Cannot get device to factory reset - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I posted this in the A500 forum as well, but it's probable that this is not a problem limited to my device, and it's also possible that there is a rom that might help me out.
I purchased my tablet on the day it came out, so it's long out of warranty. Everything has been fine with it until three nights ago.
I woke up in the morning to a crashed app alert. I don't get crashed apps often, but it does happen, so I hit ok. A few seconds later I was inundated with crashed app alerts. At that point, any app I opened would also crash immediately. Figuring a good reset would fix it, I turned it off...and it wouldn't turn back on.
I did finally get it to start by holding the volume up and power button.
But that didn't fix the problem. I've discovered that it is somewhat stable if I keep wifi off, but if wifi is on, within minutes everything starts to crash again.
I tried uninstalling some of the apps that crash, but when I restart, the apps are back. It doesn't matter what I uninstall, when I restart, it's back. Installed apps also disappear, the wallpaper resets...basically nothing I do sticks once I restart. I tried to factory reset using the button combination required for my device, and the screen gives the "erasing user data" message, but when it loads up, everything is just as I left it. I tried using the android os option to factory reset, but when I hit "erase everything", the button depresses, but nothing happens.
So obviously, I'm a bit perplexed.
I've never rooted it, and I ran an anti-virus scan a few hours before this all happened and it came up clean.
Anyone ever experienced this? Any advice? If no one has any ideas one how to fix it, is there a way to bypass the main os completely with a rom? I have absolutely no idea how those work, so it may be obvious that it won't, but I figured I'd check.
Thanks in advance! And thanks for reading this far, even if you have no advice!

Related

Touch Pro abruptly stopped working; won't boot.

So here's a peculiar incident:
I have a CDMA TP with a stock ROM and a few basic apps I gathered from these forums and others. I've had it for less than a week.
Tonite, I went to check my text messages. Suddenly, the screen went black and the phone stopped responding. After pressing the power button and fiddling with the keys, I pulled out the stylus and did a soft reset. No response. Confused by this, I tried again, but still nothing. I removed the battery, and turned the phone back on. It froze at the "Touch Pro" screen with the rom/radio/etc info at the bottom. After repeating this a few times I decided to do a hard reset. So, I turn the device on and perform the hard reset. By this point the TP is only turning on SOME TIMES, and I have to take the battery out and put it back in often just to get it to start successfully. So, I finally get the device to boot up and it starts to configure WinMo. Suddenly, while configuring, it freezes. Now I try to turn it back on, and nothing happens.
Basically the device is stuck like this, shifting between not turning on at all and turning on but freezing at the "Touch Pro" screen.
So, my question is, what the heck is going on here? Has anyone else had this problem, or does this sound familiar to anyone? Any help would be greatly, greatly appreciated.
p.s. Yes, the battery is fully charged.
kameisama said:
So here's a peculiar incident:
I have a CDMA TP with a stock ROM and a few basic apps I gathered from these forums and others. I've had it for less than a week.
Tonite, I went to check my text messages. Suddenly, the screen went black and the phone stopped responding. After pressing the power button and fiddling with the keys, I pulled out the stylus and did a soft reset. No response. Confused by this, I tried again, but still nothing. I removed the battery, and turned the phone back on. It froze at the "Touch Pro" screen with the rom/radio/etc info at the bottom. After repeating this a few times I decided to do a hard reset. So, I turn the device on and perform the hard reset. By this point the TP is only turning on SOME TIMES, and I have to take the battery out and put it back in often just to get it to start successfully. So, I finally get the device to boot up and it starts to configure WinMo. Suddenly, while configuring, it freezes. Now I try to turn it back on, and nothing happens.
Basically the device is stuck like this, shifting between not turning on at all and turning on but freezing at the "Touch Pro" screen.
So, my question is, what the heck is going on here? Has anyone else had this problem, or does this sound familiar to anyone? Any help would be greatly, greatly appreciated.
p.s. Yes, the battery is fully charged.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Time to take it in and get a new one.....
Same problem here phone started b not coming out of lock mode. Backlight is on but no display on screen (if i tilt the screen left and right i can see light coming from behind) did about 6 hard resets and still same problem. also power button works whenever it wants to. this phone sucks @ss, i want my mogul back. on a second note my replacement will be here on wednesday.
Touch Pro stock rom purchased back in nov when it came out
yeah, i've had the same problem, i found if i hit my phone on the back or side and then batter pull and hit the soft reset while off, not the power button to turn it back on, it comes back on with color on the screen not just blank black screen with backlight, this works mostly every time, but when it doesn't, i just hold the power button down and do battery pull and hit the power button and it works, its like its got a combo of things you have to do before it works.. weird
Boot Up
I have also had similar problems. I for some reason sometimes have to remove my SD card and boot up without it for some reason. Not all the time, but every once in a blue moon. Not too sure how that affects anything, but you may try that too.
well i started a thread here ***help*** because i kinda have the same problem.
i downloaded some cabs, nothing fancy but i had some problems with a theme i downloaded. when i went to deleted i couldnt..... to make a story short, i took it to the sprint store where they tried to do a master reset/ hard reset and it wont take it. it wont do a thing... they say some important files are missing...
the phone works but not the way it should... the time on the home screen wont show up. and some other small things...
dont know how this happened but i would like to know... im worried about new programs to the phone now. ( getting a new one)
still want to see if i can fix this one.
Mayonesa said:
well i started a thread here ***help*** because i kinda have the same problem.
i downloaded some cabs, nothing fancy but i had some problems with a theme i downloaded. when i went to deleted i couldnt..... to make a story short, i took it to the sprint store where they tried to do a master reset/ hard reset and it wont take it. it wont do a thing... they say some important files are missing...
the phone works but not the way it should... the time on the home screen wont show up. and some other small things...
dont know how this happened but i would like to know... im worried about new programs to the phone now. ( getting a new one)
still want to see if i can fix this one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried re flashing the ROM?
it wasnt HTC's fault for your phone's not booting...thats what happens when u try to mess with the hardware too much and you dont know what your doing
Would you want to sell???
Reboot Brick HTC process
****DOn't take battery out after hard boot***
1.just watch videohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sk56olMkCtU and do what they do but dont take battery out. LEAVE phone STUCK on BOOT screen. Nothign else will move or work but you want phone just like that.
2. connect usb cable to active sync. (this may not link up but leave usb connected anyhow) Do not delete phone profile.
3.use rom like Download MightyROM6_Herman.exe avail at: http://www.lilrico.com/Mighty/mightyromblog/?p=454
4 although active sync is still attatched but may not be connecting. It will connect thru usb anyway when you run the rom software. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fV2I2WAFkg4&NR=1
This worked and kept phone from cutting on and off. and restored ROM. don't know about original htc boot. but your phone will work under this rom for now and you can go from there.
hey thanks plain ole dumb, it works now.
man I thought it was over.
thanks again

Freezing and Force closes

I'd just commented on how I love this phone because of how fast and smooth it is. An hour or so later, I pull my phone out to take a picture and it locks up completely, the Camera FC after about 5 minutes but then it lagged like made and literally made the phone unusable.
Holding power button did nothing, button wouldn't react but if they did it took a few minutes to register the press but then did nothing anyway.
Obviously, with not being able to remove the battery, this made things difficult to reset the phone. In the end I found that holding Up on the volume button and the power button did a reset.
The phone rebooted and seemed ok but then a few seconds later it did the same thing. Even on Home screen, scrolling along froze the phone then Xperia Activity FC'd. Some of my picutres appeared corrupt so I deleted them assuming it was those causing the issue, but I'm still getting the same problem.
Last night I restarted the phone and put it on charge and it seems fine this morning.
Out of desperation, I downloaded AVG to scan the phone. I also downloaded ATK and killed anything that didn't have a use to see if that helped the phone but it did it after that too.
Anyone else had this? It started to P me off last night. The phone nearly went out the window!
It's on T-Mobile (UK) and currently using their stock ROM.
Try a factory reset.
Factory Reset will be my last resort. I hate having phones/tablets set up how I like them only to have to do it all over again!
Anyway, since I rebooted it and charged it up, it's been fine. Will have to see how it goes.

[Q] Lock Screen Won't Stay Off

Sunday, I started having a problem where my phone (AT&T Galaxy Note 2) would bring itself out of the lock screen without me touching anything. The screen will stay on for 10-15 seconds and then shut off again. It will then stay off anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes.
Very odd, right? I figured I downloaded a bad app that was causing the issue. I removed practically every app I could (I wasn't going to go through all of them to see which had permissions to bring the phone out of standby). It still kept doing the same thing.
So I did a hard reset on the phone. That should clear everything, right? The problem still kept happening.
I start thinking maybe it's a hardware issue... EXCEPT for it doesn't happen when the phone is in Airplane Mode! Which brings me back around to thinking it's some rogue app, but it still happens even when there's nothing but the default software installed from after a hard reset. It can't be the power button or a bad proximity sensor if it doesn't happen in Airplane Mode, right?
So I took it to the AT&T store and I didn't expect much. The one guy tried to play with my settings and didn't find anything wrong. He took it to the manager in the back room and the manager said I should do a hard reset (ignoring the fact that I told his employee I already had done so twice).
I've looked for answers online. The ones I've found I've tried. I've removed all applications. I've changed the screen time outs. I've even downloaded a Lock Screen replacement program. I've tried using anti-virus to scan for problems. It starts to happen again immediately after I perform the hard reset. I've moved the brightness settings. I've removed the S-Pen thinking it might be causing issues. I've turned on and off motion options. I've turned on and off wi-fi, GPS, screen rotation, multi-window, etc. Power Saving mode doesn't help. Blocking Mode doesn't help. The only thing that works is Airplane Mode.
I have NOT tried rooting my phone. I'm scared to do so, even though I'm a UNIX admin and a techie and shouldn't be scared of something like this.
Has anyone ever experienced this? I'm running whatever the normal, latest AT&T android version (4.1.2) for the Note 2. This is killing my battery and reducing screen life (is that a big deal though? I don't know).

[Q] Xperia Sola strange symptoms.

Greetings reader. I'm new to the forum but have been viewing threads every now and then, so after having read plenty of times that people should search before posting. I have searched and didn't find what I was looking for, so that's why you can read this now ;p.
4 days ago when I was trying to browse the web in college I wasn't able to connect to the wifi network or even open the wifi settings, so I reset my phone only to find the problem persisting. As if something locked me out of the wifi settings.
I'm perfectly able to access any of the other settings, so I think it's kinda weird.
Shortly after I realised I couldn't get to the wifi anymore my phone started to reboot itself automatically. Ever since that first reboot it just keeps rebooting at the same pace over and over again until I either power it off or until the battery dies.
The phone also get's unusually hot now. Not like, super hot, but definitely hotter than any other time I can remember.
I also get error messages since the problems started saying: 'Process system is not responding'. I then get the option to either force close it or wait. Neither seem to do much if anything at all other than taking away the error message. Sounds kinda critical if you'd ask me.
But so after all these symptoms started to appear I figured I'd just do a factory reset and be done with it, but every time I go into the factory reset settings, I put in my lock screen pattern and then at the last step (pressing the Erase all data button) it just does nothing.
I can touch the button and it does give the animation that it is being pressed, but it just doesn't do anything.
The phone doesn't freeze though, I can still navigate after pressing the button only to see it reboot again shortly after.
After that I tried to flash the rom, but for some reason my PC refuses to show my phone's internal memory in my pcor any sign of my phone's connection at all.
I haven't tried it on any other pc yet, so it might just be my pc, though I doubt it is since it was perfectly able to recognize it shortly before all this started.
The device hasn't endured any shocks lately or expsure to water or whatever, so I think that's ruled out as well.
I am running the stock rom, 2.3 Gingerbread I believe, and the warranty is already way over date (I think. I'll have to check that).
Any suggestions as on how to determine what could be causing this, or how to fix it? Because I really don't want to buy a new phone xD.
Macowski said:
Greetings reader. I'm new to the forum but have been viewing threads every now and then, so after having read plenty of times that people should search before posting. I have searched and didn't find what I was looking for, so that's why you can read this now ;p.
4 days ago when I was trying to browse the web in college I wasn't able to connect to the wifi network or even open the wifi settings, so I reset my phone only to find the problem persisting. As if something locked me out of the wifi settings.
I'm perfectly able to access any of the other settings, so I think it's kinda weird.
Shortly after I realised I couldn't get to the wifi anymore my phone started to reboot itself automatically. Ever since that first reboot it just keeps rebooting at the same pace over and over again until I either power it off or until the battery dies.
The phone also get's unusually hot now. Not like, super hot, but definitely hotter than any other time I can remember.
I also get error messages since the problems started saying: 'Process system is not responding'. I then get the option to either force close it or wait. Neither seem to do much if anything at all other than taking away the error message. Sounds kinda critical if you'd ask me.
But so after all these symptoms started to appear I figured I'd just do a factory reset and be done with it, but every time I go into the factory reset settings, I put in my lock screen pattern and then at the last step (pressing the Erase all data button) it just does nothing.
I can touch the button and it does give the animation that it is being pressed, but it just doesn't do anything.
The phone doesn't freeze though, I can still navigate after pressing the button only to see it reboot again shortly after.
After that I tried to flash the rom, but for some reason my PC refuses to show my phone's internal memory in my pcor any sign of my phone's connection at all.
I haven't tried it on any other pc yet, so it might just be my pc, though I doubt it is since it was perfectly able to recognize it shortly before all this started.
The device hasn't endured any shocks lately or expsure to water or whatever, so I think that's ruled out as well.
I am running the stock rom, 2.3 Gingerbread I believe, and the warranty is already way over date (I think. I'll have to check that).
Any suggestions as on how to determine what could be causing this, or how to fix it? Because I really don't want to buy a new phone xD.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Since you've not modified your Sola in any way.
Give this official method a try.
http://xperiafirmware.com/component/content/article/2-uncategorised/29-sony-update-service

[Q] Reboots every evening after getting 4.2.2 update

OK, this is really weird - after getting the 4.2.2 update, my phone reboots itself every night, not 100% sure it's exactly the same time, but it's been while sitting in my pocket or on the table, not even in use. At first I assumed it was Zooper, which I had installed right after the update, but I disabled it yesterday and got the reboot again tonight.
I even checked my Tasker to make sure some auto-reboot profile hadn't installed itself!
Any hints about how to diagnose this? Do I have no choice but to remove apps one by one? Most of the apps I run are the same ones I run on my TF300 tablet which also has 4.2.2, so don't know if it could be an app.
Did it again tonight and it is the exact same time - 9:19pm It's also interesting is that this is about the time of day I did the update to 4.2.2 It's like some daily thing going on. It must be some new app applied by default by the update, I've disabled some of the obvious new apps.
Does anyone know if I do a factory reset will it go back to 4.1 (which worked fine for me), or will it stay at 4.1?
PhysicalEd said:
Did it again tonight and it is the exact same time - 9:19pm It's also interesting is that this is about the time of day I did the update to 4.2.2 It's like some daily thing going on. It must be some new app applied by default by the update, I've disabled some of the obvious new apps.
Does anyone know if I do a factory reset will it go back to 4.1 (which worked fine for me), or will it stay at 4.1?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the Factory reset will erase all ur Apps and will stay in 4.2.2 ......
Looks like this update has really screwed up my phone. After a couple of more nights of trying to disable more apps, and trying to catch the error with logcat (nothing that makes any sense in the log, no error or crashes preceding the reboot) I decided to factory reset.
It rebooted again tonight, about 24 hours after the factory reset.
Also, intermittently now the power button will not suspend the phone, though I can hold it and reboot, I don't know any other way to put it to sleep.
Looking at the log some more, the only thing that gives any hint is that there was Location Services activity before the crash. Googling around about my problem showed there was a bug in Location Services early in 4.2 but the claim was that it was fixed. I guess tomorrow night I'll try turning off Location Services as well.
PhysicalEd said:
Looks like this update has really screwed up my phone. After a couple of more nights of trying to disable more apps, and trying to catch the error with logcat (nothing that makes any sense in the log, no error or crashes preceding the reboot) I decided to factory reset.
It rebooted again tonight, about 24 hours after the factory reset.
Also, intermittently now the power button will not suspend the phone, though I can hold it and reboot, I don't know any other way to put it to sleep.
Looking at the log some more, the only thing that gives any hint is that there was Location Services activity before the crash. Googling around about my problem showed there was a bug in Location Services early in 4.2 but the claim was that it was fixed. I guess tomorrow night I'll try turning off Location Services as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The update may have screwed up somewhere in the middle, you could try to re-ruu your phone or unlock the bootloader and flash a custom rom, also the thing about the power button not putting the phone to sleep or doing anything than reboot on long press happened to me on each and every custom rom and I never did any OTA, got my phone, unlocked bootloader and flash away from sense, my hboot is still the one that it came with, but for me that thing happens really randomly, like once every 1 or 2 weeks, and when that happens for me the volume buttons stop working also till reboot, I was thinking I was the only one facing it so I kinda decided not to talk about that as I saw no one say anything about it, but I am also one of those for who the phone turns off exactly when my phone goes to 6% battery whatever I do, on whatever rom I am and even in the recovery, so I was thinking that maybe vodafone modified something on it, that's an other reason I didn't say anything about the buttons becoming unresponsive...
So what I would recommend is to re-ruu your phone or go to a custom rom (or if none solves anything the phone may have some kind of hard brick).
Just to help out anyone else who ever has this problem.
It was not location services.
I can see clearly in two logs an HTC process crashing. This seems to cause a cascade that leads to reboot.
I contacted HTC tech support, they suggested I boot up in a recovery mode and try to wipe data cache. They were surprised to find that attempting to do that caused a reboot.
So as Ranomez suggests above, they want me to re-do the update with the RUU when they release it, which they said would be "soon" last weekend.
On the other hand, my battery life after this update is fantastic, so I've decided I can live with this to not have to worry about recharging by mid-afternoon!

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