Hello Ben,
There are many myths and misconceptions about this element. Unfortunately, distributors and online sellers (Chinese products) do not help. They only obscure the real problems. It is common to read in advertisements or item descriptions: "original replacement item" or just "front camera flex". As in the first example, you can only smile to yourself, so in the second one it is no longer fun. The vast majority of spare parts for Apple offered on the web are Chinese counterfeits, having no connection with the functionality of the original. Most often, it only look similar and it's full unfunctionality and unreliability are a minor detail. Unfortunately, the fault lies mostly with the seller, who (in many cases) does not even know what is being sold. (or... sometimes knows but it doesn't matter for sellers. Just money! Such cases also happen.)
Disassemble your replacement flex tape and take a good look at it. Compare it to your old flex tape. You will notice some differences. These differences are the reason for future problems - but this is only one side of the coin. The other side of the coin is the lack of knowledge in public space - but more on that later.
To show the problem, I will use a photo from the iFixIT store of the item you indicated in the link above. Pay attention to the white element, which was originally supposed to be a light sensor.
,
What you see, this white "thing" is a plastic dummy light sensor, glued with cyan glue to the tape. Of course, I'm not going to mention the crooked alignment causing the entire sensor assembly to bend when you try to slide it into place and end up suffering from the breakage of the proximity sensor bar. I'm not foinf to mention too, to the resistive issues of all the counterfeit tape and conductivity of a use glue in specyfic phisicall conditnions. The quality of the camera and the actual amount of pixels, it's a completely different story.
I want to tell you (perhaps the moderator will punish me again for saying this - forgive me if my comment disappears from here one day - it will be deleted by their "pet") that Apple has never sold replacement parts except recently screens and batteries for the latest models. The only real source of advanced electronic parts is a used part, removed from a broken phone. Damaged most often in a poor-quality repair workshop that sprang up like mushrooms after the rain due to the popularity of Apple in the world. But that too is another story.
...and Now just the point:
Replacing a failed TrueDepth assembly sensor does not always mean an isolated failure. Not always (which is worth emphasizing) it does have to be associated with the loss of Face.ID functionality as well. Buy a used TrueDepth unit online - it's important that it's an original item and check the proximity and lighting functions. If you see an improvement in performance, you are halfway to success. I'm afraid that due to the assembly of the current tape, you will not be able to return it. I will add as a side note that the original from disassembly costs less than 1/3 of your price. Surprised?
Face.ID is a complex set of many cooperating elements and software. Disturbing one of them will always (due to data security reasons) result in disabling the function or other problems. Find a good repair shop, take both tapes there (your original one and the new one - the original and working one you checked a while ago) and order the FLOOD Illuminator sensor transfer. The technician will know what to do and how to do it. It is not difficult but requires experience and knowledge. Surgical precision in handling the soldering iron is also required. Any good microelectronics engineer can do it - take advantage of it. An additional hint will be that the better the technician, the cheaper the service will be. It will literally take 10 minutes. All that's left to do is assemble everything and check it works. You can do this at home, on your own kitchen table, in accordance with the mission ... (I'm not allowed to write this - the iFixIT administrator has already punished me with several hundred penatly points for writing the truth, sorry - I won't do it again). You can find more in my description, you are smart - you will understand.
- regards, bert.harmidomski
11 
5 
1 
