iPad 2 Diagnosis

February 16, 2014 4:07 AM

Before I drive the 1.5 hours to the nearest Apple Store, any ideas on what could cause this problem on my wife's iPad?

iPad 2, no problems before. Suddenly, a display issue. Mostly I get this screen, but the screen will also blue or black out occasionally. I've tried a restore (not really sure why), and just curious if anyone knows what this is before I make the long trek...

posted by kuanes to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

Best answer: Definitely a hardware issue. iPads are so tightly integrated that there's no outboard display controller or anything, EVERYTHING is crammed on one board. Which is to say, you're having a logic board issue. This isn't really something you can diagnose at home.

On most devices i'd say to reseat the LVDS cable for the display just because it's ridiculous how often any sort of problem like this is solved by reseating a cable(or a socketed chip, or whatever depending on the device), but you actually need a heatgun and a bunch of grunting to get into an ipad 2, so yea, this ones on apple.

Another thing worth noting is that apple doesn't even repair these, not even as a depot repair. They just send them back to china to be remanufactured. The genius at the store is pretty much going to look at it and go "Yep, it's broken" and either hand you a new one if you're under warranty, or offer you a refurb for $ otherwise.
posted by emptythought at 4:25 AM on February 16, 2014 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Thanks, emptythought. I had a feeling that was the case. It's over two years old, so I'm guessing the warranty is shot...
posted by kuanes at 4:47 AM on February 16, 2014

It's worth a try at the store anyway, though. If it's a known issue, and not due to abuse or damage, Apple has been known to cut people breaks from time to time. You might get lucky.
posted by dinger at 5:06 AM on February 16, 2014 [2 favorites]

Did you get it wet? Looks like a "I got this wet" type of issue. I have had many iDevices over the years.
posted by squirbel at 7:55 AM on February 16, 2014

If you bought it with a credit cars and still have the receipt, a lot of cards will extend the warranty on purchases for an extra year. This usually just entails paying for the repair and then getting reimbursed by the card though.
posted by The Elusive Architeuthis at 9:01 AM on February 16, 2014

That looks super cool, actually, although I understand it's not great when you want to actually use the iPad. I agree it's definitely a hardware issue and you'll want to talk to them at the store.
posted by AppleTurnover at 2:10 PM on February 16, 2014

Response by poster: I'm not sure how, but one of these NOT Apple repair stores fixed it for my wife. Will follow up with the "how" if anyone else is searching for this problem.
posted by kuanes at 10:23 AM on February 17, 2014