Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge teardown: Hard to repair, expensive to produce

 By 
Stan Schroeder
 on 
Original image replaced with Mashable logo
Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

The Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge, with its beautifully curved but not very useful screen, is perhaps the company's most intriguing smartphone yet -- on the outside.

The inside is a different story. The iFixit team did what they do best and tore down the Edge to teeny, tiny pieces.

The highlights of the teardown include many modular -- and thus, replaceable -- parts on one side, and a battery that is very hard to remove on the other side. At 2,600mAh, it's also something of a step back from the Galaxy S5's 2,800mAh battery.

While the curved display is aesthetically beautiful, it makes life difficult for anyone who tries to pry open and repair the device.

iFixit also notes that the curved glass on the Galaxy S6 Edge, created by a process called 3D thermoforming, is much more costly than the flat glass found on most smartphones. iFixit estimates that the glass itself might cost Samsung as much as $26 per phone to produce -- about eight times more than the $3 glass in the Galaxy S5.

Overall, the Galaxy S6 Edge scores 3 out of 10 on iFixit's repairability scale, meaning it's very hard to repair -- but not as hard as the HTC One M8, for example.

Can you find the full teardown here.

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