A filed down toothpick is really good at cleaning that USB port.
Hey thanks for all the tips in the comments, I’ve got these brand new stiff-ish cleaning brushes and this one worked really well to clean out my charging port and now there’s no more beach sand grinding noise when I shove my cable into the charging port.
You don’t want to be too rough on it. There’s electrical contacts that can get blocked by dust, lint, and crap, so cleaning helps, but the contacts themselves aren’t that thick, so you don’t want to wear them down too much while cleaning. A cleaning solution helps loosen up everything with less force and a softer brush/pad is less likely to knock bits of contact off.
So just be careful because that brush might be like blowing in nintendo cartridges (clearing dust but leaving saliva specs that would wear the contacts), where it helps in the short term but makes things worse in the long term (resulting in more blowing and an acceleration of the process).
I use a toothpick.
My charging port died and I’m so pissed. 2 year old Google pixel. Never buying pixel again. I looked up how to desolder the charging port and it’s a pain in the ass. It has this like weird shield over it and I have no idea how to desolder this thing. Why can’t it be straight forward
Shouldn’t a Pixel that new support wireless charging? I’m surprised at how many people still rely on plugging their phones in to charge them these days. At the very least, it’s a workaround for a broken port.
It has wireless charging but I have a few on call situations and diabetes that I prefer a plugged in charge just in case I accidently knock the phone off the charger at night.
Android has had wireless charging for like 10 years. I can’t remember the last time I plugged in my phone (for charging)
Why the fuck would they solder the charging part to the main board? That’s just actively malicious.
It’s not just soldered there’s like a shield with anchor pins surrounding it that makes it hard to desolder
I have a cheap pack of plastic Walgreens tooth picks that are perfect for this. My phone case has a rubber cover for the port so I don’t have to do this often.
Never mind those, where do I get those cool rear view mirrors for my phone?
Huh? Lol I dont get it. What you calling rear view mirrors for a phone? or are you joking about wishing you had hindsight? 😂
I recently got a replacement battery and also the usb c circuitry. Got it replaced for $15 (everything included). Phone is effectively new now.
Can you share any instructional material you used to learn how to change the battery and charging port?
i paid a repair shop for the swapping. ($15 includes everything, battery itself is around $10 port is around $2). Whole swap took around 20 mins. though this is a third world country, so double or triple that.
but for my device, there was full repair guide available online (ifixit). the only reason I did not repair my self is because I am kinda scared doing anything battery (it was partially swollen, and i do not want lithium fire). Other major reason is I do not have screw driver bits for phone. I can do laptop repairs myself, but phone screws are even smaller, and use fancy heads, so I can not use a pointed knife’s edge to unscrew.
If your device has a ifixit guide, that would be the easiest way, they hand hold all the way through. If not, find replacement parts, see what it would cost, and maybe ask a repair shop for a price. if their quotation is within reason, then they can do a good job and you would not even need any other tools.
In fact, if I would have done it myself, I would have not repaired the port, as that required a bit more work than battery.
People don’t try cleaning their charging port before buying a new device? Thats crazy. I really have a hard time believing people don’t try cleaning before buying a new device.
Most people buy a new cell phone long before the charger stops working.
I’m weird. I’ve had my cell phone since 2020. But MOST people buy one every 2-3 years. Just because the newest latest and greatest just came out.
My 5 year old phone still has no issue charging. And when the battery starts dying, MY battery is user replaceable.
Don’t believe this person, they’ve clearly lost their mind.
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I mean, it’s one phone, paper_moon. What could it cost? $1000?
i found out weed smokers regularly use a glass pipe until it’s clogged and then just throw it away….
also, if you go dumpster diving around the first of the month you can find trash bags full of useful things that people abandon and landlords throw out.Lol this one is truly unbelievable to me. Its glass! Soak it in soapy water, vinegar or bleach, for gods sake…
it’s true… i’ve found them like that and my friend told me that’s why….
also i’m in california and everyone smokes weed and glass pipes are cheap and everywhere.
i really hate the “disposable” usb-c rechargeable vapes that can’t be refillable by law….
Cheese and rice theres a lot of responses jumping to accusations of people too lazy but I’ve never heard someone too lazy to clean a phone port for $1000 savings.
100% of the people im surrounded by in my family/friends would be to afraid of breaking it beyond trade in value towards the new phone. My case was extreme but since the screens got better id have to guess charging issues is up there for one of the biggest reasons people trade their phones in.
I’d believe it, especially with all the propaganda from big corporations and the fomo they push with new technology. Looking at Apple and their fucking yearly phone cycles.
Don’t forget to consume more! Buy two just in case! Consume! CONSUME!!!
Sounds like you haven’t met very many people.
I replaced a damaged USB C port (module) and degraded battery instead of replacing the whole device.
Those people must have a lot of disposable income.
I will admit, this makes sense, up to a point. I have 2 pixel 4a’s just sitting in a drawer because the screens got damaged, showing just a black screen. And it was the same price or cheaper to buy another used phone than buy just the screen for it, $120+ in most cases on eBay, when i was looking. So I bought another, newer phone instead of fixing the device, for around the same price.
That’s one reason why we really need right to repair. A screen shouldn’t be the same price as the entire device.
They just need an excuse to buy a new phone.
Some people are just absurdly lazy.
Also what kind of kit does op have? A sim card ejector, a metal brush, a q tip thing, half a zip tie, and some adhesive things? Any thin plastic shim will work perfectly, and sometimes even a stiff plastic bristle brush works well.
Not all are lazy, some just don’t know.
My in-laws didn’t clean the dust out of their PC for almost a decade because when they purchased it, no one told them to clean the filter on the front.
I don’t think plate manufacturers have to tell you to do the dishes. Everything needs cleaning, how do people not know this?
Well yeah because the plate looks dirty and its because you purposefully put food on it.
No one is purposefully throwing dust at their PC, and if someone doesn’t know that their PC is pulling in air, they wouldn’t know it needs any cleaning besides dusting off like other furniture.
He said “some people,” not “all people.”
I wouldn’t put anything conductive in there.
Wood toothpicks worked great on lightning ports, usbc is a little trickier and more fragile so I use a plastic spudger from an old screen replacement kit.
One of the lads at work was freaking out because he had tickets to a festival on his phone, and it wouldn’t charge. I spent three minutes digging in the port with a wooden toothpick and wouldn’t you know there was fuck all wrong with his phone.
By all means try a tooth pick and pure alcohol, if that doesn’t work a professional might get you set straight.
Repair shops can do a better job cleaning than a home option. I had a data and charge problem, bought a kit and tried 3x times; it didn’t work . Bought new cables just in case that was the issue. Brought it in for repair fully expecting to pay for a port repair. Repair shop did a through cleaning charged me $15 and sent me on my way with everything working.
Gotta be careful as well with USB-C ports. I managed to break off the middle section while cleaning a couple of times. Not a good thing, luckily phone battery was already dying at the time.
Please, not just any alcohol. Go with isopropanol, ethanol or methanol.
Shit. I used Baileys. Is that bad?
Depends, were you drinking it from a shoe?
Not as bad as cholesterol.
You must appease the Machine Spirit. You have to chant the prayers to the Omnissiah, burn the holy incense, and rub the phone in purified oils.
The Machine Spirit must be appeased.
I gave mine a good blow out like a Nintendo cartridge
I was scaping compacted sawdust off the bottom of the port with force using the Mcguyver’ed zip tie tool lol
My problem is that my battery case has stopped charging along with my phone. Phone only charges with high wattage chargers, and phone case only charges with low wattage ones. Still get like 3 days charge on the case, but now takes like 16 hours to fully charge. Also, taking the phone case off so much eventually opened the back of my S20fe. Fixed that with S7000.
Cleaning can still help if it only slow charges (if you mean it used to be able to use high wattage ones).
Gunk prevents a strong connection, which can mess with the handshake. Charger will say, “yeah, I can fast charge, check out these amps!” but not all of it gets through and the case will decide the charger is a liar and just go with slow charging. Don’t assume that something getting through at all means the connection is fine because USB has fallback options when conditions are sub-optimal.
Wireless chargers as your bedside charger will also reduce wear on your charge port so if thats the weak point of your phone that will help it last longer
If that doesn’t work it’s probably the battery, which is also about $15
LOL. That’s just bullshit. It might be 15$ for a very old low tier phone. Not for anything that is waterproof, newer or even slightly above low tier.
Battery is $15, not phone.
Waterproofing hasn’t been relevant to batteries since they were made internal.
I just checked, and a replacement battery for my 2024 HMD Skyline goes for $15.62 plus another $3.25 for the consumable adhesive pad and whatever shipping ends up being [0]. In practice, you might also need to buy tools, which can further drive up the cost.
Finding that source took a bit of knowledge. If you go by what HMD tells it’s US users, you would look on iFixit, which would be $30 for an entire kit, which includes the battery, adhesive, and tools (Just the battery and adhesive would run you about $28).
I’ve used electrical contact cleaner while the phone is off, usually works
