Last night my Transformer started acting up. I was browsing Facebook, and then I hit the back case just right while setting it down and the screen went all green and purple (garbled/glitchy). I kept pressing it and eventually the screen completely shut off, though the backlight was still on.
In this small "how to", I will show you what you need to reconnect to get the screen back to operational status.
There are two sets of tear down pics for the TF that I found. One comes from XDA member hybridau, found here and the other is Tech Republic. I'll be linking to pics from Tech Republic along with my own as they were a little more informative.
Take the device apart. Torx T5 is needed for the bottom. Work your way from the end they show in the picture here. Then, press down hard (but be gentle ) on the side until the bezel disconnects from the base (pic). Next, gradually work your way around until you get to the dock connector. I used a thin piece of plastic to go around the edges, but I've heard a guitar pic works well (I don't own one). Note: for me, the dock connector was the most difficult part of the bezel to remove.
Remove the four screws around the screen area and then the three around both long sides (six total).
Turn the device over (screen facing down) and remove the back cover (pic).
Now, look for the piece in the pics below. The ribbon needs to be pushed all the way in where you can't see any of the connectors. Mine was visibly out of place. It won't be fully out of place. I used my fingernails to gently move it back into place one side at a time. You may want to try something else... it's not the easiest thing to move back since there is tape that was/is supposed to hold the thing in place.
Full device view:
That's it! I turned it on while it was apart to make sure screen worked, but that's up to you. Put it back together the reverse way... much easier putting it back together. I put the bezel back on the opposite direction I took it off.
Little background on the device:
The device has been dropped a few times while in a protective case or when tossing onto the bed (no visible signs anywhere on the device -- seriously, the device was thrown and dropped more during shipping than it was in my possession), so I called ASUS and they issued an RMA on it. Of course, if the issues are caused by you (dropping), you have to pay. Regardless, shippings going to cost some money.
Thus, I took it upon myself to fix it. I knew it had to be a ribbon that was disconnected because I doubted it was any kind of screen problem. I had also read in another thread here that that when they sent their TF off the return said all the techs did was reattach the ribbon. What a waste of time, money, and effort?!
Anyway... hope this helps someone with the same issues I had!
Thank you very much for the details. It doesn't effect me but I have read several threads where people are having this issue. I am asking a mod to sticky this for awhile so it doesn't get lost
Thanks! I just hope it helps someone else contemplating doing what I did. I almost wasted time and money sending it to Texas for repairs!
Related
I bought today p3600. I have however a small problem. I cannot unfortunately open the cover. therefore I can not use akku and sim card. I have fear that I make p3600 broken. i need a assistence, heelp!!
if anyone can send me some picture how to open the back cover of p3600
sorry for bad english, thanks to google
my msn: [email protected]
did you manage to open the battery cover? I have the same issue.
I must be blind, but I cannot find a way to open the battery compartment.
You slide the whole back cover up. You need to use some force, and you hear a click sound when it opens. No covers sliding of by mistake on this model
Thank you!
Finally I was able to manage. You do have to apply some force. As a first timer opening the Trinity's battery compartment, I was a bit scared, but after reading your message, I said: "let's go for it! if it brakes, I'll say it was defective" .
andreuroig said:
Thank you!
Finally I was able to manage. You do have to apply some force. As a first timer opening the Trinity's battery compartment, I was a bit scared, but after reading your message, I said: "let's go for it! if it brakes, I'll say it was defective" .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL
I also had MAJOR problems opening my Trinity...glad I'm not the only one - it was a bit embaressing ;-)
Opening the Trinity
1. Remove the stylus. This helps.
2. Use the edge created to gently push up.
3. It slides only a very short distance (2 cm) to free the back cover.
4. NO pushing on the back cover like the Prophet.
Removing the stylus does help. Thank you.
Where do you put your fingers to slide up? Does the camera slide up as well?
//edit
I found out how to open. thanks for the hints!
Glad you managed.
I think it is one of the hardest removing covers I've seen to date.
How to open the back of the HTC P3600 Trinity for battery and SIM
The HTC P3600 Trinity is a really great phone. But opening the back to put in the SIM and battery is really astonishingly difficult.
The first piece of advice I offer is if you bought the phone in a local store, go back and have a member of their staff do it! Even if it is a long drive! If it does break then they will be responsible!
But, like many people, I bought mine from an online merchant so that was not an option for me.
I regret it is difficult to provide a meaningful photo. But I hope the following description may be helpful to someone.
Ignore the very minimal directions in the user guide which simply refer to sliding the back open. This is misleading. No sliding is involved. The photo in the user guide also does not correspond to the actual back of the phone so should also be ignored. It is actually one piece of molded plastic that encompasses the entire back and goes around some of the sides too. There is no panel or section to slide or swivel open.
Also ignore the two little raised bumps low down at the back. They look like the back of the Magician. I initially expected to push downwards on them to slide the back off. Not so!
Unlike the Wizard there is no release switch, as there is no panel to open.
The back pops completely off by being levered directly backwards away from the front of the phone. Not up-down-left or right. Just directly backwards.
Like this:
|Back| <--> [Prise with force!] <--> |Front|
I recommend using a soft surface for your phone during this ordeal! Something like a big cushion or a sofa or a bed. Not a hard desk. This process will take both hands and your phone will need a soft landing if slips away from you!
The only notch to use for initial leverage is if you remove the stylus. I took out the stylus to make this notch accessible. I then used two spare Magician stylii to prise the back off. I used the handle ends, not the tips. First I placed the handle end of one stylus in the notch where the Trinity stylus goes and twisted it very hard to begin to lever the back open. Once a gap began to appear I forced the handle end of my other spare Magician stylus into the gap to hold it open. Then I found another gap to prise another place on the back open more.
By using the two stylii handles with considerable force I was able to work around the back of the phone until it popped off with a loud "clack". This was an uneasy and contradictory combination of force and care!
Fortunately, I managed to do this without damaging or denting any part of the phone. I was quite relieved as it was not easy.
It does seem the back is made of strong plastic which is sufficiently strong and flexible to stand this force! HTH.
I don't see how you people found the unit hard to open at all. You just push on the lip at the bottom of it while gripping the lip at the top front with your other hand. Took me maybe 5 seconds to figure it out.
Of course, I treat all my electronics like crap and am not gentle with them at all. You guys will have working Trinities four years from now, and mine will probably be at the bottom of a lake within a few months
mikesol said:
I don't see how you people found the unit hard to open at all. You just push on the lip at the bottom of it while gripping the lip at the top front with your other hand. Took me maybe 5 seconds to figure it out.
Of course, I treat all my electronics like crap and am not gentle with them at all. You guys will have working Trinities four years from now, and mine will probably be at the bottom of a lake within a few months
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Witty post, mikesol! I do hope my Trinity will be working 4 years from now... but I have yet to have a handheld last a full year! You may just have your brain properly engaged, unlike me!
To be honest, it was just really absurdly hard to open my Trinity the very first time. Now I can open it quite easily just as you describe. Actually, it feels like it even has the potential to get a bit loose if I opened it a few more times (so I will open again only when essential)
I'd guess some of them come from the factory with the back on really, really tight. Perhaps yours had just enough give to make it a bit more apparent which way to pull? There was absolutely no give in mine any way I moved it first time around. It really would not have come off the way you describe that first time. Of course my fingers are puny and frail!
How do you like the phone?
different method
hi there,
I bought the p3600 yesterday in HK and first had the same problem. And because some of the methods described in this thread are definetly impossible with my model, I would like to present you my way of opening the back cover.
It really slides up. So take the p3600 and put it with the display to the hand in your left flat hand with the buttons on the side where your arm should begin.
Take your other hand and put it in the back of the p3600. you now should look like a Chinese in a temple.
Move/slide now your right hand up in the direction in with the fingers point. use some force. Thats it! I open it this way.
stucki said:
hi there,
I bought the p3600 yesterday in HK and first had the same problem. And because some of the methods described in this thread are definetly impossible with my model, I would like to present you my way of opening the back cover.
It really slides up. So take the p3600 and put it with the display to the hand in your left flat hand with the buttons on the side where your arm should begin.
Take your other hand and put it in the back of the p3600. you now should look like a Chinese in a temple.
Move/slide now your right hand up in the direction in with the fingers point. use some force. Thats it! I open it this way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
From what I gather here (this is a fantastic example of google translation!!! ) I think this "new method" is exactly like what was described by mikesol above. The running theme here is that you must use force to get the unit to open. Also, it is definitely a sliding motion from bottom to top - do not pry it off as has been suggested earlier! I think the camera confuses people (it looks like you need to lift the cover off around the camera - but the whole camera circle comes off as part of the back cover).
I think we can put this one to bed now.
absolutely the hardest cover to remove, but thanks to you "trailblazers" i was able to remove mine without destroying it.
I did my way
HTC Trinity just arrived. Same battery cover problem. Tried to follow advice in this thread but my big, sweaty hands could not gain enough leverage on the extremely shiny casing, to slide the back cover up. My fingers just slipped off. So here is my method. To slide the back cover up you press up (or away from you) on the bottom edge of the back casing and press down (or towards you) on the top edge of the front casing. The top edge of the front casing is maybe 5mm wide, rounded and very difficult to push against, for me at least. My method involves bracing this top edge of the front casing against an immobile hard edge while you push up on the back casing with your fingers. The immobile hard edge I used was a wooden chopping board braced against the wall. To make sure it pressed only against the top edge of the front casing (and not also against the top edge of the back casing which would stop the back casing sliding up) I used a book to next to the wooden board to raised the Trinity to the right height off the work surface on which everything rested. So....I placed the Trinity face down on the book with its top front edge braced against the edge of the adjacent wooden board and used my fingers to press upwards (towards the wooden board) on the bottom edge of the back casing. The back casing then slid relatively easily. Job done. Its not easy putting this into words. Hope someone can make sense of the above and finds it helpful.
Ok so I have the fabled white screen issue on an 8525. When it first occurred I searched and read all the write ups, decided I had the ribbon cable issue. Took it apart and simply unplugged and replugged the ribbon cable with great results, no more white screen.
I repeated once when it came back after being bumped around, again with positive results...but this last(3rd)time instead of it working I now get white screen 95% of the time. I re-notched the sliders the first time, and last time.
During the 5% it works I noticed the charge light would correspond to it going white.This never happened before...
Example:
When OFF - Connect charger, Red light for 1 second, then nothing=White screen from power on
When OFF - Connect charger, Red light for 1 second, then orange charge indicator = normal startup
When ON and Working - Connect charger, no light, no charge - reboots to white screen
When ON and Working - Connect charger, orange charge indicator, reboots normally.
There is no heat or noticeable pressure on any parts, everything seems to fit normally.
It does boot normally with screen white.
Any ideas? I really don't want to give up on this thing, is there any hope? or just ebay it for parts?
Thanks
-Nick
same problems here, if someone could just tell me what parts to order, cause I have no warranty (ordered over ebay). I tried both the instruction that has chinese fonts on the page , and other from R&R, no luck, white screen all the way..
I had the WSOD and took it apart and reassembled a few time. The 3rd or 4th time the screem came back, but now it is shifter to the right around 1/4" or so. I mean there is just white along the left edge, then the normal screen/color starts and is cut off on the right.
Does anyone know how to correct that, is it related to the same flex cable or is there something else I disturbed?
mine will fade to white.. then i just push the power to put it in standby, then push power again to wake it back up and back to normal.. it rarely does it but still annoying...
If You Ordered From At&t
I had this problem about 2 weeks ago!!!!
I thought it was a fluke!
Anyway, walked over to 43rd and Lexington (NYC FOR THOSE WHO DON'T KNOW THAT MANHATTAN IS THE CENTER OF THE WORLD)
and they gave me the EXCHANGE HOTLINE for at&t.
I called them up, told them my screen is fading to WHITE and the lady sent me a new or referbished phone.. i dont even know.
Just so you know, i ordered my phone on AMAZON with a new activation. its covered under the MANUFACTURERS warentee for a full year from the date of purchase... so is the REPLACEMENT PHONE... but not from the date of replacement, just the date of purchase.
did anyone get deeper into this yet? I got a 8500 (need those without camera) from ebay USA, already with white screen. After reading here, that this is mostly an issue with connectors, I bought it, disassembled it and reassembled it, though still white. Should I give the contacts a treatment with contact-spray? (there's a tuner spray that doesn't leave residues) Or is there something broken within the ribbon cables? Seller said it has been dropped (but he also said, he didn't want to open it, while it clearly has been opened, one screw missing and warranty seal gone). It ssems to boot up normal otherwise, I hear a sound after the boot process, so probably this isn't a software issue?
Edit: another thing I noticed: When I run it without any keyboard connected at all, it's also white. I then connected the dpad again, and I could see a hint of the at&t logo in the lower part of the screen. When I pressed around on the back of the dpad a bit, all LEDs would go on/off... Sound to me like the dpad has gone bad, possible?
Edit II: Got it. Using a 20x eyeloupe I found that the PCB of the DPad is broken under the little chip on it. Now I just gotta find a dpad here in germany, but I assume those Hermes' are all equal...
hello
where can I get manual (if there is one) for disassembling hermes. link in wiki does not work.
thanks
this worked good for me
http://inuchanbt.blog54.fc2.com/blog-entry-100.html
Anyone know if this applies to the 8125 as well? I've got a flickering white screen. I had dropped my phone a few weeks back and cracked the LCD. Replaced it with an OEM LCD - it worked fine for about 2 weeks and then just suddenly went all white. Phone still works, I can still get calls - just can't see who is calling.
I don't recall that the wizard had the same problem... Though from a logical point, it seems that there is an issue behind white screens and the thumbpad being responsible for it, so it may well be the same thing. Perhaps just disassemble the wizard (there should be a howto too) and check if theres a similar connection from mainboard to thumbpad circuit.
Is there a disassembling manual for a imate k-jam that anyone knows about?
Here's a website with a video manual i found useful...
http://viralelectronics.com/category/howto/page/2/
Figured out the problem...
The only reason I figured out the screen goes blank is because the motherboard loses connection with the screen when you slide the keyboard out...try this out and see if the screen comes back...
put the screen on sleep mode (no white screen)...then slide out the keyboard and tilt it a little hard after pressing on the screen and put the power on. if it doesnt work try again it might take some pressure and power to make it work...be careful not to put too much power but as far as I went, it's a very sturdy cell.
alternately, slide out the keyboard in sleep mode, and press all the buttons really hard and then try to press the power button (press more towards the space bar because that helps)...if any of this works and the screen comes back on even just for a second...follow the following
Go back to the person who gave the link to the site with opening the HTC instructions and follow through and clean the whole phone up from dirt around the screen and such...you dont need to put those rubber things or whatever it says to put on the screen...then when you are putting it back together, press hard on the wire connecting the touch screen to the motherboard. I suggest sealing it with a good tape...and then you are good to go! I did it but it had a few glitches...the screens contrast sometimes goes awry but it is still visible and responds to touch. Also, the physical buttons work as well!!
Good Luck and do it at your on risk.
Have any of you tried this? http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=321163
hope the best
i tried this and it worked for me. i also pressed alil hard around the d-pad and heard a pop. i think it poped back into place.
thanks
razor rc said:
i tried this and it worked for me. i also pressed alil hard around the d-pad and heard a pop. i think it poped back into place.
thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i still have this problem.
fixed my wsod
I noticed a few days ago my 8525 screen went white, rebooted and it went away. Today it came back, but would only go away for a few seconds and then back to white. After reading some forums I decided to check the connector. I took the phone apart following this site as a guide. I removed the connector on the board side and cleaned the contacts with a qtip and denatured alcohol. Phone has been perfect for the last few hours, no more white screen of death. I didn't mess with the connector on the LCD side, just the board side. I'm a computer tech and I found it quite annoying to disassemble, but I managed without causing any damage, however, I'd rate the job at about a 8/10 as far as technical ability.
Joey
warped0202 said:
I noticed a few days ago my 8525 screen went white, rebooted and it went away. Today it came back, but would only go away for a few seconds and then back to white. After reading some forums I decided to check the connector. I took the phone apart following this site as a guide. I removed the connector on the board side and cleaned the contacts with a qtip and denatured alcohol. Phone has been perfect for the last few hours, no more white screen of death. I didn't mess with the connector on the LCD side, just the board side. I'm a computer tech and I found it quite annoying to disassemble, but I managed without causing any damage, however, I'd rate the job at about a 8/10 as far as technical ability.
Joey
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i agree that this is one of the first things to try in curing the white screen issue. Others may find their problem runs a little deeper and the contacts on the d/pad chip are broken. An improvised cure which may not be very permanent is to place a little padding on the surface of the chip as described here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=321163
If you have appropriate heat gun equipment you can re-flow the solder on the d/pad daughter board - but remember to remove the sticky key pad layer or you'll cook it!!
I regret that I'm closing this thread because we have several "White Screen" threads and the questions and answers are being spread all over the place.
Please use this one for future posts:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=321163
Mike
Its easy to break the sliding mechanism when opening up the back cover. There is a small slit on the bottom back when supposedly helps do that, but it does not work as intended. If you pull out on that slit, you will cause the sliding mechanism to break in that there will now be a gap in between the 2 halfs of the phone and it will not be tight as before. The way to open the back cover is to open the slide, hold the back portion on one side of the speaker grill (do not hold or pull on the top half of the phone) and use your fingernail to separate the back cover along the edge. It will come off easilly and when you have enough of the back cover peeled away it will separate easilly. I broke my first phone's mechanism by trying to pull on the small indent on the bottom which clearly does not work as intended.
I agree. The manual mentions that little slit on the bottom, but it's obvious once you start putting pressure on it that it's a quick way to break your new toy. I just went to the other side and started prying and got it off.
Deleted Post
I think this has happened to me, the gap is driving me nuts right now is there any way to fix it cause I don't think I have a case in order to return it and get it replaced. What is stupid is that the manual tells you to open the back like that. Edit: So I ended up trying to get a new surround and since I was over the 30 days (by 3 days) they wouldn't give me a new phone. My next choice is to send it to HTC and get it fixed but I am not too sure if it is worth it, or if it will get worse and that I should. Any comments?
nVd90 said:
I think this has happened to me, the gap is driving me nuts right now is there any way to fix it cause I don't think I have a case in order to return it and get it replaced. What is stupid is that the manual tells you to open the back like that. Edit: So I ended up trying to get a new surround and since I was over the 30 days (by 3 days) they wouldn't give me a new phone. My next choice is to send it to HTC and get it fixed but I am not too sure if it is worth it, or if it will get worse and that I should. Any comments?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should try talking to HTC's customer support. explain to them the situation. and let them know that the OFFICIAL user manual tells you to do it like this. I really don't think they can blame you for instructions they gave you. It's worth a try...
Got off the phone with barns and noble which more or less went like this.
'Hello how can I help you?'
'Yes the screen is stuck on a single image can you help?'
*ten minutes of trying the usual power cycling later*
'Nope still stuck.
'You only have the basic warrentee so you'll have ot send it ot us and only if the problem is not user related then we'll sned you a new one'
'thanks.' *image shown is of a very clearly not stock nook reader app*
So now i have no reason to not open the thing up see if i can do anything as walmart /probably/ isn't going to bother looking it over before giving a refund/replacement. Trouble is i only have a philips head bit that small. Any way of getting the thing open?
Goggles2114 said:
Got off the phone with barns and noble which more or less went like this.
'Hello how can I help you?'
'Yes the screen is stuck on a single image can you help?'
*ten minutes of trying the usual power cycling later*
'Nope still stuck.
'You only have the basic warrentee so you'll have ot send it ot us and only if the problem is not user related then we'll sned you a new one'
'thanks.' *image shown is of a very clearly not stock nook reader app*
So now i have no reason to not open the thing up see if i can do anything as walmart /probably/ isn't going to bother looking it over before giving a refund/replacement. Trouble is i only have a philips head bit that small. Any way of getting the thing open?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torx
I can't remember which size is it exactly.
Try Torx T5.
The screw is quite fragile. Using wrong screwdriver might damage it severely.
Edit :
It is Torx T5
http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Nook+Simple+Touch+with+GlowLight+Teardown/9301/1
try to remove the warranty sticker using a razor blade or something similar (thin blade) so you can put it back on the screw once you are done.
Goddamnit. why couldn't they have used a philips like a SANE person? Oh right... nonuer servicable.'
*mutter* I"m twelve shades of pissed off right now because it wasn't that high of a fall just like at best a half foot. I"m sure everythign works its just not displaying a damned thing.
Goggles2114 said:
Goddamnit. why couldn't they have used a philips like a SANE person? Oh right... nonuer servicable.'
*mutter* I"m twelve shades of pissed off right now because it wasn't that high of a fall just like at best a half foot. I"m sure everythign works its just not displaying a damned thing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can easily access the battery, but it will void your warranty. The torx screw on the back is located underneath the power button. The power button just pops out if you can get your finger nail or something underneath it.
The battery is covered by the warranty sticker, so if you attempt to remove the screw, it will shred the sticker. Unless you find some method of getting tweezers in there to unscrew it, voiding the warranty is guaranteed.
And yes, you can easily use a philips or flathead: just lay a rubber band down over the top of the screw and push a screwdriver down onto it. The rubberband will provide enough grip to loosen and remove the torx. Very easy. However, be aware that the front panel slides out. Don't force it open or you'll break the internal plastic tabs holding it together.
For extra credit, remove the SD card before trying to slide the two case pieces apart.
Alright back cover's off and so far... Nothing. Plugged it in sans battery and no change. So leaving it sit for awhile see if it'll discharg any leftover power before trying again.
Edit: Reassembled. Charging.
Edit Again: Still behaving the same. :C
Edit the third: Left it sitting unplugged again now i"m going to leave it charge all night.
Why would a short fall bump cause a brick event?
The Nook will not boot up on USB power with a disconnected battery.
Did you reseat the display connector? That's the only connector on the Nook.
You could have cracked the circuit board somewhere too.
Have you tried to boot up with Noogie on an SD card?
Unhooked then rehooked the video cable while it was open jst to be sure (It /looks/ like it's in right not sure if there's a way to do it wrong.) Booted it with noogi before doing the take apart thing and no change in screen but it sees all the partitions just fine when plugged in.
Even the glow light pops up.
Seriously had to have been at worst a six inch drop on a wood surface. What the flip?
I have bought two Nook touches off of ebay that had screens that looked fine but when I opened them up and removed the mainboard I could see that the screen was cracked.
Managed to get a return from walmart.
And i count myself as lucky.
Goggles2114 said:
Managed to get a return from walmart.
And i count myself as lucky.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm glad you were able to return it. You could also have gotten it RMA'd through the warranty. When there's no sign of visible external damage it's also an easy return.
considering the amount of ridiculous punishment my Nook absorbed, I would imagine yours may have had a major defect that was aggravated by the drop.
What a story!!
I bought a galaxy note 4 right on launch day first thing in the morning. Ive had just about every phone but have been waiting for a while now to get my hands on the new note 4.
I ended up buying the phone at the St . Bruno shopping center in Quebec, Canada and once i singed all the papers for my contract and got home, I finally open the box and took the phone out of the box. I loved it, it did everything one would expect from the highest end phone on the market.
A week later however, I started noticing that my buttons, especially my home button were slightly loose and my phone was also developing a weird oil spot under the home button.
So I went back to videotron but this time at St. Catherine street corporate branch store and the manager there obviously didnt know much about phones because he looked at it and proceeded with putting windex on a paper towel and wiping my screen with it and than told me that theres nothing wrong with it.
After frustratingly explaining everything to him, he told me that if the phone makes calls and works, than these issues arent covered for any kind of exchange as its not affecting the functionality of the phone. My logic tell me however that if one buy's a ferrari and realizes that the paint is f-up, wouldn't the dealership do something about it??? Anyways, without any luck I eventually left disappointed.
The following week After exhaustive attempt to solve the matter with Videotron to no avail, I found out that there was a store here in montreal called Service Absolute which is a samsung repair center that I could bring my phone to. I called them first to not waist more of my time and was than informed that yes they could help me but that it could take nearly a month before they would have any parts for this phone.
So after patiently waiting, I finally got a call back from them and droped off my phone the following day. I only had to wait two days before i got my phone back and thought that the turn around time was great! Only after few minutes of playing with it however, I noticed that the phone's new screen which now didn't have the oil spot was actually lifting from the housing about 1mm at the top of the phone and that the buttons were all still loose.
Its easy to imagine at this point how infuriated i was with all the time spent dealing with a phone that should of been right in the first place.. All the waiting, calling and runaround I got only to get a phone that was now even worst!! I could actually see inside my phone and behind the screen. Dust was starting to get inside the phone and under the camera lens and so on and I was really starting to freak out and was completly desperate to fix this issue asap to prevent things from getting worse and worse.
So I decided at this pont to take matters in my own hands and use my old trusty screwdriver to take this thing apart and get
To the bottom of the loose buttons and screen seperation.. I know! Scray [email protected]$ but it had to be done because at this point I needed a working phone for work and nobody seemed to help me. So after watching a few youtube videos, I unscrewed the screws at the back and gently seperated the phone from the metal frame with my fingers.
The whole assembly came out of the metal frame the same komd of way the old HTC phones used to. After doing so, the first thing i found out was that if your going scatch your phones metal frame which makes up most of the phone outer surfice, it's no big deal as it can be swapped out for around 40 to 50 bucks.
Next I noticed that all the buttons (volume and power) aren't adheared to the frame but only clipped in with a few pins stratigically placed. So its normal that they have play and wiggle. They're not gonna break and we're likely engineered to be this way. The wiggling is not really important as it won't affect anything on the phone's motherboard.
The next thing I noticed was that the glue between the inner midframe (the part that holds the motherboard to the screen assembly) also wasn't glued properly and was able to gently seperate it from the lcd/digitizer assembly without a heat gun or anything.. after doing so, the home button fell out and was simply dangling from its flex cable. It wasn't actually glued in place or held in with clips or anything. It's only connected to a flex cable on the left side of the button but thats it. I was easily able to pull it out and inspect it. It was built to be completely free floating between the midframe and the screen.
Which means that again, no need to worry about anything breaking as the home button is not a solidified part to start with and only in place where it is because of the space tolerence engeneered in the screen's home button whole. So it being slightly loose is normal and something that will eventually happen to all note 4's sooner or later. The slight looseness actually makes sense to me as any dust material that will get in between the home button wont get stuck as as much as if the space toleren was less. In my opinion, I thik that iPhones have less issues like this as the home button is part of the screen assembly and is also round.
In the end, I wasn't able to adhear the screen back in place as I didnt have double sided tape but manages to send it back to samsung and get it serviced again. I clearly asked them to fix it properly this time and it looks like they finally did and glued it back properly now.
This was a crazy experience and all I can tell you is that I definatly got an up close look of this phone and decided to keep it afterall as it's still better than a refurbished one and also because it's super easy to repair if anything ever broke on it.
Anyways i know this is a long post but I thought I'd share my experience with everyone and put some of your worries to rest.
Cheers!