DanT

Since Sony quit making Clie, our warranties are mostly expired, and Sony will charge a flat fee of about $150 to repair TH55 here in US, we may resort to "do it yourself", or find a 3rd party repair shops. I figure if we can put together a sparepart center in this thread where all of TH55 diehard users can come to find links to websites that sell TH55 hardware, it will be a super convenient place to go.

Repair shops/contacts:
Chris Short
PDAParts.com
RunPDA

If you insist on getting your TH55 repaired by Sony and have brand-new part replacements, call Sony CLIE support line at 1-877-760-7669 for repair assistance or email them to:SONYSVCSOCAL@AM.SONY.COM
Service website: http://eservice.sony.com/webrma/web/index.do

Excluding eBay, and in addition to the repair shops/contacts above, TH55 online spareparts sources that I know of are:
1. Sony for:
a. Flipcover & hinges assembly, parts # X39542352
b. Screw (+) below IR lens, parts # 309130301
c. Screw (Y) for battery cover, parts # 309156701
d. Screw (Y) for HotSync (bottom case), parts # 308791631
e. LCD assembly, parts # A6072074A
f. MC4VH21 Camera module, parts # 180554011
g. Li-Ion Battery, parts # 175644611
h. Battery cover, parts # 308974201
i. MemoryStick cover, parts # 308974401
j. MemoryStick cover screw, parts # 309130201
2. Other OEM parts stores besides Sony:
a. TigerDirect
b. Partstore
3. Third party parts stores:
a. Laptop for Less for Battery
b. Brando for stylus.
c. PC-Mobile for connector (T-series plug)

Or I can check out my TH55 junkyard (see Figure 11, below ). I think I get most of the parts, except for LCDs. For that, Sony is where you need to go.

Do it yourself procedures:
1. Replacing the battery: This is pretty straight forward. First, open the battery cover on the back lower-left corner with tri-no.1 screwdriver, unplug the power cord (black & red with white connector off the motherboard, pull out the old battery. Second, reverse the procedure with new battery. marcinm123 wrote a very detail procedure complete with pictures in this TH55 Battery Replacement thread.
Caution: Read this thread first, also this one and this too.
2. Opening the case and swapping motherboard - see my post # 14 of this thread.

Specifications:
Connector pinouts

Please post other websites that you know of. Let's build our database here.

I took pictures of TH55 parts so we can use them as references, below.
L means Left side of the picture
R means Right side of the picture


Figure 1 (below): TH55 top of motherboard, below LCD assembly
8 ribbon cables connecting to motherboard:
Top L-R: 4 Hard Buttons (L), Earphone jack/IR/Left/JogDial/Right/Back buttons (R)
Middle L-R: Back light (narrow, L), LCD (wide, L), Camera (R), Jogdial (R)
Bottom L-R: Digitizer (L), MemoryStick (Middle)
All ribbon cables have either flip or sliding connector locks, except Jogdial



Figure 2 (below): Disassembled TH55
Top L-R: Stylus, LCD assembly, back of motherboard, bottom case
Center: Hard button assembly
Botom L-R: Battery, battery cover, top case & frame assembly
Inside top case & frame assemby: screws, IR lens, camera module



Figure 3 (below): Screws to put TH55 together



Figure 4 (below): LCD Assembly 1, Broken LCD (left) below good glass/digitizer (right)



Figure 5 (below): LCD Assembly 2: Back light panel, below LCD and above mirror



Figure 6 (below): Hard button assemby



Figure 7 (below): Jodial assembly & MS reader
Top L-R: IR, BACK button, Right button, Jogdial, Left button, Earphone Jack
Bottom: MemoryStick reader



Figure 8 (below): Camera Module & mounting screw



Figure 9 (below): Bluetooth chip in TH55/E vs no Bluetooth chip in TH55/U



Figure 10 (below): Camera Capture button



Figure 11 (below): My spareparts

__________________
Vx, M500, N760P, NX70V/U, NX73V/U, NZ90/U, SL10/U, SJ30/U, T415, T615C, TJ25/U, TJ27/U, TJ35/E1, TH55/U, TH55/E1, TH55/E2, UX40/U, UX50/U, UX180P, iPhone, iPhone3G

snook_cs

This is a great idea DanT.

This thread should be a permanent fixture.



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__________________
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fssia

Great idea, DanT! Actually I would say why not a "Clie Spareparts Centre" since I also have a SJ30 & SJ33 besides TH55.

Reminds me of the storyline of "Robots". DanT, u r like Rodney in Robots!

DanT

Thanks for your comments, snook_cs and fssia. I tried to change the title, but it won't do it.

Let's start populating this thread with your spare parts list then.

__________________
Vx, M500, N760P, NX70V/U, NX73V/U, NZ90/U, SL10/U, SJ30/U, T415, T615C, TJ25/U, TJ27/U, TJ35/E1, TH55/U, TH55/E1, TH55/E2, UX40/U, UX50/U, UX180P, iPhone, iPhone3G

Tam Hanna

www.gethightech.com seems to have a few CLIE spares!

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DanT

Ah, I forgot about that PDAparts.com. Thanks, Tam Hanna. I bought glass/digitizer for N760C from them. They even have complete screen (LCD & digitizer) for S, N, T (including T-665, you see that Tanker Bob?) SJ, TJ. However, no TH55 parts is available in there, yet.

__________________
Vx, M500, N760P, NX70V/U, NX73V/U, NZ90/U, SL10/U, SJ30/U, T415, T615C, TJ25/U, TJ27/U, TJ35/E1, TH55/U, TH55/E1, TH55/E2, UX40/U, UX50/U, UX180P, iPhone, iPhone3G

fssia

@DanT: no spareparts with me now.

The most important spareparts I would like to have:
1. Tri-bladed/ Y-screw driver (for replacing TH battery)
2. Batteries for SJ30, SJ33 & TH55
3. Screen protectors
4. Tungsten E styli (prefer them to Clies' own)
5. Flip covers for SJ33 & TH55 (not sure if I really need them)

Glass/digitizer? Does Clies use glass/digitizers? So that means if we drop our Clies, the digitizer may be shattered?! And is that why Clies don't have screen whine? Ok, I will need to know where to get that too.

U know what? Since I'm not an engineer or a person that know how to mess with soldering and so on, I would prefer a repair service when my Clies have major parts to be replaced. Know any company doing that for Clies?

DanT

You can get the tri-bladed screw driver from Brando, as mentioned by AVTH55 and cktlcmd in this thread. I believe they are in Hong Kong, or spend a little more to get it and flipcover from Global Source.

All PDA have glass/digitizer. Just don't drop it or sit on it. It will break. It can also get scratched if you don't use screen protector. Whine is not caused by glass/digitizer. Check the link provided by Tan Hanna (post # 5) for glass/digitizer, LCD. You can also compare battery price between PDAparts (gethitech) and Laptop for Less.

As far as replacing LCD or backlight or glass/digitizer, you don't need any soldering, just a steady hand, good eyes, and the right tools for the job. However if you want to let the professional do it, contact Don Lee at Run PDA. He is in Taiwan. A couple years ago I upgrade my N760C 8MB to 32MB RAM. He also does the glass/digitizer, LCD, and battery replacement. Very good guy to work with. Tanker Bob has his T665 upgraded to 32MB RAM and its battery replaced by Don too. I sent Don an email this morning about whether he can upgrade TH55 RAM from 32MB to 128MB or higher similar to what he has done on Toshiba E310. Still waiting for his answer.

__________________
Vx, M500, N760P, NX70V/U, NX73V/U, NZ90/U, SL10/U, SJ30/U, T415, T615C, TJ25/U, TJ27/U, TJ35/E1, TH55/U, TH55/E1, TH55/E2, UX40/U, UX50/U, UX180P, iPhone, iPhone3G

fssia

@DanT: My friend is getting a tri-bladed screwdriver from Brando for me. I was hoping Brando also do replacement batteries for SJ & TH series but they don't. Sigh.

Yeah, I was thinking of Run PDA actually but just couldn't remember the name. I guess that's my best option. Come to think of it, I will write to him and enquire abt the price of replacing my SJ30 battery. I won't bother upgrading the RAM since I've a spare 2x128 Purple MS & I'll only be using SJ30 to test new apps.

The shipping cost of Laptop for Less is a bit steep. I've yet to check out PDAparts. I've to take internation shipping into considerations. I know Laptop for Less ship to Brunei, so that's ok. Just price too steep. I'll check with Run PDA and see how much will it cost for them to post me a replacement battery. I'm sure I can replace the SJ30 battery on my own.

Btw, I would love to hear the feedback on upgrading TH55 RAM from 32MB to 128MB. I wouldn't mind if it's just upgrading to 64MB. Man, we're greedy or what?

fssia

@DanT: Abt glass/digitizer, over at the thread abt T|E2, someone is saying that T|E has plastic digitizer, thus the screen whine. But u just said all PDA has glass digitizers, so who is right?

DanT

With the technology advancing so rapidly, there is certrainly a good possibility that some newer PDAs use plastic instead of glass. So I could be wrong. I would certainly like to see the materials of construction spec for T|E2.

__________________
Vx, M500, N760P, NX70V/U, NX73V/U, NZ90/U, SL10/U, SJ30/U, T415, T615C, TJ25/U, TJ27/U, TJ35/E1, TH55/U, TH55/E1, TH55/E2, UX40/U, UX50/U, UX180P, iPhone, iPhone3G

fssia

Oh no, either I misunderstood what you said post #11 or you misunderstood what I said in post #10. It's said that P1 Tungsten E is using plastic/ digitizer & thus the screen whine. Not sure abt what kind of digitizer is Tungsten E2 made of.

It's mentioned that plastic one is used, so that the cost can be lowered, thus T|E was so "cheap". I dunno how true is that.

Tam Hanna

Tungsten E styli can be purchased anywhere, just as info....

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fssia

It can't be purchased anywhere over here in Brunei.

__________________
SJ30 -> SJ33 -> T|E -> TH55