all right let's do this so yeah you just
let us know mr. Harrow are we ready to
go let's do it let's do it
we live are we good oh my god hi guys
here we are I fix it live again are you
excited I'm excited it's been a while
right it has it's been what a month yeah
yeah a little over a month what have you
been doing
I went to Germany I was hanging out with
my friends I went to the Science Museum
and there's one called technirama and
just over the border in Switzerland and
they have all sorts of awesome science
they have this thing to show off the
Doppler effect where it's like a train
car and you should get that and you look
at and they train car comes toward you
blaring a lot of speaking you can hear
the sound shift as it comes toward you
oh cool so all sorts of little
experiments to show you cool was it like
hands-on yeah very hands-on and well the
experiments were really cool the
thousand screaming children encompassing
the entire so your point if you got a
tech neuroma bring earplugs gotcha
gotcha
well Germany school shout out to anyone
in Germany who's watching and all our
friends at the deutsches museum yeah in
Munich cool
yeah well I'm so excited to get started
we actually have a very full iFixit live
for you today we told you that we're
gonna talk to Scott one of our customer
service guru's so we'll be talking to
him later and he'll be answering some of
your questions in the chat room but we
also are going over some of our tear
downs we've had a couple like a lot of
tear downs lately one of the coolest
ones that we we've done is project tango
right project tango yeah how did how did
Google like pick us like there's only
200 right yes so there's 200 of these
magical tango devices the idea is that
they want to showcase to the new
technology the problem that are trying
to solve is that no modern device is
very good at navigating inside of
buildings so like quad copters if you're
outside you can use GPS and you can have
it to column as quadcopters but nobody
has really done anything autonomous
inside the building and the reason is
that machines kind of suck at mapping
the physical environment so the first
gizmo that we got our hands on to start
the map
was yeah this is one of my favorite
retro tear downs this is the original
connect and it is awesome
so the connect uses a camera and an
infrared projector and a I believe I'm
looking this is the infrared projector
and then you've got you've got a camera
and you've got an IR sensor projects a
map on the world and then reads it and
it's using technology from this company
called prime sense mm-hmm
prime sense is a Israeli semiconductor
start-up pretty there in cool tech we've
been following them for a long time I've
talked with them at trade shows they're
pretty nifty folks and Microsoft tried
really really hard to buy them back in
the day and they said no and so we went
along and then the new Kinect actually
uses a different technology so they
stopped using the prime sense technology
and they came up with a different way of
mapping the physical world so now we
flash forward and you know we're how
many how many years they we're four
years later yes since the cat yeah and
we've got ting go crash
okay sorry we are learning about the the
google chat technology we're getting
better and the goal for this for this
session today is to not have it crash
like it did last yeah we'll see how it
goes we recovered quickly so back to the
connect
so the original connect was a marvel of
Technology the idea is that it can tell
where you are in the room right but it's
just the connect is sitting physical and
you could sort of get a get a get a
rough idea of what's going on so the
first thing that people did was they put
the connect on quadcopters and I started
using connects to navigate around the
room well that's pretty nifty what but
you got to have that I mean this thing
as a USB power source is big and clunky
so project tango is basically a Kinect
on wheels it is a cell phone with the
prime Sense technology in it and a whole
bunch of other fancy stuff and we have
sort of learnt I mean when when Google
announced the the tango project they
said look this is just R&D we're just
gonna show it off we're just gonna give
the hardware to a select few partners
mostly academics and actually I I got an
email today from some folks that they're
at Cal Poly or local university that are
really excited about using it they want
to they want to use it to map some of
our local landmarks so there's a lot of
interesting things that you can do if
you start mapping internal structures
and you can see here in this video that
they are they're mapping internal as you
move around the room it generates a
virtual map and then you can pass that
map to AI software and used to get
around pretty nifty so what's what's
interesting about using prime Suns is
that our favorite fruit company bought
primeSense last year so what are they
gonna do now that so Google's got their
fancy new hot tango technology and Apple
bought with a company inside it but
let's let's take a look at the channel I
want to show you the the map I got mine
I want to show you the map that we
generated so what we we wanted to take a
picture of the ir field that is
generated and so this is what the tango
does and now it's okay if you assume and
you see the pattern the dot so so it's
projecting a
rid of dots on a wall or on a room and
then that measures the differences it
knows exactly what the pattern would be
if it were a flat wall but the room that
the world is not flat and so it measures
the differences between each of those
and then uses that along with the motion
processor that that's on the phone to
create a three-dimensional image of the
world for a three-dimensional file and
then it makes that available the
software running on the phone so the
idea is give us the sensors give us the
tech on them on the Santa platform and
then allow the software guys to do the
hard work of turning that into something
sure so how far out do you think we are
from this actually coming to our phones
well here's the problem with tango is
it's big if you if you look at the
device and we had to give it back to
Google so I don't have it now yeah
unfortunately we did we didn't have to
give it back you can see it's it's like
three times as big as a normal phone
right and the reason the tango is big
and beefy is that the battery has to be
massive because it's got a projector it
actually has an infrared projector
that's signing at the rooms creating the
grid of dots and then and the reading
that back in and having a projector on
the mobile device sucks battery right
angle doesn't get very good battery life
it's massive so we will not see this
kind of technology this exact format
with a Kinect style transmitter in a
mobile phone I don't think ever well I
think we will see is something else okay
and I think that the the project tango
folks are willing to let us look at the
hardware because they know this is sort
of like this is a way to accomplish a
tech demo so we can start to build
software but this is not what the final
product is going to be right because
they have a chicken-egg situation they
need they need the hardware so that you
can develop the right software but
people aren't gonna buy the hardware
until there's good software so this is I
think a couple years out but it's pretty
darn cool tech and we were super excited
to get our hands on super excited
definitely check out the teardown at I
fix it calm it's it's really cool we
obviously didn't get to play with it or
keep it as long as we liked but it's
still very cool and and it's cool that
we were one of the first to get it was
fun it was nice of them to share it
yeah super cool we also did another
teardown of the Samsung Galaxy s5 did
some of you yeah I've got it up a few
guys there we go
so this was a cool one coming out I
don't know I feel like the galaxy is one
of the favorites out there for Android
phones right well we have really been a
fan of the Galaxy S series their score
they've scored very well in the
repairability rankings as we get inside
these things the galaxy s2 s3 s4 all got
very good scores
I never bury me yeah one of my favorite
things I mean they're fun they're easy
they're robust it's it's been really a
night and day that compared repairing a
galaxy s4 with an iPhone yeah the
galaxies are quite a bit easier to work
on right or they have been until now
yeah this one was a little different we
we did encounter glue there's there was
an interesting mid frame yeah there was
like so mid frame the way that they
approach the design was they said look
we need a flagship feature that we can
show off they wanted something that
differentiate themselves from Apple they
they knew that their the fingerprint
sensor was an also-ran they they
probably knew it wasn't as good as
Apple's they knew where they were
chasing along so they needed a way so
they needed a way to differentiate
themselves so they said all right well
what if we make the thing weatherproof
that'll be amazing and and I mean this
is an important thing we get a lot of
phones with with while they're damaged I
see people dropping the phones or you're
running you get it wet so it will
definitely improve Fralick lifespans to
have a phone that is that is waterproof
so the way that they they tackle that as
they said well how in the world can we
see little the circuitry off from
everything else they still wanted a
removable battery so what they did was
they created the mid frame they glued
the front screen to the mid frame and
then they they made a removable back
plate with a rubber gasket that seals
over the battery so when the back panel
is on the rubber gasket seals around the
battery and it creates a water-resistant
Frank so it sits while others are
sitting down to a couple of feet don't
go swimming don't go to the bottom of
swimming pool all right so you can get
the back off you can get the battery in
and out easily which is great and the
battery is a primary way of that phone's
fail so Samsung is addressing two major
problems at the eye
on the house they are making the battery
easy to remove and they are dealing with
the water damage issue that's fantastic
but what they've done is the other very
common problem that both the iPhone and
the Galaxy has is the screen right and
getting in and replacing the screen on
the Galaxy s5 is much more difficult
than it is on a iPhone yeah you got to
go all the way through logic board has
to come off
yes so you can kind of understand where
Samsung is coming from and we are
appreciative by the way I also have this
as the other teardown that we did
recently this is the HTC One HTC One m8
so you can see big battery this is the
aluminum main frame and this is a you
know milled out of a single block of
aluminum mid frame or a rear panel just
like Apple does and the whole thing is
glued together so this is the
second-worst phone that we have ever
taken apart in terms are apparently yeah
that was a beast the galaxy s5 is bad
it's much worse than previous galaxies
but it's it we saw we here the five out
of ten right absolutely doable it's just
harder than it used to be really easy to
do a battery really easy to replace the
back panel probably isn't gonna break
from other damage but the screen that's
gonna be a lot harder than it used to be
on Galaxy devices right um so if you're
okay with this I wanted to bring in a
surprise okay alright so we have here
with us Elizabeth she's one of our
writers and she is the editor of I fix
it word if you guys haven't seen I fix
it dad work I will pull up some of the
things we have there but um Elizabeth
thanks for coming thank you we are so
excited to introduce you to everyone
if you don't visit iFixit that work on
the regular
you should she's always putting she and
others are always putting great articles
up there and specifically we have this
article that I have up on my screen
right here I took that photo in belly
button did you yeah that's a good guy
yeah he is separating out the copper
bits from the steel bits and power
supplies oh wow okay I see it yeah so
e-waste is the toxic legacy of our
digital age
so can you tell us a little bit about
this this is by the way if you check it
out this is one of the prettiest
articles it's all you know great
graphics great you know pictures so tell
us tell us why you felt compelled to to
really focus this one well and as we did
more and more research we learned that
it's it's an incredibly complicated
issue right and basically what we found
is there's nobody telling the whole
story there's nobody who's you know
talking about everything from mining to
manufacturing to you waste recycling to
repair and so we wanted to tell that
story so iFixit org came out of
realizing that we needed to be the
resource that was not available sure
there's a lot of folks talking everyone
has their specific bias you've got some
environmental folks that have one
perspective you have electronics
recyclers in the u.s. that are really
focused on preventing any material from
going overseas you have manufacturers
that want to talk about how recyclable
their product is without actually
demonstrating it so we felt like there
was a need for a central place for some
biased information where we could go and
talk to all the experts and share it
what was really going on so one thing I
was reading in this article that I was
surprised to see is that 75% of our
waste ends up in landfills why do you
guys think that that's the case is it is
it a lack of education do people think
that it's going to the right place and
it just doesn't end up there or or do
they just not know that you really
should be recycling things different
when it comes to electronics I think
some of it is that people don't know how
to find an electronic recyclers okay mom
and and you did tell me about this
website yeah so I've got it up on my
screen and it's called Earth 9-1-1
dot-com so Earth 911 no clarify that it
is Earth 9-1-1 calm and I've got it here
and I even got this tab open you can
come to this website and look at all
these you can you can see where to
recycle what you have in your area
someplace near you so do you think
things like is there a way that
you think people should be Kyle's taken
over my computer um do you think this
thing's like this will help or is there
a way we can get more people knowing
that that you know there's a different
place to recycle your you know batteries
than it would be to recycle your garden
stuff you know what yeah I mean I think
absolutely telling people that there are
these kinds of resources available where
to take stuff it sure is important but
you know one of the points that we
really want to hammer home is that
recycling is not the best way to deal
with your your electronic waste and that
recycling is absolutely the very very
far into the last yeah so like this site
so it's important to know and I mean
this is useful so staples will take your
cell phone goodwill will take yourself
on Best Buy will take your cell phone so
there's a lot of great places you yeah I
think them what's not listed these are
Craigslist and Craigslist is far more
environmentally preferable than any of
these sources right if you go and you
sell your phone it's gonna be it's gonna
get used it's gonna it's going to
continue with its happy life rather than
if you give it to Staples they're
probably gonna sell it to an electronics
recycler who will then most likely show
that they might they might reuse it
right most most electronic recyclers
grind up phones and computers and so on
and that way solved the energy that went
into mining and manufacturing right and
so on and you know there are many many
people who don't have access to
technology because they can't afford it
or they you know they're they're not
able to get it for some reason and and
yet we're throwing all of this
technology out things that other people
could be using exactly very cool what's
interesting when you shred the phones if
they're if there's a finite number of
phones out there and so let's say
there's a hundred thousand of a
particular phone somebody might want to
buy if you start shredding some of them
and you reduce the amount of funds that
are available which means that the price
of used phones goes up and so like one
thing that cash for clunkers did when
they killed all of those cars was
actually dramatically increased the
prices have used cars that were
available because they're just fewer
cars on the market so we see this with
cell phones if you're prematurely
recycling things it makes phones more
older phones more expensive which makes
it harder for people to afford
I think overall the the I think the I
think the other site relaunch has gone
pretty well and Elizabeth deserves a lot
of the credit for it she did a lot of
the heavy research there are a lot of
very long very boring academic papers on
things like metals recycling rates then
Elizabeth sifted through so you don't
have to and it really it's it's not only
educational but it is an entertaining
site you can and that's that's another
place you can go to pledge to do your
repairs we have a cool map to see who
has made that pledge but yeah thank you
for all the work that you're doing in
this area I think we really need a
spotlight on this is there anything now
you have a really cool platform that's
different than iFixit org that you'd
like to tell people um nobody I do want
to share my favorite statistics from
that waste page okay you put one year of
e-waste produced in the United States on
one side of the scale and all of the
blue whales still alive in the world on
the other side you're kidding just one
year whoa whoa so either we're killing a
lot of blue whales or there's a lot of
us maybe that's an amazing number and
not a good one
I don't but Wow Wow so we're continuing
to build out org and we are very
interested in feedback so Elizabeth and
I are super excited to make the site
better so if you have questions or
there's burning things that you wish we
were covering or places that we should
go in the beste gate let us know she's
editor I they fix it
we're happy to talk and improve Thanks
yeah thank you so much for being here
check it out also if you have any
questions for elizabeth she will stay in
that she's in the chat room right now
when she gets off she'll she'll be
better at her computer
and she'll be answering any of your
questions so if you have questions for
her go ahead and send them to the chat
room right now and that is ifixit.com
slash chat so we'll see you later in the
chatroom thank you so much it looks like
Carlos is online from Panama so
greetings to Panama
Hey I've never been to Panama but I hear
it's nice this time yeah I bet it's nice
all the time right yeah it's Panama very
cool well um we do have someone else
that we like to introduce to everyone
who that would be Scott Oh Scott come on
Scott come on down I told him I'd
pretend it was like them Scott you
brought me a sponsor I did my spudger is
selling me that repair is Noble
it is come on scoot in let everybody see
you okay guys this is Scott all right
one of our awesome amazing people who
will be answering the phone if you call
one of the people one one of the four
one of the four so then you're one of
the least famous people and I fix it
yeah we're most accessible anyway 25%
you just call call the phone number and
you'll answer the phone number email you
can email great so um there's there's a
question I have for you what do you love
about iFixit what made you want to work
here the first thing I got hired came in
for my interview you know walked through
the little Lobby that was a pinball
machine right there I was like okay I
got to see if I can like this is up for
grabs to play or not and then you know
took the job and I walked back out and
we got to play the pinball machines like
five minutes came back in the following
Monday at Memorial Day and it didn't
work I was like they rigged this thing
so that they knew I liked pinball okay
man got the job and then well you know
why we have the pinball machine why it's
because it always breaks yeah so what we
it's so that we always have something to
practice yeah the pinball machine breaks
at least once a month and then we were
in there I mean it's working at the
moment yeah yeah Jeff and I went through
it real quick and put new flippers on it
there's a thriving spare parts market
place for pinball really yes so so the
definition of a pinball machine is a
massive complex mechanical thing that
will break guaranteed all the time there
are so many moving parts it's just
constantly breaking in constantly a fix
jeri ellsworth
good friend of ours up in Portland she
ran a pinball machine repaired
for a long time and she owned something
like 70 or 80 pinball machines and so
shout-out to Jerry she is awesome maybe
I think all of our pinball machines are
at valve right now yeah they're kind of
big that was like the least fun thing
when we moved into the building was to
that pinball machine so tell us a little
bit more about what you do here and I
think sit ok so customer service phone
calls emails things like that I also
handle all of our wholesale accounts if
you walk into a Fry's or a RadioShack
and you see the tools there I handle the
distribution for that and then the not
so fun part is people trying to use
stolen credit card information so we've
got you know a little bit of that that
goes on so I spent some time
so all those target phone numbers yeah
you're the one who collects them at the
end of the day exactly I've got every
single person whose target credit card
number Oh your stolen yours oh yeah cool
so um you do do a lot of answering the
phone and answering questions what is
what is a question that you see a lot of
people calling in and saying and then
you're like oh I've heard this one
before
let me help you through it yeah right
first one is of course you know do we do
repairs unfortunately not we don't you
do the repairs yeah it's called I fix it
yes so there's there's a little snot
would will you fix it for me so Scott is
gonna show us how to how to do that
repair and how easy it is no sure sure
so is that is that a question that you
get a lot you get a lot of battery
questions we get we get batteries and
display assemblies or the big guys
because batteries are of course the the
big wear and tear
on the on the phone right you know
charge your phone discharge your phone
it has a limited number of uses to it
and it's gonna be you know at some point
so that's that's a huge seller so this
is my phone
just just to make it clearer I don't
know if it's I will okay so this is my
phone yeah alright so I'll turn it off
and then of course the other big one is
to play someone just place yep
Kyle talked about earlier with the
samsung galaxy you know now it's
waterproof which should help but you
still drop do you get a lot of a
particular brand I mean about yeah we
get the iPhone stuff most a lot yeah
yeah it's been really intriguing though
lately because we've been trying to open
up the market we started doing some of
those Samsung Android stuff because we
know that's kind of the big store and
it's been really interesting cuz I
always felt that the iPhone parts are
always a little more expensive cuz they
kind of have that Apple tax to them
that's partially because we're able to
get OAM exams that does a lot so in the
Apple world there's there's more
aftermarket parts yeah yeah I mean are
parts for Apple we try and source the
OEM if we're able to and if we're not
then we get what we would consider a a
perfect copy well we get the best
quality absolutely I just want to point
out that Kyle likes to live game
dangerously there are no screws on the
back panel yeah well there's you can get
the phone with the pentalobe where it's
you closing the Apple ecosystem and then
you can free your phone and put Phillips
screws on it I like that I like to have
my phone completely liberated with no
sir
dangerous but okay you swap it better
like every two days yeah well when
you're on there playing then you need
the phone to last it know for a 16-hour
flight it's nice though if you were
doing this repair Scott first you would
take out either the pentalobe or the
Phillips if you have changed them out at
the bottom and and then you move on to
yeah so then you pop off the rear cover
which apple bit of a great job it just
slides right off and then normally
you've got this was a hundred percent
phone on Kyle then you
two screws on the 4s and there's one on
the iPhone 4 okay and then the 4s you
have to be careful is there's a
grounding clip in there that likes to
pop out using the transparent panel it's
not needed though so this is also not in
there so it just makes for a lot easier
repair but besides swapping out the two
bottom screws I mean this is like the
easiest repair you can do it's I mean
we've had people that are in their 90's
do it in 20 minutes I mean it's and then
call us up and say oh my god it's really
cool that's the best feeling exactly we
did one of these onstage at Matt quarrel
last year we did it blindfolded so Scott
the other Scott actually did the whole
thing blindfolded in about two minutes
he's Scott number one though that's the
reason he's my boss so the keys you're
doing this is to rip the battery
connector off the motherboard well you
don't need it at you know so the only
real tricky thing is as you as you take
the the connector off you want to get
and pry on the connector itself and not
on the plug on the main board so you
need to get under there and you can even
use a fingernail or a spudger and and
this is the connector so this is the
piece that you want to come off and you
don't want the part on the motherboard
to come up with it we do get those phone
calls sometimes and say you know the
battery some he doesn't look like the
battery that I just pulled out of my
phone we get the picture and then it's
you know unfortunately the sometimes
it's people that are overly aggressive
Frank because sometimes it's not their
fault sometimes every once in a while
and this is like one and a hundred
thousand products when they assembled it
the first time the connector either
breaks a little bit as they're putting
it on there or it's not quite solid and
so the first time you ever go to do a
repair you pull off and the main board
breaks and you think it's your fault and
it's actually just a manufacturing
defect I was told by the tech writers
never force it never force it don't
don't get I always talk to you know
customers always ask okay is there
really easy which is a which is a very
big question unfortunately because I
mean we try and give it as a you know
most difficult rating as possible but
you know everybody does things
differently sure whatever their aptitude
is it's different but I always just say
I mean the slower you go the more you
read our guides and we spent a lot of
time on these
it's and we're always working American
we make the mistakes first we make sure
you know even if we break whatever part
we're working on it's so that you don't
do it you know we make sure to tell you
what's gonna happen in your repair well
we had some issues with the iPhone 5 you
know that we had to make some
modifications as a guy because customers
were coming back and saying okay well I
attempted it do it this way this is what
happened and so we went in and that's
the great thing about the guys too is
that they're all editable so customers
work modifying them and letting us know
well we find I mean the the way that the
Guyot is written when we first publish
it is not what the guy is going to look
like two or three years down the road
every single person that goes through
and does a repair adds to all of our
knowledge and every possible mistake
that you would might ever make fixing
this iPhone 4s someone else has made
that mistake before right posted the
question about a lot of answers made in
that it to a guide pretty much every
line every word of the guide is there
for a reason and I mean that's cool
we're able to build off the collective
knowledge of everybody but for me like
when I'm following a repair guide I tend
to be in kind of a hurry so it did turn
back on or I don't think you ever turned
it off but how did you pull the battery
out yeah so early on the time that I
connected it it must have it must have
turned back on this is this is like
instant it's it's back Thanks so when
I'm following a repair guide I tend to
just look at the pictures and not read
the text yes I'm not hurry yep and
sometimes I'll even skip a picture right
and then I'm trying to get the case off
that won't come off and I'm cursing it
and I'm saying that the repair guide
sucks and I then I realized I skips up
so yeah it does happen I mean again you
just get really excited like I broke my
phone I got to get my phone going again
and you get really excited to finish the
rewrite and to power yourself on the
back and then you know yeah this is back
on and happy and so the battery off the
shelf this came straight off the shelf
this says 47% capacity right now and
that's pretty typical for us because
when you store a battery we want to
store batteries between 20 and 80
percent full we don't want them 100%
full the battery lasts longer on the
shelf if you don't charge it up
completely and these are all tested so
they
they go through the really extensive
like five-hour tests and yeah all that
fun stuff so do you have any suggestions
for people who are having problems with
whatever they're they're dealing with
some some gadget out there but they
don't know what the problem is
yeah that's that's a really tough one I
mean our answers forum works really well
we've got some people in there that are
just way smarter than us and let me get
we get emails all the time that's like
you know my HTC one right I mean we just
don't really know those products that
well we turn them down but we don't have
much repair knowledge and much
troubleshooting my HTC one is doing this
and we said order the answers form and
people on there great and and to get
there you just go to our home page so
ifixit.com and it's it is the second tab
there at the top so and there and like
he said we just have so many great
people that are watching this and that
that are within the company and and just
wonderful people out there who have just
so much knowledge and love helping other
people out so if you put your question
up there and you're not exactly sure
what's going on that's a good place to
to troubleshoot what and a shout out to
old turkey who has been one of our
community for a very long time we just
read the story about him on I fix it
that Lord because he posted a repair
guide for blender yeah yeah yeah super
neat so old Turkey is awesome ah so
patty mr. turkey he's great and he's far
better at diagnosing these issues than I
exactly yeah and we we lean on them a
lot of times too I mean we just you know
we just don't always know we always run
into something that's not quite what
we're used to so we for awhile struggled
with hard drive replacements in a laptop
which generally quite easy there's like
six screws on the bottom popping your
new hard drive boom fired up put on your
new operating system and we get these
like really weird errors and just it
took us well we finally did which is
great not really no but I mean it took a
lot
you know and that's what's great about I
fix it - I mean our customer service
team is phenomenal so all of us were
basically racking our brains and trying
different things because at the end of
time E we don't want the customer to be
you know disappointed you're setting out
to do a repair and you're on your own
you can't even get to repair shop to
have them struggle with the particular
the Apple Store and instead they chose
to embark on it themselves and then all
sudden you can't even finish the repay
yeah because of some issues so so it
might be good so what does it take to
ask a good question because I know you
get questions all the time where I mean
people if somebody get and and you're
like I don't I don't have any idea what
you're talking about right she's sitting
like the same sort of question that
would help you do your job is also the
sort of thing that would be helpful to
post on answers yeah I mean you know
okay which actual specific device are
you working on you know there's an Apple
iPhone 5 okay it's not just an iPhone
right not just a Mac not just a Apple
yeah iPhone 5 okay and I am seeing three
gray lines horizontally across it okay
perfect now we know exactly what you're
seeing and then I have tried this
nothing which is absolutely fun if you
have no idea where to start with you
know it's understandable or you know I
tried smashing with a hammer and now it
works worse so any of those things don't
see that yeah but if you have done
battery so the history of everything
that you have tried is really really
useful so usually I would start with the
symptoms yeah the scribe your problems
describe the things that you have tried
and maybe if you've tried swapping in
parts and then as you go with the
question you you can edit your question
so you can go and improve it or you have
comment on answers so we see a lot of
times someone posts a question you get
you get proposed solutions and you might
propose a reasonable solution and they
and then I'll go into a test and say
well actually it's not that so I'll
comment on it I'll probably put your
answer up I'll comment on it right but
I'm not going to accept your solution
because nice great do you have any crazy
repair stories or troubleshooting
stories well so we have the hard drive
issue
that was brain racking I did have a fun
phone call a while ago work with the
gentleman that just like totally had the
confidence to do it but he I should say
the repair skills to do the repairs of
iphone 3gs battery which is not that
easy you got pulled the screen you gotta
pull the logic board and it's it's not
the easiest thing to do and I was
basically just own support for him you
know and he could totally do it himself
and it just he just needed like the
extra like vote of confidence and all
the steps and nicest gentleman ever but
it was you know at the end he finished
it better you know phone fired up
battery went great and you know both of
us were kind of patting each other you
know healthy choice and each other
through that so yeah it's like like the
Apollo 13 repair where they're up there
and they're doing the but you got ground
control walking me through it right yeah
poop please just for the sake of our
sanity don't expect everyone to walk we
will all walk everyone through our but
every once in a while yeah you get
someone with a heart of gold that's
trying to do it and we just want to help
yeah yeah I mean we want to help all the
customers we just you know we don't
always have the the day becomes very
limited quickly maybe this should be
answers 2.0 we can do you know phone so
you're on there and you say okay I am
ready to help people with with questions
and we just stood and do the Google
hangout you know it could be like what
was the the snapchat anonymous video
dating video service where they you know
you go on and and it would just pair you
up randomly with somebody else on the
Internet oh yes with the webcam yeah
that went downhill very quickly but you
can imagine for a pair is something like
that Scott Carlos has a question for you
yeah so how do you ground yourself when
you make these repairs oh good question
it kind of depends on what you're
working on if it's something like you're
just kind of putting new RAM into a
computer it's usually quite simply just
touch the computer and that should
pretty much dissolve you have any static
if you're working on kind of a deeper
repair probably buying an anti-static
wrist job okay and then using that
usually they've got like an alligator
clip and you can connect that to you
know
exactly we didn't really show it but
anytime scholar I are working on
electrons we're generally like reaching
under the table and touching the metal
yeah when we work on it and maybe we're
a little bit Cavalier we should probably
be wearing a wrist strap but it doesn't
have to be enough static where you feel
a shock yeah it can be these components
are so sensitive to anything so you
don't you're never gonna feel it and you
can em yeah and we don't know sometimes
we get customers that say like this part
doesn't work and we go oh we tested this
it's crazy that doesn't work and so I
mean just things like that can happen
even right we could have killed it
before we you know after we test it we
killed it
David is asking or or helping people on
the Google+ side
yeah we're do our parts go after tear
downs the Box I have from the HTC m8 so
there's a few places they go at the
moment the m8 is sitting right here so
we have this is everything from HTC
teardown including I have in here
magnetic mat and you can see we're
taking notes as we go so the plan with
any device we do a high profile teardown
on is to write a repair manual for it
eventually so the goal is take it apart
put it back together do the two you know
taking apart for the teardown and
publish that and then we take it apart
again and we spend a week or two
methodically learning learning how the
product works so the tear downs are
usually just a first stab and getting
inside and trying to get a feel for how
the device works what the semiconductors
are you know what does design decisions
they made how good together it is who
makes the cameras all of that then we're
able to spend some more time and learn a
bit about how the hardware works so
we'll take a weak will rather repair
manual and that's why we don't have the
galaxy s5 right now it's because that's
off in the other room they're writing
the repair manual for it so we couldn't
steal it
this HTC m8 is probably going to go to
the teardown or to work on the repair
manual if we feel like we can do a
repair man right this one is kind of
borderline it's so difficult and I don't
know what usually we're trying not to
damage the device as we work on it we're
not sure what the MA
it was so difficult to get it apart
we're not sure if it will still work
again so this is something we will be
putting this back together seeing if we
can get it working with other gizmos
things that are generally fairly
repairable we put them back together so
actually we're using here in the video
studio we use the Mac Pro that we did
the Mac Pro teardown of all right
sitting right over there so we tend to
try to put them to good use but I think
a very common question we get is hey can
I have the thing that you had from the
teardown and the answer is well no
because we need it to rather repair man
right and then we need it in case we
need to make changes to the repair
manual or you know sometimes I think
last year at the Christmas party we gave
away a couple game consoles someone's
gotta use it at some point so nothing
ever goes so I I'm not sure if this is
from Google Plus because I'm not seeing
it in the chat but we have someone from
Mexico City don't have a name sorry guys
but do you guys have any idea why the
following message shows up at start
unapproved caller security agent may
only be invoked by Apple I've ever heard
that one yeah yeah we would need a
little more information for that I don't
have any idea yeah give us more
information and we'll try to help you
out if not go to our answers page and
maybe go ahead and put that there and
we'll see if we can help you there yeah
let us know if it shows up in the logs
or if it's just flashing them right on
the phone yeah good question alright
great question
keep them coming we are going to stay in
the chat room and be answering questions
live for a little bit longer and then
we're gonna get off the air and continue
in the chat room with you guys we won't
leave you just yet so so someone wanted
to know what's the difference between
the original Kinect and the new Kinect
yeah an answer is that they went from
using a infrared projector that projects
the map on on the wall just like the
just like the project tango uses an
infrared projector and primeSense
the new technology is using a couple of
cameras and they're doing higher
resolution sensing on the room just
using cameras so they've got more
sophisticated they're able to
without the infrared projector which is
a very good thing for power consumption
it also might be the sort of thing that
project tango might be able to use in
the future the one that you that was the
old-style one yeah the new one it's
interesting it's actually bigger but
there's no reason that needed to be big
I don't know if it was it's weird you
look at both the the Xbox one and the
ps4 and then the new Kinect they're all
much bigger than they need to be and you
take them apart now why in the world are
some of the space inside this this thing
and the only thing I can think of is
that they're so afraid of overheating
yeah they just want but I can't blame
them but it's the exact opposite
approach you've got Apple with the Apple
TV and it's that big and then you have
the Xbox one and that's moderate oh they
sorta do the same thing and I mean have
you that we got the new Amazon TV that
was that was the other teardown that we
did lately no yeah it's pretty cool what
do you have a home Mac Mini actually
yeah that runs Plex there you go
that works great and or you can do in a
lift box like Xbox media center on it
yep I would do like just a chromecast I
think cuz it runs plex but yeah I don't
have HDMI in on my receiver so I was
trying chromecast on the screen in here
and they have a beta mode where you can
show your entire screen on the
chromecast it's pretty nifty but it's
it's like a half second lag and the
frame rate is only a couple frames a
second just coming from off your
computer so you're using it as a second
monitor it's slightly iffy but if you
once you like go to youtube and you pick
a YouTube video and you play it then it
streams directly from YouTube to the
chromecast and that's more smooth that's
pretty smart she could show pictures
with it or something then but for a pure
screen sharing from a Mac and Apple TV
is better right now
yeah well guys we've been here for a
good good amount of time you have
anything else to say
you shut off this magnetic mat you were
holding it up with all this we have one
don't don't lose the screws though
that's the point of the magnetic mat is
I can't all team
magnetic maths just keep getting I don't
do a repair without it there's like no
way so organized
I'm excited in the boat my long time
yeah so this most things stick to it
pretty well these are actually sticking
to it because they're glued on thank you
HDC but the rest of it is held on with
magnets yeah that's crazy you can stack
all those and you know you could have 10
projects move them around yeah and and
being able to write what step things
came out on and where it goes back it's
it's it's not so much for the actual way
into whatever your device is it's on the
way out and being able to put it back
together efficiently I would never do a
repair without it I don't as a kid
taking things apart and then okay yeah
maybe that's maybe that's the next I fix
it live is we just go down to Goodwill
and get a bunch of old hardware and yeah
give us suggestions we are we are taking
requests any other last-minute questions
throw up there we'll hit you after the
broadcast definitely and and remember
that elizabeth is still in the chat room
and so Scott's gonna join you guys in
the chat room in a little bit and of
course we will be there and we'll be
answering your questions so keep them
coming and we'll see you on the next I
fix it live tell us what you want us to
do next week bye guys Cheers