Random teardowns of things

Genius ECO-u261

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Epson Stylus SX115

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NoName TY1178-T48L-B52L-V3

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GoGEN DXDP262DVBT

Claims double-shielding (there is none), returned after shock from live power on chassis (return was rejected, but the unit was silently fitted with an insulation sheet under the power supply circuit), died after few weeks with smoke, power supply circuit components exploded, no fuse (fire hazard).

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SanDisk Ultra Flair (32GB)

These are nice and take a lot of abuse. The only flaw is, that the five USB3 rear contacts tend to bend up in certain USB2 sockets (mostly those that have no chamfer on the tab's front edge). Fortunately, these are really very easy to take apart and put together without any compromises on build stability. If you decide on bending the contacts back, do that only with the memory module out of the housing. Also note, that if the contact is bent too much, bending it back will most likely break it. With some luck you bend the remnant of the contact by putting a thin shim (needle or toothpick) under the root of the contact and pressing the center of the contact with something else, until it is below the height of undisturbed contacts.

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Microsoft Bluetooth Notebook Mouse 5000

This mouse is nice at first. It fits your palm, has soft-clicks and works on pretty much any surface except reflective ones. The trouble comes right after the end of warranty of this expensive and complicated piece of hardware; it becomes slimy. While this might be a bit biased, because I came to hate rubber parts on electronics, as they become brittle over time, this one has surpased everything. The rubber is actually dark blue, painted black. Why not just make black rubber like everyone else is beyond me. At first it only becomes soft to touch, but then increasingly sticky, until one day you take it out of the included pouch and see it stringing from both sides. You can wash both the pouch and the sides of the mouse (and your hands of course) covered in slime with warm water and help with some detergent, but that only helps until it dries and starts getting soft again. The only solution is to wear down all of the paint from the rubber parts. Since you need a lot of force and water (your sink will turn black for a while) for that, do not skip on disassembling the mouse, since the sensor is not water-proofed and will get ruined if it comes in contact with water.

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Never opened a mouse, that had so many parts. Normally you have 5; the bottom, the top (maybe separate buttons), the lens, the wheel and single-board electronics, optionally connected to a cable, everything held together by a single screw. This one has 19 parts, not counting the individual boards of the mainboard sandwich. There is also a bunch of screws of two types; equip yourself with PH0 and TX6 screwdrivers and something thin and flat like a nail file. The shots below are from the assembly, because the disassembly was too slimy.

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iRobot Braava 390t

This one suffered a strong hit from a door to its side while it was dutifully cleaning the floor. The rubber on one of the wheels stretched and peeled off, causing the robot to drive backwards in circles. You do not have to remove the battery to open the robot, but do it for safety's sake. Taking this apart is easy, remove four philips screws and you are in, just do not forget to unplug the cable for the charging contacts. Beware of booby-traps in the rear of the chassis in form of grease for the suspension mechanism. Also if some screws go missing, check the inside of the front assembly (another four screws), there are two permanent magnets for the mop. Taking the front apart is also useful for greasing the dry rails, that support the collision checking mechanism.

If you plan to replace the wheels, do not force the wheel-cover off by peering into it with a screwdriver (as suggested elsewhere), as that will break at least two of the three tabs (as indicated by the markings on the cover edge). Instead rotate the wheel-cover clock-wise about 10 degrees to open. This can be hard to do with fingers alone, use something hard and wide to get hold in the cover pattern (such as a nail file). There are no tools needed for the clip that holds the wheel, just pull on the round side with a screwdriver.

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Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro (SK17i)

What would you do, if your mobile phone stopped working? You would probably toss it and get a new one, or send it back when it is still under warranty. Since I'm not into bezel-less fly-swatter phones, that are popular these days, I decided to repair mine, for the second time, for the same reason, ripped ribbon cable that connects the top with the slide-out keyboard bottom. How to recognize it? Depending on which side of the cable breaks or tears first, the proximity sensor, ambient light sensor, or the front camera stop working. The display and touch-screen stopped working only after the whole ribbon cable snapped.

The phone was introduced in my area in 2011, shortly being the top of performance benchmarks. It came with Android 2.3, was upgraded to 2.3.3 and offered an update to 4.0, which I skipped for performance/space reasons. The most important feature back then was the slide-out full querty keyboard, which is also the only weak spot of the phone, due to which had to repair it. Today, the most remarkable and important feature is its form-factor; it is palm-sized.

Taking the phone apart is relatively easy. Take off the battery cover, remove the battery and all cards, gently pull half of the sticker in the battery compartment from outside to inside and unscrew the miniature philips screws along the bezel. Take care not to damage the ribbon cables in the upper half of the phone and disconnect them, at least the smaller one, using something thin and flat (such as a nail file) from the mainboard. To lift the mainboard, you have to disconnect another wide ribbon cable on the side. This is the ribbon cable that broke for me, mainly due to sliding the keyboard in and out. According to the phone stats, about 15000 slides each. Lifting the mainboard itself requires some patience, since it is held by tabs all around the bezel. Pull it out on a wide side first and don't forget to move it as not to break off the USB receptance. The ribbon cable is glued, so I do not recommend pulling it off, unless you are replacing it. Remaining stuff is mostly screws (keyboard hinge) and plastic tabs (the front part). The display is integral part of the front piece, it will most likely break if you try to separate it from the touch-screen.

For the first repair, I only bought the part with the ribbon cable. For the second repair, there were no spare parts available anymore, so I bought a whole phone that was labeled 'for parts'. Luckily the other phone was dead for mainboard reasons, so I'm good for another 15000 slides. But I stopped using the querty keyboard, because after another 5 years, there may not be even spare phone available anymore.

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