Screw you
Apple has been accused of secretly replacing Philips screws on the iPhone 4 with strange new ones that fit no screwdriver, seemingly in a bid to make sure people have to buy new products instead of trying to fix their old devices.
According to iFixit's blog, Apple has effectively made it impossible for some iPhone owners that have had their phones repaired by Apple to open them up again as the firm has swapped the standard Philips #00 screws situated either side of the connector dock with weird flower-shaped ones apparently called ‘pentalobe screws.'
iFixit said: "Apple chose this fastener specifically because it was new, guaranteeing repair tools would be both rare and expensive. Shame on them."
The new screws look similar to Torx screw heads, except they're not and no screwdrivers are readily available for pentalobe screws. Here is an image of different screw heads from iFixit.
Many people might think it's a bit much for Apple to lock down people's kit without their permission when they brought their device to be repaired to fix a different problem- effectively making sure only it can access the phone's insides. The move might also not do much to help the firm shake off its image of being very controlling.
Apparently the floral screws have also been fitted on Mac Book Airs and as a battery fastener for Mac Book Pros from mid 2009, making them almost totally tamper-proof so computer users cannot have a stab at making their own repairs.
Apple reportedly uses 3 different sizes of the pentalobe screw and iFixit reckons non-US iPhone 4 units have small versions of the pentablobe screws and all new US units will have the same. The blog warns: "If you take your phone into Apple for any kind of service, they will sabotage it by replacing your screws with the new tamper-resistant screws."
Here is a picture from the blog of the different sized screws.
Of course the ‘security' of products is a cat and mouse game and ‘unofficial' solutions are often swiftly found to ‘official' problems. iFixit has spotted a gap in the market and is selling an iPhone 4 ‘liberation kit' for $10 that lets owners replace the special floral screws with regular ones.
