iFixit dissects the Surface Pro and shows us its repair possibilities
They already did it with Surface RT and now it&39;s the turn of the Pro version of the Microsoft tablet. Like every new gadget on the market that they can get their hands on, the people at iFixit have taken it upon themselves to disassemble the newcomer Surface Pro piece by piece on their famous scale of repairability, which measures the possibilities of self-repair of gadgets, the RT version was close to the approved, but Surface Pro has been in a worse position with barely 1 out of 10."
Despite the physical resemblance of both tablets the disassembly process is significantly differentIn both cases you start by removing the kickstand from the rear, but when it comes to accessing the actual interior of the machine, the Surface Pro shows resistance from the start. To remove the screen, at iFixit they had to use a heat gun to free it from the adhesive with which it is attached to the base of the tablet. There isn&39;t even a warranty sticker to tear off, the way the adhesive remains after the process is proof enough that the Surface Pro has been opened."
Once the screen is removed, the first thing that appears is the small plate that includes the Wacom chip with which the pen works digital included in the tablet. Also visible is the LCD plate manufactured by Samsung and that seems to be similar to the one incorporated in the iPad 2. After removing 23 screws we can remove the edge that surrounds to the plate to which the front camera of the tablet is also attached.But on the way to free the motherboard there are still another 29 screws that hold two metal sides that hold it firmly in place.
After removing all those screws and carefully removing the volume keys and charging port wiring, one can already hold in their hands the motherboard that brings the system to life. To it is attached the SSD with the 64GB or 128GB of total space that has been talked about so much. On the back of the board are two tiny fans that keep the i5-3317U and other internal components cool by circulating air through the multiple slits surrounding the base of the tablet. Attached to this base is the 42Wh 5675 mAh battery made by LG, which, once again, is firmly attached to it with a powerful adhesive.
All of these difficulties cause the Surface Pro to score very low on the repairability scale>.Although the battery and SSD are replaceable, getting to them is too complicated. The LCD is very difficult to remove, there is a lot of adhesive to fight with in the process, there are close to 90 screws to remove and the risk of breaking some of the cables that join the components is very high. In short, whoever wants to be a handyman with Surface Pro is going to have to work hard, for others it is better to go to the technical service."
Via | Engadget Learn more | iFixit
