in the article you linked. Real life tests sometimes are more severe than "let's drop it in water for a while and see what happens". Apple doesn't give a warranty for a reason and in absence of a warranty all is left is "we try our best, but that's the most we can provide". Experience says, as confirmed by the skillful gentlemen who commented, that any repair and time effects just make things worse.
I don't want to take parts here, but I usually do not expect from third parties guarantees the pristine condition doesn't supply either, unless there's an insurance involved. Maybe you should complain with Wired their article was a bit optimistic :) The word "nearly" doesn't mean anything in technical terms, either is or isn't in a given circumstance.
by arbaman
I agree with everything you said here. In my case the phone was in a ziplock bag that let a few teaspoons of water in. So in this case the test seems to me to be far less severe than tests the phone usually passes. My guess is the refurbished phone didn't include the waterproofing materials the original did or they were substantially damaged by the refurbishment.
by Joe