Saturday, July 14, 2012

Broken cell phone screen, fixed. Way easy. Motorola Atrix 2 .

Remember back when you were a kid, and you took things apart to try to fix them, but then could never get them back together?
Well when we were coming back from vacation last week, I was getting the keys out of my pocket, and had a lot of things in my hand, and my Motorola Atrix 2 smartphone dropped on the ground and the screen cracked.  I was so mad, as it was on the 4th of July, we had just been driving all day and I didn't want to have to buy a new phone.....
   So... after some searching youtube for how to replace just the screen (which i came to find out is called the Digitizer, and not actually the LCD screen),  I ordered the parts on Amazon for about 53 dollars for everything i needed.
  The parts finally came yesterday and so i decided to post how easy it was to replace it.

Oh and the Youtube video I used was this one.

Well here it goes,  here is how my phone looked after it got cracked...
att, motorola, atrix 2, broken, dropped,


So I got all the necessary tools, and got to work. 
laptop, youtube, computer
 The white roll is the tape used to put the new screen on, the new screen and then those tools only cost me like $1.50. 
Motorola, Atrix 2, t5 screwdriver, pry tool, 3m tape, digitizer, screen, LCD, Amazon.com
Cant forget snacks!!!
snacks, kettle corn, popcorn, indiana, sweet, salty, sugar



 You can see it was pretty bad covering about half of the screen.     So i started by taking the back cover off, the battery, the SIM card, and the memory card out. 
sim card, sim, att, sd, sd card, 16gb, motorola, atrix 2,


There were 9 little screws around the casing that I used the T5 screwdriver for.
t5 screws, t5 screwdriver
 Then I pried off the back casing with that blue tool, that I am going to call "The Magic Blue Wedge yourself in there tool"
motorola, atrix 2, motherboard, digitizer, screen.


You then un-clip the three orange connectors.  1 for the motherboard main connector, one for the speaker and front camera, and another one for the Digitizer touch screen.   Then you lift out the motherboard which is removed in this picture. 
Screen removal, digitizer, removal, earpiece, atrix 2, motorola
 Unscrew 8 more little T5 screws to remove the metal casing holding the LCD screen in place
t5 screws, t5 screwdriver, LCD screen, digitizer
 Then lift out the metal casing, and the LCD screen can come right on out. 
LCD, digitizer, removal, scratched, motorola, atrix 2, cracked
 The old Digitizer screen is glued down to the old casing so i have to heat it up with a hairdryer to make it pliable and able to wedge out of there using "The Magic Blue Wedge yourself in there Tool"
Hairdryer, glue, removal, cracked, motorola, atrix 2, digitizer
 After some coercion and snacks, I got it to come off.
digitizer, screen, removal, casing, atrix 2, motorola
 It left quite a bit of residue behind, as maybe i didn't get it hot enough, but as you can see in the picture i have scraped the right side, and still have the left side to do. 
casing, motorola, atrix 2,
 After about hundreds (it seemed like) pieces of this really thin adhesive double sided tape, and making each part double thick, i got enough on there. 
Tape, digitizer, atrix 2, motorola, cracked, screen, repair
 Then you just feed the New digitizer connector through the little slit in the casing, and press firmly to get the tape to stick. 
glued, atrix 2, screen, casing
 AND>>>>  back together it went.   I tried replaying the video backwards, and kept having to replay parts of the video and do it in reverse to make sure i didnt forget anything.
atrix 2, motorola, digitizer, motherboard, LCD, replacement
 Most of it back together.....  and
atrix 2, repair
 Viola,   SHE LIVES!!!!!
atrix 2, startup, motorola, android, processor
 and its all put back together and runs great.   It took a little bit longer to boot up, since everything had become disconnected, but still it only took about 45 second, when the usual is about 25 seconds.
boot, startup, atrix 2, finished, broken, screen, att, motorola

Moral of the story>>>>>>>>>>>   Fix your own stuff.  Youtube has a video for about anything, and parts online are really cheap also.   Cost to replace my phone for a new one =$390 .   Cost to replace screen with the necessary tools= $53 ( plus the cost of snacks hahaha)
Any questions, or have something broke yourself?  Let me see if I can help you.

-ACS

6 comments:

  1. Hey man my screen is not broken but the touch system is failing very bad... I've been told I have to replace the digitizer.. can you help me out?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, I would think that the digitizer is going bad, or that It has a bad connection. On the back of the glass the wires are very small and may have become corroded over time or even by water. What phone do you have?

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  2. hey do you know where I can get a motorola atrix 2 motherboard

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yeah, the best place I found, and really the only place I found was on ebay.
    I found a phone that had a cracked screen, or cracked LCD or both, and they said the phone was still working and would turn on fine. That's what I used, and I just took out the motherboard and put it in my phone that has a good screen and good LCD.
    Also see my latest post that explains it all.
    http://austinscrazyscience.blogspot.com/2013/02/frankenphone-project-motorola-atrix-2.html

    ReplyDelete
  4. I dropped my phone and now the screen will not display (come on) although the screen nor the LCD is cracked or broken. The phone comes on and it works, but the screen will not come on. I had the LCD screen replaced, but it did not fix the problem.  Do you know what I should do to fix this problem? I am not able to transfer my contacts because I cannot see how to get into the setting. Please help me to see the light on this phone again.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The problem might be that the motherboard or other wiring inside got damaged. You aren't seeing anything on the phone's screen because it doesn't look like your phone is even turning on. When that happens you can either tear the whole phone apart and see if you notice anything that is broken on the inside. You could try replacing the motherboard, but considering it only may or may not be the problem, you may need to just get a new phone.

    ReplyDelete