[Q] Can't even call it boot cycle...

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tylik

Member
Jun 2, 2010
43
10
So, there I was, eating dinner while my phone read me a book.* And suddenly, it stopped. Because my phone crashed. And the amount of a boot cycle it can get through before crashing has been decreasing ever since. A complicating factor: when I still thought it was possibly a software issue, I booted into recovery, and attempted to re-flash the OS (currently it's on 10.2.1). It crashed partway through the process.

On the off chance this was a humidity issue (and not having a lot of time to mess with it) I opened up the phone, removed battery, sim, sd and the small screws in the main body of the phone, and left it in a dry well ventillated place. Now it will get as far as the initial "samsung" splash screen the first time I've reinserted the battery, and won't boot at all beside that. (It's possible that the power button was behaving weirdly, but the phone's behavior was generally so erratic that I can't say that with confidence.) Also, sniffing at the keyboard there is ever so faint a smell of burnt electronics... maybe. Maybe just platicizers. (I've noticed a bit of

This is the same phone that had screen issues (assumed to be related to a small amount of water** though subsequent evidence suggested a loose connector as an alternative hypothesis) around the beginning of February. It's been fine ever since, discounting the occasional weird usb connectivity issues that seem to be common with this phone.

I'm pretty happy to take the phone apart, but other than a general decase everything and look for loose connectors or other obvious trouble, I'm not even sure where to begin. (Also, I have about twelve hours to put in an order if I want Amazon to send by a new phone by tomorrow. Which is kind of silly, but this is swiftly and impressively dead. And otherwise it'd be no phone until Tuesday, which wouldn't kill me, but which would annoy me mightily.)

Any thought regarding common problem areas for this phone? I'm hoping to be able to leave the lab early today, which should give me some hours of working time. Well set up for tools, always happy to have things to take apart.

* Text to speech is awesome, once you get used to the robo-voice.
** Really, not a lot - none of the moisure stickers showed anything, and I don't think it got into the main body of the phone.
 

tylik

Member
Jun 2, 2010
43
10
The de-casing was fun, and yet there isn't an obviously damaged component. It was pronounced dead at 6:20 yesterday evening.
 

REV3NT3CH

Inactive Recognized Contributor
Dec 30, 2012
3,771
10,846
Crescent City
So, there I was, eating dinner while my phone read me a book.* And suddenly, it stopped. Because my phone crashed. And the amount of a boot cycle it can get through before crashing has been decreasing ever since. A complicating factor: when I still thought it was possibly a software issue, I booted into recovery, and attempted to re-flash the OS (currently it's on 10.2.1). It crashed partway through the process.

On the off chance this was a humidity issue (and not having a lot of time to mess with it) I opened up the phone, removed battery, sim, sd and the small screws in the main body of the phone, and left it in a dry well ventillated place. Now it will get as far as the initial "samsung" splash screen the first time I've reinserted the battery, and won't boot at all beside that. (It's possible that the power button was behaving weirdly, but the phone's behavior was generally so erratic that I can't say that with confidence.) Also, sniffing at the keyboard there is ever so faint a smell of burnt electronics... maybe. Maybe just platicizers. (I've noticed a bit of

This is the same phone that had screen issues (assumed to be related to a small amount of water** though subsequent evidence suggested a loose connector as an alternative hypothesis) around the beginning of February. It's been fine ever since, discounting the occasional weird usb connectivity issues that seem to be common with this phone.

I'm pretty happy to take the phone apart, but other than a general decase everything and look for loose connectors or other obvious trouble, I'm not even sure where to begin. (Also, I have about twelve hours to put in an order if I want Amazon to send by a new phone by tomorrow. Which is kind of silly, but this is swiftly and impressively dead. And otherwise it'd be no phone until Tuesday, which wouldn't kill me, but which would annoy me mightily.)

Any thought regarding common problem areas for this phone? I'm hoping to be able to leave the lab early today, which should give me some hours of working time. Well set up for tools, always happy to have things to take apart.

* Text to speech is awesome, once you get used to the robo-voice.
** Really, not a lot - none of the moisure stickers showed anything, and I don't think it got into the main body of the phone.

Get a new battery for it....had this issue before and placing new battery in it fixed my bootlooping and not being able to flash or get past samsung screen...the samsung batteries have an overcharge feature which has been known for causing errors such as this...