The Digital Doctor will see you now

A few years ago, Leo Mastrolia started a gadget repair shop. Little did he know he’d eventually become known across the internet as The Digital Doctor, and would learn to fix practically every gadget you can think of. On this episode, which is part one of our conversation with Leo, he tells us about his journey as a gadget fixer, the growth of his social channels, and how right-to-repair fights and upgrade cycles are affecting life in his store. Further reading: ChatGPT’s Computer History tracks your clicks and keystrokes Amazon is trying to crush class action suits before they get started Uber partners with Zipline on Eats drone deliveries Disney D23 2026: Everything announced for Star Wars, Marvel, and more Digital Doctor Repairs on YouTube Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed. We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:02Speaker 00

  Hello and welcome to The Vergecast, the flagship podcast of Tiny Screwdrivers. I'm your friend David Pierce, and today on the show, we're talking about repair shops. My guest is a guy named Leo Mastrolia, who you might know from the internet as The Digital Doctor. He started a repair shop a bunch of years ago. That has grown, and next to it has grown a big content business. So we originally invited Leo on the show to talk about Ramageddon. We were curious what he's been seeing in terms of repairs, how people are thinking about keeping devices longer, all that good stuff. But we ended up having a really long conversation about how repairs work in general, and how he's thinking about the content side of his business, and what it means to be a repair shop and a creator in the world we live in now, plus just some fun stories from the Digital Doctor shop.

• 0:47Speaker 00

  So we're actually going to do this episode in two parts. Today, you're going to hear Leo's story about what his life has been like as a creator, as a person working on gadgets, as a person thinking about the future of electronics, and how real people can use them. Really fun. And then tomorrow, we're going to get deep into the weeds of Ramageddon and how it's changing the gadget business. So for now, the story of Leo, coming in just a second. But first, here's everything else happening on The Verge today.

• 1:14Speaker 01

  I'm Nathan Edwards, and this is 90 Seconds on The Verge for Monday, August 17th, 2026. There's a new opt-in feature in ChatGPT's macOS app that lets your agent learn from the actions you take on your computer to help finish tasks you're in the middle of and suggest skills and automations based on how you use your computer, according to the company. The company says it doesn't save images, video, or audio, and it ignores incognito and private browser tabs, but it does track mouse clicks, typing, and app switches. Have fun with that. I will not. On Friday, Amazon updated its Terms and Conditions with new language. Customers now have to agree that any dispute will be resolved with binding arbitration and agree to a class action waiver. Amazon took similar language out of its Terms and Conditions in 2021. Uber is partnering with a drone delivery company to deliver Uber Eats through the air. The company announced a partnership with Zip Line,

• 1:59Speaker 01

  which operates in Japan, Rwanda, Ghana, Nigeria, Koteva, Kenya, and Dallas, Fort Worth. They aim to start delivering this year and reach 1 million daily drone deliveries by 2029. It's one of many recent delivery deals, thanks to new FAA rules. DoorDash launched a similar program last month. And finally, Disney held its D23 fan event this past weekend with a new trailer for Avengers: Doomsday, a new X-Men cast, some Star Wars stuff, and a teaser for a CGI Bluey movie. I'm just going to say it, there's too much Bluey stuff now. You gotta let the dogs rest, Disney. You can read more at theverge.com. That's 90 Seconds on The Verge for Monday, August 17th, 2026.

• 2:39Speaker 02

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• 3:03Speaker 03

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• 3:39Speaker 00

  All right, let's talk repairs. Joining me now, Leo Mistruglia, The Digital Doctor. How are you?

• 3:43Speaker 04

  Good. How you doing? Thank you for having me.

• 3:45Speaker 00

  My pleasure. Thank you for being here. So, we have a lot to talk about. It turns out that your story sort of intersects with every single thing we ever talk about on The Vergecast. But I want to start with the beginnings of Digital Doctor repairs, because I think you started this five or six years ago at a moment where, if I'm being completely honest, starting a gadget repair shop would have been a very strange... Like, if we were friends at that time, and you were like, "I think I want to start a thing to repair people's gadgets." I would have been like, "That's a weird idea. Why on earth would you do that?" So rewind a little bit for me, and tell me the sort of origin story of this repair shop of yours.

• 4:23Speaker 04

  Funny enough, too, you're going to get a kick out of this. I decided to open up in the peak of COVID, too.

• 4:28Speaker 00

  Oh, true.

• 4:28Speaker 04

  I thought that was a great idea.

• 4:30Speaker 00

  Yeah, physical retail, peak COVID. What could go wrong?

• 4:33Speaker 04

  So, I was 18 years old. I was working at Wawa, I was doing overnights, and I also got a job working at another cellphone repair shop, fixing phones, because I would be atrocious with my phone. I would always be breaking it. Eventually, it got to the point where I asked my former boss, Bill. I said, "Hey, like, can you give me a job? Like, I want to learn how to do this. I want to stop giving you all this money every month," you know, because I was breaking my phone constantly. And he took the chance. He said, "Yeah, come on." So I did, I worked with him for about a year. I saved up all the money I had. College wasn't really for me, so I knew I wanted to do something on my own route. I've always been, like, very self-driven. And there was a local spot in town that was for rent, so I decided to just take the leap of faith. I spent every last dollar I had. Like I said, it was the middle of COVID, but it was an essential business.

• 5:17Speaker 04

  I knew that, since everybody's working remote, they need phones, tablets, computers, everything for work. And there was nothing else in the area also, besides a couple of small kiosks in the mall, but the closest mall is about 45 minutes away. So I decided to take the leap, and it really did play out really well. So I'm very blessed.

• 5:34Speaker 00

  Was it, was it a big success from the very beginning?

• 5:37Speaker 04

  No.

• 5:38Speaker 00

  Because it's interesting timing in that, like you're just saying, everyone at that moment had just bought a bunch of new devices.

• 5:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 5:45Speaker 00

  And everybody was trying to figure out all their work-from-home gear. Everybody had upgraded their laptops. This is when, like, everyone on Earth bought a Peloton.

• 5:52Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 5:52Speaker 00

  So your, your timing in that sense was really good.

• 5:55Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 5:56Speaker 00

  Did it, did it pan out right away?

• 5:57Speaker 04

  So, I mean, just like starting any business, I'm sure even when you guys started The Verge, like, it takes time to build up that momentum. I remember the first six months of having my business. I, I was still doing overnights at Wawa, and I changed my direct deposit. So I'd go into the business account, kind of supplement it a little bit. And that kept me afloat until I actually started building the client base. And then ever since then, I mean, year after year, it's just been getting crazier and crazier.

• 6:21Speaker 00

  What were people bringing you in those early days? Like, do you have memories of the first few things that came in?

• 6:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, mostly the simple stuff, like screen repairs, or batteries, a lot of tablets, computers with water damage. Really depends on the type of day. I always tell people, because this is a very common question I get asked, like, "What do you mostly see the most of?" I tell them, "It depends on the week." Like, I feel like it comes in waves. One week will be only Samsung phones. The next week will be only game consoles, like PlayStations. And then, week by week, you get an influx of different things. But in the early days, it was definitely just a weird mix, scattered here and there, you know?

• 6:56Speaker 00

  We are dangerously close to validating everybody's conspiracy theories that these companies design their products to all fail at about the same time.

• 7:03Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 7:03Speaker 00

  But it's like, if you get, you know, the, the run of iPhones two weeks before the iPhone event every year, it's like, "Listen up, Apple, we've, we've got you."

• 7:11Speaker 04

  It's, it's not a conspiracy. I mean, it is true. Even with the new Liquid Glass update that they released, all those older phones, they're really struggling to keep up.

• 7:18Speaker 00

  Yeah, that's very true. So, at what point do you look at this business and say, "Okay, I've, I've started this repair shop. It's going pretty well. People are starting to find me." I would assume a big part of it is kind of the local experience, right? People like having a place to go where they can talk to a person as opposed to, you know, trying to navigate YouTube or figure something out over a phone. Like, a huge part of this is the customer experience. At what point do you then turn and think, "Okay, there's a, there's a content business here. I want to start making content as I'm actually doing the job." Was that part of the plan at the beginning?

• 7:53Speaker 04

  It wasn't until about a few years ago, I dabbled a little bit. I mean, if you scroll far enough on my page, I released a couple of videos here and there, because content has always been like my dream. Ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to be a YouTuber. I did, like, stop-motion animations. And if anybody remembers GoAnimate out there, I used to do, like, some really crappy animations on there.

• 8:11Speaker 00

  Nice.

• 8:12Speaker 04

  But, like, filming and creativity and YouTubers, I grew up on, like, all I watched as a child was YouTube, like Ray William Johnson, all these big creators at the time, Smash, and all these other guys. And tech's always, you know, inspired me, too. Like, I've always wanted to get, like, a new PC and stuff like that, as any kid wants, you know?

• 8:29Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 8:29Speaker 04

  But the real takeoff didn't happen until I was more established in my business. And the reason the content side of my business is so, like, just performing so well is the same reason my actual business is performing really well. It's because, it's like what you said. People just want to come in and have a personalized experience, like, "All right, that's the guy that's going to help me." Because unfortunately, in today's society, most people unfortunately don't really care to help you out. They're just there to collect the paycheck, go home. If there's something that's a little hard or challenging, they just say, "Oh, sorry, I can't help you. Go elsewhere." And they want to push that burden off to somebody else. But, these are mothers and parents and people that, like, need their devices. Like, you can't go about your normal life without having tech, going to the DMV, appointments. Everything is online.

• 9:13Speaker 04

  So it's a very crucial step that you need to have all these devices working in their full ability. But like I said, the main thing is, you know, because I'm just so personable with people, and I just want to help people out. That's why they keep coming back, and that's why they like the videos as well.

• 9:26Speaker 00

  So I imagine, though, that there's a day where you decide, "Okay, I'm gonna, you know, strap a GoPro to the top of my head just while I do business." And then just, just sort of see what happens. Like, there, there's a real, "I'm just going to put this camera on my face and see what happens" energy to some of your videos. Is that how it went down?

• 9:44Speaker 04

  So, I actually reached out to a close friend of mine. Her name's Aleah. I reached out to her, and I was like, "Hey, like, I'm looking for more people. My business is really taking off. Like, I really need some help. Like, just, if you want to be like a secretary and sit up front." And she's like, "Hey, like, I do social media, and like, I can really help you out. I think if we do some skits and work on stuff like this, like, we can really grow something." And I was like, "All right, let's do, let's try this out." So when I first started making my videos, we did a lot of skit videos. Do not watch them. They're absolutely cringe, terrible. I don't want to, I don't want to take them down, because I like seeing the progress.

• 10:15Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 10:16Speaker 04

  But like, I cannot...

• 10:16Speaker 00

  So I'm imagining, like, The Office but set at The Digital Doctor Store.

• 10:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 10:21Speaker 00

  Basically, okay, I love this. This is great.

• 10:23Speaker 04

  Terrible, terrible. But then eventually, um, we started seeing like very common, if you go on Instagram, it's mostly meta meta footage now, like people wearing the meta glasses. Um, eventually we decided to switch to those and say like, hey, how about you just show yourself fixing and helping people out? And ever since then, I mean, it blew up.

• 10:41Speaker 00

  Do you get people now who come to the store like and want to be content?

• 10:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, I would say 90% of people that come in are probably because they watch the videos. I mean, a lot of times they'll come in and say, hey, I love the videos. I drove from Brooklyn. I like a lot of people from the city drive an hour and a half, two hours to come see me. Um, tons of people from out of state drive in.

• 11:03Speaker 00

  But do you think it's because this is, this is a thing I've always wondered about channels like this where you are sort of it's, it's content, but it's also a business. And for whatever reason, for the longest time, my feed was filled with, uh, kids getting haircuts. Like for whatever reason, I just ended up on cool haircut Tik Tok. You know what I'm talking about, right?

• 11:24Speaker 04

  We're on, we're on the same side of the algorithm for sure. Yeah.

• 11:27Speaker 00

  Yeah. So, and, and I found myself wondering for the longest time, like they would talk about, you know, these, these people drove four hours just to get their haircut by me. And it would be like, okay, do they do this because they think it's going to be an awesome haircut? And they saw the haircut and were like, I want that.

• 11:40Speaker 04

  It's definitely the content.

• 11:41Speaker 00

  It's because they want to be on the channel.

• 11:43Speaker 04

  I think so, yeah.

• 11:43Speaker 00

  Okay. Okay. Do you ever get people who you come in, who come in and they're like clearly playing a character and being weird? And you're like, you need to, you need to cool it.

• 11:52Speaker 04

  You know, not really, because I've seen other creators where like, that's their like genre or like their niche is like, their videos are always like crazy story. Um, I'm not going to name names, but there's another creator who does like the same type of videos I do. And like the people that come in are very over the top and it like feels like, I wouldn't say scripted, but definitely like more staged and like awkward. Um, I like to keep my channel like completely like genuine, just put on the glasses, record, do what I normally would do if the cameras are on because you come into my store, I'm going to treat you exactly the same way that I do with the glasses on or off. Um, and I think that's why it's so like resonates so well is because people know if they come in, like I'm going to just help them out, treat them like a person. It's going to be a pleasant experience. I can hang out with my cats, you know, and life's good.

• 12:37Speaker 00

  The cats are a very important part of the channel.

• 12:39Speaker 04

  Some people come in just for them, believe it or not.

• 12:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, I would, I would assume. And I really like, there's, there's a moment in like two thirds of your videos where you try to find the cat.

• 12:47Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 12:47Speaker 00

  And for some reason that always makes me laugh.

• 12:49Speaker 04

  They're always like, where's the cat? We want to see the cat. So I'm like, I don't even know where he's at.

• 12:54Speaker 00

  It's great. Um, so at some point I would imagine the, the business is going well, the, the content business starts to grow. These two things start to feed each other, I would assume, right? So that you get more business, which leads to more content, which leads to more business, which leads to more content. Do you separate those things in your head that you have the repair shop and you have the content business and they are different things? Or do they increasingly smash into each other?

• 13:17Speaker 04

  So that's a really, really good question because this is the main issue I've been running into recently is how do I balance that? How do I balance the content and the business? Because the content, obviously, like you said, gives me more business. So I can't lack on that. And like the viewerships and like people from Philippines and New York and India and like all over the world reach out because they love the videos. They're never going to come in, you know, they're countries away. So I don't want to let those people down, but also I can't let the physical business, if you drop off a device, I can't let that also take a hit because I'm sitting there recording content all day. So my main goal over the next few months is try to build up more of a team, like team of editors and filmers. Um, this has kind of helped me leave that workload because I'm just simply one person.

• 14:00Speaker 04

  And my tech, Dominic, he's way too busy with repairs. Like we'll get down like 30 devices a day. And there's still a stack of like 300 devices in store because we also accept mail-ins. So like they're just coming in all the time. So it definitely is something I don't have a direct answer to yet because I'm still trying to navigate it.

• 14:19Speaker 00

  Does it change the thing in your mind when you start getting big in this particular way? Like not only does the volume go up, but like I saw one of your videos where your face appears in a reflection. And there's this big kerfuffle in the comments that's like face reveal. We've seen Leo now. Uh, you, you are a celebrity in a way now, right? And it's, it's definitely a different way of thinking about the business. And I think, I, I ask this in part because I've seen so many things like this go from, I am a business that makes content about my business to I am a media company that happens to have a retail store. Right? And it's, it ends up being a really different kind of phenomenon.

• 15:00Speaker 00

  And I think particularly coming from where you come from, where it's like, I, I did this not to be a content business, but because I wanted to start this repair shop. Uh, and that business is also going very well for a bunch of reasons we should talk about. It just strikes me as keeping that thing sort of pure in the way that you want it to be is going to be continually harder as the business of content gets bigger and bigger.

• 15:20Speaker 04

  For sure. And especially because like the type of content I release now, like I like doing it. I absolutely love doing customer interactions and stuff, but I also do like long format videos. And there's a lot of stuff on the long format that I can do that I can't do in a short. And I really want to be able to experiment with stuff like that, like tech reviews and stuff like that. But simply I just don't have the time. I'm, I'm pulled in every different direction.

• 15:45Speaker 00

  I mean, theoretically, your, your content business is big enough now. You have a couple of million followers across platforms. You could with a straight face, just say, screw the repair shop. I am going to be a tech YouTuber now. Has that thought crossed your mind?

• 15:59Speaker 04

  Uh, a few times. I have a very big problem of letting people down though. And I have built up a crazy big, um, local base of like just moms and grandpas and stuff that come to me for everything. And those people, like, what are they going to do? I know a lot of creators are doing that. They also have stores. They're just strictly focusing on the content. Um, which is always a possibility, but I haven't really made a decision yet of where I want to take it. But I have some ideas of different directions. I just want to try to handle all the eggs in one basket.

• 16:29Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 16:29Speaker 04

  As long as I can, until I have to make like a serious change, you know?

• 16:33Speaker 00

  Yeah. What, what is the oldest stuff you see people coming in consistently with? No, I don't mean like, I'm sure somebody is showing up with the, with the seven, but is there like a generation of devices you're starting to see more and more of now?

• 16:45Speaker 04

  Hmm. Honestly, for the, this happens a lot when in my, my business is like, when I first started, it was mostly SEs and elevens and XRs and like a few 12s and 13s. And then the next year it like just moves over.

• 17:00Speaker 00

  Interesting.

• 17:01Speaker 04

  Like the next couple of generations is the most common repair. And then the real old ones, like you barely touch, you do like one or two a week. Um, like now it's mostly 15, 16, 17s and like 13s a year ago, super popular repair. I was doing iPhone 13 repairs every day, 10, 15 a day. Now it's like one or two, you know, if that, you see the migration of people moving over to the newer generation. And then it's usually not the newest phone, but a couple before that is the ones that people fix the most.

• 17:31Speaker 00

  Interesting. I guess that makes sense. And it's, it's sort of a bummer that it's not older than that. You know what I mean? Like even the fact that the 13 has kind of fallen out of your purview.

• 17:41Speaker 04

  It, it has.

• 17:41Speaker 00

  That's not that old a phone. And, and I think it says a lot about the moment that we're in that even with phones, I think people are still upgrading more frequently. Like my guess is most people are holding on to their laptops much longer than they used to. They just last longer than they used to.

• 17:59Speaker 04

  I think top priority is the phones for sure. The laptops, most people, they don't really care about.

• 18:03Speaker 00

  Yeah. And I think we're, we're all so trained to upgrade our phones every couple of years that the idea of it still mostly does what I need it to, I'm just going to keep it. I think it's still pretty rare and it's, it seems like that's kind of what you're seeing too.

• 18:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, definitely.

• 18:17Speaker 00

  That's really interesting. So what are the big problems people come in with? I assume I can guess, right? Screens, batteries, other various, I dropped it and something happened. But I, I noticed on your channel, one thing I'm, I'm constantly shocked by is how many specific software problems people are having. Some of it is like, I can't use my phone, but some of it is also like, I, people seem to constantly have weird pop-up problems on their phones that they don't know how to solve. How much is the breakdown kind of hardware versus software problems people are having?

• 18:48Speaker 04

  If I had to guess, I would say probably about 25% is software based.

• 18:53Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 18:54Speaker 04

  And more so it's software towards Android phones more than anything. Like Android phones have very common issue when it comes to the like the bloatware apps. Um, like anything that's PDF reader or weather apps. These aren't legit apps. What they do is they call it pop-ups. And then when you go to hit the X, it'll literally download more and more of them in. And then eventually the phone just becomes unusable. Just add, add, add, add, add. So I think Android phones definitely have more of a software issue when it comes to stuff like that. But even iPhone users, especially if they've gotten the phone fixed before, sometimes the screens will just freeze up and you have to do a soft reset. Kind of stupid in my opinion that all phones now you have to hold the power with the, um, volume buttons, even on the Android phones, the same way in order to turn the phone off. Because older people, they're like, I'm hitting the power button. It's not doing anything.

• 19:39Speaker 04

  But a lot of times too iPhones will have that issue where they just freeze and there's no way to turn it off unless you do a soft reset. But if your phone's not working, how are you going to Google it?

• 19:47Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's, it's a really interesting one. And I think that's such a funny example of it is a very simple thing to know the right answer for how to turn your phone off.

• 19:55Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:55Speaker 00

  But it is actually incredibly unintuitive how to turn your phone off. It's a strange state of affairs. Uh, what about on the hardware side? Is there anything that might surprise me that you see a lot of these days?

• 20:06Speaker 04

  Well, I'm down in Jersey Shore. So I mean, we do in the summer times, definitely a lot of water damage.

• 20:11Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 20:12Speaker 04

  People still take their phones into the, uh, the ocean, the pool. Um, despite all belief about phones being waterproof, they're water resistant. They'll say waterproof to a certain degree, but I always tell people I don't trust it at all. I have a lot of customers, they come in, they get a splash from a wave. It eats through that adhesive, especially salt water, gets in the phone. Yeah.

• 20:31Speaker 00

  I was going to say waterproof also does not include salt water and super doesn't include like dirty shore.

• 20:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, that, that green water. Yeah. And, uh, another thing too is rice. Don't, don't put your phone in rice. I mean, the only thing that rice is good for is, you know, you're not charging your phone. Cause that's like being in a bathtub and dropping a toaster while you're in there. It fries everything. So the best thing to do is turn the phone off. If you could take it to a repair shop so they can open it up, dry it up, clean it with alcohol, um, to prevent any future corrosion. But honestly, the best thing to do if you get water damage is just back it up. You know, fix the bare minimum and go trade it in and get a new phone because water damage is always tricky.

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• 23:13Speaker 00

  You're mentioning wanting to do right by customers, and it does seem like that particular calculation you're describing, like, should I do nothing? Should I fix it and give it back to you? Or should I do the minimum viable amount so that you can go trade it in? I'm imagining you're doing that math constantly. Walk me through that process a little bit.

• 23:34Speaker 04

  Depends on the person. So you can kind of gauge a person's needs by how they're coming into you. If they're like, and usually they'll tell you to. Like, hey, they come in in a panic. Oh, my God, I have all this appointments, like, appointment. I got a flight later today, and I need this phone working. My ticket's on there. You know, so you can kind of gauge, all right, they need to fix now. But what I like to do in certain situations where it's like water damage, like, let's stay on water damage for a second. With water damage, I tell them, hey, I can get this phone on and working, especially because I plug it in, it's vibrating, but nothing's on the screen. But if you take a look here, like, the cameras, they're super fogged up, so water's by the cameras. I'll pop it open, I'll show them. Hey, the entire inside of the phone's wet. What I recommend, I give them multiple options. I say what I recommend is do the bare minimum,

• 24:18Speaker 04

  fix it, trade it in. But if you want to fix it and keep using it, that's on you, but I'm just trying to save you the money and the headaches moving forward in the future because, you know, water damage is always very, very annoying. And I just, I try to lay out as many options as I can. I let them choose. And I never try to push anybody in the right, like, in the direction that I want them to do. I just want them to make a decision. If they say, hey, I want to go somewhere else, that's fine. You know, make your own decision as long as you're happy with it. And that's pretty much it.

• 24:44Speaker 00

  I would assume that most people are in some kind of hurry by the time they get to you.

• 24:50Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 24:50Speaker 00

  Right, it's, I either need this now, or it's very important and I need it, or something like, you're never catching people in a sort of mega chill moment of their lives. You know what I mean?

• 25:03Speaker 04

  No, very rarely, very rarely. The reason people come in and they like speak so highly about us, like, these guys are the best, da-da-da, is because we come in at like some of their worst moments, unfortunately, you know, when they're like freaking out. And we're all super calm and like, we know we're all capable people. And like, we know, like, we've seen this hundreds of times before. I think we've fixed close to like 25,000 devices in like the last couple of years.

• 25:24Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 25:25Speaker 04

  So we've seen this issue several times over again. Me and my entire staff can fix an issue like in our sleep at this point. So we're just very, oh, yeah, no problem. Like, it's cool, like, we'll do it for this, and it'll be done in like, and they, you could see the hesitation. Like, are you sure? I'm like, yeah, I'm pretty positive. But yeah, it definitely, when you can speak to them like as a human and like just kind of talk them out of their worries too a little bit and be like, listen, it's going to be fine, that like, that does a lot for people.

• 25:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, how did you learn how to do all this?

• 25:52Speaker 04

  Um, when I was working at the other shop, he pretty much taught me everything I needed to know. Like, the bare minimums. But once I finally opened up my store, to be honest, there was a lot I didn't know how to do. But when you're starting a business, you basically just say yes to everything. You figure it out, you do research. All that information's on. You know, I fix it. Really good guides of how to like take apart devices. YouTube's always a great resource. And then also forums like Reddit and stuff, you'll always find great information on there.

• 26:19Speaker 00

  I was going to ask if you were like very confidently telling a customer you could help them and then going to the back and like loading up a bunch of YouTube videos? And I thought you were going to say no, and then I was going to tell you I don't believe you.

• 26:29Speaker 04

  In my early days, no, for sure. Now, now I don't do that, but back then, yes, definitely.

• 26:35Speaker 00

  What was the hardest skill to learn in that sense?

• 26:38Speaker 04

  Ooh, probably soldering. Soldering's always a little tough. You know, just getting a feel for it, like the right amount of temperatures and using the flux and just like keeping your hands steady because like you knock a capacitor off the board, now you got to fix that. I'm not the best when it comes to micro soldering, but when it comes to like HDMI ports and charging ports on iPads, like those are super simple. Basically, you teach anybody in like two hours how to do it, they can do it confidently. But yeah, that's definitely like the hardest like learning curve. But like diagnosing the motherboards is where it gets really tricky.

• 27:08Speaker 00

  Wait, tell me more, why?

• 27:10Speaker 04

  Um, so you have a lot of different components on motherboards, especially when you get to phone micro soldering. If you ever look at a iPhone motherboard underneath a microscope, it is the most fascinating thing you'll ever witness in your life because it's like an entire city in there. And a lot of these components are smaller than the tip of a tweezer. So if you're trying to remove something, replace it, it's very, very difficult. And you need a lot of specialized equipment too in order to work on motherboards. Like power supplies for inject power into the board, thermal cameras to see what's heating up. There's also like a couple other tricks like in order to diagnose. Then also you need schematics, which a lot of these companies, if we're talking about right to repair, don't want to provide to independent shops. So you're going based off of information that other people have

• 27:54Speaker 04

  and just testing out, you know, testing out power and kind of guessing, all right, that's the correct amount of power because it's similar to this other board. And then it gets pretty tricky though.

• 28:05Speaker 00

  And I would assume, I mean, especially when you think about things like Android phones, there's just a million of them. And every one of them is slightly different.

• 28:13Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 28:14Speaker 00

  And every one of them has slightly different problems and slightly different combinations of things. Is it sort of every new phone is a special flower that you have to figure out? Or do you get to the point where you're like, I've seen the only 12 problems anybody actually has, and I can fix them all?

• 28:29Speaker 04

  You described it perfectly, though. It's slightly different. So like, same principles apply across all iPhones. Sometimes they make massive changes, like with the back glass. On older iPhones, you would need a laser to cut the adhesive holding the back glass. You'd have to scrape it and then glue a new piece on. Now, they did a full 180. They reverted back to like the old iPhone 4s and 5s where the back glass is actually a panel that you could pop off and pop on. Which honestly, I greatly prefer, much easier. And it saves the customer mad time a lot. It's a lot more like cheap because you don't need a $2,500 laser to cut it off. Certain things will make like a big difference on, but like screens, for the most part, they're all the same. Like, all iPhones are pretty much the same.

• 29:13Speaker 04

  Samsung's 99% of the time too, they're all the same. Maybe like the connectors a little south of where it was on the last model. Sometimes they have two connectors, sometimes it's one, sometimes it's connected to the charging port. But it's all pretty much the same principles.

• 29:26Speaker 00

  What's your sense of a reasonable amount of this for people to take on for themselves? Because I'm thinking about what you said about soldering. I'm very impressed. And also, I don't think it's reasonable to expect most people to have the equipment, ability, and interest to do soldering for themselves, right? So it's like, if my charging port gives out, I think me replacing it is beyond the scope of what a reasonable person should be able to do. But like, should I be able to open up my phone and replace the battery? I think is maybe something you could talk me into. So I'm curious, as you think about like the skills you want to sort of teach to people who come into the store so that they don't have to come into the store for that thing anymore? What's on that list for you?

• 30:11Speaker 04

  So mostly software. I mean, when it comes to actual like hardware repairs, there's a lot of risk involved. Like, if you're doing a battery on an iPhone, you have to remove the screen. There's a chance that you ripped the screen. Now you got to replace the screen. Or if you ripped the proximity sensor, now your Face ID doesn't work because that's serialized with the phone.

• 30:29Speaker 00

  Right.

• 30:29Speaker 04

  Same thing with the battery. There's always the risk of, you know, you puncture the battery because you didn't use enough heat or alcohol. Now you have a fire, your phone's on fire. Not a good day.

• 30:36Speaker 00

  I did that once, that was fun.

• 30:37Speaker 04

  Yeah, I've had a couple blow up in the syrup. It's not a, not a good experience.

• 30:42Speaker 00

  Nothing like evacuating a 20-story building that I was in because I poked a phone battery. But anyway, keep going.

• 30:48Speaker 04

  Were you doing a review or?

• 30:49Speaker 00

  I was doing a review, and it was about a phone that in theory had a replaceable battery. And I was, I had a sort of side by side of here's what a replaceable battery looks like and here's what a non-replaceable battery looks like. And I had to peel out the non-replaceable battery, basically, and punctured it as I was doing so.

• 31:06Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 31:07Speaker 00

  Luckily, just a lot of smoke and no fire, but.

• 31:10Speaker 04

  Most of the time, that's, that's all that happens is it plumes that nastiness up.

• 31:13Speaker 00

  Yeah, I still caused a lot of trouble and got my company in a lot of trouble. But yeah, that's the sort of thing that I think, like, I got accused when we made that video of doing that like as a bit, just to prove the point. I was like, no, you don't understand. I was trying my hardest to do this correctly.

• 31:30Speaker 04

  You got to get like a nice heating pad, keep it on there for a couple of minutes to loosen that adhesive, and then like good amount of alcohol, isopropyl, safe to use on like any phone, tablet, computer.

• 31:40Speaker 00

  Yeah, I should have called you before I did this. But yeah, but I think you're right that that, even that is probably beyond what you can expect of most people.

• 31:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, and unfortunately, I don't, I don't like that because I, what you were talking about, it's like the removable batteries. They should switch back to removable batteries. Like, yeah, would that cut my business down significantly? Of course, yeah. But it's the right thing to do for the consumer because you have these people, they're stuck spending all this money when it's needless, they don't need to. Make the back cover removable so you can pop it open like they used to do, put a battery in. And you're good to go. You can replace your own battery. It'll save everybody a lot of time and money, but these phone companies don't want that because their main excuse is the waterproof ability. But like I said, phones aren't waterproof.

• 32:24Speaker 00

  All right, last thing and then we'll let you go. There's a new kind of gadget coming out now, whether it's smartwatches or smart glasses, like you're mentioning. It sounds like you have some of the Meta Ray-Bans. We are in a phase of trying to put a computer into every imaginable shape and size of thing. They're getting smaller, they're getting more complex in all these ways. What's your role in that future? Are we going to need repair shops in the same way? Are you going to be able to do your work in the same way as these things get smaller and weirder like this?

• 32:55Speaker 04

  So to be honest, people always ask me, like, are you worried about competition? And I say, no, I encourage more people to get into this field because there is a great opportunity for young people to learn a new trade and it should be taught in trade school, honestly, because there's no real schooling for this. It's a really good opportunity for a lot of people to get out there and whether it's just doing in-home calls and just setting up printers for people that are a little bit older, you know, software-based, hardware issues, data recovery, like fine, detailed data recovery. Most of these shops that you talk to, they're overwhelmed with work because there's so much demand and there's just not enough people out there to fix them, especially when you have the carriers, Best Buy, the Geek Squad, they don't, they don't touch it. They just sell you a new one. Apple

• 33:37Speaker 04

  even. Most of the time when they say, oh yeah, like we have Apple Care, we're going to give you, you know, we're going to fix it. Most of the time, they just take the old one and give you a new one. They charge you, you know, the hundred dollars, whatever it is, and they just give you a whole new phone and there's no information on it. So honestly, I recommend if you're young and you're, you know, thinking about getting into this industry, you should definitely start taking the leap, start doing it on the side, help out friends and family, and you could really grow a great company no matter where you are because every household has probably 10 to 15 devices now.

• 34:05Speaker 00

  Yeah. Have you repaired any of these things yet? Like, are you, have you gotten your first, I don't know, pair of Meta glasses? Or like, are people bringing you their dishwasher? With, they're like, this has a chip in it, you fix it. This is what I mean. Like, everything is a computer now, right? So the idea of, I think for the most part, you can categorize kind of phones, laptops, PCs are all close enough to each other. But now we're entering this phase where like, in theory, everything is a gadget, everything is connected, everything's a computer everywhere. And you're going to cause, people are going to start to have like smart home disasters that they're going to ask you for your help on.

• 34:42Speaker 04

  I've done a lot of nests, like Nest issues where I go to their house and like, the heater's not working. And it's, most of the time, it's just that if you go to the schedule in the app, you know, they just didn't have the timer set right. And that's literally all it is. But yeah, no, it's, people bring in strange things. I had worked on this animatronic where one of the wires got desoldered. So I soldered that on, windshield wiper motor where the wires popped off.

• 35:05Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 35:06Speaker 04

  Random things, but like, it's tech everywhere. Like you said, a lot of the Meta glasses come in. Common issue with those is the battery where it connects is on the side, like right next to your eyeball where the capture button is. The issue with those is sometimes when you put on the glasses or disconnect itself internally and there's no really good way to open it. So if you just squeeze it really hard, I found out, it reconnects that connector and then the batteries start working.

• 35:30Speaker 00

  Oh, interesting.

• 35:31Speaker 04

  But you can't really find parts for them and they also don't like coming apart either and going back together in one piece. So I have three broken pairs of Meta glasses that are sitting in my drawer at the shop that I don't know what to do with. Because certain things you just, you just can't really fix, unfortunately.

• 35:45Speaker 00

  What's the biggest project sitting in front of you right now? Like, when you get back to the shop, what's the, what's the one you're like, oh God, how am I going to do this?

• 35:51Speaker 04

  The endless stack of PlayStations. We'll clear out 25, 50 PlayStations and one day we'll just sit there and spend like 12 hours working on PlayStations because they're either overheating or they have an HDMI issue. Because the HDMI is built notoriously bad on them. And also they get so filled up with dust that you can't really clean them without disassembling the entire console. And then the third issue is the liquid metal. It slowly over time, often the constant heat cycles, so slowly droops itself off the CPU, like the main chip, and then the console overheats. So yeah, probably tackling that.

• 36:25Speaker 00

  Fair enough. All right. Well, I should let you get back to it. But thank you for doing this with me. This is, this is so much fun. I'm so glad to have you here. We'll have to have you back.

• 36:31Speaker 04

  Yeah. Thank you for having me.

• 36:33Speaker 00

  All right. That's it for the show. Thank you to Leo for being here and thank you as always for watching and listening. If you have thoughts, feelings, feedback, questions, if you have gadget repair things you want to talk about, I now have Leo's email. Not to brag, we can get in touch. Maybe I can get him to answer your questions. You can also reach out to us, [email protected] is the email, 866-VERGE11 is the hotline. We love hearing from you about all this and everything else. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, stay tuned. Tomorrow, also really good, Leo has some great thoughts on where we are in the gadget world right now and whether even he can get parts in a Ramageddon time. It's good stuff. And if you want to support everything that we're up to, the very best thing you can do is subscribe to The Verge. Go to theverge.com/subscribe.

• 37:16Speaker 00

  It gets you all of our podcasts ad-free, including this one. It gets you all of our exclusive newsletters. It gets you all of our coverage of Ramageddon and everything else. Everything. Theverge.com/subscribe. Thank you in advance. The Vergecast is a Verge production and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. This show is produced by Josh Kahas, Eric Gomez, Brandon Kiefer, and Travis Larchuk. We'll see you tomorrow. I guess Leo and I will see you tomorrow. Rock and roll.

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