While many mobile phone manufacturers are moving towards the micro-USB interface as a standard, others such as Apple and HTC are still bucking the trend. Part of [arto’s] job includes repairing mobile phones, and last month he found himself faced with a pair of broken HTC handsets that needed their charging ports replaced.

Replacements for HTC’s proprietary connectors are apparently quite hard to find, and [arto] says he had to source them from an HTC repair center. With the proper parts in hand, he could finally get down to work.

The HTC Hermes handset he repaired was a breeze, as it had plenty of space available around the charging port. He said that this allowed him to replace the jack pretty easily, but the HTC Touch Dual was a mess in comparison. He started by removing the old adapter, which was done by cutting it out bit by bit. He says that he did it this way rather than desoldering, due to its proximity to other heat-sensitive components. After some careful soldering under a microscope, everything was back in working order.

While his repairs are not necessarily the things that hacks are made of, the information is still quite helpful. Broken charging ports are extremely common among smart phones, and with plenty of these older models still floating around, his pointers just might help someone save a few bucks on a replacement phone.

This is a custom back plate with induction charging circuitry that [Derek Hughes] build for his HTC HD2 cellphone. When we checked in with him last week he showed us how to add an inductive charger without voiding the warranty but it wasn’t very pretty because the stock back plate blocked the inductive field and couldn’t be used. The solution he came up with will work with any device if you want to put some time into the build.

He took two different aftermarket cases; one fits his cellphone and the other is a BlackBerry case meant for housing a credit card. After cutting a hole in the back of the cellphone case he epoxied the credit card holder in place, smoothed the seam with Bondo, and repainted. Not only does the charger fit in the credit card case, but there’s still room for a credit card. [Derek] also measured the magnetic fields around the circuitry and found they will not damage the magnetic strip on that American Express Black you’ve been keeping on you. In the video after the break he mentions the last step in finishing this case will be to locate a 90-degree USB plug as the current connector is a bit of an eyesore.

[Derek Hughes] wanted to use inductive charging on his cellphone without voiding the warranty. He picked up a Pixi charging backplate meant for a Palm Pre and scavenged the coil and regulator circuitry from it. To make the electrical connection with his HTC HD2 he removed the mini-USB plug from a charging cable and connected it with 30 gauge wire. The whole package will fit beneath the back plate for use with a Touchstone charger (as we’ve seen with the HTC Evo) but there was one problem. The metal backplate from the HD2 interferes with the inductive charging. For now he’s using tape to hold everything together while searching for a plastic case replacement.

He walks you through the hack in the video after the break. We’re usually not worried about voiding warranties, but a phone like this takes a lot of abuse and having warranty protection or even a service agreement isn’t a bad idea.

[Danny] added wireless charging to his HTC Evo. The hard work was already done for him by Palm, it was just a matter of adding that hardware to his phone. A Touchstone induction charging kit for the Palm Pre will cost you just over $40 for the base station and a replacement back cover. [Danny's] method removes the induction coil from that cover a relocates inside the case of the Evo. He routes two wires around the battery and solders them to positive and ground connections on the board. Once it’s back together the device draws power without any wires.

[Thanks Matt]

Tired of fighting Windows mobile on your HTC handset? Now you can fight a beta ROM of Android 2.1. [Slm4996] has put in a flurry of work over the last few days to get Android 2.1 running on the HTC Kaiser (aka AT&T tilt), Vogue, Niki, and Polaris. Right now everything except the camera and bluetooth is working but there is a bug tracker to help with troubleshooting any undiscovered issues. If you want to try it out but don’t want to flash the hacked ROM to your phone you can run it beside Windows Mobile by using HaRET.

Correction: The title of this post originally read “Droid 2.1″ in error. We have corrected it to read “Android 2.1″.  [Thanks GuyFrom7Up]

Oh, for crying out loud! While we were all giddy reporting on yesterday’s wonderfully done head-mounted computer, [Andrew Lim] of recombu.com comes along and essentially does the same thing with an HTC Magic handset and three dollars worth of Harbor Freight crap. Linux kernel, WiFi, accelerometer, the whole nine yards. Consider our collective ass handed to us.

Funny thing is, either of these could be considered The Consummate Hack. One flaunting the creator’s know-how with its custom-designed parts and delicate engineering, the other exhibiting a more punk flair with random scraps and off-the-shelf technology achieving much the same effect — a solution so obvious we were blind to it. Whatever your outlook, this is a great day to be a hacker!

[via slashdot]

In our Dev Phone 1 excitement last week, we somehow overlooked phoneWreck’s teardown of the T-Mobile G1. The complex slider mechanism is certainly worth looking out. One of the major oddities they point out is the inclusion of two vibration motors. One is mounted next to the SIM on the mainboard. While the other is mounted in the frame next to the earpiece. We wonder what was gained/solved by using two. The phone also includes a digital compass module. We’d like a more detailed explanation of how the Xilinx CPLD is used. From this article in 2006, it seems HTC uses them to generate custom clock signals and switching off devices for power management.

Google has new program to sell Android phones directly to developers. The Android Dev Phone 1 is both SIM-unlocked and hardware-unlocked. SIM-unlocked means you can use it on any GSM carrier you want. Hardware-unlocked means you can run any system you want on the phone, not just officially signed ones. No more need to worry about security patches taking away your root access.

The device is $399. You will need to purchase it through the Android Market as a registered developer (a $25 fee). We wonder how long before the unsigned bootloader starts getting flashed to T-Mobile phones.

Two new Android phones have surfaced recently which may prove just as friendly: the Kogan Agora Pro and the QiGi i6.

UPDATE: While shipping is free in US, it is incredibly expensive everywhere else. Yes, we bought one.

[via Techmeme]

[photo: tnkgrl]

Google has officially released the Android source code. While the T-Mobile G1 is being released tomorrow—some already have it—it is just one Android device. The availability of the source means that the platform could be port to almost any device. It’s a complete embedded Linux package and we’ve already seen it running on the N810. We can’t wait to see what hacks come out of this.