2033: Repair or Replace

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Repair or Replace

Title text: Just make sure all your friends and family are out of the car, or that you've made backup friends and family at home.

Explanation

This comic compares the repair of cars with that of computers or other similar electronic devices. The question Repair or Replace? comes up more frequently with electronics than with cars, hence the title of the comic, and the humor derived.

Cueball is in his car. He says that there is a weird sound and asks if the car mechanic Hairy will take a look. Hairy asks him to open the car's hood, exposing the engine, to further identify the cause of the problem. Cueball then says that his hood latch, the lever used to open the hood, is also broken. The solution, according to Hairy, is then to discard the car, and "replace" it with a new car.

In reality, fixing the latch on the hood is a simple task for a skilled mechanic and would not justify writing-off the car. When a car is malfunctioning, the usual response is to attempt to repair it. A car is designed so that many of the parts can be replaced or adjusted. By contrast, when a computer or electronic device is malfunctioning, it is often judged to be more expensive to repair than to replace, and the usual action is to purchase a new device. It is generally possible to replace each part of a desktop or laptop computer, but harder to do so for more integrated devices such as tablets, and almost impossible to repair individual components with faulty or damaged integrated circuits. Thus, Randall notes in this comic that while it does make sense for electronic devices, the "solution" of replacing an object instead of attempting to repair seems absurd for many other expensive items.

The title text refers to data stored on a computer or electronic device. Before replacing the device, it is recommended backup all your personal files, so that you have future access to them, and to remove them for security. Randall likens this to having your friends and family exit the vehicle, or making backup friends and family before the vehicle is thrown away.

This comic is similar to 1737: Datacenter Scale, which is also about discarding servers instead of fixing them.

Transcript

[Cueball is sitting in a car parked to the left of Hairy, who thus stands in front of it while pointing behind him towards a big black hole.]

Cueball: My engine's making a weird noise. Can you take a look?

Hairy: Sure, just pop the hood.

Cueball: Oh, the hood latch is also broken.

Hairy: OK, just pull up to that big pit and push the car in. We'll go get a new one.

[Caption below the frame:]

I'm sure the economics make sense, but it still freaks me out how quick companies are to replace computing devices instead of trying to fix them.

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Discussion

Do I have to make a backup of ALL my friends and family? 162.158.122.66 16:33, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

Yes, in the cloud... --Dgbrt (talk) 16:41, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

Which reminds me on: http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Nethersphere Elektrizikekswerk (talk) 08:28, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

I’ll just “forget” to backup ms sister, hehehe 162.158.74.225 16:35, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

I think you should consider replacing your MS Sister with open source variant. 172.68.246.56 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Given the number of stories on TFTS about users who don't actually know what "backup" means, this is either a really bad idea or a really good idea. 162.158.75.46 17:21, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

It's rather nonsensical when you're talking about things from the same generation, but James May, in his book The Reassembler, made a good argument against fixing old things - old things made for a time when things were expensive and had to be built to last, which meant making them easy to repair when they broke down (which happened frequently) - new things are more reliable and require repair far less often than the products of old, and attempting to repair old things diverts energy away from new innovations, thus holding humanity back. No sense trying to repair an old Nokia 5110 when even the cheapest smartphone from Wish will run rings around it and last longer anyway. 108.162.250.11 00:29, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Well, the old Nokias are indestructible anyways, so you wouldn't even be able to open the case and repair it. 162.158.91.59 09:14, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Depends. The Nokia 5110 has a stand-by-time of 150h – show me a smartphone that has something like this ;-). --DaB. (talk) 13:54, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

I remember trying to break my old Nokia 1611 so I could get a new one on "insurance". Used it to play fetch with the dog, threw it against a brick wall, jumped up and down on it wearing army boots. The damned thing would not break. Compare that to a modern smartphone that bricks if you look at it wrong. 162.158.155.170 14:14, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Thank goodness, when I get rid of an old car the next owner can't log into it and review every single place I drove and every conversation I had while driving it... that's coming, though. :( MaineGrammy (talk) 09:19, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

I feel like he's ignoring that it's kind of absurd how easily we replace cars too. A couple years ago my car was caught in a hail storm. The roof was dented, but nothing was damaged. You can barely even see the dents unless the light is from the correct angle. But it would still cost more to "fix" the car, than the salvage value, and it was therefore "totaled". The car has worked absolutely fine with no problem for two years since then, but it's insane to think that if my 100% functional car was hit by a meteor right now it would not decrease in value. --172.68.34.94 19:09, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Friendly reminder to all the nerds out there, help your actual friends/family make backups BEFORE the phone is broken. - sincerely, the bearer of bad news 162.158.75.238 13:14, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

"(Perhaps, it would be smart to have ones enemies in the car so that they are thrown away with it.)" That's called "murder" and is in fact frowned upon in most societies. 172.69.210.34 15:01, 19 August 2018 (UTC)