My iPhone SE got wet

[Alwyn]

Went out for an hour with dogs in waterproof gear with iPhone SE 1 in zip pocket that let in the rain. I dried it and noticed that battery charge was down. I tried to recharge it without success. Eventually it recharged with the following result: home button doesn't work, Finder doesn't recognise iPhone on iMac (macOS 11.6) so can't backup or restore. Although it's recognised on iTunes it can't be synced. I rang Apple technical support who suggested that I try my wife's older iMac using iTunes where I could at least follow Apple's suggested procedure to do a reset but still got the message support.apple.com/iphone/restore after updating it and again after resetting it.

Scroll up to Control Centre works but Home goes to My Home not where the Home button should take me. Before the reset Siri worked once after initially saying that we hadn't been introduced but thereafter, whenever, there was any sound it/she said 'I can't hear you' and although I got text saying 'on it' none of my instructions were followed.

So it looks as if the Home button is caput and, as it's a Series 1, not worth repairing. It's a 64gb iPhone. As I have a lot of music from my iMac that I rarely listen to as BBC Sounds has everything I want, would I be able to restore my previous backup to a 32gb iPhone?

 

[IWT]

Hi Alwyn

Truly sorry to hear about your misfortune. To use a scientific term "it's knackered" . Water ingression is so damaging to electronics.

The time honoured response is to turn it off if you can, put the phone in a bag of rice or rice crispies or similar water-absorbing pellets, put that in a warm place, and leave it, leave it, leave it for days. Then try booting it again.

That sometimes works, but be warned, not all functions may be working.

Ian

 

[Alwyn]

Thanks Ian. I did put it in rice in a plastic sealed box but only overnight. I also note that the battery has degraded to 79% max capacity. As you say it's probably knackered. I had been contemplating a switch to a second hand series 2 SE so this will spur me into action.

 

[badshoehabit]

I bought a refurbished iPhone 10 from Apple as a xmas gift - £350 well spent. You will not believe the two-day battery life from a new phone! If you use TopCashBack, there's 3+% back.