Even if a wet cellphone seems dead, there's a good chance it can be resuscitated. You've gotta act fast though - the longer the water sits inside, the more likely you're S.O.L.

You're probably conditioned by now to send back broken merchandise, but your phone's warranty most likely doesn't cover water damage. And you may not have much luck pulling a fast one on your phone company - a lot of today's phones come with a "water sticker" that permanently changes color if it gets wet.

The first step: immediately cut the power by removing the battery. We know it's tempting, but resist the urge to power up your phone to see if it works - just turning it on can short out the circuits.

If you have a GSM phone (the type used by AT&T and T-Mobile), you'll want to remove the SIM card too. Even if your phone turns out to be beyond repair, the SIM should retain a lot of its onboard info, like the contacts in your phone book. If it got wet too, just pat it dry - they're pretty sturdy little things.

Now that you've got the battery out, you've got one goal: dry your phone, and dry it fast. Minus heat. Dry good, heat bad. If you thought about letting it sit around until all the moisture evaporated naturally, the chance of corrosion damaging the phone's innards increases.

So...SUCK the water out if you can. The trick is to get the moisture out through the same channels it entered. Your best bet: a vaccuum, held far enough away as you can still still be effective. (This reduces static electricity, also not a good thing.) DO NOT USE a hair dryer, even on the "cool" setting. Again, we get back to "dry good, heat bad'. You might have a warped sense of humor your friends love, but you don't want that going on inside your phone...unless you're itching to buy a new one.

Now that you've gotten all the moisture out that you can through suckage, we introduce the word of the day: dessicant. It's something that wicks the moisture out of its environment. (Think the little packets that come in the box with a new pair of shoes.) A dessicant you're most likely to have lying around at home: uncooked rice.

Leave your phone, and its disconnected battery submerged in rice overnight.

Another no-no, though you may have read differently online: alcohol. It can dissolve internal adhesives. (If your phone's gone for a swim in the toliet though, it's okay to wipe the outside with alcohol to disinfect it.)

ATTN BEACHGOERS: if your phone gets soaked in salt water, you should probably flush the whole thing in fresh water before it dries. When salt water evaporates, it leaves crystals that can damage a phone's fragile components. Just be sure to remove the battery before flooding the device.

Finally, test your phone. After you have waited a day or so, re-attach the battery and see if it works. If your phone does not work, try plugging it into its charger without the battery. If that works, you need a new battery. If not, try taking your cell phone to an authorized dealer. As a last ditch effort before buying a new phone, you can have them attempt to fix it.

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