Today we're going to take apart the brand new iPhone 12 Pro. We already know the outside
is new and different, with its stainless steel sides, flush screen, and ceramic shield glass,
but we know true beauty lies on the inside. The iPhone 12 Pro has a series of magnets
just below the back glass, and I'm curious to see what those look like from the inside.
One thing you'll really want to avoid though is letting your wallet or credit card get
too close to the back of the phone. Magnet can ruin credit cards...unless of course you
carry a shielded wallet. Huge thanks to Ridge Wallets for sponsoring this video.
I got my own Ridge Wallet about 2 years ago and it's been in my front pocket ever since.
I got the Burnt Titanium version since titanium is one of the coolest metals in existence.
Fun fact: did you know there's a hidden spider on the one dollar bill? Cool little trick
to show your friends. All you need is a dollar and some friends. If you don't have either,
you can still optimistically get a new wallet and just hope for the best...like we're all
doing for 2021. Mine's a bit worn after being in my pocket for two years, but the Burnt
Titanium still looks pretty good. It can hold up to 12 cards plus cash. The Ridge Wallet
comes in 30 different styles, like aluminum, carbon fiber, orange carbon, and a limited
edition topographical map of Half Dome. And you can choose between the money strap or
the clip version. Since these are metal of course, you probably don't want to carry them
in the same pocket as your iPhone, but it's good to know that if they do ever end up next
to each other on a table or desk or something, the magnets in your phone won't hurt the card
since the wallet will shield it. I'll leave a link down in the description. You can use
the code “jerryrig” to get 10% off your order and free worldwide shipping. There's
a lifetime warranty and a full 45 day return policy if you don't like it. I've definitely
been happy with mine though.
Now it's time to take apart the new iPhone 12 Pro. Let's get started.
[Intro]
The iPhone 12 Pro design has changed things up a bit this year, but of course it still
has the two pentalobe screws down at the bottom. This time around the iPhone 12 Pro has quite
a bit more water resistance as well. Still ip68, but tested at a depth of 6 meters in
water instead of the normal 4 meters, that the iPhone 11 Pro was tested at last year.
So there is quite a bit more adhesive which requires more heat. And the screen being inlaid
flush with the stainless steel housing also makes things a little more difficult. Long
story short, the quickest way to learn something new is by using someone else's mistakes...and
as I was lifting up the screen I didn't go quite deep enough to grab the frame and I
accidentally stabbed the screen under the glass. And while I was able to get the screen
off in one piece, that little stab in the wrong spot killed the screen entirely. So
it's a good idea to learn from my mistakes if you ever attempt to open one of these up.
The phone is still alive, but now I'll need a new screen.
Anyway, besides the fact that I just broke a phone in front of millions of people...there
are 2 tri point screws holding down a metal plate over the battery. I'll remove those
as well as the metal plate so we can get to the real goods inside. I'll unsnap the battery
ribbon just like a little Lego, along with the screen ribbon. There's another plate up
top with 4 more tri point screws that I'll remove before unsnapping the screen from the
phone entirely.
Replacement iPhone 11 Pro screens are around $170 right now. So I imagine the iPhone 12
Pro will be priced similarly when they start coming out...if Apple doesn't digitally lock
them to the motherboard making 3rd party repairs impossible, which they seem to be doing more
of lately.
There is a smorgasbord of other connectors revealed now that the screen is gone. Connectors
on top of connectors. So it looks like I'll just be unsnap, snap, snap, snap, snap, snap,
snap, snap, snap, snap, snapping them just like little Legos. The last one is taped to
the top of the motherboard so I'll peel it back and move it out of the way before we
head over to the cameras. There are 4 screws holding down the metal plate over the camera
units. iPhones are always super complex inside and this one requires at least 4 different
screwdriver bits and a whole lot of organization since pretty much each screw is a different
size and shape. The top camera is the main one.:the 12 megapixel sensor with optical
image stabilization. Then we have the 12 megapixel ultra wide camera with no OIS. And the bottom
12 megapixel 2X optical zoom camera which does have that OIS. You might be asking, 'Hey
Jerry, what about the lidar sensor?' And that is a great question. We'll get to it in a
second.
Still inside of the phone we have the front face ID and the 12 megapixel selfie camera.
The lidar module is still screwed in and facing the rear of the phone. The brains of the operation,
the motherboard, has 6 screws holding it in place. The SIM card tray has a white water
damage indicator sticker over the top grill. This sticker can be seen from outside of the
phone if you just peek inside of your SIM card tray slot. Apple's pretty smart, their
phones might be water resistant, but they aren't waterproof. And Apple can tell if it
ever gets wet when that sticker turns pink.
There are 2 more ribbons at the bottom of the motherboard. Then the whole thing can
pull away from the phone. It's another double stacked board again this year, with no thermal
paste or copper heat pipe. It's just living it's best life with no extra cooling. The
lidar sensor is held in place by two more screws. Lidar is actually pretty cool. It's
like a depth sensor on steroids – able to bounce infrared light from one circle and
measure the bounce back to calculate distances. It makes for some really fast 3D scanning
and measuring. It's even found in some self driving cars. Here in the iPhone it'll probably
mostly be used for really fast auto focusing for the camera. But it's still cool to see
futuristic technology in a mainstream smartphone.
Now the iPhone battery does have magical pull tabs. But I'm going to bust your bubble and
just break it to you that I basically broke all of them
and had to pull the battery out with my bare hands instead. The battery is a bit smaller
than last year's iPhone 11 Pro, sitting at just 2815 milliamp hours. We also get our
first look at the top side of the wireless charging coil. Spoiler alert: the other side
looks way cooler. But first we'll pull out the loudspeaker. It's a gigantic mess down
here with 10 more different sized and shaped screws and standoffs. But we finally do get
to lift out the loudspeaker with it's water resistant mesh inside of the opening, as well
as a new massive orange gasket to help seal up that hole. The SIM card tray is modular.
Kind of fun.
The taptic engine is also a bit smaller this year, but interesting fact, Apple plopped
a Lego-style connector right in the middle of the ribbon. Whoever said Apple doesn't
innovate has obviously never seen this. Plus there's this thing down here that looks super
important and I don't even know what it does. If the iPhone looks like a chaotic nightmare
inside is because it is. The wireless charger is physically tied into the phone's side buttons,
so I'll unscrew this metal bracket on the side and pull the mute switch through the
frame. Then finally, after everything, we get our first look under the wireless charging
pad and glimpse this glorious array of circular magnets around the outside. It's rather brilliant
of Apple to use magnets to perfectly position the two coils on top of each other. Instead
of using one large circle magnet, it's actually made up of 18 smaller more rectangular magnets.
Apple said that every single magnet used in the iPhone 12 is recycled, which is awesome.
Getting rid of the charging brick, headphones, and making the box smaller is also supposed
to help out the environment. Fun fact though: creating a brand new smartphone consumes almost
as much energy as using a smartphone for an entire decade. So since Apple has over 1 billion
active iPhones on the planet right now, if they really wanted to help the environment
they'd make their phones easier to repair. I mean, let's be honest, making the box smaller
is peanuts compared to how much energy we could save by just using our phones for an
additional year or two. Not much change is between each new version of a phone anyway.
Of course every step towards helping the environment is a good step. But I would like to see Apple
facilitating repairs instead of just locking every component to the motherboard and having
people buy new phones, which seems to be their current trend. The underside of the glass
can be scratched away, making for a small frosting glimpse into the wireless charger.
Apple could make one of the coolest clear phones of all time with this coil...but they
didn't. So I did. Every real detail from the inside of the phone can now be seen from the
outside without voiding your warranty. Even the magnets. We can see the magnets, the charging
coil, and even the water damage indicator sticker here on the SIM card tray. And if
we bring over the magical magnetic MagSafe charger, we can see how the two work together.
The charging coil plugged into the wall creates a small energy field that the receiving coil
can receive. Science is pretty cool.
I'll leave a link for my Teardown Skin down in the video description, along with the Ridge
Wallet. And I'll get this phone put back together and working again once I find a replacement
screen. Let me know what you think of Apple's new charging system. Would you ever buy a
clear iPhone? Let me know down in the comments. Come hang out with me on Instagram and Twitter.
And thanks a ton for watching, I'll see you around.