Within Your Walls

The infamous “white screen of death” is every iphone users nightmare.  This was my situation 2 weeks ago, after I dropped my phone on the floor (for the last time).  If you haven’t experienced this, be grateful however, if you have, you understand my frustration and panic.  Now, my phone wasn’t totally killed.  The touch screen still responded; I just had no visual.  Even after a phone call with my husband (the gadget guru/IT guy) and like a patient telling a nurse “it was just some arm pain” when she full well knew it was a heart attack, he gave me the news I didn’t want to hear.

So I checked my warranty with Apple and, like I suspected, my iphone was out of warranty (by one month).  Therefore I had some choices.

1. Send mine out for repair, probably costing me $199.00 or more.

2. Buy a new iphone 3G for $99.00.

3. Repair it myself.

The choice to send it out for repair vs. buying a new one was a tough one, especially since my hubby had never repaired an iphone before.  I was still searching for another way out when I stumbled upon some videos on YouTube showing the disassembling of iphone, and that’s when I got the 3^rd idea to repair it myself.  This seemed all the more appealing since it may have only been the cables behind the screen came off.  I waited till my husband got home to tell him my “brilliant idea” which, I’m not so sure he thought was brilliant.  I figured either way, I was going to spend at least $100.00, why not learn something.

Tiny screwdrivers, tweezers, and a suction cup in hand, I tore apart my iphone (with the help from some videos).  After I reset all the cables and turned my phone back on, the really bad news hit, it still didn’t work.  My husband then said “here, take off my screen and put it on your phone and see if it works” so I did, and Eureka! Now I still had a problem, out of the two of us, only one phone was fully operational.  According to the video I was following through this ordeal, you could order parts at “ifixit.com”.  We went to the site and found that the front panel with the LCD screen was $149.00 OMG!  The LCD screen by itself was only $70.00 (much better)and I was fairly certain that was the part we needed, so we ordered it.  Waiting the week was the hardest part for my husband, I mean; he parted with one of his favorite gadgets, for me.  How sweet.

Finally the part arrived and he sent me to the workbench to fix his baby.  Like a well-oiled machine I put that sucker back together with out a hitch.  I am now my husband’s new hero!  The reason I’m telling you all about this is, because of the cost savings.  If you’re already an iphone user you know how much they are and what it costs to have one.  You also know that service on them isn’t cheap and, in some cases more than what the phone is worth, especially if it’s out of warranty.   With just a bit of research and some fearlessness you too can fix your iphone when things go wrong.  Trust me on this, I’m not much of a techie-fix-it kind of girl, (that’s why I have a husband) but my inner feminist shouted “you can do it” and it’s kind of exhilarating knowing I did it, and I’m not so afraid to take it apart next time.

Trackback URL

Apple, Dropping it, home repair, ifixit.com, Iphone, LCD, Repairing, White Screen of Death, youtube. warranty