Gadgetory

the iconic pixel 3xl with its dual facing front cameras and a knotch you could land an airplane on is ready to be torn down taken apart and reviewed from the inside we'll see if those back glass scratches can be removed as well let's get started like with most class phones we open it up from the back using a lot of heat to soften the adhesive between the back and the frame you know how it goes big suction cup lifts up while my razor blade slices through the thick watertight adhesive having a metal tool so close to the fragile circuits and lithium battery induces a tad bit of anxiety but there's not really a better way to do glued shut watertight phones or just what we deal with these days it's hard but not impossible finally cutting through that last bit of adhesive and lifting up the glass panel reveals that the insides of the pixel 3xl look much different than the regular sized pixel the wireless charging is the normal boring black color and the black NFC is actually stuck to the glass the pixel 3xl is just less aesthetic inside than the regular sized pixel before we get too far into the teardown let's see if we can remove these scratches on the back panel erricka Griffin made a fantastic video where she was able to clean off some of the scratches on her black pixel XL in the sink using soap water and a toothbrush I mentioned my durability test video that the frosted glass panel was probably acting like a level 6 abrasive kind of like a chalkboard of sorts to any metals softer than a level 6 that it came in contact with like keys coins and pry tools brass keys are pretty common in are usually about a 3.5 on Mohs scale of hardness steel would be a 5.5 or so the etched level 6 surface of the back of this phone is literally acting like a piece of sandpaper to these common metals and the residue of the metal is left behind as a permanent mark Erica managed to clean off her softer brass residue with just water and soap but my stainless steel residue from the pry tools is not coming off with soap and water I think Google should have just itched the underside of the glass so it would still visually look cloudy but leave the glossy smooth non abrasive surface on the outside putting your phone in water is incredibly dangerous and liquid damage is not covered under any warranties and doesn't even clean off all metal marks so keep your phone as dry as possible I'll show you where those water damage indicators are hidden in just a second my welding brush is quite a bit stronger than a toothbrush but was equally unable to remove any scratches back to the teardown let's see why it's a bad idea to get your phone wet unlike the normal sized pixel three this fingerprint scanner is clipped in with a latch style connector which lifts up and then lets the fingerprint scanner come loose from the motherboard now the pixel three is ip68 water-resistant not waterproof meaning that water can still get inside the phone if it's deep enough or if there's added pressure from a faucet or steam from hot water google couldn't tell if your phone has been wet or not by this little white sticker near the charging port the white sticker turns pink when it comes in contact with liquid so putting your phone in the sink is just not worth the risk Google will know there are more water damage indicators as well but they are hidden under a series of t3 screws holding down all of the components let's start with those four screws holding down this metal side rail I'll link all the tools I use in the video description with that side rail gone now I can unclip the battery and the wireless charging both unsnap like little Legos now it's pretty excited to see some pull tabs underneath the battery usually this means that the battery has an easy removal process but both of these tabs turned out to be worthless they were incredibly tight made no sound and both of them broke before releasing their death grip on the battery which means we have to commence the prime I use a little bit of heat to soften the adhesive frying is dangerous because batteries are not meant to be bent or punctured it would have been nice if Google spent an extra two pennies per phone and got some worthwhile pull tabs like look at this nightmare it's like the monster from venom has a death grip on the lithium the wireless charger is super simple I'll peel that off like a giant sticker revealing a 3400 milliamp power battery no match for the notes four thousand milliamp hours but still better than the iPhone 10's 2,700 milliamp hour down here at the bottom of the phone we have one of the two stereo speakers held in place by five of those same t3 screws I'll pop out the SIM card tray and then remove the speaker with its black plastic covering the interesting thing about this speaker is where the sound emanates from it's just the one side of the charging port not the whole thing meaning that the extra large size of that bottom speaker grille is mostly for aesthetics looking over here at the other large hole in the bottom of the phone the SIM card slot we get yet another water damage indicator running along the entirety of the SIM card opening this indicator is one of the largest I've seen and if it gets wet it also turns red notifying Google that your phone is not covered by any warranty since it got wet this indicator is also visible from the outside of the phone when the SIM card is removed so once again keep it away from water now let Sun bury that knotch there are five screws holding down the plastic top plate over the motherboard and another two screws holding down the bracket over the taptic vibrator I'll unplug the side buttons remove one more motherboard screw and two more screws holding down the long bracket over the notch components before the motherboard can come out I'll unclip the squeeze sensor ribbon cable and the other squeeze sensor ribbon the screen ribbon and the last final ribbon down at the bottom of the board for the charging ports there's one more screw at the top right of the motherboard then I can unclip the two front facing cameras and the top earpiece speaker lastly if you're not asleep yet I'll unplug the two signal wires at the bottom and then the whole motherboard can just shimmy out of the pixel three frame the motherboard is free and it looks like we have some thick white thermal paste on the back of the processor the rear camera also plugs in back here and is arguably one of the main selling points of the pixel 3 this 12 megapixel sensor with optical image stabilization combined with Google's software it's supposedly one of the best smartphone cameras on the market at the moment it kind of just boils down to personal preference though I still prefer a dual camera setup for telephoto and wide-angle speaking of which the pixel 3xl does include two cameras I don't know if you saw it or not but the pixel 3xl has a notch on the front and that notch is home to dual eight megapixel cameras one normal selfie camera and the other camera for wide-angle grupe pictures the large earpiece surprisingly has a few sensors attached to it and sits comfortably between the two cameras right over top of the much smaller speaker grille opening realistically judging by the size of the front-facing cameras the notch couldn't be much smaller than it is large cameras need a large notch to hide behind and that's just the way this phone was designed screen replacements require heat to pull the glass away from the frame the old cracked screens usually do not survive the removal procedure so I'm gonna leave my screen in place and intact for now the last thing to come out is the charging port it has three more of those same t 3 screws we've been taking out this whole time once those are out the charging port ribbon pulls out from inside the phone frame it does have the normal rubber ring around the USBC port to help keep water out but judging by the placement of the water damage indicator even Google knows it's still a weak point the SIM card tray does have a rubber lip around the edge to keep water out as well but it's minor and unimpressive and keeping your phone away from water is still the best plan of action even if you're trying to wash off scratches I think Google did a pretty good job this year with the pixel 3 yeah the notch is big and the glass gets marked up easy but for die-hard pixel fans this is still a solid phone I'm gonna tuck the charging port back down into frame making sure all the screw holes line up with where they originally came out of slipping the motherboard back in and making sure it's not lying on top of any ribbon cables it's time to find out if this thing still works I'll clip the side squeezing ribbon back onto the motherboard this is the third iteration of the flex sensors that we've seen each little sensor can detect my new fluctuations in the sidewall squeezing acts like a button of sorts to activate the camera or other applications I'll get the earpiece back into place with the front facing cameras clipping them in one by one and the bracket that holds everything in place I know I always stress keeping your screws organized in projects like this because it's super important it actually makes the assembly process go so much faster the bottom speaker is back in his slot and finally it's time for this large random chunk of metal it makes you wonder if the phone wasn't structurally sound enough beforehand and they added the metal chunk afterward to keep things from bending in half smart move let's give them a thumbs up for the random metal chunk it sits snugly over the top of the battery connector and the wireless charging look then the fingerprint scanner ribbon can slip into its little slot in the motherboard and latch down firmly into place all that double-sided adhesive to keep the back glass down it's definitely not watertight anymore but everything still works I'd say the biggest issue with the pixel 3xl is getting permanently marked up by basically any metal that comes in contact with never has keeping your keys and phone in Britt pockets been more important a case her skin would be a good idea to help keep the resale value up but other than that it seems like a solid device to me check out the clear mod I made with the regular sized pixel 3 that looks pretty amazing inside and hit that subscribe button if you haven't already thanks dumb for watching I'll see you around