iPhone 7: Sound Volume low/distorted

[Blue House Computer Help]

I need some help with my personal iPhone 7 Plus. I bought it used about a year ago, and overtime the speaker volume has gotten quieter and quieter. Is to the point where I have to use speakerphone just to hear a phone call. Also, when I play music through the speakers I have the same problem. Headphones are fine.

I opened it up and replaced both the earpiece speaker and the normal speaker, but it hasn't helped.

Any ideas? I'd like to try to fix it if possible, both for the gained knowledge, and also because it would be a shame to chuck a phone for the sake of a cheap replacement part.

 

[gadgetfixup]

Audio IC most likely. Check if voice recorder opens and records your voice. If it doesn't, you need audio IC repair.

 

[Blue House Computer Help]

Just checked.. The voice recorder works fine.

Any other thoughts?

 

[nlinecomputers]

Why bother? iPhone 7 is EOL in October when iOS 16 comes out. Apple will block access to the store and most carriers will block it too. It’s a soon to be brick.

 

[Blue House Computer Help]

Well fair point actually... I thought it had another year of updates on it. Oh well... nevermind. I guess it's 6 years of updates is probably already 2x what you'd get from anyone else.

I just hate to let go of older tech that still works (or could potentially work using my secret superpower of fixing things).

 

[phaZed]

I guess it's 6 years of updates is probably already 2x what you'd get from anyone else.

Samsung does a good job with their updates.. Galaxy S8+ got some firmware updates in December 2021 for a 5+ year old phone.
The nice thing is the android phone keeps on working and still has basically full access without updates.

 

[Blue House Computer Help]

...Apple will block access to the store and most carriers will block it too. It’s a soon to be brick.

I don't know if this is a UK vs U.S. thing, but I really haven't seen this apple store/carrier blocking stuff on older iPhones over here. Is that really what happens over there? I agree with you to a point, in that once it's out of security updates, it shouldn't be connected to the internet, but it seems the real end of usability is the same as Android, where you eventually can't find any new apps that work on it's OS version.

BTW, I would consider myself pretty OS agnostic (Windows, MacOS, Android, iPhone whatev's), and I'm definitely not an Apple fanboy

And in any case, I took your point and decided to replace it anyway.