Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Please Help, Water iPhone 3G

A

andujar5

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 12, 2007
4
0
So, my iphone feel in water, and now it just gets stuck on the apple screen, and after a minute it goes to the itunes screen. the computer can still read it, so my question to all you gurus are:

should i put it in a bage of rice, then a hot car?

should i just test my luck and go to apple?

should i replace the screen and digitizer?

please help.....

is there a place where i can send it?
 
You shouldn't have even turned it on until AFTER the phone was given a few days to dry out.

You can try and dry it out now but the damage is already done.

Good luck.
 
andujar5 said:
So, my iphone feel in water, and now it just gets stuck on the apple screen, and after a minute it goes to the itunes screen. the computer can still read it, so my question to all you gurus are:

should i put it in a bage of rice, then a hot car?

should i just test my luck and go to apple?

should i replace the screen and digitizer?

please help.....

is there a place where i can send it?
Click to expand...

Water doesn't break electronics- it's the short circuits that the water creates that breaks them. By turning it on, you may have further damaged it...if you had just put it in a bag of rice, it would have probably survived. Next time, try not to be so stupid. :)

Apple has two water-damaged indicators in the iPhone 3G, so you're going to have a buy a new one/get it repaired...and you will have to pay.
 
Give it some time

I dropped my iPhone into a glass of water. After having problems like the ones you mentioned, it then developed streaks under the glass. I can personally attest that the rice method saved my phone. Try putting it in a bucket of rice, and occasionally heat up the rice with a hair dryer. It make take a few days, but it's a lot cheaper than trying to fix your phone. Good luck. And don't try and plug it in again.
 
Dip the iPhone full in rice (uncooked) after taping the connecter and the 3.5mm jack.

DO NOT TURN YOUR PHONE ON

Will take some time!

P.S.: All iPhones and iPods Touch come with a water detector! So dont even think of taking it to Apple! And sorry but you dont have anymore warranty/apple care regarding any issue in future!
 
Hehee, I read in someones signature something like "I cant wait for all the help I dropped my iPhone 3G in the toilet and stolen iPhone 3G threads!" (sarcasm, obviously) :D
 
rice trick, huh? never heard of that before.

assuming it sucks the water from the phone? i dont have water damage, but i like to know preventitive methods just in case.
 
i dropped my first gen iphone in water a few months ago ..the apple kept appearing then disappearing for like 2 hours then i finally got it to shut off and left if alone for a few days...then everything worked fine except the power on and off buttton ..so i waited another day and everything worked just fine....and now i have iphone 3g and my grandparents have my old one and they have no problems at all
 
d wade said:
rice trick, huh? never heard of that before.

assuming it sucks the water from the phone? i dont have water damage, but i like to know preventitive methods just in case.
Click to expand...

Preventative measures? How about keeping your phone away from liquids.
 
Apple Ink said:
Dip the iPhone full in rice (uncooked) after taping the connecter and the 3.5mm jack.

DO NOT TURN YOUR PHONE ON

Will take some time!

P.S.: All iPhones and iPods Touch come with a water detector! So dont even think of taking it to Apple! And sorry but you dont have anymore warranty/apple care regarding any issue in future!
Click to expand...
Amusing that you have to specify uncooked rice. Did somebody ask? :D
 
There is a reason why the Silica dry gel packets have a "do not eat" warning on them.. just like it's wise to say uncooked rice ;)
 
You could use silica packets :p

But, it's pretty hard to not turn it back on after. It's almost a reaction to check if it's still working, but by doing so you may actually break it. :/
 
Thanks

thank you all for your suggestions, I will leave it alone, in rice, and with a OEM charger (iphone) that heats it up for a couple of days...
 
andujar5 said:
thank you all for your suggestions, I will leave it alone, in rice, and with a OEM charger (iphone) that heats it up for a couple of days...
Click to expand...

WTF! No! If you haven't gotten it yet, electricity and water do not mix. Turning on the phone with water in it will create short circuits. Plugging the phone into electricity even while off will activate the charging circuitry and cause short circuits if water is present.

Put the phone in a bag of uncooked rice and leave it there for a week and don't touch it!
 
Sounds familiar

Long time reader, first time poster.. (perhaps because it took ages to fin an unused pseudo?!)

Well, my brother and I got the iPhone on its launch in Switzerland and a couple of days later he let it fall in the lake of Geneva...

As I have quite some experience with cell phones falling in water, I told him to put it in the oven. At very low temp, it worked with my two previous phones.

His phone was totally drowned and irresponsive in the beginning (not even switching on), and after a couple of hours in the oven he was able to use it again!

Seems like a happy story, BUT the water sensors turned red -> no warranty and worse of all: no sound. Not in the speakers, nor in the earphones.

Since a phone/ipod with no sound is particularly useless, he went to the shop and bought a new one... That's when he authorized me to play with the old iPhone.

Followed the tutorial from www.pdaparts.com on youtube and opened the iphone up, cleaned some connections, sprayed them with contact spray and put the device together again.................AND IT WORKS! :)


for info, here are some shots of the THREE water sensors, one in the jack and two on mainboard.
 
andujar5 said:
thank you all for your suggestions, I will leave it alone, in rice, and with a OEM charger (iphone) that heats it up for a couple of days...
Click to expand...

That's intelligent. Everyone said not to turn it on, the short circuits cause irreversible damage and you plug it into a charger.


Good luck with buying a new iPhone. ;)
 
if you take it back to the apple store will the genius look for the red spots on the back or will he just look into the headphone jack? Hypothetically you could cut a small piece of white paper and jam it down to cover the red spot and no one would be the wiser, just a thought, mine got completely soaked i brought it in and the genius told me he was going to pretend that I didnt say it got wet and gave me a new (2.5G version of the iphone) for free, but I've heard of people doing the paper thing
 
I guess then its a question of honesty...

About as honest as saying that a friend spilled water on it and then make his insurance pay for the new phone...

No genius bars here anyway. With normal phones they send them for repair, I guess they check the other water sensors then... and I don't want to know what will happen if they find out you tried to screw them up.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back