MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Mid 2012 Display Replacement

Tip: Use one of those weekday pill holders to have a cheep way to store screws you remove and each day of the week can be for different sizes or parts. It has been handy to have (much less expensive than the magnetic mat.

Prying the battery connector off does not take much force. I did exactly what the guide suggested (walked it off back and forth) with the spudger without any problems. Just be very gentle, much like with anything inside laptops, they are very fragile and need to be worked with carefully. A+ instructions, battery replacement was a success.

Be patient on disconnecting this one. It worked for me step by step, little by little.

One other note: The screw heads fit flush with the curvature of the case -- which means that they aren't exactly horizontal. In other words, they aren't perpendicular to the table that the computer is resting on. Don't try to force them straight in vertically, because you'll risk cross-threading them. (nearly ruined one screw hole myself!)

On my MacBook Pro, the connector seems to be an integral part of the battery.

N.B! Thank you very much all you here on iFixit! Some IMPORTANT notes. Be very careful BEFORE prying the connectors up and down. They are very fragile and the picture could actually be seen as showing a bending loading in their weakest direction, AROUND its slender axis. The connector is slender and inserted on the logic board, so the gentle "walking" up and down should be done ALONG their slender direction and WITHOUT touching the adjacent connectors. If bending is done around its axis the soldering comes apart and the cable is done and gone. Just happened. These flat cables are one of the weakest design spots in my experience. They are a major time, money and geist consuming reason for malfunction like Wi-Fi connection problems, HDD, SSD not found internally but externally from USB issues et al being found on different forums. Thanks again and again.

Be extremely careful on step 6 with late 2011 model unibody macbooks! The cable is connected very tightly to the board and has a great chance of ripping if you just pull the cable.

My cable is broken, have the part number or code to buy?

I found there was plenty of length in the camera cable (as it goes around two sides of the optical drive) so does not need to be disconnected - just ease it out of the slot alongside the drive and lay it diagonally across.

Take a few phone close-ups of this corner of your system prior to disassembly. Extra photos really help during reassembly.

I found re-attaching these antennae connectors the trickiest bit by far as they appear very delicate and seating them correctly was fiddly. In the end lighting them from the side with a small torch helped to check their position before gently pushing them down. The first one made a clicking sound as it connected, the other two went on silently. MBP wifi working perfectly now. I’m fairly sure that was at least £100 of labour had I taken it in for repair so thanks ifixit for saving me money and for the warm glow of accomplishment!

Actually, on my repair attempt, one antenna cable broke (on the image the bottom right one in the red square), I’m not sure whether it broke already before or was morbid somehow. Fact is. suddenly I had this cable in my fingers, and was sure I completely broke the macbook and need to find a new display now.

But as it turned out: the Mac is still fully working, including WIFI, BT, Camera etc. So apart from my huge relief, I want to address that these cables may break easily at their connection with the display. And that one antenna might be not mandatory for WIFI to work.

How do I know which of these cables goes in which slot when attaching the new display?

This was the hardest part for me. It took me a bit to figure out what parts were the socket and which was the cable and where were they going to separate. What I did was gently twist the pull tab on the cable in a clockwise direction. This allowed me to see a small separation between the socket and cable. At that point I knew what side of the pull tab I had to use a little pressure on, to continue to wiggle the cable free.

Eric Olson’s comment helped me a lot. I couldn’t figure out how to go about it until I read his comment. Thanks

When putting the display case back together, I found it MUCH easier to reinsert the display cable before screwing back in the data cable retainer. It did require me angling my screwdriver to get the rightmost screw in, but it was not too difficult. It certainly made it much easier to reinsert the display cable since I had more freedom to maneuver it back into position. Hope this help others. God Bless!

I have found that keeping the MacBook more open than you’d think is the key to getting this step right. Initially I opened the lid only about 50º or so, but couldn’t free the hinges from the case even after removing the final two screws. Opening the lid to about 90º has made this much easier, and means the hinges come free without catching on the rest of the body of the Mac.

I used this guide to tighten the hinges; screen was all wobbly because the four screws that hold the screen in place had worked themselves loose. Surprised that getting at the screws required the full removal of the display. One thing that's helpful in putting it all together is in regard to adjusting the position of the hinges; with the screws loose, there is a lot of play in the hinges, and if you just torque them down, the lid won't fit right. I snugged up the screws then put the display back in place on the body & inserted one screw into each side, then loosened the hinge screws to align the screen. That has to happen before replacing the black plastic cover over the bottom edge of the display.

My Macbook Pro developed a severe wobble in the display so I took it in to the Genius bar to see what could be done. They told me that fixing it would involve replacing the whole display because the problem is due to a piece of plastic inside breaking off. I suspected it just needed to have the hinge screws tightened so I brought my laptop home and gave it a go using this guide. Well, it turns out I was right! The Torx screws joining the hinges to the the display had come loose at both sides. To fix this, I got the hinges lined up straight on the display and tightened them down. To attatch the hinges to the body, I tightened one screw on each side half way and closed the display to line it up with the body. I then proceeded then to tighten all of the Torx screws on the body. Thank you for the great guide, Philip! I love this site!