iPhone 5 display not turning on

[Watabou]

Hey guys,

Today I was syncing my phone and suddenly, the display turned off. I restarted the phone and heard the familiar vibration as it connected to iTunes. The display still did not turn on.

The problem is that, everything still works, I can use Siri, receive calls, slide my finger to turn on the phone but the display still remains turned off.

So I held down the power button and the home button to restore the firmware and despite the reset, the display still did not turn on. Finally, after about 4 restores of the firmware, the display magically turned on.

Relieved, I began to set it up as a new phone. About an hour from the sync, I came back to my phone to find that the display turned off again! The phone was still syncing but the display was turned off, and I tried restarting the phone, putting it into recovery mode, DFU mode, you name it.

Does anyone know what's happening?

 

[Macman45]

Looks like a dead screen or a loose cable...either way a trip to an Apple store is your best course if action.

 

[Watabou]

Loose cable might be it, because the screen did come on one time.

Unfortunately, my Applecare has already expired so I'm not sure if Apple will be too happy to replace it for free.

 

[Watabou]

So going to the Apple Store was pretty pointless as they just told me that the backlight is dead.

The phone still works and I can see the display fine when I hold a flashlight to it (yeah, I know ).

The guy who was helping me said I could either buy a new phone for $290 (including tax) or replace the display for $160.

Both of those options are undesirable. Do you guys know what else I can do? Can I just buy a new backlight and fix it myself? I think I don't need a whole new display since only the backlight seems to be broken.