iFixit

Before we examine the rest of the Q's internals, we remove some thermal pads and rubber foot to take a look at the die-cast zinc base dome.

The whole Q weighs 923 grams (about 2 pounds), according to the Google Play website. The hefty base accounts for 423 grams, or 45.8% of the total weight!

• Pro tip: if you have a home invasion and no weapon to defend yourself, feel free to chuck the Q at the perp. It's not as heavy as a shot, but it'll give the recipient a solid gash in the head.

Google's push to quickly implement design iterations without sending engineers overseas resulted in the dome's components being produced in the USA.

Our question is: will you spend a little more in the store for a tag in the back that says USA?

We've gone too far and unleashed the Q's sentinel guardian!

Whew! Turns out it's only the internal assembly of the Nexus Q. Crisis averted. Let's take it apart.

Just in case this little guy sparks to life and tries to kill us, let's first take out the power supply. The integrated 35 W switching power supply sports a world-ready 50/60 Hz 85-265 V AC input.

Removing the audio board requires disconnecting the speaker terminal wires from their respective posts located on the back of the speaker ports.

• How did we know this was the audio board? Easy. It bears a striking resemblance to one of our favorite musicians.
• Featured on the audio board is the Texas Instruments TAS5713 25 watt digital audio power amplifier with EQ and DRC, which could also have been sourced from any one of the numerous TI fab locations.

And now for the moment we've all been waiting for: the motherboard.

It usually takes a little bit of effort to separate the heat sink from the motherboard, but a simple thermal pad is all that connects the two inside the Q.

• Remember the thermal pad we removed earlier? That provided conduction between this small heat sink and the base, turning that hunk of zinc into one lage heat sink that then expels heat to the surroundings.

Time to test our IQ with a little chip ID:

• Samsung KLMAG4FEJA-A002 16 GB moviNAND Flash Memory (manufactured in Hwaseong, South Korea, or Austin, TX)
• SMSC LAN95000A Hi-Speed USB 2.0 to 10/100 Ethernet Controller (manufactured in North America, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, China, India or Europe)
• Elpida B8064B2PB 1 GB DRAM and Texas Instruments OMAP4460 Application Processor SOC
• Murata KM10L3002 (manufactured in Japan, China, or Taiwan)
• SMSC USB3320C Highly Integrated Full Featured Hi-Speed USB 2.0 ULPI Transceiver (manufactured in North America, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, China, India or Europe)
• Texas Instruments 6030B1A4 integrated power management (manufactured in USA, Germany, China, Japan, or the Philippines)

Next we pull out the ethernet and optical out ports board.

Obviously, not every component could be sourced in the USA -- nor did Google claim anything of the sort. The "Thailand" marking is direct evidence of components from overseas.

Notable markings on the ethernet and optical ports board:

• The ethernet port is labeled as a PulseJack J0011D0NL (manufactured in China).
• The optical out port is labeled as a Toshiba TX147APL (manufactured in Japan).

The last thing left in this little ball of joy is the set of four speaker jacks. Let's pop them out.

To get the jacks out we had to use a tool we don't call on every day -- a ratcheting socket wrench and a 3/8" socket -- in order to remove the nuts holding the jacks in place.

Aww, look at them rolling around on the table. They're so Q-ute!

The folks at Google decided to take a cue from us, so we felt the need to reciprocate. Googlers, consider this an outstanding invitation to use the image on the left as a Google Doodle!

Nexus Q Repairability Score: 8 out of 10 (10 is the easiest to repair):

Removing the top cover requires no tools. Very limited amounts of adhesive and fasteners with no exotic screw heads simplify disassembly.

Very few components are soldered to the main boards, making replacing them easier and less expensive.

The entire disassembly is pretty straightforward.

Lots of components could make you lose track of important parts if you're not careful.

Everything is packed very tightly into one package, which makes replacing some components a tad difficult.

The power supply is readily exposed once inside, making repairing the device a bit dangerous unless proper caution is taken.