Our community center had an electronics amnesty day last weekend. I went to drop off some old parts and ended up staying to help. There was a whole box of PS4 consoles people were tossing out. Every single one had the same problem, overheating from bad thermal paste. It's a ten minute fix with a cheap tube of paste and some isopropyl alcohol. I took a few home and had three running by dinner time. The others just needed a fan clean, which took another five minutes. It's kind of funny how often the easiest fix gets missed. Now I have extra consoles to give away or use for parts.
My guitar amp had a constant buzz that was driving me nuts. I found a loose ground wire and just wrapped it tight with some aluminum foil tape, problem solved.
I was just trying to watch a film, but when the remote died, my buddy handed it to me like I was on call. It hit me that my repair rep follows me everywhere, even during downtime. (I used a spare battery from my keychain, by the way.)
I was working on a speaker and a spring flew off. A fridge magnet found it quick, how do you handle small parts?
In my local repair shop, tablet repairs have doubled this year. We see mostly cracked screens from falls and worn out batteries that won't hold a charge. A customer brought in an old tablet she uses for her online classes. It would not turn on after a year of heavy use. I found the battery was swollen and needed replacement. Parts for some models are getting cheaper, which helps. But newer tablets have glued parts that take longer to fix. This trend keeps us busy and learning new methods.
I just finished repairing a Sony Walkman from the 80s for a teenager. She said she loves the sound quality over digital music. It took me a bit to find the right belt drive, but it was a fun challenge. I've done four of these in the past two months. Are you getting more requests for retro gear fixes too?
Those components can breathe life into other broken gear.
I've had mixed results with just an iron and some flux. Take this with a grain of salt, but does anyone have a reliable method?