Bill Detwiler: At its heart, the Apple iPad may be a consumer device, but as we have seen with the iPhone, Apple's consumer devices often find their way into the corporate IT environment. So, if you are going to support the iPad, whether it is in the office or just for family and friends, knowing what is inside the device can really help. And hey, if you are like me, you just like to take things apart to satisfy your own curiosity. I am Bill Detwiler and on this special edition of TR Dojo, I am going to crack open the Apple iPad.
Music Bill Detwiler: This episode of TR Dojo is brought to you by TechRepublic's guide to policies and procedures. This time saving guide contains over a hundred customizable templates and forms. Go to policies.TechRepublic.com to get your copy today. Before I get to the tear down, let me give you a quick rundown on the specs of our iPad test unit. The device has a 1-gigahertz Apple designed A4 processor, 16-gigabyte of flash storage, although 32 and 64-gigabyte versions are also available. A 9.7-inch LED backlit display, it runs at a resolution of 1024-by-768 and 132 pixels per inch. It supports both 802.11n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1 and the iPad has about 10-hour battery life, which is pretty good for a mobile device. Our 16-gigabyte version retails for US$499, the 32-gigabyte version will set you back $599 and the 64-gigabyte version, $699. The 3G version of each model which is scheduled to be released in late April will cost you an additional $130 above each of these prices. Lastly, I would like to answer all of you out there who were asking why I am going to take apart a perfectly good working iPad. Well, beyond satisfying my own curiosity for wanting to know how the thing works, I believe understanding the hardware inside the device is fundamental to providing good tech support. While it is true that most IT pros will never take one of these things apart, you will just likely send it back to Apple for repair, seeing the hardware inside gives you an understanding of the device as possible points of failure, hopefully making it easier for you to diagnose potential problems. And if the device is out of warranty and you want to replace, say a cracked glass panel or a broken Home button yourself, then you will have a good starting point by watching this video. Also, I intend to dissect the Apple iPad in a way it allows me to put it back together when I am finished. So, hopefully at the end of this video, I will have a fully functional device. You will have to hang around until the end to find out. To begin disassembling the iPad, you will need to take a thin metal blade or a spludger and gently insert it between the front glass panel and the metal case. Now, like the iPhone and iPod Touch, the iPad's glass panel is secured to the case with small clips. As you work your way around the glass case, you should be able t disengage these clips without damaging the front glass panel, something that was a little more difficult to do on the iPhone and iPod Touch. Be prepared however to break a few of the clips in the process. With all the clips disconnected, we get our first look inside the iPad. Now, our next step is to gently remove all the ribbon cables that connect the glass panel to the components within the metal case. There are three cables that connect the front panel assembly to the components within the metal case. The first ribbon cable should pop lose from the main logic board with very little force. The second requires a bit more force to pull out from its connector which should also come free with little effort. And the third, a slightly larger cable is the same style display data cable that Apple uses in the new unibody MacBooks. It has a small handle that you can use to pull it free from the main logic board. At the bottom of the front panel assembly is the Home button. Now, unlike the iPhone and iPod Touch, it looks like you can easily replace a broken Home button by removing those two screws. At the top of the front panel assembly, you have the ambient light sensor and its ribbon cable and next to it, the ribbon cable for the digitizer. Looking at the other half of the iPad, what you will first notice is the very large 3.75 volt lithium-ion battery assembly. Now, you can see how the iPad can deliver those 10 hours of average use. On top of the iPad case, you can see the 3.5-mm headphone jack and built-in microphone. Right next to it, the main logic board which is mostly covered by this metal EMI shield and we will remove this in a minute and look at the chips, but for now, let us continue on around the case. Here, we have the On/Off or Sleep/Wake button, the screen rotation lock, and the volume up and down button. In the center of the iPad separating the two halves of the battery assembly is a large connector. This attaches the Home button, data ports, speakers and more, which is at the button of the iPad to the logic board at the top. Under this connector is also the Broadcom Wi-Fi and Bluetooth card. Moving to the bottom of the iPad's metal case, we find the speaker assembly and the two speakers. This bass tore the metal case and push sound out through this thin screen. Now, here are the contacts for the Home button, just above the data port. And to the side of the data port and the Home button contacts is one of the iPad's Wi-Fi antennas. A second antenna is hidden under the battery assembly matted directly in the center of the iPad over the plastic Apple logo. Now, the last thing worth mentioning here is this connector which doesn't currently have anything attached to it, but might in the 3G version. Now, let's remove the EMI shield from the logic board and look at the chips underneath. Removing the thin metal shield isn't difficult, but does take patience. With the shield removed, we can see the core of the iPad. At the center is the 1-gigahertz Apple A4 processor. Next to it are the two Samsung NAND flash-memory chips. Our test model has 16-gigabytes of memory. You can also see the Broadcom I/O controller and chips from Texas Instruments and NXP. I will provide a list of markings for each of these chips in our cracking open photo gallery that will accompany this video. Well, after about an hour and a half we were able to take the iPad down at this stage and we are stopping here. As I said at the beginning, I wanted to disassemble the iPad in a way that would let me put it back together again. If you want to see more photos of the iPad being taken apart even further, now check out the links to other iPad tear down galleries in the TR Dojo blog. For now, it is time for me to put it all back together again.
Music Bill Detwiler: Well, putting the iPad back together took only about 10 minutes and I am glad to say that everything works perfectly. Now, that is not to say there weren't a few casualties. I broke most of the small metal clips that hold the front panel to the metal case and several of these small rubber cushions which separate the front panel from the back of the metal case also came off. Luckily, I was able to rearrange the unbroken clips to hold the front panel in place. The connection isn't as tight as it was out of the box, but it will work. Also, I damaged the rubber gasket that runs between the front panel and the case and I have marred the actual metal a bit. Now, despite these cosmetic issues, I am extremely pleased with this cracking open. It was much easier than either the iPhone or iPod Touch. And as for final impressions, Apple has built a solid device that I think many will find it useful in both consumer and business environments. Also the iPad seems much easier to repair or at least refurbish than either the iPhone or the iPod Touch. I definitely would not attempt a self repair unless your unit was out of warranty and you are willing to accept the possibility at least of a less than perfect iPad at the end, but overall, the experience wasn't too bad. Well, that does it for this special edition of TR Dojo. Be sure to check out the TR Dojo blog for links to other iPad tear down galleries. And as always, for more--your path to becoming an IT ninja, visit trdojo.techrepublic.com or you can follow me on Twitter at twitter.com slash Bill Detwiler. Thanks for visiting the TR Dojo.
Pause Bill Detwiler: Wo-hoo! It is coming back on. You have no idea how excited I am about this. Look at that. That is right, it was a fifty-fifty shot, either it was going to break, I was going to leave something disconnected, the ribbon cables are going to tear or something wouldn't work, but everything works.
Laughter
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