My GS3 is soft bricked and I can't do anything - Galaxy S III Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hey XDA
This all started when I didn't put my phone on charge one night, and the morning after I got a text then I went to read it, my screen flickered and my phone crashed, this was usual when my phone dies.
However this time, when I put my phone on charge, it wouldn't boot up, it would stay at the boot animation screen.
I was running AOKP 4.2.2.
I then thought it was just a corrupt ROM so I went to re-install the ROM.
First, when I went to wipe the dalvik cache it said it had failed, this immediately showed warning signs, then when I went to install the ROM from my SD card it said that had failed also.
This left me only 1 option, to restore back to the stock ROM through Odin.
This seemed to go fine until I got to the end went instead of booting into an "android is updating" type thing, it was stuck on a boot loop.
This now leaves me stumped for ideas, so I turn to you, how do I fix my phone?
I hope I can fix this phone as it is my only phone.
Thanks, Jem

jem.graham said:
Hey XDA
This all started when I didn't put my phone on charge one night, and the morning after I got a text then I went to read it, my screen flickered and my phone crashed, this was usual when my phone dies.
However this time, when I put my phone on charge, it wouldn't boot up, it would stay at the boot animation screen.
I was running AOKP 4.2.2.
I then thought it was just a corrupt ROM so I went to re-install the ROM.
First, when I went to wipe the dalvik cache it said it had failed, this immediately showed warning signs, then when I went to install the ROM from my SD card it said that had failed also.
This left me only 1 option, to restore back to the stock ROM through Odin.
This seemed to go fine until I got to the end went instead of booting into an "android is updating" type thing, it was stuck on a boot loop.
This now leaves me stumped for ideas, so I turn to you, how do I fix my phone?
I hope I can fix this phone as it is my only phone.
Thanks, Jem
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
after you install the stock rom via Odin boot into the stock recovery and do a factory reset and wipe the cache. should boot up after that.
one thing i notice after installing 5 different OTA though odin last night they dont wipe user data you have to do it your self. so i would give that i try im sure that should fix your problem

dray_jr said:
after you install the stock rom via Odin boot into the stock recovery and do a factory reset and wipe the cache. should boot up after that.
one thing i notice after installing 5 different OTA though odin last night they dont wipe user data you have to do it your self. so i would give that i try im sure that should fix your problem
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you very very much, I didnt see the factory reset option in the stock recovery.
You're a true life saver, thanks

jem.graham said:
Thank you very very much, I didnt see the factory reset option in the stock recovery.
You're a true life saver, thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no problem at all now if i can just figure out my clients gt-i9300 issue my life would be great hahaha

Related

[Q] Samsung Galaxy s Vibrant stuck on galaxy screen

Okay so my phone decided to do a force close on everything that i tried to do so I turned it off and tried to turn it back on again but all i was getting was the galaxy screen flash up and then it would turn black.
I flashed with Odin 3 times now and it says that it was successfull but when i go to turn the phone on it reboots and says that the data wipe has failed and then continues to flash the galaxy screen and then black. Can someone please help. I am a noob and haven't done anything but flash my phone.
The answers you are going to get are to odin back to stock, however ive had this problem and to get past it I had to do a factory wipe all data in the recovery menu then it booted. You lose all data. Before you do that try cycling the phone through restarts with battery pulls, I had another issue where doing this kicked me into normal boot after about 18 tries. I'm no expert but this is how I got fixed. Mine was a busy box issue it was never installed right
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
yeah, i agree w/ kcp about the battery pull... I would try this to see if you can get your system up and running, so that way you can dl Titatium Backup and Rom Manager. I had a problem on mine that would not let me reinstall packages and then it would never leave recovery, but after i pulled the battery, rebooted, and downloaded rom manager, i found that it was the same issue as kcp (busy box had to be updated). I don't understand why, after you re-flashed the Rom w/ odin it is not working.... did you flash 2.1 or 2.2? Remember, after you flash with odin you need to wipe data and chached memory, then reboot (maybe a battery pull). Try to give more info about exactly how you flashed w/ odin.
Also my titanium says it downloads busy box but doesn't had to go get it from the market and put it in the x bin you might want to do the same when it boots to be safe.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
in_dmand said:
yeah, i agree w/ kcp about the battery pull... I would try this to see if you can get your system up and running, so that way you can dl Titatium Backup and Rom Manager. I had a problem on mine that would not let me reinstall packages and then it would never leave recovery, but after i pulled the battery, rebooted, and downloaded rom manager, i found that it was the same issue as kcp (busy box had to be updated). I don't understand why, after you re-flashed the Rom w/ odin it is not working.... did you flash 2.1 or 2.2? Remember, after you flash with odin you need to wipe data and chached memory, then reboot (maybe a battery pull). Try to give more info about exactly how you flashed w/ odin.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do i know if i flashed with 2.1 or 2.2? How do you wipe data and cached memory? I turned it back on after i flashed and it showed that it was rebooting and wiped the cached memory but the data wipe failed.
also, my phone is not unlocked
Update: I flashed with 2.2 but I did not know that it was for tmobile. I am with bell. Now i can't get it to go into download mode so that I can flash with the right rom. It also won't charge when plugged in. Am i going to have to just get a new phone?
anything on this yet? mine is cycling aswell and cant get it into DL mode ;(

[Q] Need to Revert from ICS to GB, need clear answer please!

Hi Guys
I flashed the leaked ICS but hate it. Can I flash to stock GB via Odin? What about the baseband versions etc.., would it matter?
Sorry, I read another thread but it's unclear and I want to avoid bricking. Thanks
As far as what I've read you can flash stock from Odin or even use CWM to a previous nandroid of gingerbread.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using XDA
If you got your Note from AT&T, simply flash this stock ODIN:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1506330
I went from ICS back to Gb cause I missed the tethering and it was easy. Just make sure you clear the caches and all should be well.
Thanks.. I was worried of the different baseband would have any adverse effect, but it doesn't sound like it will. I'll give it a try.
I Odin'd back to stock and I'm in a world of ****. My phone cant do anything, it just gets stuck on every swipe and reboots about every 5 minutes. Does anyone have any ideas?
Mines fine..only baseband is different, phone works.
Before I Odin to stock, I booted into recovery, factory reset and wiped cache. Odin, then booted into recovery and performed another factory reset and wiped cache again.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk
beall49 said:
I Odin'd back to stock and I'm in a world of ****. My phone cant do anything, it just gets stuck on every swipe and reboots about every 5 minutes. Does anyone have any ideas?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try factory wipe/format usb from within GB..it may help.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk
beall49 said:
I Odin'd back to stock and I'm in a world of ****. My phone cant do anything, it just gets stuck on every swipe and reboots about every 5 minutes. Does anyone have any ideas?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
figured it out. My post is below.
lindenhurst said:
You get it figured out? I did the same thing. . My old apps still there. I can tell it is gingerbread, but nothing works now. I hope you got your figured out!!
When I boot into recovery I get the screen that tells me to use the up and down keys and when I choose factory wipe, and press power button, nothing happebs. If I hold it down eventually the phone shuts off. When i restart it, nothing changed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had to revert from ICS to GB yesterday and, even tho I am on Telus, I had success by flashing the pda-odin-att-stock.rar image
I can't post links .. I'm too new. But literally.. google what's bolded above and you will find the hotfile link.
It replaced everything (including the recovery) ... FULL system image. Solved everything and brought me back to 100% stock.
So yes, I lost my root and my CWM recovery software.. but it got my phone working again.. I can reflash CWM and re-root as I need.
After the install, wipe cache, factory reset etc.
I too flashed the stock ATT rom but like the previous poster, it gave me a phone which started up but wouldn't work. When I tried to get into recovery mode, it went to a screen with the recovery mode stuff at the top, but with a yellow warning sign in the middle and some words about manual mode, and it would not let me do a wipe or reset.
Here is what I just did that did work.
I flashed the recovery-i717-cwm-b4.tar file with odin. This worked and allowed me to get into the "proper" recovery mode to do a wipe and factory reset, as well as a cache wipe. I then reflashed tieh the stock ATT rom, and my phone now is back to stock.

[Q] Need Help

guys i have a funny issue wonder if i can get some help. I flashed FlappJaxx Beta 3 and had a bad down load or something so anyway tons of reboots and nothing just the non stop vibrate.. well i i finally got it back to the down load screen after pulling the battery several times. and got it Odin back to unrooted and turn on followed the unroot instruction well i left it stock and have had same issue where i click something and it flashes and just vibrates over and over until i pull battery.. well is this phone dead is there a fix?
I odin back again and same thing im going to odin back to stock again then do a stock root and flash another room but its doing the stupid reboot over and over vibrate thing even with the non-rooted stock rom. i just can't seem to find any direction on how to fix this or is it just a lost cause. wanted it to hold on till Note 2 hit shelves but looks like a s3 in my futures.
OK didnt work still FC and boot looping this time i installed Kies and put in download mode and updated the firmware and im getting same thing. GOSH DOGGIT hahaha.. Yea i need some advise i tried everything ive read i must be missing something somewhere.
i guess no one has ever had this before? still no solution i have tried everything format the internal disc but want to know if i do that will i be able to flash odin back to stock any help there?
walkerkd said:
i guess no one has ever had this before? still no solution i have tried everything format the internal disc but want to know if i do that will i be able to flash odin back to stock any help there?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
First of all, I'm no pro at this stuff but I feel your pain.
It sounds like you are getting stuck in a boot loop of sorts.
What I would do if I was you, after flashing a rom, go back into Recovery mode on the phone and clear out the cache partion, wipe Dalvik cache, and then wipe data/factory reset. After that, reboot your phone - it should start up normally. This is what I do to my phone to get it to function as it should.
Hope that helps
i went in to the advance tab and formatted everything hahah.. it juts wiped and odin back to stock again bout to wipe it and try to odin root see if i can get it done. worth a try ive tried to much stuff im bout to take phone out get my 338 tape to a zombie target and have some fun!
walkerkd said:
i went in to the advance tab and formatted everything hahah.. it juts wiped and odin back to stock again bout to wipe it and try to odin root see if i can get it done. worth a try ive tried to much stuff im bout to take phone out get my 338 tape to a zombie target and have some fun!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What language are you using here? I have no idea what you are saying.
kmacsouris said:
First of all, I'm no pro at this stuff but I feel your pain.
It sounds like you are getting stuck in a boot loop of sorts.
What I would do if I was you, after flashing a rom, go back into Recovery mode on the phone and clear out the cache partion, wipe Dalvik cache, and then wipe data/factory reset. After that, reboot your phone - it should start up normally. This is what I do to my phone to get it to function as it should.
Hope that helps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agreed ...
When returning to stock via Odin ...you must reboot into your recovery and wipe data and factory reset the device prior to rebooting.
Even though you wiped prior to flashing the stock Odin .tar image.
These devices stay dirty even after wiping data on occasion ...g
gregsarg said:
Agreed ...
When returning to stock via Odin ...you must reboot into your recovery and wipe data and factory reset the device prior to rebooting.
Even though you wiped prior to flashing the stock Odin .tar image.
These devices stay dirty even after wiping data on occasion ...g
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea i think thats what happen. it was not a clean wipe but i think i got it now i have gotten two fc & reboot i can live with that. thanks you guys for your help.
walkerkd said:
Yea i think thats what happen. it was not a clean wipe but i think i got it now i have gotten two fc & reboot i can live with that. thanks you guys for your help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Boot into your recovery, and "fix permissions "...then reboot.
That should clear up the rest of the issues ...g
gregsarg said:
Boot into your recovery, and "fix permissions "...then reboot.
That should clear up the rest of the issues ...g
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
oh really? wow i didnt even think about that im wiping again and flashing odin to stock but this time after it boots i will wipe factory reset. then root factory reset and fix permissions. thank for the help!
Always welcome ....
Fixing permissions is overlooked a lot ...
And the wrong permissions will cause FC's all over the build ..
I always fix permissions after any flash or modification ....it's just a good habit to get into ...IMHO ...g

[Q] help messed up rom install

Hi am a noob so pls bare with me ( an yes ive watched the noob vid ) with all this droid jargon but thought i'd try anyway an root my g3 i9300 phone. Which I did successfully in Dec using sgs3 toolbox. I never got time to flash a custom rom till yesterday. I found the Omega v44 Jelly Bean rom an thought it looked good so i used it. As I went through the motions of the the installing it thru clockwork recovery CWM. When it came to full wipe or no wipe i clicked no wipe. I was a little unsure, anyway it worked and the rom was installed. It worked fine but stalled on 1 or 2 apps so I thought it must have been because I never fully wiped, so here come's my mistake...............
I thought i'd do the process again ( installing the rom thru CWM ) and do a full wipe see if that helps. It ran its course and then rebooted then got a message saying fix root? I clicked stupidly click yes thinking there was a problem. Rebooted only to find it go back to clockwork CWM.
Now when it reboots and the samsung i9300 logo comes up with no red (!) in top left. Then it reboots to the logo again on its own again with the red (!) this time an goes straight back into CWM. I think ive created two roms on one phone one rooted one not. Is this fixable? I know it sounds pretty bad but we live an learn from our mistakes, even on the epic proportion.
Also its not accessible thru usb anymore.
Thanks for anyone if you can help
Stu :crying:
A very shameful noob
StuDarb said:
Hi am a noob so pls bare with me ( an yes ive watched the noob vid ) with all this droid jargon but thought i'd try anyway an root my g3 i9300 phone. Which I did successfully in Dec using sgs3 toolbox. I never got time to flash a custom rom till yesterday. I found the Omega v44 Jelly Bean rom an thought it looked good so i used it. As I went through the motions of the the installing it thru clockwork recovery CWM. When it came to full wipe or no wipe i clicked no wipe. I was a little unsure, anyway it worked and the rom was installed. It worked fine but stalled on 1 or 2 apps so I thought it must have been because I never fully wiped, so here come's my mistake...............
I thought i'd do the process again ( installing the rom thru CWM ) and do a full wipe see if that helps. It ran its course and then rebooted then got a message saying fix root? I clicked stupidly click yes thinking there was a problem. Rebooted only to find it go back to clockwork CWM.
Now when it reboots and the samsung i9300 logo comes up with no red (!) in top left. Then it reboots to the logo again on its own again with the red (!) this time an goes straight back into CWM. I think ive created two roms on one phone one rooted one not. Is this fixable? I know it sounds pretty bad but we live an learn from our mistakes, even on the epic proportion.
Also its not accessible thru usb anymore.
Thanks for anyone if you can help
Stu :crying:
A very shameful noob
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Go to recovery holding power, home and vol up.
Go to mounts and storage and formst system, data and cache.
Then go to first page and go to install zip. Select and install your rom. Then go to advanced and clear Dalvik cache. After that reboot.
Drew071
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app

[Q] So I decided to wipe everything and startover, and BOOTLOOPED at the Samsung Logo

Here's the fact
1. I was running the 12-31-13 CM11 Nightly with KToonz 12-21 Kernel.
2. I had some problem with the screen not turning on after I accept a call. It's been going on for a few months now, despite doing full wipes in between, so I decided I was gonna just do another wipe and hope that it would somehow solves itself.
3. While I was in TWRP 2.5.2.X , I did factory reset
4. I also wipe /system
5. I flashed CM11 1-1-14 / 12-30 GApps / KTkernel / BootAnimation / SuperSU 1.86
6. During the last portion, I get some running message that it failed to mount E:/ something something & Partition and such
7. Thinking it was a fluke, I pressed reboot and... bootlooped at the Samsung logo screen
8. I Power + Vol UP back into Recovery and flashed the 12-31 CM11 nightly, plus GApps etc,
9. Got the same strings of messages telling that it failed to mount partition and E:/ and /data/ and something lost and found/
10. I rebooted and... Bootlooped at the Samsung logo.
11. I tried to get back into recovery and has been unable to.The little blue "Recovery Booting" seems to appear for a very short time before the phone rebooted again. Seems like it's not there anymore.
Part of me thinks that perhaps the phone's internal memory failed. So far the only thing I can do with it is charge the phone.
Anyone with any knowledge of this, please help.
you gotta go to back odin to get a recovery back on your phone. Also the screen not turning on has been an AOSP issue for awhile, it's not just you and reflashing won't do anything to fix it.
Sent from my CIA sanctioned device
joshm.1219 said:
you gotta go to back odin to get a recovery back on your phone. Also the screen not turning on has been an AOSP issue for awhile, it's not just you and reflashing won't do anything to fix it.
Sent from my CIA sanctioned device
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What would I do with another recovery? Is the one I have on it now doesn't work anymore?
asianrage said:
What would I do with another recovery? Is the one I have on it now doesn't work anymore?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well if you can't boot into it, it's not working right?
asianrage said:
What would I do with another recovery? Is the one I have on it now doesn't work anymore?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just a note keep in mind TWRP is not recommended for CM11. Also I am lucky I have MDK device and a version of the no data wipe stock install, whenever things go wonky (like bootloop on Samsung Logo) I Odin back to stock. make sure the phone works, then restart from scratch and re-root, re-install recovery and reflash CM. I am not super technical so sometimes it can take about 1-2 hours from screwing up the phone to going back to having a working CM11 GS4.
All Hail invisiblek
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2559335
stein5830 said:
Just a note keep in mind TWRP is not recommended for CM11. Also I am lucky I have MDK device and a version of the no data wipe stock install, whenever things go wonky (like bootloop on Samsung Logo) I Odin back to stock. make sure the phone works, then restart from scratch and re-root, re-install recovery and reflash CM. I am not super technical so sometimes it can take about 1-2 hours from screwing up the phone to going back to having a working CM11 GS4.
All Hail invisiblek
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2559335
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply. I've already started the process to flash back to stock MDK. I've been using TWRP for a while and have always been annoyed at how long it'll take to go past the logo screen (if I didn't give up and pulled the battery). Wish me luck.

Categories

Resources