Modern smartphones, as well as expensive and precious objects, are also very delicate. Compared to the legendary phones of the past (like forgetting the immortal Nokia 3310), the screen of an iPhone or a new generation Galaxy can crack or show cracks even after a small bump. When this happens, it is usually waived to make the repair because by now we already know that sending it to assistance means being without the phone for at least a month and that, if the warranty does not cover the incidental damage, the price of repairs could be very salty.Although most mobile phones have not been designed to be fixed, with the right tools and detailed guidance, however, it is possible to solve many problems economically.
Clearly opening a smartphone like the iPhone or the Samsung will almost certainly invalidate the warranty and probably also the possible extended warranty. Repairing a smartphone is not easy, but those who have good manual skills with screwdrivers and electronic components should have no difficulty in doing so operations to fix it from home.
Repair tools and kits
Whatever phone you are trying to disassemble, you need some tools to keep on hand:
- A screwdriver kit, especially the small ones. Screwdrivers for special screws like those of the iPhone we can find them in convenient kits, like the one available here -> Mini Screwdrivers, Precision Screwdriver Set Kit Screwdrivers 25 in 1 (8 €).
- Plastic tools to pull up the broken screen, via a snap or suction mechanism. These kits can also be purchased online, like the one available here -> LCD opening pliers, LCD screen opening pliers (€ 12).
- The spare part to be replaced (for example the screen or the internal battery); spare parts can usually be found on Amazon, on eBay or even in small shops that sell used phones.
How to find the guide to repair the phone
Because of the great variety of models, it will be crucial to find a specific guide to repair our specific smartphone model; thankfully, there are plenty of do-it-yourself repair sites on the Internet. In addition, of course, to video guides to look for on Youtube, the main site in which to look, the absolute protagonist of this article is iFixit, the best resource on the Internet where you can find step-by-step instructions to disassemble and repair the most popular smartphones.
The site is in English but since each guide contains very clear photos and images, it becomes easy to consult even if you do not know the language.
In particular, we have guides to repair the following modern smartphones:
- iPhone XS Max
- iPhone XS
- iPhone XR
- iPhone X
- Samsung Galaxy S10
- Samsung Galaxy S10 +
- Samsung Galaxy S10e
Each model of smartphone and cell phone is also given a reparability score (from 0 to 10), which indicates the ease of opening it and changing a piece inside it.
You can also see the classification of reparability of smartphones to discover that the easiest smartphone to repair is the Google Pixel 3a XL (at least among the latest smartphones), while all the modern Samsung we saw in the previous list are quite difficult to repair (grade 3).
Types of repair
Not all hardware damage to a phone can be repaired; the most common are listed below.
Screen
The broken screen, classic damage, fortunately often repairable.
Adjusting a cracked or broken screen can be quite simple and inexpensive depending on how the smartphone is built.
The replacement cost goes up a lot if there is only one screen on the touchscreen smartphone and there is no protective glass over the digitized one.
In cases where the display is not fused to the glass, you can replace this broken glass without difficulty, otherwise, you will also need to intervene on the cable connecting the screen to the motherboard and things get complicated.
Also from iFixit, we can get the guides to repair the screen for all the smartphones included in the previous list, in particular on the latest generation iPhones (iPhone XS Max, iPhone XS, iPhone XR, and iPhone X).
READ ALSO: Android with a broken screen, how to use it or recover data
Upper speaker and sensors
Among the components that we can replace we also find the upper speaker and the sensors, which can easily be damaged following a fall. Once the device is open replace the upper speaker and the sensors are relatively simple since it is usually a single piece connected with a plug directly to the logic board.
Also for this repair, there are guides for various smartphone models such as iPhone XS Max, iPhone XS, iPhone Xr and iPhone X.
Battery
One of the components that are often replaced is certainly the battery, which can lose much of its capacity once the two years of use have passed. Although all modern smartphones have an internal battery, it is connected to the logic board via connectors and can be easily replaced by switching on the internal components. Also, in this case, the phones on which it is easier to replace the battery are the iPhone, as can be seen from the guides for iPhone XS Max, iPhone XS, iPhone Xr and iPhone X.
Camera
We will rarely have damage to the rear or front camera; but if it stops working, the flash does not work or we see lines or cracks appear, the replacement is quite simple, particularly on the iPhone, as indicated in the guides for iPhone XS Max, iPhone XS, iPhone XR and iPhone X (lens rear and front chamber).
Conclusions
Repairing a modern phone is not a simple task: it is no coincidence that there are companies and repair specialists, who earn by repairing the most delicate components of our smartphones every day. If we have enough geeks and want to learn something, on the Web there are thousands of video guides and text guides, which we can follow to be able to make home repairs.
If our smartphone has fallen into the water and we don’t know how to fix it, we invite you to read our guide on How to save a wet or fallen cell phone.