Teardown Reveals Why The Note 5’s S Pen Gets Stuck

As many of you guys have probably heard by now, there is a bit of a hoo-ha going on right now regarding the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 and the S Pen, where it was discovered that inserting the S Pen into the phone wrongly can cause permanent damage. The main issue isn’t so much the damage itself, but how could Samsung design a phone that could be damaged so easily.

For those who are wondering why on earth the S Pen can be slotted in so easily but can’t be removed, the good folks at 9to5Google and uBreakiFix, they have conducted a teardown to reveal that really goes on when the S Pen is inserted wrongly, which you can see for yourself in the image above.

As you can see in the teardown, the S Pen appears to be wedged rather firmly in the phone the wrong way round. How it gets stuck is due to the grooves on the side of the S Pen which are meant to slide into the levers inside the slot and “click” into place, thus holding it securely. However due to the design of the S Pen, once it has been caught on the lever, that’s pretty much the end of it.

Trying to pull it out is said to be close to impossible and pulling harder could result in the lever being broken off the main board of the phone, which in turns destroys the phone’s S Pen detection function. That being said if you’re tempted to find out for yourself, we suggest you don’t. In the meantime Samsung has issued a statement on the matter, essentially telling users to be careful and to read the manual before using the phone.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Galaxy Note 5, Samsung