I suppose what is the difference between trading in a laptop for an upgrade vs doing it yourself. The number of people willing and able to replace parts on their computers gotta be not that large.
The upgradability comes with trade offs, in reliability, price, size and weight.
I totally understand how in a perfect world i could just swap parts on my macbook, but if it makes it twice as thick and heavy, with shitty plastic panels everywhere I don’t think I want it all that much
Doesn't matter whether you do it yourself or turn it in for repair. If it's harder to repair on your own, it's gonna be way more expensive to do through a shop too. Apple are notorious for designing their laptops in a way that one component dying means the whole board must be replaced.
And yes, it's possible to design repairable laptops without making them "twice as thick and heavy, with shitty plastic panels everywhere". This is a made up problem.
If apple are so much better at "design" than everyone else, why are they so much worse at repairability? Is it too hard for Apple? Is that really your argument?
The upgradability comes with trade offs, in reliability, price, size and weight.
I totally understand how in a perfect world i could just swap parts on my macbook, but if it makes it twice as thick and heavy, with shitty plastic panels everywhere I don’t think I want it all that much