This video was made by Louis Rossmann. Louis is a board repair colleague with an expertise in MacBook repair and microsoldering. He is my personal friend---the kind of friend that you debate and fight with every day :)
Honestly, Louis hates iFixit. I have always loved iFixit. I am slowly beating into him the general idea that iFixit is a wonderful thing for the world. Louis made some disparaging remarks about his experience with iFixit in an earlier recent video. I called him on it. A day of 'debate' later and he makes this video. He is overstating any involvement I have at iFixit in this video--I responded to this in my comment on this video. He is really giving an opinion on what he'd like to see out of iFixit Pro Wholesale parts. I couldn't agree more. Louis is full of a lot of really fantastic ideas if you can get past his natural brutal arrogance and hail of f-bombs. He is also one of those rare guys, like all of you, that enjoy sharing information and helping people succeed in their repairs. I'd love to see folks like Louis be enticed to spend more time in iFixit Answers.
Like Nick, I too, would not see iFixit making guides useful for professionals. However, I'd sure love to see the Answers section up the ante with troubleshooting support for everyone. I think this is possible.
This year has marked the first ever wireless repair expo, and the spontaneous formation of several robust communities of repair professionals that exchange information on a daily basis. I'm not driving the bus here, but I sure would like to see more professionals at the iFixit water cooler. I think the 'best answer goes to top' rating system is fantastic. What a great way for that one novel answer to bubble straight to the top of the pile.
There are more professionals in the Answers section now than even a few months ago. This is great!
For cell phone board-level repair, this comes at a time when the 'old watering hole' is collapsing due to fractured leadership ("Marcus" Cyberdoc and Filip Pusca--WitesOmTesla had a joint venture subscription-based forum. They have ended their partnership.)
I noticed a suggestion today in Answers, from Rany, to create a new section: iFixit Troubleshooting. Here, perhaps we could work on a collection of Wiki's to hash out and formalize the broader question of how to approach classic problems in repair. Dare I say--create standards? Most of the newbie questions in iFixit Answers could be answered easily by pointing them, then, to these documents.
There is a clear need in the repair community to have a place for professionals to discuss the repair challenges that are thrown at us as devices continue to evolve. Microsoldering, Board-level Troubleshooting, LCD refurbishing, Classic 'Achilles heel' type problems for every device..... Right now this is happening in a highly disorganized way--reddit, various cell phone repair facebook forums, instagram, parts vendor blogs, and content embedded on page 10 of repair forum X.
I would LOVE to see the resources of iFixit step in to formally provide support for this growing need---that will be up to Kyle and his team.
Kyle--I've been talking about you, and man, I hope this is true.
Question--If you went home tonight, and found that your dishwasher had water in the bottom of it, what would you do?
- A: Check iFixit Answers and grab my flashlight and screwdrivers.
- B: Call the repairman.
My impression is that you'd pick A. I have shared that impression as part of my new rant "Why Kyle Wiens is a Rock Star" (that and the grammar thing--love!) that I have used to try and convince my Scroogey friend Louis that iFixit is a good thing.
Don't tell me if you'd pick B---I couldn't stand it :)