Ever Broken a Textbook Beyond Repair? Now, with iBooks, You Can!
I’ve dropped a lot of textbooks during my time in school. Usually, it’s not a big deal: maybe a corner gets bent, maybe the spine cracks, maybe a page or two tears. Even dropping a textbook in the bathtub isn’t such a problem—if you lay it out to dry, it’s readable again in a day or so. Maybe I’m clumsier than the average person. But based on the state of used textbooks I’ve purchased, I don’t think I’m the only one who occasionally drops textbooks.
That’s why Apple’s announcement of iBooks Textbooks worries me, as a graduate student, English teacher, and advocate of user repair.
On Thursday, Apple announced iBooks 2 (a new version of their iPad e-book software) along with two new projects: iBooks Textbooks and iBooks Author. They’ve made an agreement with three of the largest textbook publishers—Pearson, McGraw-Hill, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt—to begin publishing interactive textbooks for the iPad. Right now, they only have seven K-12 textbooks available, but more are promised soon. iBooks Author, drag-and-drop self-publishing software, should allow professors to create interactive iBooks textbooks with ease.
We’re excited for iBooks Textbooks. But we have concerns about the durability of the only device on which they can be viewed. Most devices made with the classroom in mind are designed to last forever (brick-like TI calculators, for example), or at least are modular enough to be repairable. We know repair technicians who successfully maintain a school’s worth of MacBooks. Apple can make modular devices; the iPad 2 isn’t one of them.
Last Friday, I posted about how difficult the iPad 2 is to repair. The front glass is glued to the iPad’s frame, which means that if your front glass cracks, you have to loosen the glass shards from the screen with a heat gun and prying tools. You have to take apart almost the entire device to change the battery, and your chances of cracking the glass while opening the iPad are very high.
If all your textbooks are on your iPad, what happens when it breaks? What happens when the battery stops holding a charge? What happens when the backlight stops working or the power button stops turning on the device? If you can’t fix your iPad yourself, you’ll have to wait days, maybe weeks for it to be repaired (and pay $200+). During that time, you won’t have any textbooks. If you do try to fix your iPad 2 yourself, it’s difficult enough that you might break it more in the process.
So, a plea for help: In the process of writing our manual, we wrecked half a dozen iPad 2s trying to find the easiest possible way inside. Our manual shows the best path we’ve found so far. Can you think of a better way to get the glass off without breaking it? An improved solution will help us—and the millions of students who will eventually break their magic electric books.
Comments
Possibly manufacture a glass replacement for the front. Similar to how the White Unibody MacBooks have for their screen.
If a user breaks the glass of their iPad, replace it with a black piece of plastic that covers the bezel around the display but leaves the display itself exposed.
Yes, it will lead to more scratching, but you won’t have dangerous cracked glass. And it won’t break again next time its dropped.
@Jeffery – You forgot one thing. DIGITIZER….
I don’t know how you’ve done it but NONE of your links on this page work with my web browser (Opera 11.51 Linux).
I’ve never had that happen on another page.
Apple probably wants you to buy two, one as a backup while you get the broken one fixed. If you own two iPads I think as long as you tie each one to the same account you should be able to access all the content you’ve bought, right?
I am certainly agree of your worries. I love to repair iPhones and Computers but I believe that is nothing more wonderful than the smell of book paper, sense the texture and peel the pages. Of course carrying traditional books in a student back will cause you some issues in the future with your spine but digital e-books are future and the decision is always personal!
I haven’t tried this but do you think that a hot wire foam cutter would work?
Prevent the ipad from breaking in the first place. What you do is find a book that is larger overall than the ipad. Glue all the pages together then cut out a hole to fit the ipad into. Close the cover and away you go. Looks like an ordinary text book. It will suffer the same fate as an ordinary textbook if dropped and inside is a well protected never to be broken ipad…
Speaking as a Mac investor (four macs, iPad, iPhone(s), iPods……..and with elementary aged children……
Unless Apple plans a hardened, easy to repair/replace (cheap) version, please save the IPad for game play and for those workplaces/academic environs where the bottom-line allows ‘easy’ replacement (cost no factor).
Otherwise stick with droppable/toss-able/cheap paper versions.
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to remove adhesive you could try liquid nitrogen to cool it down so the digitiser would detach, I think most of the components would be safe if the unit was powered down. You would then need to place the adhesive in sheer, possibly a twist and pull method. As this is most likely a 3M product, I would contact their engineers to see what the best removal method would be. Apple has to have a method, i’m sure they dont toss out the digitizer everytime they refurb a unjit. Thanks for creating iFixit,
Thanks for alerting us, Jorn. We think we’ve fixed this issue—let us know if you’re still having trouble.
I’ll admit to never actually having attempted to open one up myself, but from looking at the designs and other opening guides, my first thought was to get one corner pried up enough to stick some thread or even dental-floss in the gap and then proceed to cut the adhesive like a cheese-wheel. Neither rayon or dental-floss should scratch any of the bits involved.
You’ll still have to shim it as you go or it will just stick back together, but it sure beats 20 minutes of levering and scraping…
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