New HTC 7 Mozart SD Card Memory Upgrade

This phone arrives with 8GB of storage space, which for most is not enough.

The good news is that the storage is managed by an 8GB SanDisk Micro SD Class 4 removable  card

The not so good news is that the card is buried under a few layers that have to be carefully removed to get at it.

Now you can also watch my video of the whole procedure here.

The first step after removing the battery cover is to carefully remove the sticker which covers the mini usb cable attachment to the pcb. The remove the top cover by gently prying it off. The main body of the phone is anodised aluminium and is all one unit so it does not split in the normal way. The only access needed is the top and bottom plastic “triangles”

Next unscrew the 3 security screws and one cross head screw at each corner of the phone. They are fairly obvious and clear to see. The screw at the top left has a Void sticker on it which if you proceed past this point you are affecting your warranty – proceed at your own risk. The bottom 2 screws are seen below together with the mini ribbon cable which attaches the mini usb port on the case to the phone. Remove the yellow tape carefully and slide the ribbon out gently so that the case can be separated once the top 2 screws are removed.

Here is what it looks like with the case and insides separated, the inside module just slides out from the bottom at a slight angle to clear the case. You can clearly see the ribbon cable now free but still attached to the case.

Right, now the slightly tricky bit. The whole inside module now needs to be split apart very very gently. I advise taking extra time and care at this stage. There is one cross head screw on the right hand side and everything else is held on by clips. The bottom does not look like it will separate, but go along the edge slowly with a mini flat blade and gently lever out every part that you can see, just use some logic and very gentle pressure and it will eventually come apart. When it separates you will see a piece on grounding tape between the 2 halves, so do not pull them apart completely just in case it is important.

On the photo above you can clearly see the screw hole and the tabs.

The piece of metal that is bent up is a mistake when I was initially looking for the SD card housing and thought it was underneath – it wasn’t.

Showing the plastic tabs which hold the pieces together, gently slide something flat in to lever them apart.

Once its apart, remember to not pull it completely away as there is a grounding strip attached to each half which you do not want to have to stick back.

All the parts of your sexy phone are now pulled apart and look like they will never go back together. But now finally you will get the first sight of the SD card on the side of the PCB.

Ok so now remove the yellow tape and pull out the card. It is very stiff at first but will come out eventually. It is not spring loaded.

I have replaced the 8GB card with a 16GB SanDisk Class 2 card as it was all I had to hand until I can get a hold of a 32GB class 4.

The all that remains is to reassemble the parts in the reverse order. First the 2 halves of the phone will clip back together fairly easily once everything is lined up and replace the screw. Its a little fiddly but not too bad to reinsert the min usb ribbon cable and replace the yellow tape over it. Check when replacing the 2 bottom screws that everything is properly lined up and that the ground braid that sits below the 2 screws is also properly in place.

On first boot up you should get a screen like this. I don’t think the connect to Zune to backup will really work at this stage so better to have done any backup before you start.

Click the reset and let the phone reboot into OEM start-up screen

Once all back up and running I had the Zune sync screen show as below:

The phone now reports 14.73 GB total memory available after formatting.

NICE ONE.

I think that’s covered everything, hope you like your HTC Mozart as much as I do and enjoy some extra storage space that it deserves.

Cheers from Scotland

Andy

HTC, MicroSD Card Issues, Mozart, Windows Phone 7

HTC 7 Mozart, microSD Card change, Windows Phone 7

November 7, 2010

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