Taking center stage on the teardown table this time around is the gold colored iPad Air 2 (gold is best!). Like previous versions of Apple's popular tablet, the iPad Air 2 isn't held together by any screws, not even proprietary ones. Instead, the chassis is glued shut, meaning you'll need to heat up the sides and pry it open carefully. On the plus side, Apple's decision to bond the front panel and LCD together makes getting inside slightly easier.
"In case you were wondering how much room you have to wedge your opening pick in between the front panel assembly and rear case, it's not much. There's little margin for error in this Air 2's margins," iFixIt says.
Once again, the copious adhesive made its way to the logic board, which is still glued in. It takes some "careful and tedious prying" to remove it, which is made even more difficult by the fact that the Lightning connector cable is soldered to it. That means if the Lightning connector goes bad, you're looking at having to replace the entire logic board.
One thing that was interesting to find in the iPad Air 2 is a lower capacity battery. Apple is now using a 27.62 Wh battery rather than the original iPad Air's 32.9 Wh capacity, though both tablets are purported to run for up to 10 hours. This would indicate that the A8X chip is more efficient than the A7 SoC.
When the dust settled, the iPad Air 2 ended up with a paltry 2 out of 10 Repairability Score. It got dinged for the heavy use of adhesive "making all repairs more difficult," and though the fused LCD and front panel simplifies the opening procedure, it also increases the cost of repairing a cracked screen.
