OT: Anyone have any experience replacing smart phone display/glass

[trader_4]

Dropped by ZTE smartphone and cracked the glass. Not a total disaster, it's mostly at the top right corner, with one crack extending down a couple inches. It's not a problem with using it, at least not so far, it's not even mostly noticeable when looking straight at it. But it is noticeable when it's just sitting there, turned off. The actual display and digitizer work perfectly.

So, I started looking at options. It's less than two years old, I'm very happy with it, so no major incentive to get another one. The display in smart phones consists of three parts. The LCD (or whatever) display, a digitizer that sits on top of that to detect touch, and a glass sheet that sits on top of that. In some, maybe most, the digitizer is part of the glass and it is with my phone.

So, the good news, you can get a new glass including digitizer for $9 on Ebay. Isn;t China great? The other option is you can get a whole display with LCD for $30. The bad news, there is a lot. For any of those, there is a lot of fine disassembly work required, the phone has to be taken completely apart starting from the back. That gets you to the replace the whole display $30 option. The problem with that is whether the replacement Ebay LCD is as good as the existing one which works perfectly and really looks great or if it will be noticeably crappier.

That gets us to the other option, which is replacing just the glass and digitizer. The problem there is that it's glued to the LCD and removing it is very tricky at best. From googling, seems like the best option is you have to heat the display up to about 80C, start separating it with a razor, then use a fine wire to work in there, back and forth, to essentially cut the softened glue all across the display, until the glass/digitizer separates from the LCD. Then you need to clean it up, then use special UV clear adhesive to put the new one on. The good news is that all this stuff that you need besides the display can be had for ~$15 or less on Ebay, including the UV light. Isn't China swell? It looks like the majority that fix these, including the shops, go the replace the whole display route. On the other hand they sure are selling a lot of glass/digitizer only on Ebay, so people must be going that route too.

For now I ordered a tempered glass screen protector to try putting over it. I'll see how it looks with that and if it improves it significantly, maybe I'll stick with that. At the least, it will protect it from any dirt or liquid getting in the cracks.

Anyone have any experience with any of this?

[Ed Pawlowski]

Very limited experience. My grandson broke his a couple of times. He bough the glass and there was a guy that advertised on Craig's List. He'd meet you at McDonalds and replace it while you wait. Forget the price, about $25. Could be worth it not to mess up an otherwise good phone.

The screen protectors help too.

[trader_4]

I found a video that shows what it takes to really do the glass only option right, ie how a real factory repair is done. Quite amazing, must be $100K+ worth of eqpt. The have a specialized machine that heats it and pulls it apart. Then a machine that scrapes the old adhesive off. That was interesting, it's basically a blade scraper that's part of a machine that's bigger than a microwave oven. The glue gets heated, then the blade moves across the whole screen, scraping it off. Then they clean the remaining glue off by hand. Then it goes into another machine that applies the factory version of adhesive, which comes in sheets. That's quite an involved, multi-step process, but it puts the adhesive sheet onto the LCD. Then comes the new glass. Then the whole thing goes into an autoclave to adhere the adhesive and get the bubbles out. How much better that result is than the guy at McDonalds, the local phone repair place or me, IDK. Or whether you'd even notice, who knows. I think this has become my new education, hobby project.

Also, how much they charge for depends on the screen. I'm surprised that guy was doing them for just $25, doesn't seem like there is much margin in that deal. Like what happens if he screws it? For a higher end phone, looks like $175 is more typical. Saw one guy who came up with the opposite process for Samsung Galaxy's. He freezes them down to like -180F, so the glue becomes brittle, then easily comes off. With the heat method, seems like

80-90C is the magic range. Below that the glue is still firm, above it the risk of damaging the LCD goes up. Of course if you have the right stuff, like a controlled temp heat plate, that becomes more accurate than me with a hair dryer. LOL

Meanwhile I have that tempered glass screen protector on order. What likely would have prevented the trouble was a case. I had one on it, but a few weeks ago I bought an HDSC memory card and had to take it off to get to the tray. I didn't put it back on and got used to liking the new, slimmer phone, until my big oooops. Looking at those videos of all the stuff in there, it's quite amazing. One thing, if the battery needs replacing, I know I can do that. It's not very hard at all, the battery is right there after you pry the back off. Held in by adhesive double sided tape. I'd say $25 seems more like a fair price for that service. MAybe I can get a table at McDonalds?

[Clare Snyder]

In my experience they are virtually identical. The one I bought for a blackberry Torch was an actual original equipment blackberry part (must have gone out the back door of the chinese supplierto blackberry) - less than $10 including shipping - - - - -

Save the aggravation and buy the assembly

[trader_4]

Here's an update. The tempered glass screen protector I ordered arrived. Good news is that with it on, the cracks in the screen are much less noticeable, it's probably 95% off of perfect. The bad news is that it's a fingerprint magnet, huge difference between the original screen Gorilla glass and the protector. The G glass, rarely showed prints. This thing, just use it for a few minutes and it's covered with smudges.

So, that leads to the next two issues. I wonder if I bought either the glass and digitizer or the whole display, if that glass is any better? Is it Gorilla glass or a cheap alternative that will smear? Given that these replacements come from China, there is no name brand identity, it seems like a real crap shoot, at best. I'd suspect that the glass isn't the same, original high quality, but then again it might be.

The other issue and question is there are liquid nano oleographic products that are supposed to apply a coating to the glass. But from what I could see, they for sure don't work as well as the original, don't last very long, if they do much at all. They cost anywhere from less than $1 to $15. I figured for $.75 I'd try a cheap one, see what it does, so I ordered it. That Gorilla glass must be some special stuff, this phone is two years old, and the screen coating was still perfect, no smudges, water drops bead right up.