Not a fridge with an UHD screen, not a washer with Bluetooth support, not a toaster that talks to the cloud.
Just functional appliances with a level of efficiency that existed 25-30 years ago and can be repaired, rather than thrown away because subcomponents are sealed black boxes with little regard to durability.
And after that, the really hard work: doing the same with printers.
One important aspect is to ditch the electronic interface (buttons, LCD, etc), since it's often the weak point, both for durability and usability.
But IMHO you still need electronic control, for function/efficiency (timers, complex wash cycles, PID temperature control, dirt sensors, etc, etc), as well as usability.
However the UI should be replaced with a single on/off button, and bluetooth; the complex interface becomes a smartphone app or web page, which can be upgraded, hacked, and is in any case much more usable than LCDs, buttons and poorly designed constricted UI. And if there were a few cheap (super-mass-produced) general-purpose standard controller boards in use, rather than each manufacturer/model having a custom board, then repair/replacement of the electronics would be easy too.
> However the UI should be replaced with a single on/off button, and bluetooth; the complex interface becomes a smartphone app or web page,
As someone who has played the Mega Man Battle Network series [1], I love this idea.
In those games (highly recommended and well worth getting an emulator for), every appliance and machine basically has a universal interface which your "Navis" (think anthropomorphized avatars of Siri) can "jack into" and interact with.
In the real world, I guess something like that could be implemented as:
- Every appliance comes with an standard interface which exposes all its controls and configurable parameters.
- The first time you unbox a new appliance, you register it with your control device (computer/phone/watch.)
- After that you just use any app on your control device (like the HomeKit one on iOS) which supports the standard protocol, to enumerate and view each appliance's controls.
- There could be different levels of access depending on authentication and proximity. Say, a web page might only show you the basic status of all your appliances, but being on the same local network will offer extra controls, while physical contact between your phone/watch and an appliance via NFC will reveal its most sensitive settings.
For the most part, I think this is already the case today with a lot of products. Most people just have no idea a compressor works on a fridge or how to diagnose the problem. There's really nothing you could do to make a compressor less complicated to work with. Washers are driers don't exactly have embedded computers. They're straight forward to fix, too. Plenty of dishwashers available that are non-electronically controlled.
Most everything is fixable if you're not afraid of a screw driver and watching a Youtube on how to take it apart.
I agree with you here. I used to believe that all the appliances are not fixable due to all the comments people make like "they are not like they were 30 years ago".
In reality when I opened up some of my appliances for DIY repair I found them to be incredibly simple and easy to repair after some youtube videos. I am sure there are some examples where an appliance is not fixable but all the appliances I have owned in my life have been.
Not a fridge with an UHD screen, not a washer with Bluetooth support, not a toaster that talks to the cloud.
Just functional appliances with a level of efficiency that existed 25-30 years ago and can be repaired, rather than thrown away because subcomponents are sealed black boxes with little regard to durability.
And after that, the really hard work: doing the same with printers.