Follow up on Broken iPhone Glass Repair
July 30, 2008
Apparently I have generated a flurry of interest with regard to fixing the broken iPhone Glass! I spent nearly a week and eight emails trying to help an 18 year-old and it took a lot of time, so I am going to post a follow-up on this project with the hope that it answers people’s questions. Basically, I am going to copy and paste what I have been emailing folks.
The lcd screen and digitizer come as one whole unit on eBay. On eBay through the eBay store yallstore. So I don’t get banned from wordpress by providing a link, which has happened before…just do a ebay store search for this store name.
Maybe the prices have gone up since this seems to be a high demand product.
HOWEVER, since going through this repair myself and other people wanting to know how to do this repair, what people need to understand is that going this route might be cheaper, but is definitely not the safest nor less-risky way of going about this. I have to do some pretty technical workarounds to harvest some parts and put things back in working order. Its time consuming and stressful and in retrospect, I would never do it again and I am not going to spend time writing a manual because I am busy and have a day job and a family!
Therefore, I would recommend buying the $169 glass/lcd/digitizer unit preassembled through pdaparts.com if doing the repair yourself. Is it expensive, yeah, I suppose if you don’t have $169. Otherwise, send it to them and have them repair it for you. I spent an entire week and 9 emails trying to explain the whole process to some 18 year old kid and it took a lot of time, so I am going to spare myself and everyone else who reads this post and tell them that they need to really follow instructions carefully and not get cocky and think this is easy because it is not. Even professional technicians admit this is a hard fix. Also, if you are unsure about ebay listings and whether you are getting the real thing, my advice is to stay away from eBay and go to pdaparts.com or pdasmart.com and have them fix it for you or buy the parts because these are OEM and are going to be legit.
ALSO, you will need a plastic case opener and pdaparts.com is the only site I know of that is based in the U.S. and provides a tool that is hard enough to wedge into the case to open it, without damaging the metal. I originally bought a set of plastic case openers from a Chinese seller, and the metal case just shredded the plastic to bits without doing a thing toward opening it. It took me three weeks to get everything I needed and then basically an entire afternoon and evening fixing it.
If you have the guts to go through with it, by all means do it, but be warned. Its not easy. Apple really wants you to go out and buy a 3G. That’s how they make big bucks. By the way, pdaparts.com has a 3G repair video out now and by all accounts it is FAR easier to repair, so if you should go out and get a 3G version, and drop it, at least your chances for repair are better than the 1st gen model.
Good luck
February 12, 2009 at 4:14 am
I am batting .333 on three 2G phones: on number three, easily repaired the screen by swapping out the whole LCD/Digi/Glass unit. Second phone: broke a delicate ribbon cable while removing the broken screen. But again, after installing a new and difficult ribbon cable, I put in a complete LCD/Digitizer/Glass unit. First phone: cracked the digitizer while picking away at the shards of broken glass. No way should anyone try to just replace the broken glass. Project will take 15 hours and you need to be lucky or you’ll bend the case, crack the digitizer underneath the broken glass as I did. And no blogs mentioned my ribbon cable danger: you can snap the mic/home button ribbon cable by not noticing that the home button assembly is glued to the underside of the glass screen. Its black mounting bracket must be gently sliced away from the glass before pulling the glass away from the case. The bracket is only 2mm thick so it easily looks like it’s part of the black glass. In conclusion, bite the bullet and buy the complete display unit… it swaps out well if you’re even a little experienced at electronics repair. Eat macaroni for a month if you have to but don’t waste 15-20 hours gambling that you can successfully peel off the broken glass. Because if you fail you’re out the cost of te screen *and* all that wasted time.
February 12, 2009 at 6:22 pm
Yes Gary, you are absolutely right. That is why I have warned that folks should only attempt this when being extremely careful and patient. You have to have nerves of steel. I am batting .500 so far. The first time was successful, the second time, I decided to sell on eBay (not bad-got about $280 total for it). I now have a 3G and have reviewed videos on how to fix broken glass, and the repair is a lot simpler because Apple uses cheaper/fewer components in the 3G (hence is why the phone is cheaper than its predecessor). Anyway, thanks for the post–its good for people to know the risks involved in DIY repair. Many folks are offering repair services and the more competition there is, the lower the repair price becomes. My recommendation is–unless you are a complete whiz at repairing electronics-defer to an expert.