Database Users

Broken G1, looking for advice or a generous member.

Hello everyone,
I had a G1, until an incident walking my dog ending in it being tossed into a storm drain. I fished it out, dried it in rice for 5 days, and started it up. It sort of worked at first with some key sticking. So I took the unit apart in order to try and clean it up. Now it doesn't turn on, which I believe is because I tweaked one of the wires pretty hard accidently while putting it back together.
Since then I have been using my Father-in-Law's Treo Pro. Which is killing me. The phone itself is very nice, but win-mo is killing me.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure I have a working LCD and digitizer, but not enough money to dump into another phone. Because of this, I believe I have 2 options, sell what I have on eBay, I've been watching broken G1's on eBay, and even water damaged units are going for $120, or get a hold of a phone with a broken lcd and try to swap it out.
If I go the eBay route, is there a way to remove my Google account link from my phone while the phone will not start? If someone managed to get it working, I don't want them to have access to all my stuff.
To go the other route, as I said, I don't have the money to dump $120 on another G1 to use for parts. So if any of you readers have a broken, or working G1 sitting around, and would be kind enough to want to send it to a broken-hearted G1 lover, that would be the most awesome thing ever.
Thanks for taking the time to read.
Matt

G1 ribbon/tape caught in its Hinge

Yesterday, I impulsively rooted my phone (my first time), successfully did it after several tries and installed jf 1.5. When everything was done and fully functional, I noticed some resistance when closing the keyboard. I tried closing it several times trying to investigate the cause.. until my screen just went black suddenly, w/ the resistance in closing it getting stronger! What I discovered was that the brown tape inside the screen, bottom part, ( the one you can only see w/ keyboard open) was caught in the hinge ripping it partially out of place. I dont have any idea what is the main finction of that tape/ ribbon but I believe it has something to do w/ the lcd. I ended up w/ a dead phone, won't power up anymore. i called the customer service but they don't have any idea what i'm talking about and suggested me to go to the nearest Tmobile store. I did and to my disappointment, nobody in the store also knows anything about G1, even though I'm pointing out to them the tape that was caught by the hinge! I called customer service and they seem not to understand about that hinge part of G1. Anyway, they will send a replacement in 3 days and I hope they wont discover that I rooted the phone. Well, it won't power up anymore and besides the problem is on the hardware and not on the software I installed.
I came across the same problem posted in one of the forums,a long time ago, coupled w/ some pictures I tried searching it again to no avail.
Anybody here have the same problem w/ G1? I do believe that HTC and Tmobile should be aware of this hardware flaw and do something about it. I love my G1, w/ its physical keyboard. But if all my G1 will end up this way, I may have to find a better phone.

Yep... had the same thing happen to me. Brought it into the store (30 days or less) and got a new one. If your's is older, it should still be under warranty. Contact T-Mobile and they should send you out a new phone.

That ribbon has several conductive traces in it. Basically, its a bunch of wires, and you moosed it out. I would say that it was your fault for forcing it when you should have investigated the problem BEFORE ripping it out.

Sounds like your screen just doesnt turn on, not that its bricked.
Thats the ribbon that connects the lcd and backlight to the ui module. It can be fixed most likely if you're not afraid to take it apart. What prob happened is the ribbon got bent up a bit, and one of the 2 connections for it got pulled out.
I disassembled one of my G1's completely, and there is a very specific way that ribbon has to fit into the hinge. Its not all that difficult, but you have to be very gentle and patient to get it back to where it needs to be.
You should go to the Dev forum, and do a search for G1 repair manual. You'll see what i mean. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions about it, although Im not an expert, just a tinkerer.

@lbcoder: you dont have to "investigate" anything, its made the way it should work, all he did is open and close screen, thats called a manufacturer defect, and falls under warranty.
@tr.slate: you are right, however that's exactly what OP put in his post. Nothing bout phone being bricked, but hardware flaw.
@jdc2006: yes, G1`s construction is not the most durable, as we can read around this forum, even i had squeking (or however oyu spell that word) but im guessing that it`s the price we pay for something new as this (though i would expect a bit more from HTC) but i dont think that all will have that problem. though Im on my second G1, first one got nasty case of stuck pixelitis.
now excuse me, i have to dispose a body from the trap.
G`nite.

This is going to be my 4th G1 and I hope the last..
The 1st one- brand new; has dead pixels- returned/replaced
The 2nd one, obviously a refurbished item, keyboard imperfectly fitted; home/call buttons replaced w/ cheap looking plastic, not the marble-like.
This 3rd one- almost perfect but ribbon/hinge flaw.
Good thing is I still have my old HTC Touch
tr.slate.. tnx, I like to tinker too but this beyond my capabilities.

I never had any problems with Tmobile fixing mine...When I first got mine in February 09 the ribbon stuck out a bit....they told me come back in 2 hours, i came back and they had it fixed, as others have said, it really needs to be in the right spot or something bad could happen to it...Its a cell phone, not much space to use.

unresponsive touch screen

So my girlfriend drooped my phone and broke it on me. Oh my beloved atrix what ever will I do without you. Everything about the phone is working just fine so I am curious if its just the touch panel that ia broken. I touch the screen and nothing happens I have fully charged it and turned it on and off several times. Do you guys think if I replace the touch panel that there is a chance it will work again. I didn't get insurance on it because I was very careful with it and took care of it like it was my child lol.

First of all I would like to point out that it is ok to admit that you dropped it, and not your gf.
Secondly I would suggest tearing it down and checking the connections. I have seen where the digitizer connector will be loose and wont be responsive on other phones. I have never taken apart the atrix, so I dont know if that is a unlikely thing for it or not.
In the unlikely event that it really was your gf who dropped it, you could always guilt her in to getting you a new phone

Lol I swear it was her we were at the bar last night and she was trying to show somone the gi Joe psa's. Ill try and tear it down have to find a walk through I guess. The real kick in the teeth is I just bought a e book and it was really starting to get good . As far as guilting her, her parent were with us and gave me a kindle fire because they felt bad but the things useless until they get android running well enough on it.

there is a teardown site, i am too lazy to look it up, I am supposed to be studying business law right now ... dont tell my wife im on xda

I tried to replace my digitizer once and I wouldn't recommend trying to fix it yourself.
There are several youtube videos of the teardown and they are elaborate enough but some parts are really tricky and it's not as easy as it might look. Took me a few hours and the result was far from perfect...

Took the mobo out and checked all plugs everything seems fine. Replaced and still no response I will give the digitizer a try hopefully it works. Ordering it tonight and post my results when it comes in and i install it. I'm supprised you had problems putting it back together only problem i had was my God damn shaky hands lol. I am assuming it fell just right and damaged the chip on the digitizer itself. If it ends up working I know for sure that I will be buying a very buff case! The internals on these things are so fragile!

Took it apart, put it back together. Somehow it works better just from doing that?

So, took apart my xplay today because my screen was having issues and I wanted to see if a cable was loose.
Couldn't tell what was wrong, so I put it back together.
After putting it back together, I noticed a few things.
1. The power button that had always been loose was suddenly tight and in one spot. I thought the phone was just made that way. Turns out mine was improperly assembled right from the time I opened it. Gotta say, that button is far less annoying now. Anyone else have a loose power button?
2. My battery. Before taking it apart, my battery was at 19%. After putting it back together, suddenly my battery said 43%!! Suddenly it's got more? The heck is going on here?
3. My screen hasn't glitched again so far. Even though I didn't actually do anything other than unplugging/screwing and replugging/screwing some parts.
4. Originally, the left trigger felt "mushy" now it clicks like the right one.
On a side note, after seeing how the slider works on the inside, I recommend ONLY opening the slider when you're actually about to play a game, and not just fiddling around with the phone. The way it's designed makes it very obvious to me that the ribbon connecting the screen to everything else is easily destroyed. It wouldn't surprise me if my screen was having problems because of that ribbon.
Edit: NOPE. It's totally screwed.
Edit again: When the screen is glitching, moving the slider makes it start working some of the time. I'm becoming more and more convinced the ribbon cable inside the slider is the problem.

captain67 said:
EDIT: NOPE. It's totally screwed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL

Trolololol .
Can't you find a replacement cable?

I found one online, but I'm flat broke and literally have 1 dollar to my name the next 2 weeks. And my phone company wants what's left over after rent of the next cheque..
I'm gonna try and see if Rogers is stupid enough to give me a new phone without noticing what I did.
Sent from Asgard

Good luck!

captain67 said:
I found one online, but I'm flat broke and literally have 1 dollar to my name the next 2 weeks. And my phone company wants what's left over after rent of the next cheque..
I'm gonna try and see if Rogers is stupid enough to give me a new phone without noticing what I did.
Sent from Asgard
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like it's ten bucks shipped from ebay:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/SLIDE-SLIDE...572?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20c4999f34
The only problem would be it'll likely take at least 2-3 weeks for it to come from Hong Kong!

Screen off/black/dead? But onscreen buttons, sound, touch and LED lights work

I have the dreaded S7 that only has the Eng boot image to root it. G930p. I change the wallpaper put it on the charger because the battery was quite low, and came back a few minutes later to a black screen or a completely off screen, but all on-screen touchdowns work, touches work because I can open the lock screen with swiping, and on-screen buttons work because I can turn it off. Also all the LED lights work. Yet I still can't see anything on the screen and I've tried touching all over to see if the brightness may have been turned all the way down. I have read online that when the battery gets too low the screen dims to a certain level until the battery dies or the phone is plugged in. In some cases at the battery is too low the phone fails to wake up when it's plugged in and the screen goes out. Now here's the problem I can't figure out when the phone is in download mode therefore after flashing firmware I can't go through the proper steps of factory resetting the device because I can't see the screen. Now there may be a couple of reasons why this happened one being having used in Xposed module to remove some status bar icons. Now I didn't have issues with the same exact phone on Android 7 with the Xposed module blocking status bar icons so I use the same module for this device which is now on Oreo. However I am used to seeing the screen stay on and a warning pop-up saying the system user interface has crashed and usually that warning presents itself over and over until the status bar icon is replaced. Now I did have to go about a different way of doing this on Oreo. Since turning off data doesn't actually make the data indicator disappear I turned on airplane mode to get rid of it and then made the airplane mode icon disappear because that Xposed module will not make the data icon disappear. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get this device back I just want someone to tell me the screen is not dead and it's still able to be brought back that would make me happier at this moment.

Hey, i hzve an s7 edge myself i spent the extrra doe and got the one with dual sims and 128gb motherboard as well. It's been my bae ever since. its been tied to me everywhere i go. 3 or four jobs the lake, hiking, skiing, the shower while it was all original She's fell out of my pocket into the toilet while i was bent over cleaning. Don't get me started how many times ive dumped it out of my lap getting out of the car or bed. what im getting at is im not the type of guy to buy a lambo and leave it at home while i take everybodies pink slips with the camero. I bought the one i wanted and i use the **** out of it because i love it. Ill try to shorten this up a bit here. I had my girlfriend cussing me like a moron when i bricked it 10 minutes in to its 1st full charge. But I straightened it out that morning and then i took the plastic off and slapped it in an $80 case because i used to own a umi super and the screen on that thing would break if you laid you hand on it too hard while you were driving and since this phone cost like $400 more i was bound and determined to not break it like the umi. (That phone puts anything ive ever play edwith to shame when it comes to performance but still to this day theres not one case that covers the screen that fits that phone).With the curved screen and that price tag There was no other way to go at the time i know where to get a case to get the job done for much less now but ...Any ways what i first started having problems with was battery life turned charging port problems. Basically kept a clean rom and fresh apps to for the longest time just to keep the damn thing on for a couple of hours at work when. It never lasted more that 4 hours even when it was brand new but if i kept the screen off i could just make it through rush and still have some sort of music or movie the whole time. Eventually it ended up strapped to a power bank because maybe its just me but 3 or 4 hours isnt **** for a phone battery . i mean who buys a mini tv that only plays the shows you like and its backwards compatible all psxsegatendo 1 and 2 games and turns the screen off. battery life to me is how long it will last on high full blast and a little flash light just in case. every thing I read about this thing raved about its all day 2 with the screen off battery life. Talk about everyone being liars my umi had a little bit bigger battery by the specs but it would last like 4 days if it was half dead and i realized i was gonna be in the woods for a while. what i'm getting at is eventually no matter if i kept my storage and apps clean or not the it was gonna be dead real quick if i didnt have it plugged in. No problem i just settled into carring my phone around on a power bank the size of a brick. Talk about rocking it old school. I might as well have been walking around the appartments with the house phone and the dock. Around here if you get your phone fixed you do it yourself or you can just plan on them breaking the damn thing or bugging it or losing it out of spite and after i did the screen on my umi a couple of times i was not looking forward to doing my edges. I wasnt sure it was in my skill set. I'll have you know when my charging cables started going bad so often that i was staked out trying just daring a ***** to get close to my phone you know drawing down on servers at waffle house because i would go take a piss and somebody broke the wire i just bought at the store across the street oh hell no. Somebody was gonna die either some random waitresses or that f**king wire knome that gets me every time slip up and zone out or it was gonna be my phone. so researched a little bit and made a few calls and ihad a tuperware container with $600 worth of screws and stickers. I say it again i have you know when i finally had to replace the battery my phone was in mint condition there wasnt a scratch on it. Except the little bit of paint around the inside of the charge port. And i try not to drop my phone and i put it down if i need to use both hands but it was mint condition after it came back from hell the second or third time before. Turns out when i changed the battery i was back to getting a reasonable 4 hours of screen on time but it didn't take long for me to realize it wasnt a tweeked out waho and it wasnt knomes and it wasnt my power bank ****ting out on the quickcharge port ... I just needed a new charge port.heres where we come back around to your question. I bought one and while i was waiting on it it dawned on me that all i really did was pop the back off i might wanna see how hard it was gonna be to change the charge port. So about the time the package came i finally found a video with somebody that actually doing a good step by step tutorial on changing the charge port. Then needless to say i see why i couldnt find video where somebody only changed the charge port. The only way to do it with out doing super micro soldering is to replace the screen because you have to actually dismantle the screen to get the capacitive buttons out. This is because the are actually on a pcb with the homebutton and then wrapped around the frame then the screen is glued down. the only people i saw get the screen loose from tje glass and frame from whatr i could tell where just lucky and happened to have the camera going when they rolled the dice and either tried to hit that 3 degree sweet spot inbetween burning the leds and the glue not melting.. Or they didnt give a **** about this $600 burner phone because they have a whole room full of them for parts in their daddys dust free glass lab that has has every niche piece of tech for doing the job minus the actual machine at samsung. Oh and dont forget the fat mexican kid that stole a bottle of the adhesive remover made for it god knows who he knows that works there but i have to put him in there even though he didnt risk anything because the internet won't tell you what adhesive they use so good luck figuring it out i tried like 15 different chemicals and hes not gonna tell you either and he made sure to put it in a different bottle so you cant tell from the video. you might keep on being positive and think well i saw new screen s for like 30 dollars 10 if its used but let me tell you they used to be 50 with everything you need to do it fairly easily . Those $10 $15 are at leaste 30 now and they dont come already fastened to a frame and most dont even have the glass that goes over it. All this is assuming that you still have a mint condition untouched screen thats still ok. If you actually need the screen its no skin of your back now that i told you what you are getting into most straightend you out so theres not much trial and error where you spent 50 80 on parts you cant use before you just go ahead and breakdown and buy the whole thing even though the pieces are less than half cost because most people dont have the equipment and know how to properly use them and get the job done right. Now once you sit with this price tag for a while and decide if you guys can get along with each other after that much money comes up missing. It's a piece of cake to change basically the hardest thing is getting some of the cables to actually snap back onto the different pieces. the rest might take you 30 minutes or an hour but its really kindercarden low level difficulty you just have to have a blow drier or hopefully a heat gun. so here it is the original samsung screen is the only one, out of the 4 screens that i got my hands on, that the touch digitizer or whatever still works after the screen is out. The rest must have had the electronics tied together because they would work with just crack but if the screen goes out all the way none of the screens i had were resposive to touch. so try and get that thing re flashed to stock and see if that helps. i doubt it but ive seen it before . Now its been a year since i bought a screen so they may have doubled by now but last time i bought one I got one of what is understood to be one of the better ones actually put together in a factory with the gold foil caps where the different screws go and it wasnt pulled off a parts phone. and the cheapest if could find was $100 and tax and shipping it WAS like 120 american keep in mind 2 or 3 months before that i bought the same thing for $50 to the door frame and all. if i had to do it again i would definatley buy a used original if i could find one with no burn marks. There were hot boys in china selling the **** out of some screens off phones they stole and parted out like a chop shop would do a car. but i couldnt see past the used part the first time i replaced my screen especially since if every thing was as it should be in the world i wouldnt be taking a perfect screen and throwing it in the trash because nobody at any of these 20 something electronic repair places in my town has the nuts to take a soldering gun to my phone an replaceing the port its self. Oh and one more thing dollar for dollar they wanted exactly the same amount of money at the shop to replace the screen if you don't think you can do it they said 120 for an s7 edge. but the piece of mind was well worth doing it yourself once you get into it and see how easily it can be done.
Sincerely Walter,