Pinebook Pro Lid Magnet / Sleep Fix
If you’re like me, you’ve been swept up in Pinebook Pro fever. Afterall, who can resist a $200 blacked out Linux laptop made by a cool open source tinkerer hardware company? And even though Pine64 is VERY CLEAR that this whole laptop is basically a huge community experiment, my expectations were pretty high due to the hype.
After I got through the learning curve of disto hopping on a BIOS-less machine like this, I fixed issues such as trackpad firmware, performance tweaks, and overall app issues with ARM. However, the machine still wouldn’t go to sleep when I shut the lid. And even when I DID manually suspend it, it would wake up WITH the lid closed.
I assumed this was just an issue with the Pinebook Pro not having any type of sensor to detect lid closure, but after a little digging, I found some documentation reporting that many of these machines were shipped with the lid magnet in the WRONG SPOT (whoopsies), but not to fear because there was a fix. All you had to do was take the entire computer apart, move the magnet and put it back together and hope you still have a computer.
Easy, right?
You bought a Pinebook Pro to be cool and hardcore, so roll up your sleeves and get ready to earn your nerd badge!
The Repair
The fix for this is pretty straight forward, but is time consuming and a little scary if you’re not used to taking computers apart. I recommend making sure you have plenty of space and a safe place to put screws.
The tools you need are pretty simple, just a small phillips screwdriver and something thin to pry panels open with (I love using a thin guitar pic).
Flip the machine over and remove all the little screws on the bottom and pull off the panel.
Next up, you’ll want to remove all of the screws holding the screen hinge. In both far corners, you’ll see little black plastic spacers. Pop them out and keep them. (they’re keyed to fit snug into place, but pretty sure there is no difference from left / right)
No going back now! Carefully lift up the black tape and pull on the little gray part over the ribbon cable. This will unlock the ribbon cable for the screen and you can pull that out.
Now the screen is technically disconnected from the body of the laptop, but the hinges are holding it down and kind of “looped” into the body. So carefully hold the screen and the body and lift the body up until about 90 degrees. Then as you lower the body back down, the hinges stay standing up. Now you can lift and wiggle the body of the laptop to get it free from the screen. Yay, your Pinebook Pro is now headless!
Now comes what most people claim in the HARDEST part… removing the hinge cover! It’s actually not all that complicated once you get it started and realize how it’s put together. I’d start on the NON-WIRE side, and start at the very bottom where you see the connection. Again, I use a guitar pick here because it’s thin enough to get in there, but won’t destroy anything if I slip. But even with the pick, it’s a PAIN to get started.. but once you get it started, you got it.
Once you get it started, you want to pull it away and up. Sort of peel and roll it up and you’ll feel it start to release.. then work your way down.. pop pop pop pop and it’s off!
Once that is off, go ahead and remove the hinges, and put them aside. Then peel off the 2 little bumpers at the top of the screen, and remove those screws too. Now get your handy pry tool and start working around the screen, starting at the corners, until you have the front bezel off. I found this to be pretty easy, but you might encounter some light adhesive on the bottom part, but it comes off easily. Take extra care guiding the monitor wire through the hole too.
At this point, you should be looking at all of the parts in your work area and be saying to yourself, “what did I just get myself into?!”. Don’t worry, that’s totally normal, but take a deep breath, or drink.. you’re almost there!
If yours is like mine, you’ll see the magnet snug on the side of the lid, and it SEEMS like it’s in the right place, but it’s not. The magnet is glued there, so we need to carefully pry it off, and since that’s scary to do right next to your display, it helps to give yourself some room.
You don’t need to fully remove the display panel, but you can slightly lift it up and “scoot it” to the left a bit to give yourself some space. Now you can patiently work at that magnet until it pops out.
Congrats, you’re officially HALF way done!
Now we get to put the magnet in the CORRECT place, which is up against the actual panel, and like about 1 cm down. Since the side of the panel is metal, the magnet sticks right to it, and no adhesive is needed.
I also thought, if you DO have to adjust the position later, you should be able to sneak something in there and push it up or down as needed, WITHOUT having to take it all apart again.
That’s it! Slide the panel back in place, and just do ALL of the steps in reverse! The only issues I had with re-assembly was getting the front bezel fully snapped on. (it always felt like there was 10 more snaps more to do). And for some reason, when I went to put the bottom back on, it almost felt too big to fit. I really had to wiggle and work it so it would rest flat. Weird, but worked.
And after all that, my Pinebook Pro DOES sleep when I close the lid, and actually STAY asleep. The only remaining sleep-related issue I have is that when it’s closed, the act of plugging in the power seems to wake it up (while still closed) Same deal for removing from power. But you just have to open the laptop and re-sleep it.
I hope this has been helpful, and if you have any corrections or suggestions, let me know!
