[Nursie]

That's very true, we do have a lot of rules in the UK and the EU about things being "fit for purpose" and "reasonable expectations" of how long they should last. There was some muttering recently about that being a very long time indeed (10 years?) for some appliances. And a standard 90 day electronics warranty would not fly here.

I think Apple got into trouble with this recently too, when selling Apple Care it was pointed out to them that people already had a legal right to longer/stronger warranty conditions than Apple were selling them, in some countries.

I would be interested to read a proper evaluation/analysis of the effect this has on pricing levels and profitability of hardware businesses in the EU.