It spends hours in your hand and touching your face and yet you never clean it! Yes, the phone is the germ factory you are carrying around with you. If you want to stop the transmission of coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak – sanitize your phone!
According to The Spruce, the phone is among the 3 dirtiest places in the home!
Every time you touch your phone you are transferring virus and bacteria onto the device and picking them up. Those microbes then have a free pass to stay on your face and transfer to any table or chair you leave your phone on. Minimizing the spread of the coronavirus is more important than ever and we are sharing a few tips for cleaning your phone.
Do NOT wipe the phone with a strong hand sanitizer or disinfecting wipe! It can ruin your screen and even short circuit internal components.
Tips and tricks for cleaning your phone (and keeping it germfree)
- Wash your hands – Keeping the phone clean starts with washing your hands with soap and water regularly. The fewer microbes you have the fewer you will transfer to your phone.
- Wipe with soap and water – The most effective and cheapest way to keep coronavirus off your phone is to wipe it down with a damp cloth with some hand soap. DO NOT put any liquid on the phone directly. This can damage the device. Always put the solution on the cloth first. The BBC conducted tests and turns out that it cleans the phone’s surfaces to a very safe level. (watch video below)
- Disinfectant wipes/Phone sanitizer – Disinfecting wipes with 70% isopropyl alcohol are safe for using on the phone’s screen and back. Don’t wring the wipe out too much otherwise, it will drip solution through open crevices. Apple has confirmed that Clorox wipes are safe to use on the phone screen.
- Distilled water – Smudges and fingerprints on the screen and back aren’t just unsightly, they are sticky spots that ‘store’ germs. Use distilled water and a microfiber cloth to wipe away smudges. After that, use soap or disinfectant to clean the phone.
- Scotch tape/Blu Tack– For lint and debris stuck in speaker grills, around camera bumps, in microphone holes, and around buttons, use scotch tape or Blu Tack. The adhesives in both of these are excellent for picking up dirt. For stubborn debris, use a toothpick.
- ‘UV safe’ – The device of the cleanliness freak, ‘UV safes’ have become all the rage since COVID-19. They basically bathe your device in UV rays – very effectively killing all organisms on the device. A couple of warnings: they can cause discoloration to the phone’s body, and anything that doesn’t UV rays will not be cleaned.
Mythbusting some bad phone cleaning ‘tricks’
The screen on phones uses an oleophobic coating that repels oil and smudging. It also makes the glass smoother to slide your finger on. Strong cleaners, like kitchen cleaners and dish soap, will damage that coating and ruin the screen. Here are a few things you should NOT do!
Household cleaners and solvents – It says ‘glass cleaner’ on the spray you have but it is neither disinfecting nor is it safe to use on your delicate phone screen.
WD40 – It is an incredibly strong de-greaser. It’s so powerful that it will damage the screen and wipe away the adhesives holding your phone together!
Ammonia and bleach – They will cause permanent blotchiness to all glass surfaces and likely ruin the camera lens too.
Compressed air – Shooting high pressure air into any ports on your phone will force germs and dust in. These will disrupt circuit boards. Worst case scenario, the high-pressure air blows the screen off the phone or dislodges the SOC.
‘Takeaway’ phone repair in Toronto
If you have damaged your phone trying to clean it, don’t worry. ASK Computers will remain open during the coronavirus outbreak, though we are taking extraordinary measures to keep our customers’ device clean and functioning. After all, this is the time you want to be connected with your loved ones.
Drop in and leave your device; we’ll call you once the repair is done and you can pick it up. Now that’s phone repair takeaway in Toronto.
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