Screen Replacement Instructions

[erikkugel]

Hello friends! I have a question about replacing the screen on the PinePhone:

Are there any instructions online on how to perform a screen replacement? I've found a YouTube video about disassembling and reassembling the PinePhone but it stops short of showing how to remove the bottom daughter board, the ear piece, that thing that looks like a little hockey puck at the bottom right corner, and a few other things that seem to be glued in or not easily removable.

I have a new replacement screen on hand and was able to remove most things including the "motherboard" but I'm struggling with removing the last few items and unsure how to proceed...

Thanks in advance!

[RTP]

Hello friends! I have a question about replacing the screen on the PinePhone:

Are there any instructions online on how to perform a screen replacement? I've found a YouTube video about disassembling and reassembling the PinePhone but it stops short of showing how to remove the bottom daughter board, the ear piece, that thing that looks like a little hockey puck at the bottom right corner, and a few other things that seem to be glued in or not easily removable.

I have a new replacement screen on hand and was able to remove most things including the "motherboard" but I'm struggling with removing the last few items and unsure how to proceed...

Thanks in advance!

I performed a Pinephone screen replacement a week or so ago.

This video offers a nice example to follow for anyone doing so: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CgdAMhqSeA&t=1301s

Ahead of my screen replacement, I actually bought a 2nd usb-c port / board, as I wanted to be prepared for anything that could go wrong (heard others were unable to save theirs during replacement).

Luckily I was able to retain all my original parts, and now have an extra usb-c, for whenever the original may go bad.

Removing The Board / USB-C:

It's a good idea to snap some photos to make sure you get everything in the right place when putting it back together.

The USB-C port/board can be removed (carefully) after unscrewing all screws, and detaching the left side wire (when you reattach this, carefully align wire connector to avoid breaking anything).

Once the board is 'free' from screws and the lefthand side wire...

You can save your speaker / 'puck' (vibration motor) by using a careful hand. Slowly scrape under the thin, 'mesh' piece (for speaker), getting as close to the phone as possible, with a flat, electronic repair pry / tool.

If you don't have a tool on hand, you could try a credit card, possibly a blade if very careful (be very careful).

Most important is keeping the above pictured parts in 'one piece'.

Using something flat (to scrape underneath the 'screen' appearing piece) obviously works best, as you want to retain a maximal amount of the original glue (to hold everything in placement).

Reassembling:

When matching up the 'mesh', you will want to carefully align this to match up with original placement.

You can carefully fit the wires into a gap. It can be helpful to take pictures before, as a reference on how everything fits.

Hope this helps.

[Zebulon Walton]

There are some notes in the wiki about replacing the screen:

https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PinePh...the_screen

[erikkugel]

Hello friends! I have a question about replacing the screen on the PinePhone:

Are there any instructions online on how to perform a screen replacement? I've found a YouTube video about disassembling and reassembling the PinePhone but it stops short of showing how to remove the bottom daughter board, the ear piece, that thing that looks like a little hockey puck at the bottom right corner, and a few other things that seem to be glued in or not easily removable.

I have a new replacement screen on hand and was able to remove most things including the "motherboard" but I'm struggling with removing the last few items and unsure how to proceed...

Thanks in advance!

I performed a Pinephone screen replacement a week or so ago.

This video offers a nice example to follow for anyone doing so: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CgdAMhqSeA&t=1301s

Ahead of my screen replacement, I actually bought a 2nd usb-c port / board, as I wanted to be prepared for anything that could go wrong (heard others were unable to save theirs during replacement).

Luckily I was able to retain all my original parts, and now have an extra usb-c, for whenever the original may go bad.

Removing The Board / USB-C:

It's a good idea to snap some photos to make sure you get everything in the right place when putting it back together.

The USB-C port/board can be removed (carefully) after unscrewing all screws, and detaching the left side wire (when you reattach this, carefully align wire connector to avoid breaking anything).

Once the board is 'free' from screws and the lefthand side wire...

You can save your speaker / 'puck' (vibration motor) by using a careful hand. Slowly scrape under the thin, 'mesh' piece (for speaker), getting as close to the phone as possible, with a flat, electronic repair pry / tool.

If you don't have a tool on hand, you could try a credit card, possibly a blade if very careful (be very careful).

Most important is keeping the above pictured parts in 'one piece'.

Using something flat (to scrape underneath the 'screen' appearing piece) obviously works best, as you want to retain a maximal amount of the original glue (to hold everything in placement).

Reassembling:

When matching up the 'mesh', you will want to carefully align this to match up with original placement.

You can carefully fit the wires into a gap. It can be helpful to take pictures before, as a reference on how everything fits.

Hope this helps.

Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation. The video also helped!

I followed the instructions and was able to get everything in place. Some of the existing adhesive didn't make it  (there was a little residue left on the old screen back-plate from the duaghter-board ribbon. Same with the circuits from the speakerphone, though both seem OK otherwise). The phone powers on, display and touch inputs are working, charging is working, WiFi is working (I assume that mobile data and bluetooth are also working but did not explicitly test those yet), the buttons respond to presses, vibration is working, earphone is working, mic, etc...

A couple of things seem to be NOT working:

1. The internal speaker doesn't seem to work. The earphone works OK, but the internal speaker refuses to make any sound. I'm not sure if the speaker had previous issues unrelated to the screen replacement, or if something got damaged during the migration from the old screen to the new one, or if this is just related to OS bugs.
   
   Here's a picture of how the speaker looks post migration (not sure if the image sharing is going to work, but in a nutshell - it looks very much like it did on the old screen):
   
   
   
   
2. Megapixels fails to load, so it's a little hard to test the camera. I'm not sure if Megapixel fails to load because there's an issue with the camera, or if the camera is fine and this is just Megapixels being Megapixels. I can see v4l devices in place, so I'm not jumping to conclusions on this one just yet.
   

I've grabbed the factory test image from PostmarketOS (v0.64.0) and the tests confirm the above.

I'll see if I can narrow down those two issues. Any additional feedback is welcome.

[RTP]

You are probably missing contact with the speaker.

Actually had the same experience (no speaker sound) during first attempt.

Take a look at the inside side of the black 'backing', the piece taking many screws (holding the phone together).

Looking at the inside of it, see where it comes up to the 'mesh' piece?

You will see metal contacts on the inside of this (black piece taking many screws).

Try adjusting your alignment of the 'mesh' looking piece, to match better with those.