Acer Iconia One 10 Tablet Repair

 I received another haul of old electronics from kind Freegle lady Margaret who was having a clear out. There was an old Asus netbook which had died, but it gave up another useful 10.1 inch LCD panel so I have ordered a control board for it on eBay.

There were two tablet computers with cracked touch panels, an Asus Nexus 2 and an Acer Iconia. Both tablets booted up and could be reset and used with my Bluetooth combination keyboard and trackpad. A bit of research revealed that the Nexus would be much harder to repair and probably was too low spec to be worth the trouble, whereas the Acer would be an easier repair, was still had a decent spec (Intel CPU and 2Gb or RAM) and had received a final update to Android 7 only 2 years ago. Decision made, I purchased a replacement touch panel for £12 on eBay.

Acer Iconia with cracked touch panel (Bluetooth keyboard)

While the new touch panel was on its way, I decided to sacrifice the Nexus in the spirit of learning and had a go at removing its broken panel. The panel was closely integrated into the LCD and although I did manage to remove it, at the last moment the LCD came apart and cracked. Very useful learning though, especially around how much heat to apply to soften the glue holding the touch panel in place. Of course I stripped the broken tablet and got some spares, the most useful being the lithium battery.

Unfortunately I forgot to take my 'phone out to the workshop when I was actually doing the job on the Acer, but here are a few points to note if you are going to try this.

Search out YouTube videos to show you how to take the tablet apart so that you can disconnect the touch panel from the main board. Most tablets pop apart with the help of one of those plastic spade tools, but there can be odd screws and things to watch out for.

The touch panels are held on with a mastic adhesive like rubber which needs a lot of heat to soften it. A hairdryer won't be enough unless you have a few hours to spare, so you will need a hot air gun. That means be careful as you don't want to melt any plastic parts, webcams or USB sockets. I used my hot air soldering gun as it has a small nozzle, but in the past I've used a full size paint-stripping gun with a bodged nozzle made of a thin steel off-cut.

My tech guru Richard rightly suggested taping the cracked screen so that it would come off in one piece. It is still hard to do even after gaffer-taping and of course I manged to cut myself, so another tip is put on a pair of work gloves before starting (not after you're bleeding). Heat round the edges only, keep the gun moving to avoid hot-spots and when the glass is just hot enough to burn a fingertip you are probably there.

Repaired Acer Iconia tablet being charged from DIY 6-cell power block.

My replacement touch panel already had 3M double-sided tape to fix it to the LCD screen so it only took about 5 minutes to put it all back together again and it is now working really well. As with the Samsung Tab E I rescued 3 years ago, I have ordered a matte screen protector and a snappy red case to give the Iconia a new lease of life.