# Dis-Assembling Electronic Devices



## mosaix (Mar 13, 2020)

There's a guy on YouTube that I stumbled across by accident. He dis-assembles electronic devices to find faults or just to understand how they work.

I don't know why but I find his YouTube videos compelling. There's something about his accent as well that makes him interesting to listen to. Give it a go and you'll understand what I mean.






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## Foxbat (Mar 14, 2020)

I tend to do a few repairs myself. I’ve recently repaired a guitar effects processor and Fender Deluxe 112 amplifier.

I always find the most difficult part is getting in to the damned things. I have a PC LED monitor that I think may only have a blown internal fuse but I can’t find a way  to dismantle it without damaging it.


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## mosaix (Mar 14, 2020)

Foxbat said:


> I tend to do a few repairs myself. I’ve recently repaired a guitar effects processor and Fender Deluxe 112 amplifier.
> 
> I always find the most difficult part is getting in to the damned things. I have a PC LED monitor that I think may only have a blown internal fuse but I can’t find a way  to dismantle it without damaging it.


I have exactly the same problem FB. Let me know if you manage to ‘break’ in. 

My greatest achievement so far was replacing the rechargeable batteries in a SatNav and reformatting it’s hard disk that had had some bad sectors on it.


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## Foxbat (Mar 14, 2020)

There’s meant to be a new law coming soon - the right to repair. A manufacturer will be legally obliged to make their devices repairable rather than simply replaceable.

Hopefully, it will make it easier for folk like us to get inside these things.


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## mosaix (Mar 14, 2020)

Foxbat said:


> There’s meant to be a new law coming soon - the right to repair. A manufacturer will be legally obliged to make their devices repairable rather than simply replaceable.
> 
> Hopefully, it will make it easier for folk like us to get inside these things.


Saw that. 

They definitely didn’t want me to replace the batteries in the SatNav. They were buried behind the pcb and glued in place. I got another two or three years service out of it. 

Although not electronic I’m refurbishing my forty year old office chair. New castors and a lick of varnish. I took the seat and back to be re-upholstered. “Probably cheaper to buy a new chair” was the response. My withering look is probably still being discussed in the shop as I write.


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## Vladd67 (Mar 14, 2020)

There is a series of videos of a guy showing how little the people in the Apple stores know. They frequently charge for things that don’t need repairing, or claim the cost of repair is so high you might as well buy a new product.


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## Foxbat (Mar 14, 2020)

When I was doing my apprenticeship in industrial instrumentation, I spent a lot of time refurbishing flapper/nozzle assemblies (parts for a pneumatic controller) but when we moved to newer kit, I couldn’t get spares kits and we had to replace whole units (the old ones went back to the manufacturer for refurbishment which we then had to buy back). 
With waste minimisation now a priority, it’s right that we make things last much longer and avoid sending them to landfill. Quite right about the chair @mosaix


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## Vladd67 (Mar 14, 2020)

Foxbat said:


> When I was doing my apprenticeship in industrial instrumentation, I spent a lot of time refurbishing flapper/nozzle assemblies (parts for a pneumatic controller) but when we moved to newer kit, I couldn’t get spares kits and we had to replace whole units (the old ones went back to the manufacturer for refurbishment which we then had to buy back).
> With waste minimisation now a priority, it’s right that we make things last much longer and avoid sending them to landfill. Quite right about the chair @mosaix


Sounds like alternators in cars. Once upon a time if your alternator packed up you could just replace the brushes and it was as good as new, but then this became no longer possible and so not only did you have to buy an entire new unit but you handed over your old one, for free, which I presume was refurbished with new brushes and resold.


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## Finch (Mar 14, 2020)

The cost of repairing somethings can often make a D I Y repair, a nothing  to lose situation . I recently replaced a hard drive on an old Mac . Learning that the screen is held in by magnets is the key . There are a number of leads that need to be unplugged from the screen that feel a bit tricky , but changing the hard drive is relatively easy. You can be misled into thinking  somthing like a Mac is so advance it is beyond repair .  It is conventional electronics in a fancy box.


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## mosaix (Mar 14, 2020)

Finch said:


> The cost of repairing somethings can often make a D I Y repair, a nothing  to lose situation . I recently replaced a hard drive on an old Mac . Learning that the screen is held in by magnets is the key . There are a number of leads that need to be unplugged from the screen that feel a bit tricky , but changing the hard drive is relatively easy. You can be misled into thinking  somthing like a Mac is so advance it is beyond repair .  It is conventional electronics in a fancy box.


Sometimes there are useful YouTube videos of people who have done exactly what you want to do.


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## Venusian Broon (Mar 14, 2020)

Foxbat said:


> There’s meant to be a new law coming soon - the right to repair. A manufacturer will be legally obliged to make their devices repairable rather than simply replaceable.
> 
> Hopefully, it will make it easier for folk like us to get inside these things.


Wasn't that an EU thing to be adopted in 2021...so that does not include us in the UK?

And while that might mean that manufacturers design products that can be repaired more easily, it may mean that us brits may still find barriers in the way when it comes to this, because officially we don't have this right? 

The biggest scam I can think of is the hiked prices of spare parts, even if repair is easy - even some as simple as the 'official' screws can be exorbitant. 

(Although this may depend on the economic model the company uses. For example I believe games consoles are usually sold well below cost, given the initial volume sold, so if something goes wrong inside, they would rather you bought a new one to get that overall cost down. So they incentivised the system to have high cost spare parts to deter people to do this. On the plus side it means that you are getting good value for your console if it doens't break down, I suppose.)

@Finch As a PC Overlord   I've known that a personal computer, Mac or otherwise, ain't special and have been easily fixing and changing stuff since the 1980s. It is my understanding, however, that Apple, deliberately design products to deter this - for example soldering things to fix things into place that on a PC would be very easy to remove etc. Hence why I prefer to remain with a nice boxy PC. The thing with computers is that past a few years use, you _have_ to open them up because things like the fan and cooling vanes for the processor chip will get clogged with dust and will need to be cleaned. It's a very simple process, but it's a process that Apple make people believe they will lose their souls if they attempt it.


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## Vladd67 (Mar 14, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Wasn't that an EU thing to be adopted in 2021...so that does not include us in the UK?
> 
> And while that might mean that manufacturers design products that can be repaired more easily, it may mean that us brits may still find barriers in the way when it comes to this, because officially we don't have this right?
> 
> ...


Or at the very least their warranty.


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## Venusian Broon (Mar 14, 2020)

Vladd67 said:


> Or at the very least their warranty.


Yeah, so instead of opening up your noisy computer yourself, getting a tweezer and extracting a few grams of dust, so that it's purring like a new machine with years of life still in it, you take your noisy Mac to a genius bar, where they tut and shake their heads, tell you it's terminal and suggest that you buy an expansive brand new Mac and they will transfer the old harddrive to the new one for a very fair price.*  

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* I'm being a tad facetious, but something somewhat similar, of that sort of order of magnitude, happened to a friend of mine.


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## Vladd67 (Mar 14, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Yeah, so instead of opening up your noisy computer yourself, getting a tweezer and extracting a few grams of dust, so that it's purring like a new machine with years of life still in it, you take your noisy Mac to a genius bar, where they tut and shake their heads, tell you it's terminal and suggest that you buy an expansive brand new Mac and they will transfer the old harddrive to the new one for a very fair price.*
> 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> * I'm being a tad facetious, but something somewhat similar, of that sort of order of magnitude, happened to a friend of mine.


Well those videos I posted plus others the same guy has done should make people think twice before approaching the ‘Genius’ Bar.


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## Venusian Broon (Mar 14, 2020)

Vladd67 said:


> Well those videos I posted plus others the same guy has done should make people think twice before approaching the ‘Genius’ Bar.


Exactly.


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## Foxbat (Mar 14, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Wasn't that an EU thing to be adopted in 2021...so that does not include us in the UK?


Dagnabbit! Didn’t think about that. As for warranties, I never go beyond The standard 1 year. If it was badly made or has an inherent fault, it’s likely not to last a year. After that it’s fair game in my book.  

Computer wise, I’ve recently replaced a dodgy power switch,  power supply and graphics card all in the same PC. But I can’t complain because I bought the PC in 2006 and all those repairs have given it a new lease of life (which is exactly what the manufacturers don’t want)


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## mosaix (Mar 14, 2020)

@Venusian Broon - spare parts! Our cooker hood is an ex-dem model that came free with our kitchen.  AEG from memory. The fold down front is held in place with four mushroom-head bits of plastic that clip into four plastic grommets. Cost about 10p to make. Cost to buy - £29!!!


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