Friday, May 07, 2010

Omnia align screen success

Oh no!
I, along with so many others recently experienced the dreaded Omnia align screen bug. When Windows Mobile starts up, it forces you to align your screen. However, if the screen won't align, which is incredibly common with the Samsung Omnia, you can't get past this screen and your phone is completely unusable. Personally, I'm staggered that such a big company will ignore such a fundamental issue.

Since my phone is out of warranty, I decided to take matters into my own hands and replace the screen. So I went to ebay and found a new digitiser for $12.98. I bought mine from this seller (search for Omnia Digitizer) and was very happy with the service. The digitizer came with a selection of tools that were sufficient to do the entire job.

The digitizer is a clear panel that sits on top of the lcd screen. It's what is responsible for letting the device know when the screen is tapped.

Fitting the digitizer
Once the digitizer arrived I found these instructions and followed them. Although since I was only replacing the digitizer I didn't need to remove the camera or the keypad membrane.

I then reassembled the phone and crossed my fingers. It powered up then presented the dreaded "align screen" screen. I tapped each of the alignment markers once and.... it worked!

Success!
Since then the phone has been so much easier to use! The accuracy of the screen is so much better than it ever has been. It's still nowhere near as good as an iPhone or a HTC HD2 or a HTC Desire... but what can you expect from Windows Mobile 6.1?

From a brick to a fully functional phone for only $12.98. Bargain of the year!

Update
After a few days of living with the digitizer I have found that it's incredibly prone to scratching. I've been careful to keep it clean but still have 3 significant gouges out of the screen. So I'd definitely recommend a screen protector goes on straight away.