[almost resolved, input requested] F60 screen broken

[Brair]

Having dropped my Gigabeat F60 one too many times the screen is no longer running. *tears*

I realise this is nothing to do with rockbox, though I could perhaps make a claim of the beautiful interface driving me to distraction.

I am mostly looking for a direction/ forum to go with my questions, as the folk here are all clued up and have solved many of my problems without me having to ask. Alternatively, someone may be able to help me directly.

Im not certain of the exact problem, but the symptoms are as follows.
Progressively darkening screen, as though the contrast was slowly being turned down. It is now effectively black with the faintest hint of display display showing.
For a time the full screen worked fine with pressure on the upper corners, suggesting an issue with contacts.

No visible damage to screen.
She still draws power and the side buttons light up, in fact playing fine aside that I cant see the menus (go gigabeat!)

With my high quality skills (read: minimal) fixing electronics I suspect this will be a throw away job but I thought it would be worth the try.
If nothing else there will be a HDD and battery up for grabs and wouldnt mind pointers for this as I havent found a decent forum for that yet.

[bascule]

You could try using it with the voice interface. At least that would allow continued use while you fix the screen.

Have a search around for disassembly pics, there are bound to be some either on the Rockbox Wiki or other Gigabeat user sites. That would allow you to open yours up and attempt a manual fix. It sounds like you *may* be really lucky and just need to re-seat the LCD connector...

[burkjavier]

I would open it up.  Once you get the top / bottom clips off, it's pretty simple (just a few small screws).  For the clips, just pry off slowly, maybe with a small flat headed screwdriver.  It's possible that you might break them as the plastic is pretty flimsy, so keep that in mind.

The LCD (assuming it's similar to my F40) is connected to the main board at two places - I think it's entirely possible that the larger connection could become loose with a drop, and may just need to be re-seated.

Worst case, you could probably get at least $40 US for it on eBay, just for the 60GB drive.

[dreamlayers]

This might be a problem with the backlight, which is probably the small connector.

[Brair]

I appreciate the input. Though I also hate you for it, since I have now spent several hours searching through this and a few other sites looking for a pull-down guide in the hope there might be salvation.
I would prefer an offer of someone to come over and fix it for, say, 3 beers and some pancakes, but I'll take what I can get (thats another thank you)
For anyone following, I eventually found someone elses pull down
http://www.angelfire.com/bug2/gigabeat/

Its for the F10 but the outer case appears identical.
It seems mygigabeat.com has everything I need but is down temporarily/ permanently

Hopefully updates upon my eventual success


_________________EDIT______________________________________

So I got things pulled apart and fiddled around for a while. No sign of damaged ribbons or unplugged connectors.
Ultimately it looks like part of the small ribbon should ground on an exposed terminal.
Applying pressure on the ribbon causes everything to work fine.
The problem now is keeping that pressue up in a functional way (ie case closed up)

Normally Im ok with ghetto solutions, for example a matchstich in the right spot will do the job.
My only question, is this likely to cause other problems - say, a fire in my pants (ahem)

Thoughts? Comments?
Pics of the relevant areas:

http://i483.photobucket.com/albums/rr200/T_Brair/CIMG7874.jpg

http://i483.photobucket.com/albums/rr200/T_Brair/cimg7881.jpg

http://i483.photobucket.com/albums/rr200/T_Brair/CIMG7882.jpg

[Brair]

No one wants to use this opportunity to convince me to put super glue or chewing gum or packing beads in my Mp3 player?
Huh, go figure.

[dreamlayers]

Sure, you could put something there to apply pressure.  As long as it's not something electrically conductive which can move around and short stuff, it shouldn't be dangerous.  It would be best to use something that's attached so it won't move around.  I've used folded tape in one case.

[Brair]

I couldnt make the contacts line up acurately enough and gave up. Now the owner of a new Sansa.
This means I have a spare semi functional Gigabeat F60.
I would off-load on ebay but dont expect a lot of offers on a player with non-working screen.
It looks like people are after bits to fool with/ canablise but I cant find a specific forum here.
Am I missing something? Or should I just leave a "for sale" sign on this post (I guess thats what Im doing now)

[LambdaCalculus]

Keep the for sale sign up for now. Maybe someone with some spare Gigabeat parts would be willing to pick it up for a small fee and fix it up.