Replacing a Nokia E66's case

Details

Category: Cellular Phones

Published on Sunday, 22 December 2013 18:49

Written by Ben

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I have been using this old cellphone on daily basis for over 3 years now and time has taken its price on it. when I say time I mean everything that affected the cellphone during that period of time and that includes: weather effects , gravity (falling here and there on a hard/soft floor) , dust , sun exposure , dirt , fluids and so on.

As much as I am a gadget and technology junkie , I never really found a will and the necessity to upgrade my cellphone and act as a part of the herd around me. That herd jumps on every new cellphone that comes out , spending a lot of money on a fancy piece of technology it doesn't necessarily needs.

I admit , the Nokia E66 is slow and old and doesn't support the majority of the applications out there, but, it gives me basically everything I really need in my daily life. It's Symbian OS is old and obsolete but it's capable and good enough to run WAZE , WHATSAPP , streaming internet radio from thousands of predefined stations (this feature was included in the cellphone) and MP3 files - all that simultaneously , a little slowly but steadily , without crashing.

So why not maintain it properly and restore it? (rhetorical question)

That's what I asked myself before buying a complete new housing kit for it. along with the housing kit I also bought a screwdriver kit and a pack of Torx head screws. I made the calculations and came up with the conclusion that taking it to a cellphone repair lab would cost me quite a lot and would not be worth it so I decided to go ahead and enter into an unknown territory trying to fix the cellphone on my own.

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Before the repair:

After over 3 years of continuous use wearing signs on the E66 could be clearly seen. The front LCD cover was full with scratches , the external outer cover of the top sliding unit got dismantled , both screws that held the cover of the top sliding unit were gone , the top sliding unit 's plastic was broken and the housing had many scratches all over it.

I couldn't stand looking at it anymore.

Getting it done - disassembling the cellphone:

1. At first I turned the cellphone off the normal way

2. After the power was off I removed the back battery cover and the battery itself.

3. Removing the battery allowed me to remove the SIM card    

4. Removed the MicroSD card        

5. Removed 6 Torx head screws from the back of the cellphone - 2 of them which hold the keypad outer bottom front cover       

 6. After making sure all available screws were unscrewed , I put them in a safe location.

Separating the 2 major parts of the housing :

This part was the hardest. The two parts just didn't want to be separated from one another , and on the one hand i really wanted them to be separated and on the other hand - I knew increasing the amount of force might damage the electronic board. So whatever you do - be very patient in this part and do not get temped to increase the amount of brute force you use.

I used a special tool for this purpose that was included inside the housing kit I bought. It's basically a flat thin plastic separator. I believe it was made out of plastic to prevent damaging the other plastic parts and the cellphone's delicate electronics.

After finally removing the keypad outer cover I began trying to separate the back cover from the electronic mainboard. Remember - be patient and consistent , use small amounts of force.

Once the back cover was separated from the mainboard I could start removing the peripheral remnants that were still connected to the back housing unit. Those remamnts included the power charging unit , the right vertical keypad that controls volume , the headphones connector unit and the camera unit. 

Once all these units were out I was able to completely get the mainboard free of any housing parts.

Installing the new housing and covers:

Basically this part is the easiest. Once you know where each part should be it's not really a problem reassembling the housing.

1. I began with the peripherals because they were the easiest parts to reassemble. the headphones unit and the power charge unit. I just put them both inside their place.

2. The camera unit and the right keypad unit were next. Again, putting the camera board in place was very easy, however , the keypad was a different story and presented some challenge and tested my patience…

3. Next , I placed the entire mainboard in its place. It seemed relatively easy…but right after I thought for myself that I was done and activated the cellphone to see that everything is alright , I noticed the LCD was working in a weird way - half of it was on and half was off. So finally after carefully inspecting the mainboard, I found out that while I was putting the mainboard into the new housing I accidently disconnected the LCD data cable from the mainboard itself. Connecting it back was a bit tricky because of its size, again ,patience is a key here.

4. After the mainboard was in place along with its peripherals , I screwed back the 6 Torx head screws I had originally unscrewed.

5. In order to screw in the 2 bottom Torx head screws I had to put back the new keypad outer cover. But BEFORE I put the outer cover, I had to put the keypad itself back BEHIND the outer cover.

6.  Next , I put back the second keypad unit in the sliding part of the cellphone (just under the LCD screen)              

7. After all that work I noticed that the LCD screen got filthy and greasy due to the exposure to my fingers. so I cleaned it using a special LCD solution and a soft cloth specially designed to clean LCD monitors.              

8. Next , I installed the top cover of the sliding part of the cellphone. This part was also tricky. At first I didn't realize that besides having 2 screws on the top back side to lock its position , the entire cover is locked in place due to "pressurized installation". That is , the cover has to be placed by using

some amount of force and mechanically locking it on the sliding part itself.       

• Returned the SIM card back                                                                                                                                                                         

• Put the battery back

• Put the battery cover back

As a bonus I did something I have been planning to do many months. I replaced my 2GB MicroSD card with a bigger 8 GB card.

Later on I took the temporary LCD transparent protection cover off and replaced it with a new one that can survive longer.

RESULT:

Just like new:

Pros:

1. Cheap solution for restoring an old cellphone

2. Relatively easy installation process - everybody with technical skills and patience can do it

3. The Cellphone would look like new after the installation process

Cons:

1. The housing unit was cheaply manufactured, it was shipped with a broken edge , the plastic LCD cover got minor scratches very quickly and the outer cover of the front sliding unit fell off due to poor glue quality the manufacturer originally used.

Price:

• Full new housing for Nokia E66 - 6.53$

• T4 , T5 and T6 screwdriver set for Nokia E66 3.98$

• 3 LCD Screen protectors - 1.79$

• 10 units of Torx screws - 5.15 $

Total: 17.45$

Beats buying a new Iphone-5….

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