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The first model of iPhone, Model A1203 with 4, 8, or 16 GB capacity and an aluminum back. Repair requires a significant amount of prying, and may require some soldering. This page aims to help users troubleshoot, fix, and seek help for the iPhone 2G.

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What's the best practice for reassembling my phone?

My on/off button recently stopped working, which at first didn't matter, till after a failed upgrade I needed to get into recovery mode. I now removed the back and the on/off button (and all the stuff attached) and I have a replacement part which enabled me to get the phone working again. However actually properly reattaching the exchanged part seems to be difficult, especially because the screws seem to be non magnetic. So are there any good ways to do this? I'm one step away from more or less gluing it back together ....

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Don't glue it! Super glue would probably "wick" into the on/off button and ruin it.

I have a few general tricks for putting non-magnetic screws into tough locations. For all of these tricks, make sure you are using the correct size screwdriver (Phillips #0, #00, etc.). They include:

Using gravity. Hold your screwdriver vertically and balance the screw on its tip. Hold the on/off switch in position as you hold the phone vertically and insert the screws.

Taping the tip of the screwdriver. If you stick a strip of duct tape over the tip of a screwdriver and force the screw on the end, the tape will deform and might hold the screw on. This tends to work better if you attach the duct tape to the tip of the screwdriver sticky-side out.

Magnetizing the screw & screwdriver. Mostly all mechanical fasteners are steel, which is ferrous and can be magnetized. Rub a strong magnet in one direction over the screw & screwdriver to slightly magnetize them.

Gluing. Use a minuscule drop of super glue to temporarily glue the head of the screw to the screwdriver. Use as little glue as possible, because you don't want any on the threads. Once the glue is dry, thread the screw into its hole. After threading it in, gently wiggle the screwdriver to break it free from the glue.

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Get a small magnet from a stereo cabinet door and slap it on the screw driver and you now have a magnetic screw driver.

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the screws have a little magnetic energy in them... go to a hardware store and get a little magnetizer cube for a screwdriver, or bring your screwdriver to the store and just rub your phillips in there for a few seconds... also, you can get a smaller phillips... iPhones use #00 size phillips heads, which even without a magnetic force; the screw sits nicely in the head and doesnt fall out...

It takes practice, but you'll get it... with or without gravity!

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Yeah, I know glue wouldn't be a good solution, but as long as you use little of it and it's not conductive it coul work.

Any way, I successfully reassembled it now, so here I'm posting some more things that helped me:

Unfortunately the part with the headphonejack and the buttons on it is one big part, connected by cables, so very hard to get into place properly. Therefore it is important to figure out which end you have to attach first (silent mode switch I think). Also it helped me a lot to hold the rest of the cable/part in place or out of way with some small strips of see-through scotch tape. This really helped a lot. Also I used tweezers (might only work if they have tip that's pointed inwards)

Also to all the people mentioning the proper scredriver to use: I can read. And I fixed my macbook air already which also need a PH#00. But this is the smalles one. And maybe its't just the one I bought here, but they don't always sit nicely in.

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@Ptr702 Did you actually disassemble (and reassemble) an iphone? I find that hard to believe, because although the screws still are #00, for reassembling I found them much more annoying then for example the ones in my macbook air. (which are also #00)

The thing is the screws/scredriver should be magnetic but somehow it wasn't. The iphone screws seemed to use a differen metal or paint then the macbook air ones, maybe that's why it didn't work.

Anyway, in my own answer I detailed what helped.

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if some please can let me know where l can get a screw mat for now please

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I need a screw mat and where l can get some soldering and iron to do some soldering on a ground connecting if you can help thank you

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step21 will be eternally grateful.
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