You will need

* A precision plus head screwdriver
* Maybe a prying tool

Instructions

1. Remove back cover, battery and SIM/SD card(s).
2. Using a precision plus (Philips) head screwdriver, remove the 7 screws as indicated. They are all the same size.

3. Unclip the main board cover around the other edge of the screen bezel. There are 6 main clip points that need to be released so the cover can be lifted out. Be careful on the narrower side sections of the cover. Minimal force is required if unclipped correctly. Use caution not to lose the volume, power button, small rubber mount and the USB socket slider cover.

4. Unplug the white coaxial cable and three flexi-plugs from the main board. Also unstick the power button board from the phone case. This can all be done using a fingernail.

5. Remove the main board.

6. Unplug and remove the camera modules all in one. Unplug the tiny flex cable from the SIM/SD board by hinging the black side of the plug upward then sliding the flex cable out. The black speaker module lifts away. The SIM/SD board is removed by unplugging its flex cable on the underside of the main board, then gently prying it up from the main board to the left and right sides of the flex cable and on the opposite side to the left and right sides of the area where the hinged socket for the speaker flex cable is.

7. The audio units (headphone jack, ear speaker and light sensor) are all connected together via flex cables. Some tape may hold down the flex cable which needs to be peeled up first, then the earphone jack and light sensor lift out. The ear speaker may be glued down, so may need a little more prying to lift out. It all lifts as a single unit.

8. The three circuit boards at the bottom seem to be glued down. They are all connected by non-removable flex cables. There is a flex cable plug on the middle one and the other end of the white coaxial cable on the one on the right. I have not included removal of this in this teardown.

Assembly

Notes

You will need

* T5 Torx screwdriver
* Precision plus head (Phillips) screwdriver
* Prying tool
* Tweezers

Instructions

1. Turn phone off, remove the lower cover and the battery cover. Remove the battery.
2. Remove the camera flash cover. (See video note: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGsRtSEWpmE)

3. Remove 5 torx T5 screws holding the back cover in place. Two in the bottom cover area, two in the battery cover area, one in the camera flash cover area (This screw is longer than the other 4).

4. The volume button PCB is best lifted up before removing the phone cover. You may need to peel the IMEI sticker up to get the volume button PCB to lift upward. Use tweezers to lift it, and a prying tool if required to pry the cover outward a little.

5. Remove the back cover.

6. Remove the small metal cover sitting over the LCD plug, left side of the area covered by the lower cover.

7. Remove 3 torx T5 screws holding down the lower main board. Remove the plastic lower main board cover.

8. Carefully peel up the mylar (silver looking tape) near the LCD plug on the lower main board. It does not need to be completely detached from the device. There was no rubber in the phone I had. It was stuck to the back cover. The small rubber on the mylar remained stuck to it. * Unplug the LCD cable from the lower main board.

9. Remove the coaxial cable frame from the phone. It is located at the top of the lower main board.

10. Remove the rubber from the vibrator mechanism located on the left side of the device (thin red and black wires lead to it) and carefully lift the mechanism from its mount. You do not need to unplug the mechanism from the main board unless required.
*
11. Lift the speaker from the upper main board. (The model I had did not have a microphone rubber, or a microphone, located in the place shown in the original teardown video) *

12. Carefully peel the mylar from the top left corner of the device. It can remain attached to the black cable. Unplug the black and white coxial cables and the flashlight cable (located in the top left corner) from the upper main board. You may not need to remove the reciever and it's cable from the upper main board depending on your circumstances. * Otherwise follow directions in original teardown video to do this. (Remove plug and lift out)

13. Remove the plus head screw from the upper main board, located below where the speaker sat and remove the plastic upper main board cover.

14. Carefully remove camera cover frame and then camera module. They lift upwards. No special tool is required. *

15. * The SIM FPC and its mylar does not need to be removed unless it is being replaced or the lower main board being replaced. It can be lifted out as one unit with the lower main board if desired. Else, remove SIM FPC mylar and the module as per original teardown video.
16. Remove the main black mylar from the middle of the device. (See video note: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6LHhfIs2eA)
17. Remove the screws from the lower main board located just above the LCD socket, and just below the vibrator mechanism.

18. Carefully lift the lower main board from the device. (See video note in step 16 for small detail on this) The lower and upper main boards are connected by two plugs, located above the top of the lower main board. The lower main board can be unplugged from these and lifted out.



19. For further removal please refer to original teardown video as note at beginning of this guide.

Assembly

Assembly is the reverse of this procedure, with these notes:

1. When mounting the lower main board, ensure the two plugs on the ribbon from the upper main board are plugged in securely.
2. When remounting the back cover, ensure that the volume key PCB is lifted up so it can be slotted back into place once the back cover is remounted.

Keywords

HTC Desire HD A9191 mobile cellular cell phone android disassemble disassembly tear down teardown guide step by step instructions with pictures photos images video notes hints tips remove removal main board parts camera cover gps]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120428-040327 2012-04-28T00:00:00Z 2012-04-28T00:00:00Z
Ingredients

2 cups of milk
1/2 cup (80 grams) of plain flour
25 grams of grated tasty cheese

Method

1. Warm milk on stove top, just before milk is at simmer point, remove from heat.
2. Add the flour and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until blended as smoothly as possible.
3. Add cheese and stir until melted through the sauce.
4. Add to lasagne as desired.

Notes

The thickness of the sauce is controlled by the amount of heat placed into the mix. The hotter the milk, the thicker the sauce will become. If the milk is too cool, it may not thicken at all and have lumps through it. Apply more heat if this is the case.

Thickness of the sauce will increase as it cools also.
]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120416-031726 2012-04-16T00:00:00Z 2012-04-16T00:00:00Z
Cosentino showcased a few "large" illusions on AGT, but I was really amazed by his skills with the "smaller" illusions involving card tricks and sleight of hand. While some tricks are easy for adults to work out you can't help but be amazed at his ability to trick your eyes and for a few moments make you wonder, "how the hell did he do that?!", when a card with his name on it is revealed in a helping audience member's hand when it appears as though it should have the audience member's name on it.

Beside the illusions, he is also a trained escapologist and showcases his skill in this. Picking locks blind while contorted up in a tiny tool box and the classical straigh jacket escape to name a few.

The other thing I like about Cosentino is that he almost always refers to his displays as "illusions". Although it may appear there is some out-of-this world power being used it is definitely only an artfully designed trick for the eyes.

For anyone out there wondering whether to go and see the show, I think it is definitely worth it. Especially if you have younger children that can be amazed and perhaps a little confused by it.

My favourite things were his card tricks, and his "broomstick levitation" illusion. (Still cant work out how he does that. Gotta be some counterweight thing going on there somewhere)]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120401-021210 2012-04-01T00:00:00Z 2012-04-01T00:00:00Z Semaphore Kernel onto Samsung Galaxy S running the latest (at time of writing) ICSSGS release, RC 4.2.

My experience with ICSSGS was bittersweet up to this point. First starting with RC 3.1, which I found extremely fast, had a few annoying bugs that were major drawbacks to it. RCs 4.1 and 4.2 reduced the number of bugs but slowed the performance of the system overall. While 3.1 was snappy and visually fast, 4.x were slower, but I found they ran more apps without dropping back to the home screen like 3.1 did.

So I tried to install Semaphore for ICS from their website. Unfortunately, I didn't read carefully the thread on XDA forums and I software bricked my phone. A few hours later after many flashes with Odin and stuffing around in CWM Recovery I was able to get ICS RC4.2 going again. (Hot tip: Don't delete your update.zip from your sdcard!)

So the Semaphore kernel is very simple to install. Just do the following:

1. Download the Semaphore kernel you want from http://www.semaphore.gr/downloads - NOTE: I am running ICS so I used one of the ICS packages. If you are not using ICS, you should be using a different package AND in that case, the installation method is different! My instructions only suit users with ICS installed on their phone!
2. Copy the downloaded ZIP file to the root of your phone's sdcard. I renamed it to something easy like SemICS091.zip (I chose v0.9.1 - choose whatever you like)
2.5 Highly recommended - once the file is copied to the phone, run a file explorer on the phone and check the MD5 sum of the zip file. Confirm it is the same with the MD5 sum on the Semaphore website. This ensures the ZIP file is exactly the same as the one on the website and nothing was corrupted in download/transfer. I used ES File Explorer to do this. It is free from Google Play and you just long tap on the file and there are options in there which lead to checking the MD5 sum.
3. Reboot your phone and select "recovery" mode from the reboot menu. Alternatively, you can switch the phone off then press and hold Volume Up + Home key + Power button to enter CWM Recovery mode.
4. In CWM Recovery, navigate the menu to select to install update from ZIP file on the SD card. Make sure you "select zip to install" from the sdcard and not "install update.zip"
5. Select the Semaphore update ZIP file on the sdcard and confirm to install it. CWM will install the new kernel.
6. Reboot phone. You should see a different boot logo this time, something to do with Semaphone kernel.

Enjoy!

My use so far has found this update to be really good. The phone runs much faster, just like RC 3.1 was.

Another XDA thread also recommends installing Nova Launcher. I'm not a big fan of fancy launchers so this is totally optional but I installed it and find it pretty nice. It has a few additional features that are nice but I will leave that up to you to explore and find out.

Until next update...]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120319-040503 2012-03-19T00:00:00Z 2012-03-19T00:00:00Z
Check out the official page at the Google Code site for files and updating instructions: https://code.google.com/p/ice-cream-sandwich-sgs/

Quick update instructions (from ICSSGS RC 3.1):

1. Download ICS RC4.1 ROM ZIP file from google code site
2. Copy downloaded zip file to root of phone's SD card. Verify file copied perfectly (file sizein bytes, md5 or something)
3. Reboot phone and select recovery mode (hold power button -> Reboot -> Recovery)
4. Follow menu instructions to update from ZIP file on sdcard. New ROM will be installed
5. Follow menu to reboot phone
6. Phone will restart and do some updating. Done!

No Responsibility.]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120207-230844 2012-02-08T00:00:00Z 2012-02-08T00:00:00Z
This is a [almost complete] step by step guide on how to update an unrooted, stock firmware Samsung Galaxy S running Gingerbread 2.3.3 to ICS 4.0.3 RC1.

Standard disclaimer people. No responsibility taken for using or following this guide and the consequences of doing such. These steps worked for me and are based of a number of guides already out there on the internet. I just compiled the steps into 1 guide for my personal archives if I ever have to flash back to a stock ROM and do this again.

Note that the rooting package says firmware version XXJVP. My firmware was a stock 2.3.3 Optus firmware updated via Kies in Australia. It was XWJVN and this rooting method worked for me. Ensure your phone works with this rooting method before doing it (ask on forums or something)

Overview

1. root 2.3.3
2. Backup your apps and data with titanium backup
3. Ensure network lock is off.
4. update-cm-7.1.0-GalaxyS-signed 98.2mb
5. ICS_4.0.3.0(RC3.1)_GalaxyS_Full 145mb

Root 2.3.3

1. Get XXJVP-Complete-Rooting-Package-1.zip from beardeddonkey.com and extract.
2. Ensure connectivity work by having Kies installed on PC and having connected the phone via USB to Kies at least once.
3. Put phone into download mode: Turn off phone, press Volume Down + Home + Power. Screen will go to download mode.
4. Run Odin on the PC
5. Plug the USB cable in.
6. In Odin, the phone connection should be found. There may be more than one port found. Ensure Re-Partition is NOT CHECKED, click the PDA button and select the CF-Root-XX_JVP_AAD_RFS.tar file.
7. Press Start button in Odin. Phone will be rooted and it will reboot automatically.


Backup Using Titanium Backup

1. After phone boots go to: Menu, Settings, Applications, Development, turn on USB debugging.
2. Go to Market and install Titanium Backup for free.
3. Run Titanium Backup, go to Backup/Restore and backup all apps and system data.
4. Make backup(s) of the data backup, either on external SD card and/or PC/online.


Ensure network lock is off

1. *#7465625#* type this into the phone number pad on the phone and check if network lock is off before flashing to CyanogenMod.
2. (Dont know steps to turn it off because mine was)


Update to CyanogenMod 7.1.0 (Gingerbread 2.3.7)

1. Download CyanogenMod ROM update-cm-7.1.0-GalaxyS-signed.zip from beardeddonkey.com
2. Ensure Clockwork Mod app is installed (CWM) and in app list.
3. Copy update-cm-7.1.0-GalaxyS-signed.zip to the root folder on the SD card in the phone. Rename it to update.zip.
4. Install busybox (by Stephen, free edition) from the Market. Run busybox, allow su access.
5. Run CWM app, allow su access.
6. Power off the phone and boot to recovery mode: Volume Up + Home + Power. Phone will appear to boot up as per usual but will go to ClockworkMod Recovery screen. Use Volume Up/Down to move up and down list, Home button to select.
7. If you want to backup everything, go to Backup and Restore -> Backup. System will backup to internal SD.
8. Select "wipe data/factory reset", select "Yes -- delete all user data". System will wipe all data. The formatting takes a while and may seem like it has frozen. It hasn't. Let it do its thing.
9. Select "wipe cache partition", select "Yes - Wipe Cache". System will wipe cache.
10. Select "advanced", select "Wipe Dalvik Cache", select "Yes - Wipe Dalvik Cache". System will wipe Dalvik cache.
11. Select "install zip from sdcard", select "choose zip from sdcard", scroll down to "update.zip" (note that Linux puts Capitals first. lowercase names are further down the list), select "Yes - Install update.zip".
12. The phone will reboot and have a cyanogen splash screen. If the system drops into CWM Recovery mode again (this time with blue text) do step 8 - 11 again. To find the update.zip you may need to look on the "internal sd card" as it seems to confuse the internal and external sd cards.
13. The phone should now be running Gingerbread 2.3.7 Cyanogen Mod 7.1.0.


Update to ICS 4.0.3 rc3.1

1. Download ICS_4.0.3.0(RC3.1)_GalaxyS_Full.zip from beardeddonkey.com
2. Copy file from PC onto the root folder of the internal SD card. Rename it to update.zip
3. Hold power button on the phone and select Reboot, Recovery Mode.
4. Once the CWM-based Recovery screen appears, select "wipe data/factory reset" and confirm.
5. Select "wipe cache partition" and confirm.
6. Select "advanced", "wipe dalvik cache" and confirm.
7. Select "install zip from sdcard", "choose zip from sdcard", select "update.zip" and press Home key. Confirm.
8. System will reboot. If the phone goes into a reboot loop: remove battery to turn off phone. Hold Volume Up + Home + Power to enter recovery mode again. Repeat steps 4 - 7. After ROM installs select "Go Back", "reboot system now".
9. Phone should now boot to ICS 4.0.3 rc3.1 :))))))))) (first boot up takes a while)


Notes

* The files available for this guide are not my work. I have only placed them here as a convenience to myself, not to steal other people's glory. All glory be to the authors of the files! If you are paranoid I may have altered the files and put viruses in them yo ucan google the filenames and find other/original copies like I did.
* The setting for allowing applications from Unknown Sources in ICS is under Settings, Security. Not under Settings, Applications. You need to tick this option to use Titanium Backup to restore your phone data.
* Titanium doesn't seem to work correctly in ICS. It always complains that Unknown Sources setting is not ticked even when it is.]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120125-182911 2012-01-26T00:00:00Z 2012-01-26T00:00:00Z
Recently I went through my Toshiba L650 and removed a whole stack of software I don't use anymore. I found a whole list of Toshiba software that I would normally leave on the system but this time I decided to compile a list of the software, what it does and whether I decided to keep it installed or not.

The formatting of the table is difficult to get on this size webpage, so here is a link to the original file.

You can download the original document from my Google Docs: Toshiba Software - What it all is

Below is a list of the text contained in the file (for web searching reasons)

Program Name
Description
Did I keep it?
Toshiba Assist
Contains a collection of shortcuts to various Toshiba Utilities.
No
Toshiba Bulletin Board
Contains a collection of shortcuts to various Toshiba Utilities and some functionality like accessing help topics and memo notes etc.
No
Toshiba Config Free
Software that aims to simplify connecting and troubleshooting wireless network connections.
No
Toshiba Disc Creator
Disc burning software.
No
Toshiba eco Utility
Monitors and can control system settings to improve battery life of the laptop. Also tracks system power consumption in real time and displays power usage history.
Yes
Toshiba Face Recognition
User login authentication using face recognition software.
No
Toshiba Hardware Setup
?
Yes
Toshiba HDD/SSD Alert
Monitors drive SMART Predict Failure function and alerts user to backup data in the event of a failure being predicted.
Yes
Toshiba Media Controller
Control your music, pictures and videos by streaming content to any compatible device that supports the Digital Media Renderer (DMR) functions in your home.
No
Toshiba Media Controller Plugin
A plugin associated with Media Controller.
No
Toshiba PC Health Monitor
Monitors system components and shows information such as power consumption, battery health and charge level, CPU temp and fan speed.
Yes
Toshiba Recovery Media Creator
Utility for creating system restore files that can be saved to different media formats like CD, DVD, USB drive etc. These files would be useful if HDD failure occurred and the system restore files were not retrievable from the HDD.
No
Toshiba Reel Time
Utility that displays files accessed by date in descending order in a “thumbnail reel view”. Has some sort/filtering options, and some shortcuts to programs.
No
Toshiba Service Station
Automatically search for TOSHIBA software updates or other alerts from TOSHIBA that are specific to your computer system and its programs.
No
Toshiba Software Modem
(by LSI Corporation) a software modem does the job of a hardware modem but is done in the software.
No
Toshiba Speech System *
Consists of a voice-composition application (text-to-speech) that analyzes documents and reads them aloud using an easily heard and understandable, and a speech-recognition application that recognizes the words you speak into a microphone. This allows you to control and operate various Windows programs by voice command rather than using the keyboard or a mouse.
No
Toshiba Supervisor Password
Utility to set/manage the Toshiba supervisor system.
No
Toshiba Value Added Package
Contains several diagnostic utilities, as well as Power Management Capabilities and also contains the utilities which let you use the FN function keys that control Display Brightness, etc
Yes
Toshiba Web Camera Application
A toolbar that contains shortcuts to webcam related settings and functions.
Yes]]> http://www.beardeddonkey.com/home/index.php?entry=entry120122-204348 2012-01-23T00:00:00Z 2012-01-23T00:00:00Z