I was working on a friend's phone and ordered a replacement iPhone 5 screen. After I installed it, I noticed some screen flickering around the edges of the LCD and some occasional ghost clicking. It seemed like when I hovered my finger close to the screen, it would click there. I don't know if ESD would cause this kind of behavior, but I have also never had this kind of issue before. I checked all my cabling and re-seated everything about 10 times to no avail. I also installed my friend's old cracked screen and it worked just fine (apart from the broken glass). No amount of resets or re-installations would make the problem any better, so I'm kinda at a loss here. Thanks for the help.
"I had a similar problem with one phone. Tested 3 different screens, all with the same result. When putting the original screen in or testing the screens in different phones all worked fine. I have been doing some iPad mini repairs lately and often as not if you have a ghost touch there, it is because you did not transfer all of the black tapes from the original screen to the new one. Parts of the screen will then make a connection with the aluminum frame and cause home buttons pressing themselves, ghost touch and loads of other problems.
On the iPhone 5 there should be a tape over the place where the backlight/lightbox cable is soldered to the connectors. You can see this in the green circle on the picture. If the tape is absent it looks like the on win the red circle. My hypothesis is that because the aluminum frames get bent a bit when falling, the absence of this tape does not always cause problems but sometimes does. I will let you guys know if I encounter the problem again in a phone and if its fixed with the tape. (I think the original tape is better then a regular scots/electric tape but can't remember the name of the specific tape kind so take it off your old screen for now)"
"After replacing my screen with a screen replacement, at least for my case I think I found the solution.
My symptoms: ghost clicks, touches not detected, sometimes even battery problems (battery would not charge, displaying wrong charge and random reboots).
I noticed that, when holding the phone in certain positions, some (or even all) of the ghost clicking would stop, and basically the screen could work flawlessly. After reading boomvalk's answer on possible contact with connectors and aluminium parts, since my bottom screws (the ones around the lightning connector) were lost, I decided to give it a try.
Moved the small protective tape from the original broken screen to the new replacement screen, but unfortunately, no success. Then, I noticed that, the back of the screen replacement had the aluminium part exposed completely, as opposed to the original screen which had some kind of protective black layer. I also remembered that, my screen replacement came with a pink plastic cover on the back, which I think was meant to be discarded when installing it. I decided to put it back on and then close the frame and turn it on.
And voila! it works! I am not sure what part of the aluminium back of the screen replacement was making contact with some other electronics inside the phone, but nonetheless the thin pink plastic cover covered it, and now it is working flawlessly for one day, holding the phone in as many positions as I could.
Hope this post helps someone who has this problem, and sorry for my bad english, since english is not my first language.
Ok guys, I repair boards and can shed a little light that might help. First off the black tape can matter so change it all. What is important is the tape on the back of the plugs the most. It serves a dual purpose of helping with a mechanical connection and anti static. The other black tape may help (back of rear cam, backlight tape, and tape over flash bracket) but prob not. Also the bad battery or heating battery doesn't cause issues, its the heating board. Excess heat causes resistance to any circuit. Another thing to remember is to always disconnect the battery when doing a screen. There is voltage in the plug pins and when your sliding the plug in it could short that voltage to the pins next to it. Turning the phone off before disconnecting the battery shouldn't matter though. Finally what no one wants to hear is that it could be your touch chip on the board. There are 2, one goes bad and causes zebra lines and no touch, the other causes no touch and ghosting. There are also a host of capacitors and a chip and coil that send power to the touch chips. At the end of it all, here's the scoop. If you put the old cracked screen on or another original Apple iPhone screen on and it works again, it's most likely one of 2 things. The first is you got a bad aftermarket screen. Screen refurbing is hard on the lcd and digitizer and getting bad ones happen. The second is how the plugs on the aftermarket screens are. These can be changed and a tell tale sign is no black puffy tape on the back of the connectors. Aftermarket plugs don't fit the same and that tape has a purpose. There is a reason the metal plate screws over those plugs, a mechanical bond is required. So if you have replaced cables with no tape, first clean the plugs on the board (with bat disconnected) with 90% alcohol and a toothbrush. Then plug them in and put the old tape from the other cables on the new screen. If you don't have the old screen, 2 or 3 layers of electrical tape squares at the end of each connector over the metal backs of the plugs will do. Finally if the touch is bad on old screen and new and all the tape is there or it's an original screen, you are looking at a board issue. I'm not sure of too many people that do the stuff I do but odds are if you can find one, they will be on eBay. It is safe to send out to these people only if..... The phone is completely unusable anyway AND if not repaired there is a 100% refund AND <<< (this is a big and) they guarantee to send the phone back the same way it left. This means if it powered up before it better after the repair even if the touch doesn't work. You don't want it to lose value if not repaired. If this isn't in their message then send them a message personally and get them to guarantee those 3 things.. Hope this helps ;)
Solution is easy, this is caused by excess heat in your phone, if the cause of heat is the battery change it. If the cause is the new screen,then put the brightness to minimum.
"Problem: Flickering around the edges of the LCD after a screen replacement.
Cause: The problems you guys are having happens with the iPhone 4 and higher are caused by disconnecting the battery without powering down the device (swipe to power off) or not waiting for the full power down before disconnecting the battery.
Solution: The only thing you can do is minimize your flickering by running the device with the screen on for about 20 min. That should cause most if not all the flickering to disappear.
Sometimes you can mishandle the screen and the flickering effects are similar except you will see it in the middle of the screen also. This usually doesn't go away.
You can leave the battery connected technically while doing a screen replacement, but you run the risk of shorting board level components. You should disconnect the battery but only after swipe to power down is completed."
I have been having se issues. Only on the 5 and 5s models. 5c has yet to be a problem. After looking real closely there is a piece of tape on the top left and under the tape there is another layer with like an alluminium layer under that. Transfered all 3 layers over to new screen and seems to be working. It would be right above the rear facing camera. Had to look real close to find it and be super careful transfering it over. The allum is super thin
