iPhone Logic Board Repair (2016)

1. Introduction

What is logic board repair and when is it necessary?

The logic board of a iPhone is the like the organs inside a human body. It contains most of the hardware needed for a IPhone to function. Ironically enough most repair shops lack the knowledge to perform logic boards repairs. They focus on the most common repairs: screen and battery replacements. Even Apple doesn’t do this kind of repairs. When a iPhone gets water damaged or suffers a hard drop changes are that the logic boards needs repair. So there seems to be a business opportunity here. Asides from the addicting thrill of repairing a iPhone logic board of course.

But what does it take to start repairing logic boards? Basically three things: Tools, knowledge and experience. Let’s start with the tools: The smallest repairable parts on a logic board are hardly seen with the naked eye. So what you need is good microscope. They range in price from 200 dollars minimum to a couple of thousand. Personally i use a 200 dollar microscope and doing fine. But if you want to do all kinds of logic board repairs you’ll need a 500 dollar minimum microscope. Secondly what you need is a soldering- and hot air station for removing and replacing parts. Thirdly what you need is a multimeter to test parts and circuit lines. Finally you’ll need a DC power supply to see the board powering on, and for testing short circuits. These are the main tools. Of course you need some extra tools for running the repair process like a tweezers and heat resistant tape.

But where to get the know-how? With this book you have a good start and overview of what is needed for logic board repair. I will further guide you to other sources of knowledge. Most important: the iPhone schematics and the repair solutions offered by Filip Pusca of Itelsa Solutions. Schematics give you a blueprint of the logic board is build. It shows the components, their values, and how they are connected. It’s like a city map with roads, bridges and houses. The official iPhone schematics are not publicly made available by Apple, and the ones on the internet are leaked . personally i avoid them and use a Chinese tool with operates just like the schematics instead. The ZXW tool.

The tool comes with some great extras: as well. The tool shows how each component on a circuit line is connected, and it also show the value components, and the positioning of IC’s.

In this work i will lay out the basics of iPhone logic board repair.