Prying Eyes: Dissecting Google Glass

At this point we saw no obvious means for removing more plastic. We carefully prodded with spudgers and screwdrivers, but ultimately found an internal screw that was difficult to remove non-destructively. We applied force and leverage, cut a bit around the internal screw, and peeled back the outer shell. We then removed the now-exposed internal screw.

Side touchpad

Removing the casing exposed a few parts, including the separate touchpad module on the right side of the unit. When a Glass users looks like they are pensively tapping their temple, they are interacting with this sensor. The touchpad is a full custom module made by Synaptics, and is driven by a Synaptics T1320A touchpad controller.

Main CPU board

The main logic board was now exposed. The inwards-facing side holds an RF module, some small connectors and support ICs, and copper noting that this is "a GOOGLE [X] production."

This board was stuck to a thermal pad with lots of paste. After removing it and cleaning off the pink thermal compound, we revealed the core chips powering Glass: a TI OMAP4430, 16GB of SanDisk flash, and an Elpida mobile DRAM chip. A flex PCB and an RF cable, anchored with some metal tabs and a U.FL connector, trailed from this board to the behind-the-ear pod.

Some text in the copper on this board reads >9K! It's over 9000!

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