First, before anyone says this is sds/brickbug, it seems to be different. My phone keeps turning off between 2 and 10 seconds after turning on in any mode, normal boot, recovery, or download mode. My first thought was a stuck power button like my friend's S2 had (I fixed his) but after taking it apart and testing the internal switch with a multimeter, the switch doesn't seem to be stuck in the closed position as I see a changing resistance value when the button is pressed. It's also not the battery as I have used external chargers and a battery from a friend's phone. Same issue. I looked into the SDS thread and those all seem to be the phone won't boot at all or can make it into download mode but can't flash, but not constant rebooting like this. I've completely taken the phone apart (up to removing the mainboard) several times and can find nothing wrong with it. I'm inclined to think some sort of hardware issue but haven't found an answer for what. What seems the most telling is that, when it reboots during the boot animation (at a different spot each time) it hangs for a second before turning off, making me think it's some sort of serious hang. I also wonder if it could be the power regulation chip.
Bottom line, I've done some serious research but haven't found anything. I'd be willing to send it to a repair shop like the commonly listed mobiletechvideos.com but I'm not sure a Jtag would fix it if it really is a hardware problem. Any ideas or experience with the issue?
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Ah, thanks. I tend to think of the Q&A, HELP AND TROUBLESHOOTING (emphasis added) forum as just the Q&A and forget the last part.
This model has never had an isdue with Sudden Death. I think that's the international models only. If that's what you have, you may want to post this in that forum as they may hsve seen this before.
If I had to guess though, I'd say its more likely a hardware problem. If it were software it would probably hang at the same place every time.
I could be wrong though...
Sent from my SGH-T999 using xda premium
Ah, no, it's a T-mobile. I did notice that sds was in the international forum and was going to check if it applies to the US but forgot. Yeah, I'm leaning towards hardware too. It'd be nice if I could find someone else who has had the same problem and has a diagnosis. The device is out of warranty (It somehow shows water damage though it's never been submerged. Dumb Florida weather...) so I want to evaluate other repair options before considering Samsung. I buy my phones second hand so spending more than $100 fixing it quickly becomes debatably useful. If it's hardware, obviously a JTAG won't fix it. I don't have anything super important on there but do have some game progress I haven't backed up since I started so I'd like to avoid a wipe, which is probably a pipe dream at this point.
Yeah, you could try a factory reset, if you can get into recovery long enough. If it comes to it though you could always sell it for parts. Or buy an s3 with a broken screen and swap parts.
Unless you hear from someone else though, I'm afraid your only way of knowing is to attempt a jtag repair. If it doesn't work, its probably hardware.
Good luck however it goes!
Sent from my SGH-T999 using xda premium
Yeah, recovery usually doesn't even show and only occasionally just gets to the TWRP splash screen so I can't do anything there. Just checked Ebay and was shocked how cheap broken screen S3's are. I have hope! If I just need the mainboard, does the carrier matter? I know roms are interchangeable but I'm not sure where the antennas are tuned for Tmobile's AWS. I imagine it's in the Qualcomm Radio on the mainboard which would require a Tmobile device. Any idea?
JesusFreak316 said:
Yeah, recovery usually doesn't even show and only occasionally just gets to the TWRP splash screen so I can't do anything there. Just checked Ebay and was shocked how cheap broken screen S3's are. I have hope! If I just need the mainboard, does the carrier matter? I know roms are interchangeable but I'm not sure where the antennas are tuned for Tmobile's AWS. I imagine it's in the Qualcomm Radio on the mainboard which would require a Tmobile device. Any idea?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't say positively, but I'm pretty sure that's correct. AT&Ts I747 will work on T-Mobile networks, but you will never get the performance from it that you would with a T999. If you could find a T999L that would be even better still!
I know the cell radio is built into the SoC (wifi and BT are on a broadcom chip), so the more I think about it the more positive I am that you'd need to try to stick with the T-Mobile device.
Sprint and Verizon devices won't work though, just so you know. Those are CDMA. Yours will need to be GSM. An easy clue to this is if it has a sim card. I'm telling you this becsuse there are still other models out there, and some may or may not work. Just in case you can't find a T999 or T999L.
Sent from my SGH-T999 using xda premium
The best part about spending 30 minutes typing a post is having your browser crash. Anyway, if you have any further questions because this is going to be a bit brief, let me know.
My background: Fairly well-versed in Android, custom ROMs, flashing, rooting, doing development work on Android, reading directions, decent google-fu and RTFMing. But I really need help on this one. The phone in question is my primary phone, which I actually like to keep as stock because I don't want anything mucking up on it. It's 20 months old (daily usage), running stock 4.1.1, which was rooted about 17 months ago with cf autoroot, which I needed for development purposes. For the past 10 months, I have been using an extended aftermarket battery, because when traveling and thusly using navigation, gtranslate, lots of messaging, and whatnot with a bright screen whilst outdoors, I was tired of having my phone leave me without a communications device at 8pm.
Recent changes to phone: Several weeks ago, before another bout of traveling, I did my usual *#197328640# perso256 disable (one of the reasons that I like keeping my phone at 4.1.1), and voila -- carrier unlock.
What happened: Things were going swimmingly for a few weeks, when one day, I was out and about, typing something into google translate, and the screen just went black. It was early midday, and the phone was at 90% battery (extended battery life ftmfw). Every now and then, when doing serious multitasking (and, mind you, since the early days of owning this phone, as well as through the entire life of my GS1, which still works, by the way), my GS3 would occasionally reboot of its own accord. I thought nothing of this, except it just being a hallmark of samsung phones, and a minor inconvenience, at worst. This time, however, it failed to power back on. I removed the battery, held in power button in an attempt to discharge any residual power, and put the battery back in. Nothing. Panic. No ssung logo, no vibration, no lights, nothing. Just the black screen staring back at me. There was no moisture, and no trauma to the phone... nothing, save for a ridiculous sinking sensation.
Symptoms: Phone completely unresponsive. I tried a charged stock GS3 battery, and the symptoms are the same. If I plug the phone in without a battery, the led lights up red for a time, and that's it. Even though I haven't modded this phone at all, with the exception of the rooting almost 2 years ago, I tried everything I could think of and read online. vol up + power + home. vol down + power + home. Leaving the battery out for a while. So much reading through these forums and some others online. When I plug it in in windows (even though I primarily use linux), I get the QHSUSB_DLOAD problem, so I do not think it is a problem with the power button? Or maybe the power button can be permanently depressed or something that would cause this? Anyway, I've installed QHSUSB_DLOAD windows drivers, but don't want to start flashing things until I know there isn't another longshot option to get this to work. I even loaded up linux and ran pblclear, which allegedly attempts to knock HTC phones out of being stuck in QHSUSB_DLOAD mode. Didn't work, but figured it was worth a shot, and seemed relatively harmless.
Why I don't even know if it's SDS: The reason I'm asking this is because I'm completely at a loss. SDS appears to affect i9000s after 150-200 days, OR when people incorrectly flash a ROM, or something happens during flashing or modification. My phone is an ATT i747 has been fully operative for 600+ days, and I haven't done any flashing, rooting, whathaveyou in nearly two years (and it was just that simple autoroot that I ran once).
What I'm wondering: I really want to get this phone working, because of hundreds of images, notes, data, etc. that I have accrued over the past few years. Most of my videos and larger files were on my sd card, but literally hundreds of memories and works in progress that I would do insane things for were saved to the phone. I'm an idiot for not backing it up, but I wasn't doing anything to the phone, so wasn't expecting such a catastrophe. Will JTAG work? What about a debricking microsd image? Most of the ones I can find are for 4.1.2 or 4.1.3 -- are there any for 4.1.1? I'm nearly certain 4.1.1 is my version, because IICR 4.1.2 and 4.1.3 don't even have the perso256 disable menu, and it's why I had not upgraded to them. It seems like the microsd rewrites would wipe the contents, and then I would have to quickly attempt a recovery on the data? Or have there been any cases with similar failures that are something else dying on the board? To be perfectly honest, if it appears to be an issue with the board, it's not beyond my ability to perform BGA rework and remove the emmc entirely, and transplant it onto a new board, but I would ///really/// like to avoid that.
Thanks for reading... :angel:
Edit:
Additional information: I forgot to mention that I have found pages such as this samsung-galaxy-s3-sgh-i747-i747m-repair-dead-boot-1755452 [I'm afraid you'll have to google it because I can't post links if you want to look TT^TT] which have files that say, for example, "Samsung SGH-I747 Repair Boot Supported" if using JTAG. So, if there aren't suggestions about how I can fix my phone with an sdcard unbrick, or something else, does anyone know whether or not doing a boot repair will unbrick a phone without wiping the ROM itself? Thanks again~~
Top5a said:
The best part about spending 30 minutes typing a post is having your browser crash. Anyway, if you have any further questions because this is going to be a bit brief, let me know.
My background: Fairly well-versed in Android, custom ROMs, flashing, rooting, doing development work on Android, reading directions, decent google-fu and RTFMing. But I really need help on this one. The phone in question is my primary phone, which I actually like to keep as stock because I don't want anything mucking up on it. It's 20 months old (daily usage), running stock 4.1.1, which was rooted about 17 months ago with cf autoroot, which I needed for development purposes. For the past 10 months, I have been using an extended aftermarket battery, because when traveling and thusly using navigation, gtranslate, lots of messaging, and whatnot with a bright screen whilst outdoors, I was tired of having my phone leave me without a communications device at 8pm.
Recent changes to phone: Several weeks ago, before another bout of traveling, I did my usual *#197328640# perso256 disable (one of the reasons that I like keeping my phone at 4.1.1), and voila -- carrier unlock.
What happened: Things were going swimmingly for a few weeks, when one day, I was out and about, typing something into google translate, and the screen just went black. It was early midday, and the phone was at 90% battery (extended battery life ftmfw). Every now and then, when doing serious multitasking (and, mind you, since the early days of owning this phone, as well as through the entire life of my GS1, which still works, by the way), my GS3 would occasionally reboot of its own accord. I thought nothing of this, except it just being a hallmark of samsung phones, and a minor inconvenience, at worst. This time, however, it failed to power back on. I removed the battery, held in power button in an attempt to discharge any residual power, and put the battery back in. Nothing. Panic. No ssung logo, no vibration, no lights, nothing. Just the black screen staring back at me. There was no moisture, and no trauma to the phone... nothing, save for a ridiculous sinking sensation.
Symptoms: Phone completely unresponsive. I tried a charged stock GS3 battery, and the symptoms are the same. If I plug the phone in without a battery, the led lights up red for a time, and that's it. Even though I haven't modded this phone at all, with the exception of the rooting almost 2 years ago, I tried everything I could think of and read online. vol up + power + home. vol down + power + home. Leaving the battery out for a while. So much reading through these forums and some others online. When I plug it in in windows (even though I primarily use linux), I get the QHSUSB_DLOAD problem, so I do not think it is a problem with the power button? Or maybe the power button can be permanently depressed or something that would cause this? Anyway, I've installed QHSUSB_DLOAD windows drivers, but don't want to start flashing things until I know there isn't another longshot option to get this to work. I even loaded up linux and ran pblclear, which allegedly attempts to knock HTC phones out of being stuck in QHSUSB_DLOAD mode. Didn't work, but figured it was worth a shot, and seemed relatively harmless.
Why I don't even know if it's SDS: The reason I'm asking this is because I'm completely at a loss. SDS appears to affect i9000s after 150-200 days, OR when people incorrectly flash a ROM, or something happens during flashing or modification. My phone is an ATT i747 has been fully operative for 600+ days, and I haven't done any flashing, rooting, whathaveyou in nearly two years (and it was just that simple autoroot that I ran once).
What I'm wondering: I really want to get this phone working, because of hundreds of images, notes, data, etc. that I have accrued over the past few years. Most of my videos and larger files were on my sd card, but literally hundreds of memories and works in progress that I would do insane things for were saved to the phone. I'm an idiot for not backing it up, but I wasn't doing anything to the phone, so wasn't expecting such a catastrophe. Will JTAG work? What about a debricking microsd image? Most of the ones I can find are for 4.1.2 or 4.1.3 -- are there any for 4.1.1? I'm nearly certain 4.1.1 is my version, because IICR 4.1.2 and 4.1.3 don't even have the perso256 disable menu, and it's why I had not upgraded to them. It seems like the microsd rewrites would wipe the contents, and then I would have to quickly attempt a recovery on the data? Or have there been any cases with similar failures that are something else dying on the board? To be perfectly honest, if it appears to be an issue with the board, it's not beyond my ability to perform BGA rework and remove the emmc entirely, and transplant it onto a new board, but I would ///really/// like to avoid that.
Thanks for reading... :angel:
Edit:
Additional information: I forgot to mention that I have found pages such as this samsung-galaxy-s3-sgh-i747-i747m-repair-dead-boot-1755452 [I'm afraid you'll have to google it because I can't post links if you want to look TT^TT] which have files that say, for example, "Samsung SGH-I747 Repair Boot Supported" if using JTAG. So, if there aren't suggestions about how I can fix my phone with an sdcard unbrick, or something else, does anyone know whether or not doing a boot repair will unbrick a phone without wiping the ROM itself? Thanks again~~
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
same thing just happened to my 20 month old att s3.i unlocked the bootloader and flashed a twrp recovery.the phone was on 4.1.1 and rooted.
now just a lifeless phone
thorur said:
same thing just happened to my 20 month old att s3.i unlocked the bootloader and flashed a twrp recovery.the phone was on 4.1.1 and rooted.
now just a lifeless phone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did it die closely after the unlocking/flashing? Or a long time after? Or was the unlocking/flashing an attempt to save the phone? Ever get it fixed? I'm so anxious!
I never heard of qualcomm chips doing this. There is a app called emmc brickbug check on the market though it won't be of much use to you now.....but it allows you to check the mem. Controller chip and check if its a "sane chip" and allows you to probe the memory for any bad sectors.....its really quite a nice app
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
crazymonkey05 said:
I never heard of qualcomm chips doing this. There is a app called emmc brickbug check on the market though it won't be of much use to you now.....but it allows you to check the mem. Controller chip and check if its a "sane chip" and allows you to probe the memory for any bad sectors.....its really quite a nice app
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, thanks for the input! Makes me feel a better hopefully the emmc isn't completely fried. I just really want my files, and am continually irritated at myself for having been so stupid to not make backups.. although I have phones from 10+ years ago that have never completely died in such an unexpected manner. It's quite the agonizing wait for a JTAG programmer to come in the mail. If I can manage to get it to boot from SD, which I haven't been able to do so far, do you think it's logical for me to simply reflash the bootloader/CWM, then attempt boot? It shouldn't erase files, right?
You can try a bootloader and recovery flash which might yield results.....and the plus side of that is that it won't wipe the memory unless you format the /data partition or you do a full Odin restore with ROM kernel and everything
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
crazymonkey05 said:
You can try a bootloader and recovery flash which might yield results.....and the plus side of that is that it won't wipe the memory unless you format the /data partition or you do a full Odin restore with ROM kernel and everything
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've also searched everywhere for a debrick image for 4.1.1 AT&T... anyone know where I can get one? All I can find are ones for 4.1.3 =\
EXACT same problem here, let me know if you find anything
(Btw, my phone also had the "power button stuck down" issue, but your phone will vibrate when you put the battery in if this is the issue.)
If I'm not mistaken you will be able to Odin to 4.1.1 while using the 4.3 SD card debrick (again this is just guessing)
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
I've tried the SD card debricks for 4.3, and still nothing happens. Yea, I also don't get vibrate. As a long shot, I actually installed the qualcomm drivers and ran the qdload.sh script to attempt to send a signal which kicks the phone out of that mode (works on some... I want to say, HTC, phones), but, yea, I think the emmc just failed somehow. I'm hoping that the failure is just in the bootloader segment, and that by jtag reflashing the bootloader area, I should be able to boot. Either that, or even if one of the memory sectors died, hopefully it's not the one with my data partition. I still can't believe this ! Out of all the electronics I've ever used, aside from a hard drive or two, I've never had something like a phone just kick the bucket with no warning. gha !
Also, thanks for all the tips and stuff, guys and gals. Tell me if you figure out anything, and I'll let you know if I get it fixed with jtag.
OK plz let us know how it goes! I don't want to sound rude but your phone would be the only snapdragon I have ever seen fail....and I've been using snapdragons since the s1 on a HTC wildfire s
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
crazymonkey05 said:
OK plz let us know how it goes! I don't want to sound rude but your phone would be the only snapdragon I have ever seen fail....and I've been using snapdragons since the s1 on a HTC wildfire s
Sent from my ATT Samsung Galaxy SIII using TapaTalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ZOMG SO RUDE > haha, j/k ;P Yea, no problem, dude/dudette! I know how it feels reading threads with no followup... I'm actually surprised that people have come out of the proverbial woodwork mentioning having similar problems to me ! It really sucks spending inordinate amounts of time reading threads and not arriving at a definitive conclusion... so, yea, I especially want to let people know if there is a fix, and/or how I did it.
So, with regard to what you said about the snapdragons not failing... yea. This is rekking my mind, tbh, because I've just never had a device insta-fail on me like this (aside from some old computer hard drives that were server backed up, but yea that's essentially par for the course on that medium [yay for S.M.A.R.T.]). Especially a device that I'd only had for less than 2 years, and though my GS3 has heavy usage, I treat it very well (no drops, water, etc.)... so, yea.
Also, a minority of people with whom I have spoken via the æther have also experienced similar emmc failures on i747s, as well ! Which I was not expecting. It's still insane, though, to believe that, out of such a small percentage of phones that could potentially experience SDS, and then which ones actually do experience it... and then to not even have an i9000 and /still/ experience it on an i747... I feel as though I've won the lotto. Except ****ty.
I'm waiting on parts to come in, then surgery will commence.
Did you try going into download mode? If you can so that then the phone is fine. Another thing is try reflashing stock Odin which will erase msgs and stuff but not music or pics unless u tick "repartition".
Sent from my SGH-I747M using Tapatalk
Open serial port...OK
Connecting to the RIFF Box...OK
Firmware Version: 1.37, JTAG Manager Version: 1.56
Selected Resurrector: [Samsung I747 V1.0.5095.46594]
Connecting to the dead body...OK
Detected dead body ID: 0xhexhereisOK[redacted] - CORRECT!
Set I/O Voltage reads as 1.81V, TCK Frequency is 1 MHz
Resurrection sequence started.
Establish communication with the phone...OK
Initializing internal hardware configuration...OK
Uploading resurrector data into memory...OK
Starting communication with resurrector...OK
Detected an Initialized FLASH1 Chip, ID: 0x0015/0x0100 (000000, 0x000400000000 Bytes = 16.00 GB)
Detected an Initialized FLASH2 Chip, ID: 0x0015/0x0100 (000000, 0x000000080000 Bytes = 0.50 MB)
No Resurrection Data is available for the eMMC Chip with Capacity = 16.00GB
WARNING!!! Using Resurrection Data for the eMMC Chip with Capacity = 14,68GB
Flashing the dead body...
ERROR: DCC Loader has reported Error Code = 0x51 (0x000000). Trying to recover...OK
ERROR: DCC Loader has reported Error Code = 0x51 (0x000000). Trying to recover...OK
ERROR: DCC Loader has reported Error Code = 0x51 (0x000000). Trying to recover...OK
ERROR: Stopped due to multiple communication errors. Terminating at 0x0003AB3FBE00
Had to reduce the speed to that 2MHz/1MHz to get communication to work. So, 0x51 is a DCC power failure problem... but it is able to detect the initialized chips. So.. not really sure how to proceed at this point. I haven't checked the signal quality on my NRST line, which apparently can cause problems. Some people have increased the voltage from 1.8 to say 1.9, but doing something like that requires me to actually make my own resurrection file, which I haven't had the time to do yet.
Anyone seen a problem with something like this before?
The 000000 is somewhat unsettling, as the chip is apparently supposed to report some ID#? Although, the failures that I'm getting don't seem to be the typical ones that happen when the emmc becomes completely toasted.
Oh, yea... I can't seem to figure out wth is up with --> WARNING!!! Using Resurrection Data for the eMMC Chip with Capacity = 14,68GB
Like..... ??? I think I'm using the most up to date resurrector?!
EDIT: Dumping out the entire contents of the emmc (haven't had errors so far, but it will take a while at 1 MHz), into a bin file (this avoids the bad sectors in the bootloader).
Does anyone know what to do with the resultant *.bin file? I think that if I got another surrogate GS3, I'd be able to write that onto the phone, essentially cloning my dead phone. I'd like to avoid having to do that, though -- does anyone know how to write one of DCC bin jtag file dumps into a readable file system?
Hi everyone, long time XDA lurker, first time poster here. Hope I'm in the right spot.
I have a 3XL that bricked overnight similar to what I've seen on other posts (for example: https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/...Rj7bE_8k87pI2zaSnIskWwmvsbMpMeVBlmWrHPsqhUY0c)
Long story short, can't get it to boot, isn't recognized by fastboot/adb. I started following this guide https://www.thecustomdroid.com/qpst-flash-tool-download-usage-guide/ and my phone is recognized, but like one user in the xda post (above), I don't know where to get the raw firmware file that I need to move forward (need elf or mbn file with maybe some xml files?). I've been searching high and low and this is where I'm stuck. I've seen some mentions about needing to get these files from someone who actually has a working 3 XL, but I'm not sure if that's the only option. Does anyone have any insight that could help me move forward?
And on that note, if I manage to recover the phone using this method, will it be recovered right back in the state it was, or will it be freshly formatted? Again, I've read lots on this, but I can't seem to get a straight answer. To be honest, while getting the phone working again would be amazing, my priority is recovering the data from the phone, so if this QPST recovery will only end up giving me back a naked phone, then I'm open to alternatives.
Any help is appreciated! Thanks!
Currently in the exact same boat as you, unfortunately...
I'm also mostly interested in just getting to my data, although having a working phone again would be nice.
I can get the serial port to show up in qpst but I'm pretty much at a stand still from there, can't get anything else to work.
Have you had any luck??
I'm in the same position as you guys, pixel 3 XL bricked, bootloader locked, no recovery just Fastboot Mode (With OEM Locked, any command wil not work there.. thank u so much Verizon), I was looking and this seems to be the only way but I can not find any dump from a pixel 3 xl working to flash in EDL Mode, if you guys can find something let me know, I'm gonna try to find it on my side too
Unfortunately I never found a solution. QPST recognized the phone, but could never successfully connect to it. While Googling the issue, I noticed that this has happened to a number of other people too, and it often seems to coincide with updates, so it could be linked although good luck getting Google to admit to that.
I ended up swapping the phone out for an S21. This is the first phone that has even bricked itself so bad that I couldn't recover anything from it, and seeing how it has happened on many generations of the Pixel line, I wasn't very tempted to get another one unfortunately.
Chiming in with a similar story to the rest of you folks.
I'm an experienced user that knows his way around adb/fastboot and flashing custom ROMS and whatnot, but in this case I have a completely stock Pixel 3XL that I woke up to find in this hard bricked EDL state. I am up-to-date with any and all updates for the OS and I usually pull those down on release day or very shortly after. No idea what update could have caused this, but in my case, I am overseas with a bricked cell phone - SUCKS.
Hopefully the QPST files can be located so that we can recover from this bull****.
I know some people with a working 3 XL. Are there instructions on how to extract the necessary files from a working phone to flash through QPST on the bricked phone?
I just ordered a 3 XL for my daughter and I'm getting scared seeing these stories. Is it just aged hardware related? Or is it update related? It's weird that it seems to be happening over the last few months on the 3 series which makes me think its either related to an update that rolled out or just mileage until failure of the chips?
I have had for two years a used one year old 3XL and had no problems. If someone has instructions, I would be glad to extract what is needed. At this phase it has only been unlocked to use DNS66 though I consistently ROM'd all my earlier phones. Age related ;-)