If you’re depending on your iPhone to do home inspections, it had better work. If your phone is acting glitchy or has been damaged, there are a few simple solutions that can save you some work time stress. Here are some easy fixes for common iPhone problems.
Problem: The home button doesn’t work.
Solution: Use accessibility features.
Unreliable home buttons are one of the most common problems home inspectors have with several different editions of iPhones. Lucky for all of us, the cure is simple as pie. What many users don’t know is that the iPhone comes equipped with an array of impressive accessibility features designed for users with physical disabilities. One of these features is a function that allows users (that’s you) to sidestep the home button entirely and replace it with an on-screen button that accesses your voice control, lock screen, and volume buttons as well as provides a direct line to your home screen.
If you’ve got a faulty home button, tap on “Settings,” then “General.” From there, scroll down to “Accessibility” and scroll even further down to “AssistiveTouch.” Once Assistive Touch is on, you should see a black box with a white button appear on your home screen. This will always be on your screen and will allow you to access your home screen from any app. Here’s a video demonstrating how:
The Problem: Your phone took a dip
The Solution: Dry that sucker out
Water is the enemy to the iPhone but accidents happen and sometimes phones get wet. There are waterproof iPhone cases and rescue products on the market that are designed to help recover waterlogged phones, but in the likely event that you don’t have a rescue kit, MacWorld.com recommends keeping your phone off and leaving it in a container or dry rice overnight. You can also try using a hair dryer to get some of the water out before it causes more damage. Neither of these solutions work 100 percent of the time, but they have been known to save some devices. Whatever you do, just don’t turn the device on if water is an issue.
The Problem: The battery is dead.
The Solution: Replace it.
Apple will replace your, but it’s going to cost you. Another way is to do it yourself and buy a far less expensive battery kit online. (You can get started here. Make sure you purchase the kit that is specific to your phone as parts differ between iPhone iterations). Most kits come with a oh-so-tiny screwdriver which you’ll need to remove the back panel of the iPhone as well as a suction cup or prying tool designed to help you remove the old battery. To get to the old battery, turn the phone off and use the screwdriver to remove the even tinier two screws at the base of you phone (right next to the speakers) and to remove the screw holding the old battery in place. From there, pry or suction the old battery out, slip the new one in and replace the screws. Voila. Your phone is like new. This walk through gives you a first hand battery replacement demo in under five minutes:
The Problem: A broken screen.
The Solution: A brand new screen.
A cracked iPhone screen is almost a right of passage for any home inspector who relies on their phone. A replacement in a store can run you a couple hundred dollars, but a replacement screen purchased online is almost laughably cheap in comparison. If you’ve replaced the battery, you’ve already got the tools necessary for this job. Like battery replacement, throwing on a new screen requires turning the phone off, removing the bottom two screws and pulling off the old screen using a suction cup and/or prying tool. From there, you’ll need to remove more screws inside the phone. Exactly how many screws varies dramatically depending on which version of the phone you’re carrying. The easiest way to walk you through how to replace an iPhone screen is simply to watch someone else do it. Here’s an explanation of how to replace a screen on an iPhone 5:
And a longer one on replacing a screen on an iPhone 4: