Alex Loves Everything

Monday, February 11, 2008

iPhone vs. Washing Machine - WINNER: IPHONE




Ok, so first off - yes, I am a colossal idiot and accidentally washed my iPhone. It was in the small pocket of my jeans when I was preparing them for the wash, and a quick glance at the table gave me the impression that my iPhone was not in my jeans. The curse of having two iPhones in the house. Later on, when I discovered that was not my iPhone, I pretty much immediately sprinted down to the laundry room, dreading what I was about to find.

Sure enough, right at the bottom of the washing machine: my precious, glorious, unresponsive iPhone. Clean as a WHISTLE, but unresponsive. After my four stages of trauma set in, (horror, disbelief, self-loathing and ennui) and I was lamenting the walk of shame over to the Apple Store to purchase another one, I decided to plug it in - just to see what happened. Well the screen lit up with this actually-kind-of-beautiful pattern, there seemed to be some moisture under the screen. Very similar to when you take a shower with your nice watch on (another proud moment in my life.)

After a little while, it popped up the 'ok idiot, plug this iphone into itunes please' with a 'your phone is broken!! call support' message. So I hitched out a deep sigh, and placed my phone on the bedside table, composing my iphone's requiem in my head.

Fast forward to this morning. I took my iPhone with me to work for some unknown reason, and for shits and giggles docked it. It went through the standard sync procedure, the screen came on, and *FANFARE* - iPhone works! Screen works, internet works, it both sends and receives calls, everything SEEMS to be working fine. There's still a bit of fog on the screen, and I'm hopeful that will work itself out in time. If it starts acting screwy, I'll post some updates... but as of now, works great!

Here's my question: HOW. IN. THE. WORLD. IS. THIS. POSSIBLE?????? MY IPHONE WENT:
**THROUGH AN ENTIRE WASH CYCLE IN A WASHING MACHINE WHILE POWERED ON**

At any rate, thank you very much for making such a good product, Apple.

Labels:

posted by Alex at 9:21 AM

49 Comments:

  • well that's one way to get the face grease off. (yes, i'm shocked too.)

    By Blogger angie, at 5:05 PM  

  • This is a surprisingly common occurrence. Cell phones and iPods can very often survive even extended submersion if they are given a chance to throughly dry out. Not that you should really test that hypothesis or anything, but I know a number of people who have revived various electronics after they got dunked.

    By Blogger jab, at 5:16 PM  

  • YOUR A MUPPET

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:02 PM  

  • lol nice one, the best I've ever done was back in the day I washed my PS1 memory card and it still worked... this is slightly more impressive though XD

    By Blogger Leigh, at 1:44 AM  

  • Donkey snarf boogers tweedle dee wtf

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:38 AM  

  • I've done the same thing with my samsung Sprint phone. it was wonderful to watch it come back to life. i think this is actually not as uncommon as i thought, i think most people just have less patience and assume that it's dead.

    By Blogger Josh, at 8:39 AM  

  • I did this to my iphone too! Pretty much wanted to cry when I found out what I'd done, the screen had all these crazy moire-ish/diagonal line patterns in it...but I did some research and found that keeping the iphone in a bag of white rice could help dry it out, so that's what I did. A week later the screen looks perfect, you wouldn't even know that it had gone through an entire washing machine cycle... with soap!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:52 PM  

  • it hppend to me with my gameboy when i was 4(who know the shower would kill it)

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:47 AM  

  • Keep an eye on the battery life. I went swimming last summer with my Shuffle in my pocket (why I'd ever put an iPod in my trunks, I'll never know), and though it still powers on, it keeps its charge now for 5 minutes max and quits.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:37 PM  

  • I'll one up you on this one... I washed and then dried my iPhone. It came out of the drier cracked battered and bruised but after putting in on the charger for a few hours it came right back to life and works perfectly. The glass on the front of the phone is cracked but other than that I still use it. Not one thing wrong with it. WOW!!

    By Blogger Mike, at 10:22 AM  

  • I've gone through at least seven different cell phones in last 4 years, searching for what I hoped would be the uber phone. I had a Nokia N95, which the Nokia promises is a super computer phone. It also retails for an average of $300.00 more than the iPhone. I put off the iPhone purchase as long as I could. I chalked iPhone fever up to Apple hype. But, I have never, ever been happier with a phone than I have with my iPhone. Your story just proves what a great product Apple made!

    By Anonymous Tasha Ward, at 12:09 AM  

  • It should still work as long as it was not on and there was no power going to it. Electricity likes going to the path of least resistance and water is a good conductor with no resistance. If the iPhone was on, the electricity running through it would bypass the built-in electrical wires and resistors, and fuses and cause a short, or an overload and burn stuff up. I believe that by the time you powered it on, it was pretty much dry (I bet you set it on a rinse cycle), but still had some condensation, causing a small short somewhere, hence the warning when you first turned it on. But by the time you docked it the next day, it would have dried out more and was good to go. I used to work at HP and we used to wash circuit boards in water after a computer would auto solder the board. Some parts didn't need the solder so we had to cover these parts up with an epoxy paste ( I forget the technical name of the paste-like substance). After this was done, we had to wash out the paste by running distilled water over the circuit board. We then had to dry it completely, or the water would create a short when powered on. I believe that we put it in a warm oven (I had this job in 1995 so it's been a while). Once it was completely dry, it was good to install into the machines, in this case, electronic testing equipment. The previous post was correct in that you have to watch the battery. The water may have caused a short between the two terminals (negative and positive) and may have damaged it. If you are lucky, maybe it's okay. I think the only problem you may have is the condensation under the screen. This may be hard to dry, and once it does, it may leave a big ugly spot under the screen, but if you can live with it, more power to you. Also, check the net to see if you can take off the screen. I had some dust under my PSP slim and was able to take off the screen and clean it. Anyway, good luck.

    By Anonymous Grouchy Dude, at 3:50 PM  

  • Just took my son's IPhone out from the washing machine, it seems ok except turning itself on. I will let it dry to see if it helps.

    By Anonymous Spoon, at 7:19 AM  

  • I went to my schools fountain day and was in like a tidal wave for 30 mins my phone was soaked. it was on when it happen and i also tried putting it on and it turned on but now 5 hours later it doesn't do it anymore but the screen will light up when i pluged it in. I'm letting it sit in rice over night and hopefully it still will work and if not at least a get the second addition of the phone.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:42 AM  

  • I just washed my IPHONE today and i am trying to get it back, so i don't have to buy another one. So i will let you know if this really works. If it does thanks for the info.

    By Anonymous PeteyS, at 1:21 PM  

  • I washed mine yesterday. I read a bag of rice would help absorb the water faster. I sealed up the phone in a bag of rice and left it under a blow dryer on low heat for most of the day. I could see there was no more condensation in the camera lens so I docked it and it works! The screen is still a little bit foggy, but it really doesn't hurt the functionality. I'm hoping it will clear up, but either way I'm so relieved I don't have to replace the phone.

    By Blogger Michael-Anne, at 5:45 AM  

  • My dear Iphone went to the washing machine on tuesday morning. I tried to dry it with the hair drier. I plugged it in the charger and didn't work. I "baked" the Iphone (inside a bowl of rice) in the oven at 50 ºc for 10 minutes , sealed it in a bag of rice overnight, next day I left it 10 hours in the rice bowl under a direct lamp light, facing up and facing down...
    After all that intensive care, on Wednesday night I plugged it in the charger and ¡miracle! it worked perfectly. The fog in the screen has dissapeared almost completely and everything works fine. Thanks for the rice advice!!!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:40 AM  

  • update: after a couple days the rest of the condensation evaporated and the phone is as good as new!

    By Blogger Michael-Anne, at 6:31 AM  

  • Same here!!!! I washed my IPhone in a long cycle hot water wash.... and after 3 days drying, it works!!!!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7:48 PM  

  • I just washed my iphone, and it does not turn on. I tried pushing the button on the top, but nothing happens. I will try drying it out with the rice of bowl and hopefully it will help.
    I have a question for you guys though - should I try connecting it to my computer and powering it on again? or will it short and blow something inside if I try it? (the phone was on when I washed it)

    Thanks ahead.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:40 PM  

  • So, I have sort of dried out my iPhone in a sack of rice. Connected it to my computer and it turned on! Amazingly it worked, except that I had to use my headphone microphones to talk over the phone. Interesting fact is that whenever I do not use the headphone microphones the person on the other end of the line does not hear me, but I can hear my echo.
    Everything esle worked just fine...until...until 4 hours later when it simply shut off! It does not turn on anymore! When I first turned it on, I noticed that there was still some moisture under the screen - does that mean that the moisture still in the phone might have caused a short? but why did it work then after being in a washing machine?

    Can anybody suggest me what to do? my e-mail is: chengizhan@gmail.com

    Thanks ahead.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:13 PM  

  • Just pulled my iPhone out of the wsher. It's in a ziploc full of rice in front of the heater vent. Thanks for the advice.

    By Blogger Jeff, at 1:47 PM  

  • i just got a cell phone for christmas and i accidently washed it in the washing machine too! mine is a motorola KRZR. i still dont know if it works. it had been sitting on the rigister fr a while and now it's in a bag of rice so it soaks up the moisture. i was soooo sad!!! i hopw it works. im glad yours did!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:14 PM  

  • i just got a cell phone for christmas and i accidently washed it in the washing machine too! mine is a motorola KRZR. i still dont know if it works. it had been sitting on the rigister fr a while and now it's in a bag of rice so it soaks up the moisture. i was soooo sad!!! i hopw it works. im glad yours did!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:15 PM  

  • Add me to the "Where's my Iphone? Oh no!!! In the washer!!!!" club. I put mine in a bowl of silica gel (found at Hobby Lobby and used for drying flowers) for 2 days and it powers up. The screen is very foggy but I'm hoping that clears in time. Thank goodness it didn't flatline. My toddler's Xmas pics were still on it.

    By Blogger Janet, at 1:20 PM  

  • I too had the horror of finding my IPhone in the bottom of the washer, washed with detergent and spun dried. The phone looked ok, but had a total dead screen: nothing. Found this site (thank you!!!) and did the bag of rice thing, placing the rice bag on a warm heater/radiator overnight. The next day it powered on, but I got a rapid flash of screens that looked scary, so I left it in the rice bag for a second day. That made a difference, and I got a normal function except for long water marks under the screen, so I painfully sacrificed my cell phone ONE MORE DAY to the rice bag. What an amazing device! After the phone's third day in the Uncle Ben Spa, it works perfectly, no water marks, holds its charge, all data intact. The trick is not to rush it from getting TOTALLY dried out, against all human temptation of using it before its ready.

    PS I use liquid Tide.

    By Anonymous wendy, at 5:30 AM  

  • Washed mine too and works fine accept for my camera.. Anybody have the same problem? or got it fixed? By apple? how much did it cost? I hope mine will work again..

    By Blogger z80, at 3:59 PM  

  • Someone in the earlier thread mentioned "bowl of rice". I hope you didn't stick your iphone in a steamed bowl of rice..

    By Blogger z80, at 4:05 PM  

  • Just washed my iPhone this past Saturday. Didn't know about the rice thing so I went to the craft store and bought some silica gel used for drying flowers. 2.5 days in a tupperware and the only thing that is wrong with the phone is the screen has some marks on the inside, but you can only see it from angles.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 8:23 PM  

  • Left my iphone "on" in a pants pocket and washed them on about a 45 minute normal wash in a front loader then not realizing it was missing it remained in the pants pocket and was placed in the dryer for about a one hour total dry time. The next morning I then realized my iphone was missing. I found it in the pants in the dryer and placed it in a ziplocked bag of rice for two days without even trying to turn it on. Results..... it is now working and has been all week but does have some water markings on the screen but all applications, photos, music....everything is there and working. The first day it did not want to stay on unless it was plugged into the charger but now seems to do OK. So if you are a dumba*s like me, do not give up because this phone is apparently pretty tough. I do check my pockets better now.... sometimes you learn the hard way.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:57 PM  

  • Thanks a million! I washed my iPhone a few months ago...when it was powered on, ready to go. Out it came and dead it was. It was fully charged at the time, so I tried turning it on. The screen flickered to life, looking like it was outside my window on a snowy day. Then...nothing. Blackness, like it was mirroring my mood. Perhaps, I thought, the charger? Nothing. In desperation, I called the phone company. Normally, they are very sympathetic...they're Swiss. This time they laughed. That was very unusual.

    A week or two of negotiation later, I got a 'discount' off the full price of replacement. I wouldn't give them back the original because I had some data on there I wanted to make sure could not be read and I'm paranoid that way. So I put it away and resolved, when I could mentally take it, to figure out how to erase the phone.

    One week later, I googled washing the phone, hoping to find someone with a similar experience who'd been able to zero out their phones. Instead, I found your post. What the heck, I thought, why not try to rice thing? First I tried to charge the phone one last time, to no avail. In the rice it went and I forgot about it for a couple of weeks.

    Then I remembered. Pulled it out of the rice and plugged it into the charger. The battery icon popped up. Curious, I let it charge and checked it a couple of hours later. Lo and behold, there was my old phone, working. Amazing. Headphones worked too. Double amazing.

    It's been a few months and there have been no problems. The screen wash is almost completely gone now and my wife is very happy with her (new) iPhone. Me too. So thanks for sharing your experience and making mine better. Cheers.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4:09 AM  

  • Well this idiot Mom washed her son's, powered on, iphone, in his pants, in the washing machine. The precious phone was rescued by its man-child owner before it ended up in the dryer. Distraughtly he cradled his unresponsive playmate and attempted to revive it with the wall charger. Mustering up his best stink eye, he glared at me while no sign of life (the infamous apple) appeared. He tearfully held it under the blow dryer and then mournfully laid it in a bed of rice, gasping as if it was his last breath, I sealed off his connection to the world with a Tupperware lid.

    Strangely enough his father and I were supposed to take it away from him last weekend due to bad grades - but we procrastinated. So I wonder if this is some kind of bad karma for not taking it away like we said we were going to. Sooooo it gets to be in it's rice bath for the rest of the semester! Perhaps long enough to dry out.

    Moral of the story - if man-child is old enough to own an iphone he is old enough to do his laundry!

    By Blogger Windyday, at 7:56 PM  

  • It all depends on the IC's and the way the device is engineered. at the age of 13 I fished some ol' sega genesis roms out of the Arkansas river. Dried 'em out and played my new games which I expected to work because I opened one before. (Its just a rom chip in there with the occasional capacitor and possible resistor/resistor series. Nothing major like a screen. One guy said his phone worked and then didn't. Capillary action. Leftover water accumulated and branched a short. The reason they don't short in large amounts of water is because most IC's in devices powered by 9v have an actual voltage range between 9-24v and in water the electricity has more places to go. Less water in the presence of water is more dangerous. You can never be too sure what will survive though. Some microchips can only withstand a couple of millivolts (millionths of a volt) before they blow out. Some screens may blow the LED's (if led type) when wet and when powered on. Like the guy from HP said, water may have been a part of the manufacturing process, yet the components had now current (alternating or direct) flowing through them. If your device becomes wet, power down immediately! Remove the battery if possible! (Never open your IPHONE CASE!) Consult your manual for maximum operating temprature (heat) and dry your device with that temprature without exceeding limits for several periods if needed until no longer moisture is detectable.

    My 13 month old daughter dropped her Iphone in the potty. Figured I would look into it. I really can't find much more use for an IPhone than to let a toddler surf youtube.

    Apple, You make great products for kids. 86.9% of your current/former customers are ADULTS.

    Cheers

    By Anonymous Triston J. Taylor, at 5:20 PM  

  • One iPhone through the wash cycle, now duly placed in a bag of white rice on top of the radiator! From the posts here I'll think I'll give it till Tuesday and then see if it's alive.

    By Blogger Martin, at 4:03 AM  

  • Hi, i washed my iphone today, when i realised it's already been blended for 15minuts. I got it out found it still on, but after a while powered off. The LCD is broken with a long crack :( Just find this website, hope the rice spa can work. anyway i think i have to replace a LCD. i'm not sure wether the apple store can repair it...

    By Anonymous Cynthia, at 7:12 AM  

  • dag just found my iphone in the washer, will try the rice thing, hope it works, i am already having withdraw.........

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:56 PM  

  • Hi, I am feeling hopeful after reading many of these comments so thank you all for that.

    My 3G joined the ranks and took a tumble in our front loader this morning. It went in a "stain cycle" (super soaker) with "extra rinse" (help to dry?) and was scrubbed to perfection with Oxy Clean and Seventh Generation Laundry detergent. It looks beautiful but is unresponsive. I knew better but for some reason I tried to turn it on. Anyhow, in another stage of grief, I took the SIM card out and sucked my phone which seemed to get some water out. It's now in a bag of dry rice and I will resist trying to turn it back on before morning.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:17 PM  

  • ok so i'm back, just to report back in, washed iphone in washer sat. nite just turned it on after 48 hours in rice and low and behold the sucker came on, still has wet looking streak on screen, hope that clears up but am grateful that it works at all, so thanks to all the advice and i will pass it on.........withdrawls over....

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:26 PM  

  • Went to an outdoor concert and left early because of pouring rain. We got home completely soaked. My daughter had left my wife's iPhone 3g in her pant's pocket. When my wife had got home, she pitched all the jeans in the washer (HE washer) and the iPhone went through the entire cycle. Needless to say, it was completely DEAD. I took out the SIM card and loosely wrapped it in a paper towel and submersed it the stuff you used to dry flowers (desiccant) 24 hours later, the iPhone fired right up. There are some water spots on the LCD, but I assume they will clear with time. Speaker works great...headphones work, Internet works. If the LCD is hosed, I have seen them online for $40, so not to worry. Any type of drying agent (rice or desiccant) will dry it out. Just seal it up in a ziplock bag.

    By Blogger Gman, at 4:33 PM  

  • oh noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:29 PM  

  • I, to, have now joined the ranks of putting the iphone into the washing machine, but I realized it was in there after 15 seconds when I tried to use the touch screen on my wallet >.>, so I ran back to the washer and pulled out my newly wet Iphone, it sorta still worked but the sleep button wont work and the silent switch wont activate silent mode anymore, and the keyboard tap sounds wont work, but other then that it still works... weird. Its in rice now and hopefully it will clear up.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:49 PM  

  • After seeing such a long list of replies I see that it is probably pointless.. but I figured I would at least put my two cents in to give some kind of assurance/hope to the one going down this page with a wet iPhone in their hand. It took me just 3 days to get the iPhone thoroughly dry. I used a small container of dry rice, and the heat from my PC monitor to do the trick, throwing a pair of shorts over the monitor to keep the heat in.. warms it up a bit.. but it turned on after I plugged it into a wall iPod adapter. It wouldn't just turn on itself.. and I wouldn't dare plug it into my PC.. just a tiny bit of screen damage in the upper right corner, very small, almost unnoticeable. So there you have it, another happy ending to a very grim situation.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 8:32 PM  

  • I put my iPhone 3g through the washing machine yesterday, it was powered on, but I caught it after about 10-15 minutes. when i pulled it out, it was off and completely soaked with soapy water. I rinsed with it clean water, then I did rice for a day. Today I bought silica gel which is a strong desiccant from a crafts store, used for drying flowers. I'm going to let it sit for at least two days, then see if it works.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:49 PM  

  • My 3G fell into the dog's water bowl - I yanked it out after a second or 2 and then tried to turn it off. It kept restarting until the 5th attempt when it finally stayed off. I dried it off and stuck it in a bag of rice (My phone prefers "Original Persian" to Uncle Ben's). Also found some silica gel in a sushi packet which I added to the rice.

    2.5 days later it is working fine (phew) but...

    --- BEGIN IMPORTANT TIP ---

    Don't do the idiotic thing that I did - removed the SIM holder before putting it in the rice! - so rice got inside the SIM socket and eventually I had to open the phone (instructions from youtube..)to extract a grain which jammed up the SIM card and pressed against the screen (and slightly damaged it..)

    Deep sigh...

    By Blogger StuckInTraffic, at 2:36 PM  

  • I tried the silica (my post is above), but after 5 days, my iphone is R.I.P. i'll miss you buddy.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7:35 PM  

  • Haha, I cannot believe how many of us have been idiotic enough to let our precious little iphones take a dip in our washers *sigh*. Mine decided it needed a clean about an hour ago, I think I'm still in a state of shock as all I can do is laugh.

    My steps:

    1. Taken out sim card, hopefully my numbers can be saved if the phone red lines
    2. Do the hairdryer thing for a bit
    3. Place the corpse in a bed of long grain rice and seal it shut in some tupperware
    4. Resurrect in a few days
    5. ???????
    6. Profit (working iphone, hopefully)

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