As I mentioned
over in this thread, I recently had an incident where I broke the screen on my iPhone. It still worked, but it had a large, and obvious, crack that ran down the full face of the device, as well as another smaller crack at the bottom near the home button.
After some Google searching and panic, I found a few options for repairing the phone (which was well-past the end of its one-year warranty). The cheapest option was to buy a replacement component from either ifixit.com or directfix.com and crack the case open and fix it myself. There were a few different options here, ranging in price from $40 (for a challenging repair involving melting glue with a blow dryer and lots of other steps), to $70 for the option I was going to go with (which looked slightly challenging, but not bad for a technical minded person), and $109 for a pretty simple "full screen replacement". The other main option was to take it to an Apple Store, where they'd replace the glass while you wait for a hefty $199 (or more likely, just swap you for a refurb unit).
Then I found
iResQ, which is an authorized apple service vendor. They offer a program where you can send your iPhone in and they will repair it for you THE SAME DAY they receive it, and then ship it right back out. They also handle iPods, many kinds of Laptops, and PSPs, among other devices, though different services have different timeframes and conditions. I was QUITE nervous about shipping the device out to someone I've never dealt with before, but I decided that having a 90-day warranty on the repair job, and having an expert do it in clean and dust-free conditions would be a valuable benefit. Plus, it wasn't that much more expensive than doing it myself (especially since I'd have ended up needing a few tools). They have a deal right now where Broken Glass/Digitizer replacement (when the glass is broken, and maybe the touch input doesn't work right, but the LCD panel itself behind the glass is fine) is $79 with same-day turnaround. After paying an extra $20 to cover overnight UPS shipping both-ways, I packed up my phone last Thursday AM and sent it off.
The phone just came back today (Monday) on the UPS truck, and I am very pleased. The phone is repaired quite nicely. I wouldn't quite say "good as new", but it is very close, and I'd say in better shape than it was before I threw it across the parking lot (by accident, of course). The only visual clue that it has been repaired is that the metal ring around the screen is very, very slightly separated from the plastic on the bottom right corner (about the width of a hair), and there is a slight bit of rubber poking up a tiny bit on the left side of the glass itself (there is a black rubber, or maybe silicon, mount around the glass anyway, and it is just ever-so-slightly bent out of whack). Neither of these flaws are bad AT ALL. The rubber part isn't even above the level of the glass (you can't feel it at all), and you really need to put your eye way in there to even see it.
The glass itself is perfect, and there is now absolutely no dust under the screen (which I was worried about). I had a few dust particles under the screen before and they were annoying, so at least it fixed that too! The service was exactly as described on their site. I sent the phone via Overnight Express UPS (using the label they emailed that I printed out). They received the phone Friday morning, my account was updated as it was in progress, and they sent me a tracking number immediately when it was sent back out via overnight UPS later that day. Had my time not straddled a weekend, it would have been back in 3 days total.
It came back packed well in a box obviously designed specifically for iPhones. It has a 90-day warranty where they will cover any problems with the screen free of charge. All-in-all, I am VERY pleased with their service and would happily recommend them to anyone else so unfortunate to have broken their iPhone or iPod in a similar manner.
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Topic: iPhone/iPod broken? iResQ Gets My Seal of Approval (Read 2101 times)