I'm stupid. Like really really stupid. Here's the story.
I'm a very basic ubuntu on PC user, so when I found out they'd released Ubuntu Touch, I googled it immediately. The download site said in no uncertain terms that "THIS IS A DEVELOPER PREVIEW IMAGE, NOT FOR GENERAL USERS", but I said what the hey, I'll just reflash the stock image if something goes wrong.
The installation went successfully, but Ubuntu wasn't taking any keyboard input to get past the initial setup phase. I was already looking at 3 hours of sleep before work so I just flipped my nexus case shut and went to sleep.
Now that I'm at work and trying to power up the thing, nothing happens. The screen flickers for a fraction of a second when I keep power + vol down pressed, but it keeps looping in that flickering mode. When I plug it into a charger, it doesn't show a charging symbol (it would only show that if it were off, so maybe ubuntu is still running?)
I restarted it at least a couple of times without issue when Ubuntu wasn't recording my keyboard touches, and I'm positive now that Ubuntu didn't put my tablet into sleep mode when I flipped the lid shut (like I was used to with the factory rom) so the battery is dead, but it should at least still give a battery charging indication?!
I also read somewhere that it might help to keep the power button pressed for 30 seconds, but that didn't do anything. I feel like taking the darn thing apart and yanking the battery, the caveman approach. RIP IT APART!
If I can put it into fastboot mode, all my problems will be over, I can take over from there. But what do I do to get it there, other than the normal, obvious power + vol down?
Helpful suggestions are most welcomed, as well as rants telling me how I shouldn't have done what I did
Forgot to mention that the computer gives no indication that a device has been plugged in. Also hey! My screen is on constant flicker now, something like one of those old television sets.
Give a shot at a force restart. Hold the power button for like 20 seconds. And start it up while holding power and volume down.
Sent from my MB612 using xda app-developers app
---------- Post added at 09:11 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:09 PM ----------
Didn't notice you said you tried already lol. Hmmmm a battery pull would definitely help but I know you don't want to open your case. Only things I can think of would be the force reset, letting the battery die completely, or a restart through adb which won't work since its not picking up a device on your computer.
Sent from my MB612 using xda app-developers app
I managed to get it to work, apparently the battery was down, and since I couldn't even get it to turn off all the way it wasn't even showing the battery indicator it shows while off.
I'm now able to get into CWM recovery and fastboot but fastboot isn't recognizing that a device is plugged in. I used USBDeview to remove all drivers and reinstalled them but still no go. And all the guides I'm reading are asking me to put the device into USB debugging but I can't do that since there is no OS on the device at all, not Ubuntu, not JB.
I tried to sideload "image-nakasi-jdq39.zip" using CWM but that didn't work...
* daemon started successfully *
error: device not found
And fastboot just keeps saying "waiting for device".
Update your adb and fast boot binaries. Adb debugging doesn't matter at all in fastboot
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk HD
Thanks a lot, both of you. It's working now, just going through the initial setup. Thanks a lot!
Hello all,
Recently I have had a major issue with my nexus 7. About a week ago, it died (ran out of battery) while I was using it. When I attempted to turn it on after charging it, I would get the screen that says google, with unlocked lock icon. The tablet would be frozen at this screen. I left it running until it died again. I was running the latest stable release of cyanogenmod 10 with no problems before when this happened.
By now I had realized that the nexus may have been bricked. I did some googling and found that this is an issue other users have been having when their battery died on android 4.2.2. I attempted to restore the nexus. At this time I was able to access bootloader on the device by holding down all of the buttons at the same time. However, I decided not to restore the nexus, and wait until a time where I would be able to turn all of my attention to the problem. But when I tried to restore the device yesterday, I was not able to access bootloader! I connected the device to my PC (running win8) and it is not recognized. Similarly, trying fastboot restart-bootloader gives me "waiting for device". I am afraid that the bootloader may have been corrupted somehow.
My question is, how can I fix this? Is there a way to reflash the bootloader, or is there something that I am missing? Is there a hardware operation that needs to be performed on the device (battery pull, etc)?
Thanks.
AW: [Q] Help! Nexus 7 not working, may be bricked
I doubt your nexus is bricked. Most likely you entered the APX mode. Hold down the power button for about 6-10 seconds, then it should exit from there.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/APX_mode
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Not working
AndDiSa said:
I doubt your nexus is bricked. Most likely you entered the APX mode. Hold down the power button for about 6-10 seconds, then it should exit from there.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/APX_mode
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I hold down the power button, the device just turns off and comes back on again. The google boot logo shows for a few seconds, then I get a black screen.
patil215 said:
When I hold down the power button, the device just turns off and comes back on again. The google boot logo shows for a few seconds, then I get a black screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you get a Google logo, that is a good sign - it means the bootloader is at least partially intact, possibly even in perfect shape.
I would proceed assuming that your battery is completely discharged.
Put the device on the charger overnight and then try starting it up while it is still plugged in to the charger. Hold the vol-down button and the power button continuously until at least one second after the Google logo flashes - this should put the device into fastboot mode if the bootloader is intact.
Something to remember is that Li-Ion batteries have a safety feature that prevents them from charging if the battery voltage gets too low. This is part of the reason why they are shipped with a 50% charge - they can sit that way for months and months only self-discharging at a very very slow rate.
OTOH, if you discharge the battery deeply and then let it sit for a long time afterward - especially if there is something like APX mode draining current - the battery voltage can fall below this "safety threshold voltage" and (even though it is still a "good battery" it can no longer be charged).
I'm not sure it the N7 can be started up while plugged in to only the charger; if it can, disconnecting the battery and trying to power up the device might be a way to discriminate "dead device" from "unchargeable battery".
good luck
I've tried this before
bftb0 said:
If you get a Google logo, that is a good sign - it means the bootloader is at least partially intact, possibly even in perfect shape.
I would proceed assuming that your battery is completely discharged.
Put the device on the charger overnight and then try starting it up while it is still plugged in to the charger. Hold the vol-down button and the power button continuously until at least one second after the Google logo flashes - this should put the device into fastboot mode if the bootloader is intact.
Something to remember is that Li-Ion batteries have a safety feature that prevents them from charging if the battery voltage gets too low. This is part of the reason why they are shipped with a 50% charge - they can sit that way for months and months only self-discharging at a very very slow rate.
OTOH, if you discharge the battery deeply and then let it sit for a long time afterward - especially if there is something like APX mode draining current - the battery voltage can fall below this "safety threshold voltage" and (even though it is still a "good battery" it can no longer be charged).
I'm not sure it the N7 can be started up while plugged in to only the charger; if it can, disconnecting the battery and trying to power up the device might be a way to discriminate "dead device" from "unchargeable battery".
good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried this before. I still get a google screen, even after fully charging it. Does this mean that the battery has become unusable? How can I fix this?
Then try it again. It takes less time than typing a post into XDA.
There are two ways to try it.
1) Hold both Power & Vol-Down simultaneously, and keep holding them down until at least 4 seconds after the B&W "Google" text appears on the screen
2) Hold only the Power button down continuously, but be ready! Press the Vol-Down button as soon as the Google logo appears! - you only get less than a second to do this. (If you are late, the bootloader tries to boot the boot partition). Also, you need to keep holding the Power button down (3 or 4 seconds) after this - wait long enough that you are convinced that the fastboot screen is not going to occur.
As for the battery, you can pop off the back case and use a voltmeter to CAREFULLY measure the open-circuit voltage. The normal 0%-to-100% voltage range is about 3.6v - 4.15v. Obviously if it won't take a charge then there is a battery issue. BE CAREFUL - avoid doing anything which could short the terminals even momentarily.
bftb0 said:
Then try it again. It takes less time than typing a post into XDA.
There are two ways to try it.
1) Hold both Power & Vol-Down simultaneously, and keep holding them down until at least 4 seconds after the B&W "Google" text appears on the screen
2) Hold only the Power button down continuously, but be ready! Press the Vol-Down button as soon as the Google logo appears! - you only get less than a second to do this. (If you are late, the bootloader tries to boot the boot partition). Also, you need to keep holding the Power button down (3 or 4 seconds) after this - wait long enough that you are convinced that the fastboot screen is not going to occur.
As for the battery, you can pop off the back case and use a voltmeter to CAREFULLY measure the open-circuit voltage. The normal 0%-to-100% voltage range is about 3.6v - 4.15v. Obviously if it won't take a charge then there is a battery issue. BE CAREFUL - avoid doing anything which could short the terminals even momentarily.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried holding down the buttons in various configurations at least 50 times already. As for the battery, there is current flowing, so I don't think this is a battery issue. Also worth noting is that if the device completely dies and I plug it in again, the charging battery sign appears (an empty battery slowly filling with white bars). Sometimes the device will give a black screen with little white sparks flickering randomly on it.
Well there have been several posts on here with identical symptoms, where the affected owner later reported that their tablet mysteriously started operating normally.
Unfortunately nothing consistent seems to have emerged from those reports.
You could try disconnecting the battery for a few minutes and reconnecting it to see if that makes any difference.
But whatever you do, you're gonna eventually have to press some buttons & the procedure I suggested is diagnostic for the bootloader, even if the boot or /system partition are borked.
BTW In my experience that battery charging graphic shows the charge state of the battery - does yours show closer to empty or full?
bftb0 said:
Well there have been several posts on here with identical symptoms, where the affected owner later reported that their tablet mysteriously started operating normally.
Unfortunately nothing consistent seems to have emerged from those reports.
You could try disconnecting the battery for a few minutes and reconnecting it to see if that makes any difference.
But whatever you do, you're gonna eventually have to press some buttons & the procedure I suggested is diagnostic for the bootloader, even if the boot or /system partition are borked.
BTW In my experience that battery charging graphic shows the charge state of the battery - does yours show closer to empty or full?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Mine shows the battery going from empty to full, like an animation. Also, I'm considering sending in the device for repair but I know that since the bootloader is unlocked it probably wouldn't be free.
Also can you link me to any posts related to this? They might be useful in solving my problem.
Thanks
Were you able to get your computer to recognized your Nexus when you connected it? I had to jump through a bunch of hoops with my Win8 machine to get the driver installed, because it didn't pass Microsoft's signature check. Maybe you can use Wug's toolkit to try to fix it, or at least re-lock the bootloader before sending it in for repair?
codehunter2000 said:
Were you able to get your computer to recognized your Nexus when you connected it? I had to jump through a bunch of hoops with my Win8 machine to get the driver installed, because it didn't pass Microsoft's signature check. Maybe you can use Wug's toolkit to try to fix it, or at least re-lock the bootloader before sending it in for repair?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
After spending a few hours, I was able to get an adb driver installed onto my computer, I also had to jump through a lot of hoops (I run win8 too). Running adb devices shows the nexus in recovery mode. However, I can't access the bootloader whatsoever. Typing fastboot reboot-bootloader just hangs, and I've tried several toolkits but they just hang. I'm not sure if I can do anything unless I can access bootloader. If you know anything I can do please tell.
patil215 said:
Mine shows the battery going from empty to full, like an animation. Also, I'm considering sending in the device for repair but I know that since the bootloader is unlocked it probably wouldn't be free.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
By coincidence I was charging mine right now (82%), so I shut it down and looked at that battery animation. (I have the v4.18 bootloader & Dec '12 hardware) First the "lightning bolt" symbol shows up in the battery icon, and the a little later, it performs a "filling the battery up" animation. But here's the important part: when that animation runs on mine, it starts from nearly, but not quite full (mostly white, not all black)- about 82%.
Can't tell exactly from the way you described your situation, but this (again) sounds like your battery is either not charging, or the bq27541 charge controller is reporting the wrong battery state.
Unplug the battery and let it sit for a while before reconnecting. If you have a safe way to measure the battery voltage, do so. You'll know right away if the battery is charged and the charge controller chip is lying.
---------- Post added at 08:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:37 PM ----------
patil215 said:
After spending a few hours, I was able to get an adb driver installed onto my computer, I also had to jump through a lot of hoops (I run win8 too). Running adb devices shows the nexus in recovery mode. However, I can't access the bootloader whatsoever. Typing fastboot reboot-bootloader just hangs, and I've tried several toolkits but they just hang. I'm not sure if I can do anything unless I can access bootloader. If you know anything I can do please tell.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is completely bizzare. The only way that a recovery can be started is via the bootloader. If the bootloader doesn't run, nothing can run. (The recovery is a booted kernel just as with the regular OS). Moreover, you saw the battery screen light up - if a recovery was (still) running, you would think something would show on the screen (although I guess recent versions of TWRP does screen blanking now). Very weird.
bftb0 said:
By coincidence I was charging mine right now (82%), so I shut it down and looked at that battery animation. (I have the v4.18 bootloader & Dec '12 hardware) First the "lightning bolt" symbol shows up in the battery icon, and the a little later, it performs a "filling the battery up" animation. But here's the important part: when that animation runs on mine, it starts from nearly, but not quite full (mostly white, not all black)- about 82%.
Can't tell exactly from the way you described your situation, but this (again) sounds like your battery is either not charging, or the bq27451 charge controller is reporting the wrong battery state.
Unplug the battery and let it sit for a while before reconnecting. If you have a safe way to measure the battery voltage, do so. You'll know right away if the battery is charged and the charge controller chip is lying.
---------- Post added at 08:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:37 PM ----------
That is completely bizzare. The only way that a recovery can be started is via the bootloader. If the bootloader doesn't run, nothing can run. (The recovery is a booted kernel just as with the regular OS). Moreover, you saw the battery screen light up - if a recovery was (still) running, you would think something would show on the screen (although I guess recent versions of TWRP does screen blanking now). Very weird.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can I have the links that you mentioned about users having identical symptoms that "fixed themselves"?
I really don't want to send it in for repairs if it's going to cost me. I'm a student with not much money to spare . One of the reasons I bought the nexus 7 in the first place.
bftb0 said:
By coincidence I was charging mine right now (82%), so I shut it down and looked at that battery animation. (I have the v4.18 bootloader & Dec '12 hardware) First the "lightning bolt" symbol shows up in the battery icon, and the a little later, it performs a "filling the battery up" animation. But here's the important part: when that animation runs on mine, it starts from nearly, but not quite full (mostly white, not all black)- about 82%.
Can't tell exactly from the way you described your situation, but this (again) sounds like your battery is either not charging, or the bq27451 charge controller is reporting the wrong battery state.
Unplug the battery and let it sit for a while before reconnecting. If you have a safe way to measure the battery voltage, do so. You'll know right away if the battery is charged and the charge controller chip is lying.
---------- Post added at 08:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:37 PM ----------
That is completely bizzare. The only way that a recovery can be started is via the bootloader. If the bootloader doesn't run, nothing can run. (The recovery is a booted kernel just as with the regular OS). Moreover, you saw the battery screen light up - if a recovery was (still) running, you would think something would show on the screen (although I guess recent versions of TWRP does screen blanking now). Very weird.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I also fully charged the nexus 7 overnight. The battery icon now showed no animation because the battery was full (it first showed a picture of the lighting bolt battery, then a picture of a full battery) so I believe that the battery is working correctly.
patil215 said:
Can I have the links that you mentioned about users having identical symptoms that "fixed themselves"?
I really don't want to send it in for repairs if it's going to cost me. I'm a student with not much money to spare . One of the reasons I bought the nexus 7 in the first place.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I didn't make a record of them - you will need to search. What sounded very familiar was when you had said
patil215 said:
...black screen with little white sparks flickering...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What I recall - probably imperfectly - was that most of those cases seemed to spontaneously resolve when the owner charged their battery. And since your story started out with "black screen and little white sparks flickering", and "low battery" it sounded quite similar.
The various folks who mentioned this said things like "white lines flashing", "like sparks", or "like snow on an old-fashioned TV screen". Don't know if that will help you search, but they are in this forum (Q&A).
I also don't know if their tablets were in one particular mode or another (judging from a PC connected to the tablet - a black screen on the tab doesn't tell you anything) - I don't think any of them reported this.
As I said previously, that Black and White Google logo is produced by the bootloader. I just started my tablet in APX mode right now, and while the "charging battery" icon shows up when using the APX cold-start sequence (Vol-Up+Power), that B&W Google (text) Logo does not show up on the screen - the tablet goes directly from battery charging to APX mode (detected by looking at the PC - device shows up under "Other devices -> APX" in the device manager; VID/PID pair USB\VID_0955&PID_7330&REV_0103
)
So, my point is that it sure seems like your bootloader is there and capable of at least starting up at least part way.
What if your Vol-Down button was not working and you had a borked "boot" partition? If you had that combination, the bootloader wouldn't go into fastboot mode, as it would never see the Vol-Down keypress... and if your boot partition was borked, then you would never get any boot accompanied by a black screen.
At this point I think you should try observing the behavior of the USB port from the PC while trying to start it up... and even though you've tried it before, see if you can get the fastboot screen to appear. Perhaps there is something funky going on with your Vol-down button.
good luck
bftb0 said:
I didn't make a record of them - you will need to search. What sounded very familiar was when you had said
What I recall - probably imperfectly - was that most of those cases seemed to spontaneously resolve when the owner charged their battery. And since your story started out with "black screen and little white sparks flickering", and "low battery" it sounded quite similar.
The various folks who mentioned this said things like "white lines flashing", "like sparks", or "like snow on an old-fashioned TV screen". Don't know if that will help you search, but they are in this forum (Q&A).
I also don't know if their tablets were in one particular mode or another (judging from a PC connected to the tablet - a black screen on the tab doesn't tell you anything) - I don't think any of them reported this.
As I said previously, that Black and White Google logo is produced by the bootloader. I just started my tablet in APX mode right now, and while the "charging battery" icon shows up when using the APX cold-start sequence (Vol-Up+Power), that B&W Google (text) Logo does not show up on the screen - the tablet goes directly from battery charging to APX mode (detected by looking at the PC - device shows up under "Other devices -> APX" in the device manager; VID/PID pair USB\VID_0955&PID_7330&REV_0103
)
So, my point is that it sure seems like your bootloader is there and capable of at least starting up at least part way.
What if your Vol-Down button was not working and you had a borked "boot" partition? If you had that combination, the bootloader wouldn't go into fastboot mode, as it would never see the Vol-Down keypress... and if your boot partition was borked, then you would never get any boot accompanied by a black screen.
At this point I think you should try observing the behavior of the USB port from the PC while trying to start it up... and even though you've tried it before, see if you can get the fastboot screen to appear. Perhaps there is something funky going on with your Vol-down button.
good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
UPDATE!:
Not sure if this will help at all. But I ran adb -d reboot bootloader, and the device just turned off. Completely. I turned it on again by holding power for 15 seconds but I got the exact same thing as before (google with black screen following). Once the device was on and I connected it to Windows, windows said "Windows detected malfunctioning device". But I couldn't duplicate the results again. Running adb -d reboot bootloader just hangs.
patil215 said:
UPDATE!:
Not sure if this will help at all. But I ran adb -d reboot bootloader, and the device just turned off. Completely. I turned it on again by holding power for 15 seconds but I got the exact same thing as before (google with black screen following). Once the device was on and I connected it to Windows, windows said "Windows detected malfunctioning device". But I couldn't duplicate the results again. Running adb -d reboot bootloader just hangs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Incredibly, extra-ordinarily bizzare. ADB on the tablet side is a daemon process that runs in userspace. You would need a completely functional kernel to be running on the tablet, and a functioning ramdisk too in order to communicate with the tablet. ADB does not talk to fastboot mode, nor any other mode of the bootloader.
IF YOU ARE REALLY SHUTTING YOUR DEVICE OFF AND THEN SOMETIME LATER YOU ARE ABLE TO TALK TO THE TABLET BY USING THE adb COMMAND (not fastboot), THAT MEANS THAT THE BOOTLOADER IS SUCCESSFULLY BOOTING SOME (unknown) LINUX KERNEL.
That truly beggars the question of why you are seeing anything on the screen after the google logo. Did the previous ROM not have a splash-screen?
Well, if you can communicate with ADB it might be appropriate to try:
adb reboot recovery
and see what this does.
If you can find the device in the Windows device manager, what would be really, really helpful would be the device VID/PID pair.
The way you do this is like this:
1) Identify the device in device manager; right-click on it and select "Properties"
2) Select the "Details" tab
3) In the "Property" Combo-box pulldown, select the Property Name"
Hardware Ids
If you can get those values we can identify exactly which mode the device is in. There is a decoder ring at the end of the first post in this thread
OK, I'm starting to get fatigued, as I offer up both things to attempt as well as avenues of exploration, and you seem to simply ignore all of it.
I know you have tried it several times, maybe even a million times. Please try both methods of starting the tablet to try and intercept the initial phase of the bootloader startup and see if you can get the tablet to go into fastboot mode.
It's OK to try it and fail. But in all this back-and-forth, not once have you said, "yes I tried it again and it still failed". Try it and report the result, even if it fails.
Please try it again - both methods. In the second method where you click the Vol-Down button only after you see the B&W "Google" text, you need to do it really quickly - and not let your finger off the Power button either for several seconds.
---------- Post added at 06:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:02 PM ----------
PS
The "-d" option to the adb command should only be needed if you were running an emulator via the Google SDK on the same PC.
If that were the case, when you ran the command
Code:
adb devices[/url]
you would see multiple lines of output indicating multiple devices on the machine - one for each running emulator, and one for the actual hardware device (so long as it is actually booted into a recovery or OS and you have the right drivers installed).
bftb0 said:
Incredibly, extra-ordinarily bizzare. ADB on the tablet side is a daemon process that runs in userspace. You would need a completely functional kernel to be running on the tablet, and a functioning ramdisk too in order to communicate with the tablet. ADB does not talk to fastboot mode, nor any other mode of the bootloader.
IF YOU ARE REALLY SHUTTING YOUR DEVICE OFF AND THEN SOMETIME LATER YOU ARE ABLE TO TALK TO THE TABLET BY USING THE adb COMMAND (not fastboot), THAT MEANS THAT THE BOOTLOADER IS SUCCESSFULLY BOOTING SOME (unknown) LINUX KERNEL.
That truly beggars the question of why you are seeing anything on the screen after the google logo. Did the previous ROM not have a splash-screen?
Well, if you can communicate with ADB it might be appropriate to try:
adb reboot recovery
and see what this does.
If you can find the device in the Windows device manager, what would be really, really helpful would be the device VID/PID pair.
The way you do this is like this:
1) Identify the device in device manager; right-click on it and select "Properties"
2) Select the "Details" tab
3) In the "Property" Combo-box pulldown, select the Property Name"
Hardware Ids
If you can get those values we can identify exactly which mode the device is in. There is a decoder ring at the end of the first post in this thread
OK, I'm starting to get fatigued, as I offer up both things to attempt as well as avenues of exploration, and you seem to simply ignore all of it.
I know you have tried it several times, maybe even a million times. Please try both methods of starting the tablet to try and intercept the initial phase of the bootloader startup and see if you can get the tablet to go into fastboot mode.
It's OK to try it and fail. But in all this back-and-forth, not once have you said, "yes I tried it again and it still failed". Try it and report the result, even if it fails.
Please try it again - both methods. In the second method where you click the Vol-Down button only after you see the B&W "Google" text, you need to do it really quickly - and not let your finger off the Power button either for several seconds.
---------- Post added at 06:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:02 PM ----------
PS
The "-d" option to the adb command should only be needed if you were running an emulator via the Google SDK on the same PC.
If that were the case, when you ran the command
Code:
adb devices[/url]
you would see multiple lines of output indicating multiple devices on the machine - one for each running emulator, and one for the actual hardware device (so long as it is actually booted into a recovery or OS and you have the right drivers installed).[/QUOTE]
Sorry for not indicating the results of all of your suggestions.
Believe me, I have probably tried both of your button combinations at least two dozen times already. And I have gone down every avenue of exploration that you've suggested.
I've even tried every single one of the button combinations in the thread of nexus 7 button combinations. When I do anything from when the device is on, after 5 seconds or so the device turns off. Then the tablet shows the Google screen for about 5 seconds, no matter what I do. After the google screen comes a blank black screen (I can tell the device is still on because it's illuminated black, different from if the device was dead or powered off). There's not even a way I can get the tablet to power off - it just automatically restarts even if it's not connected to power, so I have to let it die or do a battery pull if I want to fix it. The black screen remains there indefinitely (until the battery runs out of course).
I've tried disconnecting the battery, leaving it disconnected for 30 minutes, connecting the device to power with the battery disconnected, having the buttons held down and connecting the tablet to wall power and USB pc, and different chargers. Nothing gives me a different result. The battery is alive and working, and the voltimeter did give me a current, sorry for not posting that earlier. About the random sparks/snow, there is really no pattern to when these appear, although they might be more frequent (but it might just be me) after a battery pull or full battery discharge.
Remember, I used to be able to access the bootloader but that stopped working for some reason. I'm kicking myself right now for not restoring the tablet when I was able to access bootloader, but I was busy at the time.
I've had some experience with rooting, locking, and unlocking other android devices, but this is something extremely weird.
Also, I should have posted the hardware ID's of the device before. I had done the exact same thing as you suggested when I was trying to install an adb driver for the nexus 7 (had to jump through a lot of hoops to get it working on win8, goddamn win8). The hardware ID's are USB\VID_18D1&PID_D001&REV_9999 and USB\Vid_18D1&PID_D001. According to the guide this means the device is in custom recovery, which makes sense because I was running Cyanogenmod 10 with clockworkmod recovery. If normally booting into the OS, the tablet should be giving me the default animated Cyanogenmod splash screen. Perhaps this issue is a bug with clockworkmod recovery?
I know that -d is to target a specific device, however I pulled up adb and went through each command methodically (really tedious) to see which ones would work. For some reason adb -d reboot-bootloader was the only thing that gave me a response, and even that won't do anything anymore (it just hangs, same with any other adb command). adb reboot recovery hangs also, and any fastboot command gives me waiting for device. Since I've installed a driver for it, in device manager the device shows up as Android phone and Android Composite ADB Interface. Windows tells me it's working properly (really? I'm not so sure windows).
I'd like to apologize for not indicating the results of trying your suggestions. Believe me, I have been trying them! I've spent probably a total of 12 hours trying to get this damn tablet fixed.
I'd also like to thank you. Without people like you this forum would not be any good. I am really grateful for any advice even if it does not work.
I know this is a hell of a problem. No goddamn clue how this happened. I love android but I sincerely hope that this is a clockworkmod recovery problem because otherwise that would make it a mistake on Google's (and therefore android's part). I know that the battery issues are quite frequent on android 4.2.2, but I have yet to find another user with my symptoms.
Lastly, do you know of some way to lock the device or destroy evidence of having the bootloader unlocked without being able to access the bootloader, in case this can't be fixed and I have to send it in for repair?
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Click to collapse
patil215,
Whew. That took you some time to write - thanks for all the details.
The USB\VID_18D1&PID_D001 USB Device Id sure does look like the custom recovery. I will assume - unless you say differently - that you would see this VID/PID pair any time you had the "black screen but with the backlight on".
Android uses this thing called the "BCB" (Boot Communications Block) to write instructions for the bootloader about what it should do when it starts up the next time. In the absence of seeing this, no doubt the bootloader has a default behavior. But basically, the way this works is that a "reboot" command eventually causes the kernel to write into this non-volatile memory area, and then a soft hardware reset occurs. The bootloader is aware of the BCB, and under normal circumstances, it will read it and attempt to follow the indicated boot mode - and then either erase the BCB or fill it with the "default booting instructions" just prior to booting a kernel or special-purpose mode previously indicated. In this way it will return to it's default behavior the next time it is booted.
The reason I mention it is that I have seen on other devices that got borked (HTC Droid Eris) in a way that sometimes those phones would always jump into a particular booting mode - and ignore any hard-button presses that would normally cause the bootloader to follow a different path. The Eris had/has "bootloader", "fastboot", and "OEM" modes and sometimes borked devices would not boot into anything other than the OEM mode.
So, since you apparently are seeing some evidence that a partially-functioning recovery is running, that sounds like a very similar scenario - the Asus bootloader is always booting to your (damaged?) recovery.
So, that's materially different (I think) than what other folks might have experienced it. The first time I've seen it here, although TBH I've only been looking in here for a little less than 3 months.
I don't know what else to suggest - it sounds like maybe you've tried things like "adb shell" commands?
If the bootloader can't be forced into fastboot mode, that (possibly damaged) recovery mode is the only privileged thing you have left. It seems to me that if you can't get into that somehow - adb being the most obvious route - then there is little left to do.
No, I don't know how to relock the bootloader without using the bootloader. That's probably something that can only be done with factory methods (possibly in APX mode).
Sorry.
Hey,
This is my first time posting here and really using the site. I have the Sprint Galaxy S4 and just updated to the SlimKat official build 7 and had no initial problems. A day later it starts to reboot constantly and would stay on for a couple minutes. Now it is stuck in a bootloop and will shut off even when going into download or recovery mode. When plugged into a computer the computer won't even recognize the phone and the phone will not turn on. The only time the phone will even start to boot is when it is not plugged into wall/computer and on battery. I have no idea what to do now.
That's a tough one. Usually with a soft brick, if you can make it to recovery, your phone can be saved but since you can't... I hope you get it working!
Sent from my SPH-L720 using XDA Free mobile app
puresublimie said:
Hey,
This is my first time posting here and really using the site. I have the Sprint Galaxy S4 and just updated to the SlimKat official build 7 and had no initial problems. A day later it starts to reboot constantly and would stay on for a couple minutes. Now it is stuck in a bootloop and will shut off even when going into download or recovery mode. When plugged into a computer the computer won't even recognize the phone and the phone will not turn on. The only time the phone will even start to boot is when it is not plugged into wall/computer and on battery. I have no idea what to do now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Go to sprint galaxy s4 thread. All answers there. You need Odin 3.09 then stock ng2 tar. To flash through computer.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using XDA Free mobile app
I already have odin and the tar files for stock. When plugged into my computer it will not even register that it is connected and so I can't use odin to flash it.
The same thing is happening to me. I get to the Galaxy S4 splash screen, then it shuts off. Even if I try to boot into recovery
I'm going to pile on in here as I seem to be having a similar issue. I had my S4 (not rooted, stock rom) on my dock streaming google music. A phone call came in and the phone started vibrating like crazy and wouldn't stop. The screen shut off and the phone was still vibrating. Finally it stopped and was shut off. When I try to start it a few things happens. It will sometimes boot to my lock screen and the screen goes black and I think it is powered off. Sometimes it will get past the lock screen and then die shortly after. After like 2 or 3 times of that it won't even boot. It loads the Samsung screen but never gets to the Sprint screen or boots. If I leave it for some time shut off with battery out it will go back to booting to the lock screen then dying etc... When I press the buttons to get into recovery it says recovery is loading and then the screen goes black. I swapped batteries and that didn't do anything. I tried pressing the menu button or the home button to try and boot safe mode and it just loads normally not that I think that would help anyway.
Any ideas on things I can try next? What is this odin thing? Would that work for me?
---------- Post added at 07:09 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:16 PM ----------
Ok... I can get into recovery now and will try a factory reset. Are you sure you are going into recovery correctly. Apparently I was not. Hold volume up power and menu button and when the phone vibrates let go of power only.
Before I do a hard wipe is there any way to get data off the internal memory from recovery mode?
So I got a custom recovery installed, reinstalled stock rom, things worked ok for awhile. Then it started random reboots every 10 mins or so. Now it is back to instant crashing and rebooting. Any idea what could be the issue? I'm assuming at this point it is hardware related. Why can recovery and download mode run consistently without crashing but when an os is fired up it has issues? If it was a hardware issue shouldn't it not work across the board?
So I had Sprint replace my phone on the 8th. I have been using my same batteries (1 stock 1 Anker) and chargers (some stock some not) without issue the past 5 days. I rooted and installed xposed and some modules (original broken phone was never rooted and was completely stock). Things were going great until tonight when it started reboot looping exactly like the old phone. I switched battery and same proble. After I took the battery out and left it out awhile it fired back up but I'm afraid the problem will return. Is it possible that the battery or charger randomly are causing damage to the phone? I only have 14 day warranty on this replacement and need to figure this out.
So things were going well for awhile and then the reboot loops started up again. I did some digging and read that apparently Samsung phones are notorious for sticking power buttons and the symptoms were exactly what I was experiencing. I watched some videos online how to open the phone and clean out the power button but it didn't make a difference. I then read that squeezing the connector for the power button with a pair of pliers sometimes does the trick. Not for me. So finally since I'm not under warranty, have no insurance, and the phone wasn't working anyway, I just ripped the white plastic part of the power button right off. Well, that seemed to do the trick. Phone immediately fired back up without issue and has been going strong. I glued a small thin piece of plastic where the old one used to be and I am back in action. If my little plastic piece solution eventually fails or breaks off I will consider soldering on a new button but so far so good.
If you have tried everything else, and are looking for last resort, try cleaning the power button with some alcohol, and if that fails, rip off that power button! Here is the video that gave me the idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Glllc7bEJs and here are some other power button videos: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=s4%20power%20button&search_type=&aq=f&oq=
I am unable to boot up the device. I tried all (power + Vol Up) key combos, not working. Is there anyway to pull data out from the device?
easyxpress said:
I am unable to boot up the device. I tried all (power + Vol Up) key combos, not working. Is there anyway to pull data out from the device?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No fastboot or custom recovery ?
Then no theirs nothing really to do
Maybe a battery replacement would boot it up
Sent from my ONEPLUS A6010 using Tapatalk
No fastboot or custom recovery. I'm wondering if the *storage* can be pulled out like a hard drive?
easyxpress said:
No fastboot or custom recovery. I'm wondering if the *storage* can be pulled out like a hard drive?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope it's just a chip on a circuit board
Sent from my ONEPLUS A6010 using Tapatalk
easyxpress said:
I am unable to boot up the device. I tried all (power + Vol Up) key combos, not working. Is there anyway to pull data out from the device?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not enough information. What did you do prior to your phone failing to boot? Was there a software mod you installed? What were the symptoms the phone showed the last time it was on? Any problems before it failed to boot like an old battery, misbehaving ROM, poor charging?
Basically, you need to identify (help us identify) the cause of your phone not booting. We cannot find the solution to a problem we don't know the cause of. The problem must first be defined and then we work from there.
All the best.
twistyplain said:
Not enough information. What did you do prior to your phone failing to boot? Was there a software mod you installed? What were the symptoms the phone showed the last time it was on? Any problems before it failed to boot like an old battery, misbehaving ROM, poor charging?
Basically, you need to identify (help us identify) the cause of your phone not booting. We cannot find the solution to a problem we don't know the cause of. The problem must first be defined and then we work from there.
All the best.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Prior to the phone failing to boot, the phone kept crashing. I saw the screen turning into *mess* and then the phone shut off by itself. Initially, I was able to boot up the phone after the crash, however the screen would get mess up and shut off again after a few minutes. Eventually, It got harder and harder to turn on the phone until it finally failed to boot (die). At this point, the phone seems dead. When I plug in the charger, there is no response of any kind, just black screen.
At one time, when the phone was on its last legs, I was able to boot into the Recovery mode, the phone seems to stay in that mode without the crash. Unfortunately, I didn't stay long enough in the Recovery mode to confirm this.
The phone was running on Lineage of Android 8. I have been using the phone for two years, the battery is surely weakened but can still last an hour or two for continual Youtube watching. I didn't do any software update after the Lineage Android 8's last nightly build.
Hope you can help and give some pointers. Thanks.
-- Joseph
easyxpress said:
Prior to the phone failing to boot, the phone kept crashing. I saw the screen turning into *mess* and then the phone shut off by itself. Initially, I was able to boot up the phone after the crash, however the screen would get mess up and shut off again after a few minutes. Eventually, It got harder and harder to turn on the phone until it finally failed to boot (die). At this point, the phone seems dead. When I plug in the charger, there is no response of any kind, just black screen.
At one time, when the phone was on its last legs, I was able to boot into the Recovery mode, the phone seems to stay in that mode without the crash. Unfortunately, I didn't stay long enough in the Recovery mode to confirm this.
The phone was running on Lineage of Android 8. I have been using the phone for two years, the battery is surely weakened but can still last an hour or two for continual Youtube watching. I didn't do any software update after the Lineage Android 8's last nightly build.
Hope you can help and give some pointers. Thanks.
-- Joseph
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Click to collapse
This appears to be hardware failure. The SoC is most probably dead. You should have recovered your data when it was still able to boot. Right now I think it's too late.
twistyplain said:
This appears to be hardware failure. The SoC is most probably dead. You should have recovered your data when it was still able to boot. Right now I think it's too late.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just plugged in the phone. Miraculously, after few minutes, it did come up with the boot screen (with some messy lines), see the attached picture. However, It didn't go beyond the boot screen and recycle again for 2 or 3 times and then no more. I was able to duplicate this recycling situation several times after plugging it to the charger. Also, I was able to push it into the Recovery mode, but it only stay at the boot screen (with lines) and shut off again after few seconds.
What do the messy lines on the boot screen suggest? Is it the battery totally dead? Or, is the charging system faulty that somehow it doesn't have any enough juice to push thru beyond the boot screen and hence shut off?
-- Joseph
easyxpress said:
I just plugged in the phone. Miraculously, after few minutes, it did come up with the boot screen (with some messy lines), see the attached picture. However, It didn't go beyond the boot screen and recycle again for 2 or 3 times and then no more. I was able to duplicate this recycling situation several times after plugging it to the charger. Also, I was able to push it into the Recovery mode, but it only stay at the boot screen (with lines) and shut off again after few seconds.
What do the messy lines on the boot screen suggest? Is it the battery totally dead? Or, is the charging system faulty that somehow it doesn't have any enough juice to push thru beyond the boot screen and hence shut off?
-- Joseph
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what happened to TWRP ? thats stock recovery
will it enter fastboot mode ? if you can get into TWRP their is a chance of off loading your userdata to a PC
easyxpress said:
I just plugged in the phone. Miraculously, after few minutes, it did come up with the boot screen (with some messy lines), see the attached picture. However, It didn't go beyond the boot screen and recycle again for 2 or 3 times and then no more. I was able to duplicate this recycling situation several times after plugging it to the charger. Also, I was able to push it into the Recovery mode, but it only stay at the boot screen (with lines) and shut off again after few seconds.
What do the messy lines on the boot screen suggest? Is it the battery totally dead? Or, is the charging system faulty that somehow it doesn't have any enough juice to push thru beyond the boot screen and hence shut off?
-- Joseph
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup...This phone is dead. I have seen a similar le pro 3 posted here on XDA with the same streaks along the display. It's definitely a hard brick. No way to get around it that I know of. I'd like to rope @tsongming in on this. He has seen a few dead pro 3's so this is within his expertise.
Sent from my LeMobile Le X526 using XDA Labs
twistyplain said:
Yup...This phone is dead. I have seen a similar le pro 3 posted here on XDA with the same streaks along the display. It's definitely a hard brick. No way to get around it that I know of. I'd like to rope @tsongming in on this. He has seen a few dead pro 3's so this is within his expertise.
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Click to collapse
Sorry bad news.
As twistyplain said, your phone is absolutely fried, and there is no solution.
It's definitely no brick, that is a hardware issue... Most likely shorted solder connections. The same thing happened to two of our X727s, we have one left that still works.
I highly recommend buying a seemingly unbrickable Xiaomi phone. Their budget models are awesome and of course their flagships are awesome. Everyone in my family has Migrated to Xiaomi . I currently have Android 10 working flawlessly.
Thanks for the info. I made a mistake of not backing up the photos from the phone. I'm still hoping for a slim chance and searching that some of the repair shops (in China?) are somehow able to boot up the phone and retrieve the photos for me. Meanwhile, I'll check into Xiaomi.
-- Joseph
easyxpress said:
Thanks for the info. I made a mistake of not backing up the photos from the phone. I'm still hoping for a slim chance and searching that some of the repair shops (in China?) are somehow able to boot up the phone and retrieve the photos for me. Meanwhile, I'll check into Xiaomi.
-- Joseph
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Click to collapse
If you are in China and located in a large city or tech industrial area you should have plenty of shops that repair at the component level.
Your phone could very likely be repaired by a shop that has a hot air rework soldering station with an electron microscope.
We used to have these types of places in the US but they have all gone out business, replaced by board swappers, who charge a lot. I would suspect that you could get it repaired in China for 100 yuan or less.
I worked in Beijing for 3 months, about 18 years ago and these types of places were everywhere.