Jason Simonelli

Try charging it with a dedicated USB wall charger for a few hours. And then try Recovery mode, if that fails, try DFU Mode. http://www.ihackintosh.com/2009/06/recov...-mode-and-dfu-mode/ Remember that the iPhone comes with a 1 year warranty. Even if the warranty is over, bringing it in and getting it fixed is usualy less expensive than buying a new phone...that is unless you know exactly whats wrong, if you do know whats wrong(and your not under warranty) buying a replacement part is a good idea. Let me know if it works, -Quad.

The "connector to nowhere" is probably the PCIe lanes for the SSD. The cover has a PCB that joins the lanes.

In theory you should be able to use a adapter and plug it into a standard x4 PCIe slot (or maybe one that converts it to Thunderbolt or USB3?).

@iFixit

Not sure if someone else covered this yet, but...

I think that port with the cover (Step 3) is the PCIe rails for the SSD. The PCIe rails traces are split and the little cover has a PCB in it that joins the traces.

If you get a chance test this by removing the cover, boot the machine off off a USB stick and see if the SSD is still detected.

Hopefully someone in the future will whip up a adapter with a long cable (think GPU extension cables) that goes into a PCIe x4 slot.