De-grunge Your Port

So, I said to the woman in the phone-repair shop that my phone had stopped charging and she took it from me, plugged her charger into my phone, glanced very briefly at the screen and told me I needed a new charging port. She also told me that, as a kindness, she was willing to order and install the port for a mere forty pounds sterling.

I told her I’d think about it which, as we all know, is code for are you mad, woman, I just want my phone to do what it’s meant to do, not rollerskate around the room juggling mice and singing “La donna è mobile” from Verdi’s Rigoletto!

Anyway, I left the shop and googled ‘charging port HTC U11+’ and found that they cost £9.95.

Then I googled ‘how to change a charging port on a HTC U11+’ and watched the 5 minute video that said that all I needed was a heatgun (or a hairdryer), two playing cards, a tiny screwdriver and a pair of tweezers.

It looked straightforward enough, but I bet the guy on the video had to do it a fair few times before he got it to look so easy. Anyway, it totally looked like it was worth forty quid. At a push.

Then, as an afterthought, I googled ‘how to clean out a USB-C port’ and read what it had to say.

Then I went home, took a needle from the sewing box and carefully dug this out from the charging port:

Since I did that I’ve been typing this on my phone and charging it. It’s gone from 30% charged to 65% charged in that time whereas before, it wouldn’t charge at all. Also, the charger fits tightly into the port, whereas before, it would have fallen out by now.

The moral of the story is: before you even think of paying forty pounds sterling for a new charging port, try cleaning it out instead.

On reflection, this principle could also be applied to many (many (many)) things.