Nexus One Teardown

Teardown

Teardown

Teardowns provide a look inside a device and should not be used as disassembly instructions.

Well, we went for it. After forking out a bank-account-devastating $530, we have the Superphone in hand! Keep your eyes peeled as we tear this baby apart.

After all was said and done, we made a video slideshow of it as well. Enjoy!

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Add Note Edit Step 1 — Nexus One Teardown  ¶ 

  • The Nexus One, manufactured by HTC, is the latest and greatest Android phone. It sports:

    • A 1 GHz Qualcomm (QCOM) Snapdragon processor.

    • A 3.7" 480x800 widescreen WVGA AMOLED display.

    • A 5MP digital camera w/ LED flash that also records .mp4 video.

    • 802.11n wireless capability for when you can't depend on 3G.

    • 7 hours of 3G talk time from a removable 3.7V, 1400 mAh lithium battery.

  • The box's color scheme kind of looks like Google's.

  • Pawning apps on the clear plastic protective sleeve? Guess the app store really is that desperate.

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Add Note Edit Step 2  ¶ 

  • Droid, meet Nexus One. Anyone else see the transition from Terminator to T-1000?

  • iFixit's Android family. Darwin would agree that progress has been made.

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Add Note Edit Step 3  ¶ 

  • The unbelievably easy task of removing the plastic rear cover gives access to the replaceable battery. Hey Apple, take notes!

  • Inside the battery compartment you can see:

    • The 5MP camera lens

    • LED flash bulb

    • External speaker

    • The warranty-killing VOID sticker

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Add Note Edit Step 4  ¶ 

  • Warranty = VOID. No turning back now.

  • This phone is very nicely put together. After removing three screws and prying with a plastic opening tool, the battery tray comes right out.

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Add Note Edit Step 5  ¶ 

  • The upper circuit board is held in place by another Phillips screw.

  • After removing the screw, maneuver the upper board past the two metal clips holding it in place and lift it out of the phone body.

  • The large black-coated foil section is the data connection between the two main circuit boards.

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Add Note Edit Step 6  ¶ 

  • After some trying moments with a few tools of destruction, we figured out the bottom cover can simply be popped off with a plastic opening tool.

  • Guess what? We found more screws.

  • This phone uses many foil antennas attached to the several plastic internal frame pieces.

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Add Note Edit Step 7  ¶ 

  • With a quick pry of the plastic opening tool, we found that the black plastic frame slightly envelops the lower side of the logic board.

  • And just like that, the plastic frame snaps off, revealing the lower logic board.

  • It's quite a colorful phone on the inside. We've got oranges, greens, yellows, dark grays, and all sorts of fun stuff!

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Add Note Edit Step 8  ¶ 

  • We had to take care of one more Phillips screw.

  • After that, the logic board assembly slowly-but-surely slid out from the rest of the phone.

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