Luckily, I have never been in the position of catapulting into a pool only to come to the horrific realization that my precious cell phone was in my pocket….so I have never had to deal with the ramifications of such activities.
However, I have over the years come across countless Facebook groups and pages set up saying things like “DROPPED MY PHONE IN THE TOILET/PHONE TOOK A SWIM, NEED YOUR NUMBERS!!!” by the poor saps who have befallen such catastrophes.
Well, leave it to Japanese techno-designers to come up with the “dryer box”, which supposedly resurrects your water-soaked handheld after a half hour of time in the box.
According to this post from Wired, Whether it works or not is a different matter: if water already shorted out the electronics, you’re out of luck. If you ripped the battery out fast enough, then you may fare better. If your phone or iPod or whatever is resurrected, there will be a ¥1,000, or $12 charge. Should it not rise from the dead, the session is free.
So, if I have this right, you take the waterlogged phone, drop it in this box and then it blows hot air at your phone until it’s dry…but depending on how wet the phone was this may be a waste of a perfectly good half hour?? That sounds…kinda lame.
Of course, the miraculous could happen and your phone could somehow end up fixed by this hot air box, in which case you’ll be out twelve dollars. Oh well, I guess that’s better than whimpering your way to the phone store and buying a new one…
I have friends who have tried the “put it on some rice and let it sit for a bit, it will dry out the phone and you’ll be all better!” fix and I don’t remember the results of such trials, so maybe that doesn’t work after all.
But if you’re in Japan and you find your phone not conducive to underwater expeditions, then track down one of these boxes and go to town.
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