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Introduction |
| This repair requires either an extremely fine tipped soldering iron and extremely steady hands, or an SMD rework station. | | Remove the Apple TV's bottom cover and drive as described in Apple TV Teardown. Carefully peel back the two copper sticky grounding strips near the LED module. Swing the outer aluminium case up and carefully slide it it towards the connector side of the motherboardlogic board until it comes off. Remove the LED module by undoing two screws with a number 0 Philips head screwdriver. Then carefully unplug it from the motherboardlogic board to make it easier to work on. | | There are two miniature SMD LEDs, one is clear and one is yellow. Unsolder the yellow coloured LED, which is actually the white one - the clear SMD LED is amber when on. Replace with another high intensity SMD LED. I used a blue one to match my other hi-fi components. The anode (+) is marked on the circuit board and is away from the infrared receiver side. Reassemble is a simple reversal being sure to remember to reverse every step.
SMD LEDs are difficult to find as a spare part. I carefully ground down a normal sized LED with a Dremil until it would fit. The only source of SMD LEDs I could find was LED bar lights in various colours such as these: http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=ZD0450&CATID=33&form=CAT&SUBCATID=879 | | | Enjoy! |
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