smallwesley | # 1 | 2010-02-21, 02:27 | Report

Dropped my N900 bad... slipped out a coat pocket. Upon examination the screen backlight would occasionally flicker on. With presssure to the screen it would function as normal.

Determine the the root cause after carefully removing the screen from the main device: The ribbon male connector from the screen had popped out of the female socket due to the impact of the fall. Only by luck its pins were lined up in the same points and any pressure to the screen would cause the pins to full connect.

Beware folks.. that this is just another thing that could happen with this lovely beasty. It just might take a bit of surgery to fix it yourself regardless of warranty.

kazuki | # 2 | 2010-02-21, 02:30 | Report

ouch, i'm glad that didn't happen last night. how high did it drop from? what kind of flooring did it hit? concrete?

smallwesley | # 3 | 2010-02-21, 02:31 | Report

Landed on hardwood.. About 4 1/2 feet out of a pocket... Landing flush screen down.

flydeep | # 4 | 2010-02-21, 05:23 | Report

that is one costly 4.5@ft to fix, sorry for your unfortunate incident. best wishes for a fix.

chippy | # 5 | 2010-02-21, 20:35 | Report

This happened months ago to my trial N900 (without dropping it) and Nokia wouldn't repair it so i't been sitting here gathering dust. Is it an easy thing to repair? Can you explain how you did it?

Regards
Steve

NotTheMessiah | # 6 | 2010-02-21, 20:51 | Report

im sure thats easy to fix. just be careful with dismatling / reassembly. ribbon cables are easy to put back into place. some types will just slot it and others there is a latch that you push down to lock the cable into place. i see no reason why most people with a little patients and the right screwdriver coudlnt fix this themselves.

smallwesley | # 7 | 2010-02-22, 16:45 | Report

It wasn't too difficult of a fix. Remove the 4 screw and carefully pull apart.

I didn't exert much pressure on on the male socket to get it snapped back into place. Be rest assured, once it clicks into place, it stays. After that, you just have to be careful to attach back the screen component to the main case. When taking it appart, notice the tab that wedges near the top of the keyboard.

Outside of all that, my N900 is running as nice as when i bought purchased it.

chippy | # 8 | 2010-02-23, 12:02 | Report

Thanks. I got the device apart but one of the screen screws was just solid and wouldn't budge. In the end I damaged the screw head and now there's no change of getting the screen apart! Oh well... at least I tried.

Thx for the tips.