Two Destroyed iPhone XS for $8.50 - Can They Be Saved?

hi guys welcome back to another huge jefferies video in this video i'm gonna be trying to resurrect two iphone 10s phones i purchased for only eight dollars and fifty cents that's unbelievable for an iphone 10s even a broken one but not only that i want two of them one device looks complete but is catastrophically damaged and the other is in parts and without a housing screen or battery what happened to these well that remains a mystery but in this video we're going to see if we can get these working once again our first phone has its screen snapped in the middle and lifting out of the phone the frame is snapped on both sides and the back is shattered into a thousand pieces if i had to take a guess at what happened i would say it's likely been run over with a lawnmower the second phone is in bits so someone has attempted some form of work on it but it's never been completed given how little i paid for the phones i was honestly surprised to see it arrive in fact they spent more posting it than the total i paid for the two phones they lost money selling it so it was no surprise to see that they had literally thrown the phones in the box and shipped it no packing material no care pulling it out you can see our first phone is complete and a bag full of bits which contains the motherboard for the other phone i'm going to start with the one in bits as it's going to be the easiest to test right off the bat so tipping them all out i'm going to get the motherboard and connect the charging port the led flash and power button the face id module a new screen and a battery for this i'm going to use a brand new iphone 10s display and an iphone 10 battery holding down the power button i was surprised to see the phone actually turned on you can see we're greeted with the unable to activate face id on this iphone the bigger issue though is the touch isn't working and shortly after i got another message saying the iphone cannot make or receive calls that sounds like a problem but the phone is alive so maybe it's just a faulty display i'll disconnect our battery and instead of using an iphone 10s screen i've got a spare iphone 10 screen that i know works interestingly enough the iphone 10 and 10s screens are interchangeable although the frame is slightly different so you can't actually install it into the housing you can see this time around it also lights up just fine but still none of the touch is working and we're still getting that warning message about not being able to make or receive calls this message will also trigger a little warning icon in the status bar however before we go any further we need to first check if it's locked apple had an awesome tool to check whether a device would activation lock if reset though apple removed this tool so we'll now need to rely on third-party websites that aren't always accurate typing in the imei number we can see this is a 256 gig iphone 10s and activation lock is on this means if i reset the phone in itunes apple won't allow the device to activate and be set up even though the phone isn't lost or stolen the last owner has to remove it from their icloud settings as for other iphone 10s it's a 64 gig model and has fined my iphone as off so there is still a chance for this other one plugging it in it draws about an amp of current which indicates to me that it's charging and likely working underneath i'll remove the two pentalobe screws and get what's left of the display removed from the frame i used a spudger to achieve this as it was quite easy to get it underneath the display given the vast amount of gaps around the edges lifting it up you can see the water resistant seal is still in place which indicates to me that it's likely no one's been inside this phone since the catastrophic event i'll need to remove the several tri-wing and one phillips head screw so i can remove the shield covering up the necessary flex cables we'll need to remove to disconnect the display with the display removed you can see the internal damage it's evident the phone has been bent in the middle quite severely with the battery having deformed however the logic board appears to be untouched and likely is still working given the glass is shattered on the back and the frame is snapped on both sides the phone can be flexed with no effort take a look at the screen we just removed it's no longer even flat so it's now time that we test this second phone i'll connect up a test display and reconnect the battery closing up the display i can press and hold the power button and surprisingly it appeared with the apple logo it booted up to the hello screen and had obviously been factory reset unfortunately just like our other iphone 10s the touch isn't working in itunes i was able to set up the phone and you can see it appears in itunes as a 64 gig unit on ios 12.4 so what's going on why aren't any of the touchscreens working on these iphone 10s phones it's definitely not my display and connecting up a usb keyboard you can see the phone is actually alive underneath while i'm able to unlock the phone using the keyboard i can't proceed any further in the setup and the other iphone the keyboard does nothing as of apple's ios blocking usb accessories after a restart these issues we are facing are board level issues that have been affecting the iphone 10 and 10s phones it's common to see phones these days with two pcbs soldered together to make a multi-layer logic board however issues can arise if the board gets ever so slightly bent in the case of the destroyed iphone i'm not surprised to see a board issue given the extent of the damage both boards suffer the same issue when placed on a flat surface it might not look like much but it was enough to separate some part of the logic board halves and stop the phone from fully working you can see this gold band running around the logic board this is the spacer in between the bottom and top portions a common weak spot which causes this very issue is right next to the sim card tray what does this mean for our repair well i can't proceed any further it can be fixed but it's extremely complicated and out of my depth unfortunately i couldn't save them which is going to make this an unsuccessful repair however even with the devices not working i still think i got an amazing deal there's still lots to salvage from these phones the charging port taptic engine speakers screws cameras can all be reused and my advice is if you're looking to buy and fix an iphone 10 or 10s model avoid any with bad touch a warning icon in the status bar or one that says it cannot activate otherwise you'll be facing the same issues as i am with these very phones based on my personal experience the iphone 11 pro models hold up much better to damage and bends so they seem to be improving on this board design and on that note this has been a huge jeffries video if you like what you saw hit that subscribe button and consider checking out the phone restoration playlist for some successful repairs unlike this one and if you're looking for any tips or what tools i use to repair devices be sure to check out my website link for which is down the description that's all for this video and i'll catch you guys next time

Channel: Hugh Jeffreys

Views: 324,591

Rating: 4.9111557 out of 5

Keywords: Hugh, Jeffreys, Apple, iPhone, iPad, iPod, technology, repair, restore, restoration

Id: ThtIyiml4E0

Length: 7min 40sec (460 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 09 2021