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How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

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Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#24
How many of these parts are genuine? Many of the parts are so specific to the iPhone they can't be generic off the shelf components. Some seem impossible to knock off like the SoC or the touch sensors.

If you find a genuine part, that works, is it stolen? Some aesthetic problem? Some defect that doesn't quite render it unusable?

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#25
post #17

I've tried to fix the screen on an iPad and an iPhone. In both cases, I destroyed a ribbon cable connector and rendered the devices useless. I tried to follow the instructions, I tried to use proper tools and go as slowly as possible, and in both cases, the delicate surface mount connectors just turned into powder and flaked right off the board.

You must be doing something wrong. I have had my original iPhone 5 since release in 2013. Ive replaced essentailly every part in the phone but the mainboard. I just bought a parts phone on ebay for $20 and completely replaced the digitizer. Battery replacements are $5 and take two minutes. Ive even replaced the entire lightning port assembly for 7$ in parts and an hour of time. Its the most modular easily repaired phone Ive ever owned. Granted though, this is the original iPhone 5. All the newer phones with Touch ID and force touch digitizers are more expensive/complicated. But the notion that Apple phones are not repairable is just false.

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#26
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because quality increases when Apple repackages Chinese components in a shiny white case.

Definitely. Apple should add many QA steps filtering out the vast majority of bad parts. First there would be incoming QA on any received shipments. And any well run assembly line contains many check steps to make sure the unit has good constituent parts. This way you don't burn good parts farther down the line on a unit that was never going to pass. Then there is out going inspection and burn in testing. All that te…

QA/QC isn't exclusive to large companies. DIY hobbyists can do the exact same thing.

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#27
post #24

How many of these parts are genuine? Many of the parts are so specific to the iPhone they can't be generic off the shelf components. Some seem impossible to knock off like the SoC or the touch sensors. If you find a genuine part, that works, is it stolen? Some aesthetic problem? Some defect that doesn't quite render it unusable?

I stay far away from non OEM stuff when repairing iPhones. You can get cracked screen and iCloud locked parts phones on ebay for dirt cheap. Everything but the mainboard is usable.

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#28
post #23

On top of that 300, add R&D costs, marketing, assembly and shipping and you could very well justify the hefty price we pay for the iPhone. I am actually surprised it cost this much to make custom.

For what it's worth, he did pay for almost all of the assembly. He bought an assembled mainboard, and paid about 70 bucks for the assembly on the screen (in addition to what he already paid for parts).

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#29

A fun hobby and project, but I'm guessing nearly all those parts are knock offs and of very cheap quality.

If you read his blog post he mentions that the logic board is recycled and he thinks that alot of iphone 6 parts come from recycled/broken phones.

quote from the blog about the logic board: "The one I bought is refurbished/repaired, almost undoubtedly from a real, legitimately purchased phone made by Apple that was recycled at some point."

Re: How I Made My Own iPhone in China [video]

#30
post #17

I've tried to fix the screen on an iPad and an iPhone. In both cases, I destroyed a ribbon cable connector and rendered the devices useless. I tried to follow the instructions, I tried to use proper tools and go as slowly as possible, and in both cases, the delicate surface mount connectors just turned into powder and flaked right off the board.

You must be doing something wrong. I have had my original iPhone 5 since release in 2013. Ive replaced essentailly every part in the phone but the mainboard. I just bought a parts phone on ebay for $20 and completely replaced the digitizer. Battery replacements are $5 and take two minutes. Ive even replaced the entire lightning port assembly for 7$ in parts and an hour of time. Its the most modular easily repaired ph…

I just have very bad luck when things get small. I was so proud of myself when I got all that broken iPad glass off cleanly. Then that happened and it was a really dark moment for me.

Currently I'm dealing with an out of warranty Apple Watch where the screen just went and fell right off, and apparently you cannot buy the glue strips for it unless you buy the whole screen. Apple figured out how to stop people from getting glue!

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