Seeing how a lot of Samsungs products are engineered it boggles my mind that Apple can have a very similar product yet over-engineer it to the point of being nearly unrepairable.
I don't think apple is over-engineering its product, they do that for a reason. I have a exact same watch and never took it into shower, however, after 9 months of daily use, samsung's crappy adhesive fails and the watch's ecg sensor and hrm sensor stopped working. I won't purchase any samsung products anymore.
Apple wants more money, but Samsung wants more customers. So it makes more sense that Samsung sells replacement parts while Apple wants to sell more devices.
2:01 "Do not disassemble your device. The water- and dust-resistant features of the device can be damaged." Traditional wrist watches that are waterproof have a rubber or silicone O-ring under the back (and/or crystal face) and the crown. When they are put in place, they are rubbed in some silicone lube to reduce friction against the rings while being assembled. When such a watch is opened up, the rings invariably get damaged in some way because the lube would be long gone. So the usual practice while being serviced is to replace the rings using the same method as at assembly. You can see this being done in countless videos on YT. Suggest Wristwatch Revival channel or The Nekkid Watchmater channel to understand what I mean. With this watch, the back doesn't screw on (although it is screwed down) so there would be no real friction against the waterproof seal. It doesn't even look like the traditional O-ring. However, it might still be a good idea to put some silicone lube along it, in case any part of it is worn. If there is a replacement part for it, it would probably be a good idea to get a new one. I would also examine the buttons. They would have to be waterproofed as well. After all, salt water did get in.
@@two_tier_gary_rumain I'm assuming that they thought that you stole the info from a video, then wrote it down as a comment without linking the video itself. Either that, or they were grumpy that you didn't link to Wristwatch Revival and Nekkid Watchmater's channel?
@@iddra1868 that's not really true, go look at ifixit's smartphone repairability scores and they are almost at the bottom, often featuring heavy adhesive. of few redeeming qualities, at least they don't (yet) pair components like apple does...
@@Jazzy-kz6wd I would rather remove adhesive than a fragile screen. The most important thing to me is that you can easily replace all the components without breaking any others. That makes it a 10/10 in my book.
I've literally just repaired that same watch a couple days ago! Disassembly process is a breeze compared to other smartwatches, and internal layout is very sensible. Mine developed a weird touchscreen issue, so I bought a not working unit and swapped all of the components from my watch to a case with display of a dead one, so at least I got my daily watch working fine again. That non-working unit turned out to be water damaged and corrosion got up to button contacts, so I ran a jumper wire from a button to the board, cleaned it and assembled it in the case with bad display. It booted, but touchscreen is still dead on the bottom half. But hey, that's one and a half working units, that's fine by me :3
A word on salt: Salt is a highly soluble mineral and will crystallize as soon as it dries up. Salt is also a great conductor of electricity and such must be REMOVED from electronic product. This is done by either wicking it away or diluting it away. I saw you do neither. On the contrary, you managed to smear it over a greater surface making it much more likely to cause problems in the future. That combined with no seal replacements does not sound like a particularly proficient repair to me. I hope you find the time to read this piece of constructive criticism.
Samsung does not accept the warranty if water gets in to watch. But it happens when you swim in the pool very often, the water-resistant is 5 ATM and Samsung let users swim with it in commercials and manual instructions, so this is a problem where Samsung doesn't take responsibility and lies to users. I think is much better to buy a Huawei gt2 for swimming, it is also 5 ATM but I did around 100 km in the water and the watch still works, not like active 2 which stopped working after a few minutes in the pool.
Just a hint. If you do a watch like this again use some silicone grease on the seal. It’s helps it slide in place and will aid in waterproofing. But as always great videos.
This damage surprised me, my Fossil Sport is 3 years old and I've swam with it in the ocean many, many times and it's still working like new. Apart from being dog slow and the battery being super crap...
Many things can do it, maybe an odd strike to the side moved the seal a little, maybe he moved his arm in a weird motion underwater and the pressure was directed to the microphone part.
Well, it's luck of the draw on build quality, I had a Ticwatch C2 that died completely after 2 trips to the beach, and it's got the same water rating as my Fossil Sport. Suffice to say I'll never buy another Ticwatch. Waiting for the Fossil Gen 7 to drop. I guess a watch manufacture knows something about making watches properly waterproof, compared to a tech manufacture...
My old Gen 5 had a broken screen for a year before I replaced it with a gen 6 recently. Swam with it in the ocean as well. Hours at a time and it was never a problem. Waves hitting it, diving in a pool, the whole 9 yards. Even with the cracked screen, it kept working even after being abused underwater. Really surprised to see the Samsung watch have problems with it. Definitely don't want to form my entire opinion on their watches based on one, but considering the gen 5 and 6 are completely sealed, I'd make a guess they're probably more water resistant. Though, as a result, you lose repairability. Hard to say which I prefer. Edit: you lose repairability*
Great video Hugh... if only you had done this 3-4 months ago, I would have made sure to be more careful with the power button ribbon cable when attempting to repair my water damaged Samsung Gear S3 Classic! 🤣😂 Everything was going along fine, after opening it up, I could see where the water damage was, so cleaned it up as best I could, then reconnected everything, however it didn't turn on. Decided to buy a new battery (don't have a multimeter), to start with, so when it arrived, I attempted to take out the old one, which I couldn't work out how to do initially, so was a little rough with it, and to my horror, I discovered that the power button ribbon cable had come off! 😭 Fortunately I have a soldering iron... unfortunately, I have never attempted anything of this minute scale, so gave up and bought a second hand Samsung Galaxy Watch (2019) instead.🤣 I've kept everything though for a rainy day, but might get a new board and screen, if I can find any. Thanks Hugh. 😎
Hey Hugh, great video and repair, I was curious how you handle broken parts on arrival, like the back button. Since this one worked out is it just "no harm no foul" rather than working with the sellers?
I have a question, my watch suddenly gave me a black screen but you can feel the vibration from the watch when you scroll on the screen, any suggestions to what can be wrong ?
That is the same watch I repaired. It had a bootloop. I tear it down and found it having water damaged. I dunk the entire logic board into alcohol and allow it to dry after removing it from the alcohol. Reassembled and it worked despite the screen having some dead pixel that I can live with it
Every time Hugh fixes something, there is a bit less ewaste around, he is saving the planet from the greed of manufacturers! Keep doing such great work!
Nice clear video. After wearing my Active 2 in a hot tub, it got stuck on the "Rebooting..." screen. Figured it had to be water damaged. Following this video, I was able to take it apart and dry and clean it (I just used isopropyl alcohol). Now it's back on and charging!
Dont know if this is related, but my samsung s7's screen immediatly died after tuching ocean water but it had no external damage. The screen then slowly turned purple but the phone underneath was still working when a mouse was plugged in. Have you seen anything like this happen before to AMOLED? I was also going to fix it, until i realized that it cost 70% of what i paid for it new to replace the screen. I just love technology 😅
Yea so, if you really liked the s7. You could get a new one for like 50 dollars. Samsung has always had the best screens on the market, and thus even the old ones are expensive to manufacture even today.
not a fan of oled due to the more fragile nature of the displays and the higher cost of replacement. but thats just me, someone who uses their phone as more of a tool than a entertainment device.
I noticed the vibrator was circular, not rectangular. I'm disappointed. The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra (the phone I have) has a rectangular vibrator (haptic engine, good vibrator, whatever you wanna call it). The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra that I also have has a bad, sloppy, circular vibrator. I mean fine, they cheaped out on it, the vibration in the tablet is probably not really that vital. But bro, this is a watch! The thing you're supposed to wear on yourself almost all the time! Why is the vibrator so shit? I wanna feel nice haptics like on Apple Watch, not muffled vibrations like on 10 year old phones :( Samsung fix that please
I read Samsungs website BEFORE I went swimming in a Swimming Pool a few weeks ago. I specifically checked and it said its resistant for pool swimming and should be fine, just dont dive it put it under forced water. I just dipped in and was just swimming around, and then it rebooted..and kept rebooting then switched off... I let it dry out, then opened it up and it looked fine inside, no corrosion but a little bit of water still so i wiped it all down with IPA (99.3%) and some cotton buds and let it dry for a day. When I tried it again it eventually turned on. It bugged for a bit, but then after like 2 days it stopped charging. It detects that it's on charge however the watch discharges and doesnt take in any new charge. I thought maybe it was the battery so got a replacement. I then replaced the battery. It powered on and works perfectly. All the touch, the sensors, and bluetooth/wifi work all fine. I tried factory resetting it, but still it wont charge. Unfortunately ive had it since 2020 so its out of warranty. Ridiculous that Samsung say yes you can go swimming in it, when light swimming in the pool (not salt water) straight away killed it. So I just had to fork out $500 for a new smart watch, thanks Samsung zzz.
I Have a Gear S3 Frontier and it stopped displaying, I tried your methods and finally got the watch to display when I pressed both buttons while watch was resting against charger. The S3 has a full charge, but each time I selected something to reset from the reboot - like turn on bluetooth, or change date ( it defaulted to December of 2015 and 7 o'clock - not the standard 10:10 I am familiar with when coming out of an update or complete power down. I think the watch is toast. My Gear S2 continues to work faithfully. thanks for your hints even though I was not completely successful. Guess I can use it as a paper weight.
i recently had to open a gears s3 to change the battery. it was easy with the whole repair costing me about USD 30 and battery lasts at least 2 1/2 days. Samsung outright refused to repair such an "old" watch and 3rd party repairers wanted about usd80 for it.
My watch just went out and can't show anything. I can still hear it, and everything still works on it. It's just when I wore it last, I was on my motorcycle and it was raining. And after I got finished riding and looked at my watch, nothing.
Hugo, do you have like an website or something that I can send to you because I have an old 2006 pro keyboard which the pro mouse and they are dirty and I don’t know how to clean them. Cheers
What is the screw driver reference for the first part? It seems three wing, but I don't have the driver for that so I wonder which size should I get. Thanks!
I have Gear Sport watch and it had similar salt water damage. Opened it up and cleaned it but bezel does not select things as you turn it. Is the vibration motor related to the bezel selection?
Samsung is so weird, they are repairable (relatively to Apple devices) but somewhere there is a battle going as it seems they want to copy apple anti consumer tactics
I am watching all of your video you use the brush with big brisle, why not use toothbrush is has a finner brisle that can remove tiny particle when cleaning.
the galaxy watches are simply garbage i got a fold z3 and a couple of months later i got a email saying thanks for getting the phone here is a starter pack and a free galaxy watch 4 which is simply put the one no one wanted as the display is to smal and the strap is white with black rings and when you first get it its learning what you do and the battery goes from a 100 to 40 in thee hours but the worst thing is ive worn it eight times as i dont like the strap and the edge of the screen has chips in it and i dont mean one or two but a load so the scrolling messes up to put it simply its shite at least the classic has the bezel that protects the edge but the basic one no one wants does not and its just annoying as the bat just seems to die if you use anything even a alarm so if your going anywhere like camping or to a hotel hope you have a bat pack as it will die the tech is good but the battery length is the let down and the screen its like the old phones that would scratch if a bit of dust touched the glass
It's amazing that samsung can engineer a beautiful watch while being very easy to repair And also impressed that they did the same with the Buds I like that it's easy to repair.
Samsung's Ear Buds, and Watch, are proof that Apple doesn't remove repairability because it hinders design.. but because they want to ensure the product is disposable.
Hey, can you please tell me from where you've bought the display? I have the same watch with the same issue that was damaged while used in the specified parameters by Samsung and warranty won't cover it apparently.
Unfortunately I'm one of those people who didn't read the fine print. On my last day at the ocean the watch went bonkers rebooting over and over before going black. Now it won't come on. 😥
I had to open this watch up to readhere my screen to the frame since the old adhesive gave up. It really annoyed me that I had to purchase a tri-point screwdriver to get in and getting the main assembly out of the frame isnt easy either. Also, my microphone dropped out of its place when i was cleaning the glue residue, but I managed to get it back to fully working condition :)
Hey Hugh, any chance of letting us know where you purchased the replacement screen and housing from? The screen of my Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 has recently stopped working (but the watch is still operating as it's synced to my phone)...😱
I have the Watch4 Classic so I've never seen the Watch Active interface and I don't think I would have liked my Galaxy Watch as much as I do if it had that interface.
Thank you for your video. It really helped me to fix my wife's watch after we had claimed on the insurance. My good lady now has an upgrade while I trial her old 2 active. May yet need to get a new screen.
