Broken Screen, Broken Heart

February 17, 2013 12:03 PM

Cracked screen on a Kindle Fire HD. Can it be repaired?

I received a Kindle Fire HD for Christmas. I cracked the screen a few weeks ago. I dropped it once. It was fine and no damage. A couple weeks later I noticed a crack. It's fully functional but the crack is upsetting.

I don't think the purchaser bought a warranty. I went through Amazon Kindle Help pages and can't find repair services. I am willing to pay for repairs. Has anyone had their Kindle repaired? Is it possible? Thanks for any information.

posted by Fairchild to computers & internet (8 answers total)

Contact Kindle customer service (phone is best). Most likely they will offer you a discount on a new one. Kindle CS is awesome, talk to them.
posted by batikrose at 12:07 PM on February 17 [3 favorites]

Thank you batikrose. I called them and you are right, they were very professional. They offered me a replacement for $250. Original price $299. I might live with the crack. Thanks for your answer.
posted by Fairchild at 12:34 PM on February 17

A lot of third party repair places will probably be able to fix it. If they charge you less than $250 is, of course, the question, but odds that it can be fixed are good. I know I several places I talked to offered Kindle repair.... just not my old kindle keyboard.
posted by Jacen at 12:38 PM on February 17

If there is a crack yet it is fully functional, then the crack is probably in the protective glass of the case, rather than in the LCD screen. I haven't taken a Fire apart, but I'd assume the case glass and the LCD screen are completely separate elements. If so, I'm guessing this may be a repair that you could do yourself, if you can purchase a broken kindle (with undamaged glass) from ebay, or in some other way obtain a replacement case or piece of glass.

(I know of someone who replaced the broken glass in their (large) tablet by getting a window glass supplier to cut a sheet to size. It lacked an anti-glare coat that the original had, but it worked. That blunt approach isn't really an option in devices like yours where the glass edges aren't covered by a bezel, but I thought you might like to hear that replacing case elements yourself is doable.)
posted by anonymisc at 12:52 PM on February 17

Thanks for the suggestions. My husband has replaced a broken iTouch screen with help from a YouTube video tutorial. I don't know if I want to go down that road.

The customer service person said that the Kindle I own has Gorilla Glass and that it's very durable. I wonder if I bring it to a place like this UBREAKIFIX.COM will it be gorilla glass? Their charge is $89. I'll have to ask. I might live with it. I haven't told my husband that the screen is cracked. He bought for me. He won't be angry but hate that I wasn't able to keep it nice for at least a year.
posted by Fairchild at 12:59 PM on February 17

I would definitely keep looking for ways to fix it. Too bad Amazon can't do better than that for discount, they used to (on original fire). Best of luck to you.
posted by batikrose at 1:04 PM on February 17 [1 favorite]

With devices like these it usually isn't worthy trying to repair, because repair would cost more than replacement. (There's no economy of scale on the repair process.)
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 2:12 PM on February 17 [1 favorite]

Exactly -- the margins on electronics at this price point are so low there isn't much that you're going to get in "give" from the OEM. (It's been alleged many times that Amazon is actually losing money on every Kindle as it is.) I would get it repaired however possible -- even if it isn't "gorilla" glass -- and then make sure I got one of the many available protective covers.
posted by dhartung at 3:05 AM on February 18