I personally don’t mind the statement because it is relevant to why we’re in this boat. The irony of his statement though is that the solution to the free markets is govt regulation, which he then also opposes is his next statement. You can’t have it both ways.
Not leaving customers with a fractured experience is, in fact, why Apple themselves are running into regulatory impositions with Lightning cables. We want to encourage innovation but then we want to force everyone to agree on a standard later. Same problem. Not sure what the solution is.
I generally err on the side of leaving things be unless they are likely to trigger additional wrangling. Which, until now, this comment hadn’t. (I’m less tolerant of comments that are just a repetition of complaints that have already been beaten to death.)
So if we all just focus on the real-world practical issues surrounding this situation, I won’t have to delete anything. But if discussion veers further into issues of free markets and government regulation, I’ll bring out the axe.
FYI, I replaced my wife’s AirTag battery this morning (Amazon was a little slow). The Energizer battery worked like a charm and I heard the lovely chime when I closed up the case.
I’ve read most of the comments here, and it seems all are buying either Duracell or EverReady, either locally or through Amazon. The thing to look at is capacity. Cheap batteries don’t have near the capacity of well made batteries. The top CR2032 will have near 240 mAh capacity, those you buy at your grocery store maybe just 200, that is a 20% increase! (Now capacity might change some according to test conditions, the load used, and the threshold voltage, most use 20 C, 15kohms, 2 V.) Amazon, surprisingly, does not list capacity in general. I found Mouser.com and Digikey.com do list capacity in their tables, and you can sort on it, but these company’s sometimes sell only bulk, but usually in as small as 5 packs, and the shipping cost might be high. But their tables will tell you what brands are best. I found Varta, Renata, usually near the top, Maxwell, Panasonic, Sony usually pretty good. If you want to buy local, here in Albuquerque we have a place called Electronic Parts that sells top brand batteries, you might find something similar, and usually Batteries + does too. Or look for those top brands on Amazon.
Unfortunately, one of the more recent iOS updates removed the battery level for AirTags. So now you’ll only learn about low battery before it actually goes out. No chance to proactively check how much juice my various AirTags have left. Bummer. Supposedly, Apple noticed issues with getting a reliable reading. So instead of fixing that, they just removed the indicator entirely.
I just checked on a Macintosh; Find My did show a battery indicator for an AirTag. (I also checked on an iPad and could not find a battery indicator. I would so have liked to tell you how to get it on an iOS device.)
Maybe the battery indicator will disappear from macOS at the next iteration.
Sorry, I should have noted that noted that my MBA is running 11.6.8. Apparently I was correct that the battery indicator will disappear in a future iteration.
I easily took the coating off from the Duracell battery with those creams to polish jewelry. The bitter taste was gone and my AirTag worked straight away with the polished Duracell battery.
I figured it out!! I first wiped it with alcohol, then I rubbed bleach on it for about 1 min then sprayed/wiped it again with alcohol, let it dry and inserted the battery and it worked.
I realized the new battery which I got didn’t work in the AirTag, so I looked up why. I found this forum and this is what I did: I removed the coating on the battery by using a white eraser on the bumpy side (neg), then swapped it with a Qtip using 70% Isopropyl Rubbing Alcohol. I put it into the AirTag and it beeped.
This absolutely works (as you’d expect, because you’re abrading the plastic bitterant coating from the surface). Though I don’t think you have to do the positive surface, it couldn’t hurt.
I did not have fine sandpaper as close as hand as I did a fine emery board. It has the advantage of being flat and spreading force over the surface.
So, the battery that shipped inside my AirTags is branded Panasonic, and it includes both the family-safety icon that indicates a bitterant coating, and a legend that says “INDUSTRIAL”. The negative terminal appears to be buffed off around the perimeter, where the AirTag negative terminals make contact.
I am picturing either a spate of problem-solving at Apple that led to a special run of modified CR-2032 batteries from Panasonic, or a last-minute session of buffing batteries at the factory so the product could ship.
For what it’s worth, the battery indicator appeared in Find My on both iOS and Mac Ventura once my battery started to reach EOL. It seemed to be showing a charge level and a percentage. I’m guessing by the “4%” that it was reporting that the threshold for, ahem, allowing us to see how much battery life is estimated is 5%.
When I got the new battery doctored (see upthread) and installed, the battery indicator was once again hidden.
Sounds like a job for those folks who like to delve into plists and flags…
Sounds like alot of unnecessary trouble. I bought whatever brand from Amazon. No problem, except trying to open the case and then struggling to lock the case. Finally was able to do with plastic gloves on. That’s the hassle for me.
(I’m less tolerant of comments that are just a repetition of complaints that have already been beaten to death.)