Apple Pencil Teardown Reveals Antenna, Battery and Tiny Folded Logic Board

[MacRumors]

iFixit has completed an Apple Pencil teardown, removing the outer plastic casing to reveal the pencil's inner metal cylinder. The teardown provides a closer look at several Apple Pencil components, including the antenna, battery, pencil nib, Lightning connector and miniature folded logic board.

Apple Pencil has two emitters in the tip that enable the iPad Pro to determine the pencil nib's angle and orientation relative to the display, and adjust the pen stroke accordingly, explains iFixit. iPad Pro has a digitizer that likely determines the distance from each emitter to the screen.

At the core of the Apple Pencil is a tiny 0.329 Wh lithium-ion rechargeable battery that holds just 5% of the charge of an iPhone 6s battery, next to a small cylindrical black and gold antenna. There is also a small ribbon cable that connects the Apple Pencil's battery with its Lightning connector for charging.

On the other side of the battery is the Apple Pencil's tiny folded logic board that weighs just one gram, yet houses more than five components, including an ST Microelectronics low-power 32-bit ARM-based Cortex-M3 microcontroller and Qualcomm Bluetooth 4.1 chip from Cambridge Silicon Radio.

- Red: ST Microelectronics STML151UCY6 Ultra-low-power 32-bit RISC ARM-based Cortex-M3 MCU
- Orange: ST Microelectronics AS5C Y533 (also found in the 2015 Apple TV)
- Yellow: L05286 QS4 VG Z SGP 528
- Green: EWX 01129
- Not shown: Cambridge Silicon Radio Qualcomm CSR1012A05 Bluetooth Smart IC

iFixit awarded the Apple Pencil its lowest repairability score of 1 out of 10. While the pen nib and cap can be replaced if worn out or lost, iFixit says you can't get inside the Apple Pencil without destroying the device. It says the 12-hour battery is not replaceable, giving the Apple Pencil a limited lifespan.

Article Link: Apple Pencil Teardown Reveals Antenna, Battery and Tiny Folded Logic Board

 

[akfgpuppet]

I don't know what else they expected.

 

[macintologist]

If it was highly serviceable it would probably be a crappy design. If you're going to use the thing, use it.

 

[Fzang]

I think iFixit repairability scores have served their time. It's time to stop this. You can't continue to make things smaller, more compact and more advanced, and still lay it out so the average Joe can replace every part with a screwdriver and some elbow grease.

 

[longofest]

My pencil broke, but I was able to put it into a sharpener, but you can only do that limited times. I wonder if Apple is going to provide a sharpener?

 

[Chuck Kostalnick]

Ironically, they gave a traditional pencil 2/10, as it's compatible with most standard staplers.

 

[meaning-matters]

I think the Apple Pencil is an amazing piece of technology! Its drawing response (shown in the videos) is ridiculously fast! It's again Apple's better version of something common. Looking forward trying one out in the local Apple Store soon. I'm not being ironic here.

 

[businezguy]

It's kind of interesting to see how much today's technology has been able to shrink logic boards. I'm sure that pen has more power than computers sold 20 years ago for $3k.

 

[iCloudStrife]

Turns out a real pencil has a limited lifespan too. Of course, a real pencil doesn't cost a hundred bucks...

In other news, Apple tells me mine's on the way.

 

[tahoe94]

My 16 year old doesn't even draw for 12 hours, and he paints and draws all day. I think 12 hours is quite long enough and if your serious about this device you will probably have at least 2. I thinks its an amazing invention that will give artists what they have been wanting. No one uses their fingers to draw or paint unless your a toddler and do not have the ability to grasp.

 

[Jason83]

I hope everyone sees ifixit for the farce they are. (And for the record, autocorrect tried to change ifixit to idiot... Quite apt if you ask me.)

 

[sunapple]

Can't believe how much it resembles an actual pencil. Ruined when opened, runs out of juice after extended usage.

 

[Kaibelf]

Another Apple release, another iFixit complaint about how they can't sell kits.

 

[SteveAbootman]

Other than a small percentage of potential customers, I think most people are resigned to the fact that if their smartphone/tablet/mac is broken, they'll need to pay to have it get fixed. It's the price we pay to have small, compact and powerful devices. Time to retire the repairability score.

 

[bobob]

I like iFixIt's commentary on that folding logic board:

What is this—a logic board for ants? Not quite, but weighing in at a whopping 1.0 gram it's definitely the smallest we've ever seen.

 

[Rogifan]

It's interesting to see what's inside these things but I could do without the snarky iFixit commentary. And why does something like this even get a score? Ridiculous.

I like iFixIt's commentary on that folding logic board:

This is actually interesting, especially considering what Jony Ive said in that Wallpaper interview (see below), but it gets lost in all the snark.

http://www.wallpaper.com/design/apple-reinvents-the-pencil-in-conversation-with-sir-jony-ive

I think this is certainly one of those occasions where at the end of this design and product development exercise, it really did yield two things. One was the Apple Pencil. But the other was a more significant understanding of how we do everyday things. We’ve learned a lot, which is actually useful beyond this project.

 

[bobob]

I could do without the snarky iFixit commentary.

The snark is the best part! Otherwise, they're just a glorified storefront for a bunch of cheap-ass tools.

 

[ronjon10]

No worries on that review, I will lose it far before the battery has any degredation.

 

[kingpushup]

So, like a pencil.

 

[PBG4 Dude]

It's kind of interesting to see how much today's technology has been able to shrink logic boards. I'm sure that pen has more power than computers sold 20 years ago for $3k.

I have mine mining bitcoins in its spare time.

In seriousness though, intel's 386 chip supposedly has more computing power than the mainframes used during the Apollo missions.

 

[Mac 128]

It's interesting to see what's inside these things but I could do without the snarky iFixit commentary.

That's rich coming from you.

 

[xnu]

Ok $99 seems appropriate. That seems pretty cool.

 

[topgunn]

I love iFixit.

 

[roland.g]

Maybe one of the MR tabs across the top needs to be an iFixit page. Just collect all the tear down articles there. And spare us from the updates.

I understand that there is a need for it, but we're not talking about breaking Apple rumors here. Just innards and repairability scores.

 

[tech3475]

Other than a small percentage of potential customers, I think most people are resigned to the fact that if their smartphone/tablet/mac is broken, they'll need to pay to have it get fixed. It's the price we pay to have small, compact and powerful devices. Time to retire the repairability score.

I say keep the score.

I know people who like to repair their devices themselves so its useful knowing how repairable something is.