[Mac User #001]

Not quite, but it might as well be gone.

Well, what happened was my little brother threw a battery in the house, and where does it hit? My screen. It has a nice little crack on the top right corner. That then produces lines where the screen has stopped working, most going from top to bottom, but a few going from left to right, just not as visible. It makes my trash can, Spotlight, the date and time, and my wireless connection all unusable, not to mention all of my folders. I can move the folders and shrink the dock so the trash can is out of the way, but for the rest, I don't know.

Now I can't blame him. My brother is 6. He can't pay for the damage, nor can he seem to understand the severity of what he has done. I mean, really it's my fault. I should have closed the lid while I was in the bathroom.

And I'm sure replacing the screen will be expensive. Still, can anyone give me an estimate?

I guess this is time for me to finally get that MacBook Pro I've always wanted. Better start saving now...

[Laminar]

Is it a 12 or 14 inch? My 14" iBook's screen got messed up in a bike accident last year. I bought a screen from a fellow MacNN'er that was parting out an identical iBook for $160. To install a new one, you have to take out 8 screws, and that's it, it was really simple.

[Mac User #001]

12".

Man, thats a serious crack. Thats shattered. I've got one small cracked spot; it just messes up the screen a lot.

Thanks for letting me know about how easy it is to replace. So I just need to find another 12" iBook screen and swap them out myself?

[Laminar]

That's what I did. I hadn't ever worked on my iBook like that before, but it turned out to be a piece of cake, with the right tools.

The 4 sunken screws around the shell of the display use a small allen wrench, probably 1/16 inch. Once the 4 screws are out, you have to pop the back off of the frame, which is easiest to do with a guitar pick. You can find a pack of multiple sizes at any music shop or big-box store. Using something like a screwdriver will often mar the plastic, but a softer guitar pick slipped in the crack and slid around the edges won't hurt anything. Then there are 4 tiny phillips screws that hold the display onto the metal frame. Remove those four screws and disconnect the monitor cable, then swap in the new display, and reverse the removal process.