Einleitung

More power, more screen, more battery, more speed. What does all that really mean? More heat. So how do you get all of that heat out of a device like a smart phone? It's not like you can add a fan or a large liquid cooling system... let's see how the magic is done.

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    • Hi everyone, I'm Greg. I design thermal solutions for consumer electronics for a living. I thought this would be a fun community to share and learn with. This is my first tear down I am posting so I will try and get better with time. I welcome any feed back and comments that you might have! Thanks, and enjoy!

    • Here it is...fresh from my friend in the Far East. Triple camera and squishy protective cover included!

    • Full disclaimer: I'm not going to be looking into the detail of components on the boards in this tear down, unless that is specifically asked for. This will be all about the thermal solution.

    • That being said, this teardown will be a good guide to get you into the device for repairing whatever you need to. :)

    Do you know where I can get an OEM camera lens? Specifically I bought a used Mate 20 X and the camera flash has no diffuser on it. Just the bare LED with the glass over it. I need the glass lens which has the diffuser or if the diffuser is a separate piece or the back glass cover with the lens and diffuser.

    Paul Levenhagen -

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    • No visible exterior fasteners...seems pretty standard now-a-days. Looks like we need some heat. They say it can handle heat...how much? Just to get here took me 25 min...I started at the bottom.

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    • ~30min later, success! That was a lot of effort. But, now we get to see what kind of guts this machine has!

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    • Right away, we have a hidden land mine. But, to be honest, expected. The fingerprint sensor has a ribbon cable that attaches to the motherboard (somewhere).

    • Thankfully, this is a very long and flexible cable, making it simple enough to dispatch.

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    • There we have it! Our first foray into the thermal solution of this beast! For the uninitiated, this is graphite. It is covered in black plastic, but it is an incredible thermal conductor.

    • Take note here...if you are ever to do work on these (or any smart phone today) take special care around this material. It is critical to the thermal stability of the device!

    • Did I mention is it flexible? Plus, 3X the thermal conductivity of Copper! Cool stuff.

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    • They always find ways to thin things down in these phones, so lets keep on digging.

    • The flash came loose a little while taking off the back cover. Just make note of that.

    • The long copper colored ribbon cable going across the graphite part will need to be removed, carefully.

    • With a little heat and careful tugging, the cable and graphite separate without issue.

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    • Finally some fasteners! A lot actually, 10 just for the mother boards plastic cover. There is a hidden screw under a white security sticker.

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    • Standard ribbon cable attachments here need to be disengaged to get the PCB out. I prefer plastic spludgers. :)

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    • It always amazes me how small the PCBs of these smart phones have gotten!

    • There is a clip cast into the metal chassis on the left side of the PCB. That needs to be addressed to remove the board.

    • It will try and stick in place due to some thermal interface material that is holding it down.

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    • Battery is next. So we address the large ribbon cable traversing its expanse.

    • Just three screws, and all the same size as before!

    • (OK I admit, I skipped a lot of detail here. But suffice it to say, the little battery tabs labeled in Chinese were not very helpful. So I just jammed a card under it. I used minimal heat to make it happen.)

    • Yay! The battery is gone! It was still easier than most of the new Samsungs...

    Can you please show us how big or small are the dual firing speakers on this phone? Are they equal in size?

    Taufik Hidayatullah -

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    • OK, still no signs of anything hiding, but in my experience, there is usually a thermal solution dedicated to the display. Time to go digging!

    • Another 30min minimum heat and careful prying exercise in patience here.

    • But your patience (and massively powerful heat gun) will be rewarded. I started at the ear speaker and slowly worked a chisel blade Exacto-knife into the gap. It was incredibly delicate work. Note how thin the bezel is. I'm shocked at how powerful the adhesive was on this one.

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    • Here we have the cooling solution for the OLED display.

    • On the right is a small copper tape that has some EM shielding material involved.

    • On the left we have a large sheet of graphite again, and some smaller copper strips as well.

    • But on closer inspection, I am seeing what looks like something hidden below the graphite...

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    • Look at that! With a little heat to carefully remove the flexible graphite, there is a thin (400micron) vapor chamber!

    • When looking at the location, it seems to be drawing heat from the hotter top side of the phone and drawing it down to the cooler bottom side of the device.

    • I will tear into the vapor chamber at a later date to update you on the internal structure.

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    • There we have it! Final tally:

    • Vapor Chamber

    • Large piece of flexible graphite to spread out hot spots on the back of the device.

    • Large piece of flexible graphite to keep the OLED display in an isothermal state.

    • Several smaller pieces of copper foil to distribute heat, and provide some more grounding points for the device.

    • If you have any questions please leave me a comment! Thanks for checking this out!

    • Quick Edit. Added an image of the battery per request in the comments. Cheers!

gregkramer

Mitglied seit: 06/06/12

566 Reputation

20 Kommentare

This is a great teardown, Greg! Thanks for sharing!

Taylor Dixon -

Agreed, this is awesome!

Jeff Suovanen -

Nice work. I guess you reassembled it—did it still work?

Tobias Isakeit -

It does still power on! The ultimate test of a successful tear down!

gregkramer -

Great guide. Wasn’t even sure what this was til I saw the phone. Amazing how much can fit into these already tiny devices.

Daniel Powers -

Thank you very much~!!

Can you show me the battery picture?

I wanna check some information of the battery.

Heejoon Moon -

Heejoon, I added a battery image. Hope it helps!

gregkramer -

Thank you for doing this. I cracked the screen on mine. Can the front screen be removed and replaced without having to remove the back cover? I wasn't sure if you could get to the cable for the screen.

mshawnlane -

Hey mshawnlane, thanks for checking it out. Unfortunately no, the screen cannot be replaced without going through the back of the device. The flex circuit travels through the mid-plate chassis of the device. That means that even thought you could remove the display first, then cut the flex cable, to attach a new one, you need to go through the back cover.

Just be extra careful when you do get to the point of removing the display. This phone has the strongest adhesive holding on a display I have ever encountered. Patience is key! Cheers!

gregkramer -

Thank you @gregkramer for your reply to my question.

mshawnlane -

Thanks for that!

I was wondering about water resistance, do for instance the USB-C port and headphone jack have seals?

J M -

Hey @iliketoplay , since the screen on my Mate 20 shows some cracks but is otherwise still fully functional I was wondering if you knew wether it would be possible to replace the glass cover of the screen without having to replace the whole display unit, as that would be quite expensive.

Also thank you so much for this teardown, I imagine it will be quite helpful when disassembling my phone!

Benjamin Rübsamen -

I would not want to try to remove the glass from the OLED. I have done it a couple times back in the days of the Samsung S4, it was a terrible pain in the butt, and for a less than optimal result. If a display swap is needed, I would just try to purchase an entire unit.

gregkramer -

I have to admit I really like this phone yes it's large but %#*@ is it awesome and super fast to

david cantrell -

My nfc has malfunction after my phone drop, wich part to replace?

Ranger -

Hi, thanks for this great walk through, I only need to replace the battery (I hope) can I skip step 1 to 8?

Sincerely

Serge

serge-the -

Serge,

You really need to remove the graphite layer, and get the PCB cover off (Step 7). That exposes the battery connector. Just FYI, when i removed the battery, the pull-tabs really didn’t work out well for me. I ended up using some solvent and quite a bit of gentle prying with a credit-card shaped tool.

Good luck!

gregkramer -

Thanks a lot for the teardown. I am interested in the exact position of the GNSS antenna. Is it visible in any of the pictures you show here?

Barnbold -

Do we have to remove the motherboard in order to replace the battery? Thanks.

teekuang -

华为20x 我买不到电板

hoohengtiewfoon -