Ipad Screen not working.

poshniallo

Hi

I dropped my ipad, but there is no external damage - the screen etc are all fine. It's in a strong case, but not quite strong enough.

However, the screen isn't working. All I can get out of it is some dim light, and then once for a few seconds a burst of multicolored lines appeared. Googling says this is consistent with damaged screen connections.

The internal workings seem fine - I connected it to iTunes, backed it up, restored it to factory, and then restored the backup. No effect on the screen. It's still the same.

My question is, is this the kind of thing a private repair store can fix, or do I need to go to Apple? Where I live Apple are very expensive and hard to access, but there are private repair stores around.

Ta.

bowen

You could take it to the private repair store, you'll probably need to end up spending nearly as much as a new iPad so keep that in mind.

It's also going to void a warranty if you still have it. But they might be able to fix something like that for $100-300, rough ballpark, depending on how bad it is. If it's just a broken connector it'll probably be <$100.

syndalis

What model iPad is it? If it is a "new / 3" or earlier, just replace it with the same model for what you will pay for anyone to fix it, likely... or invest that money towards a newer device.

If it is an iPad 4, Air or Retina Mini, I would definitely get it repaired. Reputable repair shops will be able to fix any of the issues present in those models, and it will cost the same or less than Apple, most likely.

If it is an Air 2 or a Mini 3, you need to go to apple with that, because the new parts and processes are not really finalized for the independent folks yet and the stuff that does exist is kind of cheap and terrible. And even though the Mini 3 isn't all that different, a lot of the stuff related to the cabling and connectors is.

poshniallo

It's an iPad 2, 16gb, Wifi. An old one

I called a shop and they quoted me 15000 yen (about $150) for repair.

So now I am thinking about wandering around Akihabara and seeing if I can get a used iPad mini 2. I don't really want to spend the extra money, but the mini 1 seems to have roughly the same innards as the iPad 2, and some recent software doesn't like that.

Hevach

$150 is a lot cheaper than I generally charge for the same thing (and I'm notorious for underquoting nasty repairs). I pad my ipad repair prices a bit - there's a couple parts, particularly the wifi antenna and digitizer, that are very easy to break in the process. And if the digitizer breaks, there goes your weekend picking tiny glass shards out of all the glue and tape.

poshniallo

Thanks for all the advice. I ended up ordering an iPad Mini 2 from a used store. Excellent service, they even went into the store, took the ipad off the shelf, uploaded some photos for me to check, and asked if it looked OK to me, before getting to the billing part of the transaction.