Help! I think I got a brick? - Verizon Samsung Galaxy S III

Hi, I'm a super newbie with a nice gs3 who have been toying around with rooting and roms for a bit.
recently, I noticed that my clockworkmod folder was taking up great amount of space in my phone memory (approx. 4 gigs)
so I decided to delete the folder and re-root my phone.
After re-rooting, all my phone now does is stay on for a bit, freeze, go to a black screen, and then turn back on.
It has repeated this cycle for infinite times now.
I've tried the to reboot into recovery mode by pressing vol.up+power+home, but all it does is stay on the samsung reboot logo.
I've also tried to soft un-brick the phone with odin, but the process always fails and it doesn't even seem to be able to start the process.
It seems to be able to recognize the device, but won't do anything else further and keeps telling me it has failed.
My decision to delete the clockworkmod folder was a super stupid decision.
Have I hard bricked my phone? Is it soft brick? Or have I just completely sabotaged my phone to a whole new degree?
I have no idea what has happened and desperate for a fix while crying in the corner of my room.
Please help!!!

Sounds like you just deleted a nandroid by deleting the clockwordmod folder. That shouldn't effect the phone functioning at all. What do you mean by "re-rooting?" Deleting that folder wouldn't effect root not sure why you tried to re-root. It sounds like something went wrong during the "re-root" process. What method did you use when trying to do that?

You soft brick your phone. I believe You didn't have to root an already rooted phone. In Odin you must click PDA(must be checked also) and choose your stock ROM. Your phone must be in download mode for you to even start the process. I will also like more details like root method and what version android your running.

Related

Reviving the Samsung Galaxy S 4G

I wanted to share my knowledge and experience from the past 2 days. Most of the help came from guides and posts on this forum so I wanted to give that back.
We were trying to root the SGS4G and because we're noobs we made the mistake of thinking it was a Vibrant. Got a Vibrant ROM and tried to flash it though Odin WITH re-partition checked. Everything we read said if you do either one of these things, you will brick your phone.
Sure enough we bricked the phone. It was trying to boot into the Vibrant ROM but was getting stuck on the word 'Vibrant' and then showing a whole lot of weird colored pixels. We then learned we'd made a massive mistake and that the phone wasn't a Vibrant after all.
We got a stock ROM for SGS4G and started trying to push them through Odin. Faced countless FAILS and freezes and finally it took us to the Recovery Mode and we tried the Restore option. It booted into a crippled SGS4G ROM. When it booted, it vibrated every 10 seconds or so and it had a null IMEI and unknown baseband.
We tried following a guide that wanted to change some text in the nv_data.bin but the numbers we were meant to be editing (0018810?) didn't exist in our nv_data.bin. So that didn't work for us.
In the meantime we tried to flash the stock ROM in Odin but kept getting FAILs and Freezes. With this step we lost even the crippled operating system and couldn't reach anything except the 'phone --!-- computer' screen. Luckily, this acts the same as download mode, so not bricked. We kept trying to push the stock SGS4G stock ROM (Froyo 2.2) several times and failing.
At one point we got a completely black screen, wouldn't turn on. Bricked again. We found this post on RootzWiki and it worked for us that time and brought it back from the black screen to download mode http://rootzwiki.com/topic/1820-how-to-unbrick-your-sgs4g/
Somehow we ended up at this guide here on XDA for fixing the "null/null" IMEI http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1142829
We followed that guide. When you add the PIT file it automatically checks 'Re-Partition' in Odin, we didn't uncheck it. Bricked again. It was stuck on the Samsung logo and when we tried to get to download mode it got stuck on a black screen with the loading circle/lines and 2 computers were giving 'The USB device has malfunctioned' when we plugged it in. The unbrick guide above (RootzWiki) didn't help this time. We tried restarting the computer, let the phone rest without battery for half an hour, held power button for a minute without battery, still nothing.
Finally I accidentally pressed the power button (rather than the volume buttons to get into download mode) and it went to the samsung logo (as expected) and after that I was able to get into download mode. The key to this I think is to keep on trying powering on normally then try download mode over and over and eventually it should get unstuck and the computer should recognize it again.
Once I had it back in download mode, I followed this guide again BUT!!! I made sure to un-check re-partition and I did not check "Phone EFS Clear" (because I had tried that already before it was bricked and wanted to see if a straight ROM would work first). Everything worked perfectly, I got my IMEI and Baseband back, without modifying anything.
I don't know if this was a miracle, or if any of it will work for anyone else, but the moral of the story is don't give up even if you've done the absolute worst possible thing. I don't even think hardbrick exists on this phone after everything we were able to save it from.
Cheers
Hardbricks do exist on this phone but you have to try really hard to do it. A few people have managed it. Way to stick with it and recover your phone. I've done that more times than I can count.
hechoen said:
Hardbricks do exist on this phone but you have to try really hard to do it. A few people have managed it. Way to stick with it and recover your phone. I've done that more times than I can count.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I didn't feel like i really hard bricked it until i saw the USB computer connection error "device pluged in malfunctioned" in more than one PC.
Then i really felt like its a hardware BIOS chipset level problem now but man...
That story cracked me up. That is exactly why I spend days reading before I even root my phone. I made the mistake one time on my old G1 and it could not be revived.
Congrats on getting it working. (especially without flooding the q&a with redundant questions that have been described in detail several places )
hani1400 said:
I wanted to share my knowledge and experience from the past 2 days. Most of the help came from guides and posts on this forum so I wanted to give that back.
We were trying to root the SGS4G and because we're noobs we made the mistake of thinking it was a Vibrant. Got a Vibrant ROM and tried to flash it though Odin WITH re-partition checked. Everything we read said if you do either one of these things, you will brick your phone.
Sure enough we bricked the phone. It was trying to boot into the Vibrant ROM but was getting stuck on the word 'Vibrant' and then showing a whole lot of weird colored pixels. We then learned we'd made a massive mistake and that the phone wasn't a Vibrant after all.
We got a stock ROM for SGS4G and started trying to push them through Odin. Faced countless FAILS and freezes and finally it took us to the Recovery Mode and we tried the Restore option. It booted into a crippled SGS4G ROM. When it booted, it vibrated every 10 seconds or so and it had a null IMEI and unknown baseband.
We tried following a guide that wanted to change some text in the nv_data.bin but the numbers we were meant to be editing (0018810?) didn't exist in our nv_data.bin. So that didn't work for us.
In the meantime we tried to flash the stock ROM in Odin but kept getting FAILs and Freezes. With this step we lost even the crippled operating system and couldn't reach anything except the 'phone --!-- computer' screen. Luckily, this acts the same as download mode, so not bricked. We kept trying to push the stock SGS4G stock ROM (Froyo 2.2) several times and failing.
At one point we got a completely black screen, wouldn't turn on. Bricked again. We found this post on RootzWiki and it worked for us that time and brought it back from the black screen to download mode http://rootzwiki.com/topic/1820-how-to-unbrick-your-sgs4g/
Somehow we ended up at this guide here on XDA for fixing the "null/null" IMEI http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1142829
We followed that guide. When you add the PIT file it automatically checks 'Re-Partition' in Odin, we didn't uncheck it. Bricked again. It was stuck on the Samsung logo and when we tried to get to download mode it got stuck on a black screen with the loading circle/lines and 2 computers were giving 'The USB device has malfunctioned' when we plugged it in. The unbrick guide above (RootzWiki) didn't help this time. We tried restarting the computer, let the phone rest without battery for half an hour, held power button for a minute without battery, still nothing.
Finally I accidentally pressed the power button (rather than the volume buttons to get into download mode) and it went to the samsung logo (as expected) and after that I was able to get into download mode. The key to this I think is to keep on trying powering on normally then try download mode over and over and eventually it should get unstuck and the computer should recognize it again.
Once I had it back in download mode, I followed this guide again BUT!!! I made sure to un-check re-partition and I did not check "Phone EFS Clear" (because I had tried that already before it was bricked and wanted to see if a straight ROM would work first). Everything worked perfectly, I got my IMEI and Baseband back, without modifying anything.
I don't know if this was a miracle, or if any of it will work for anyone else, but the moral of the story is don't give up even if you've done the absolute worst possible thing. I don't even think hardbrick exists on this phone after everything we were able to save it from.
Cheers
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wheooooooooowwww,..you just UNBRICKED mine, I know of the Battery pull etc...but the post you referenced
is MAGIC
This was not my first Rom nor Root on this phone, it weirdly happened while doing the GB starter....via ODIN, which i also used before..no clue what went wrong, oh well...
Thank you, thank you "i did"....Yohoooo
Yup i agree i like to read, reread then read as i do. This way i got a pretty good understanding of what I'm doing. Btw i have just started using one click and it is sooooo simple. I love it.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA App
The link for fixing null/null IMEI is not working.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1142829
diavel said:
The link for fixing null/null IMEI is not working.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1142829
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=881162
Im still carrying this phone, stupid baseband unlock for iphone won't come out now I am carrying 2 phones, one as an ipod touch and the galaxy s! Good story, hope it can help others, but I am prepared to jump off of this bandwagon anytime now!

G2X Not Starting

Well early today I was running ics 4.0.4 on my g2x and I got tired of it, so I decided to restore my backup of my original rom/settings.I forgot I had switched my micro SD card to the one I had in my droid incredible 2, and I ended up restoring my dic2 back up. From there the phone would just stay at the LG screen, so I started to look around. I tried using nvflash, but it stayed the same, then I tried the flash.bat, when I turned the phone on it still stays on the LG screen but with the blue loading bar underneath, and when I try to put it into recovery mode it says S/W Updates. I don't know what to do, I'm a newbie to this stuff although I was able to root it myself. I don't care if I have to unroot my phone or go back to my original rom, I've been looking for something like this for hours and can't find anything. Please help, Thanks!!
When you used nvflash, exactly what steps did you take?
follow this guide http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1248644
when you plug your phone in to use NV flash, find the device in the device manager, uninstall the driver and check the delete box, unplug the phone then start the guide.
you cannot hard brick a tegra device with flashing so you should be able to recover.

Droid Charge - Soft Bricked

I am having a brutal time with recovering my rooted, soft bricked Droid Charge. More than a while ago while trying to root it, I bricked it, but followed the step by step tutorial on this site and fixed it with ease. But recently, it magically soft bricked. I tried EVERYTHING to recover it, including all the step by step tutorials on here to recover a Droid Charge. I have it to the point where it boots (which takes forever). It'll boot to the main screen then basically freeze and shut down. I re-flashed the rom, pit, recovery, etc, etc ... and that's about as far as I can get.
Is my phone pretty much shot? Does the usb port matter? All the files were successful in Odin, but I was using Windows on a duel booted Macbook. But either way, it's stressing me out, especially now that I'm stuck with a lag-fest BlackBerry that makes me want to throw myself out the window. Can anyone help?
_Silky said:
I am having a brutal time with recovering my rooted, soft bricked Droid Charge. More than a while ago while trying to root it, I bricked it, but followed the step by step tutorial on this site and fixed it with ease. But recently, it magically soft bricked. I tried EVERYTHING to recover it, including all the step by step tutorials on here to recover a Droid Charge. I have it to the point where it boots (which takes forever). It'll boot to the main screen then basically freeze and shut down. I re-flashed the rom, pit, recovery, etc, etc ... and that's about as far as I can get.
Is my phone pretty much shot? Does the usb port matter? All the files were successful in Odin, but I was using Windows on a duel booted Macbook. But either way, it's stressing me out, especially now that I'm stuck with a lag-fest BlackBerry that makes me want to throw myself out the window. Can anyone help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what is phone model dude?

I made a goof rooting my phone, please help

So, I followed all the basic instructions of getting ADB, downloading and flashing twrp, and my goal was solely to root my phone so I went ahead and got SuperSU as well and installed it through twrp. Everything went fine until I went to reboot my phone and it wouldn't work, it would only boot into twrp no matter what I did. In a moment of foolishness, I decided to go to the reset section of twerp, and switched to partition A (it was on partition B, where everything had been installed). Now my phone only has a black screen, and no amount of trying to soft reset or anything is turning it on. The only indication I have that my phone is doing anything, is that when I plug it in to my pc I can hear the connection sound. I can't access any files on the phone, and ADB doesn't recognize that the phone is plugged in. It's a Moto g7 power phone, and I used the latest versions of the programs. Also, I did do something of a ****ty backup before I started the process, but since my phone wasn't rooted I don't know how much that'll help me. All the stuff I find online says to just install a stock rom or whatever; but I can't even access my phone to do that. Is there ANYTHING I can do or am I ****ed?
Thanks so much for any and all help
Zacigator said:
So, I followed all the basic instructions of getting ADB, downloading and flashing twrp, and my goal was solely to root my phone so I went ahead and got SuperSU as well and installed it through twrp. Everything went fine until I went to reboot my phone and it wouldn't work, it would only boot into twrp no matter what I did. In a moment of foolishness, I decided to go to the reset section of twerp, and switched to partition A (it was on partition B, where everything had been installed). Now my phone only has a black screen, and no amount of trying to soft reset or anything is turning it on. The only indication I have that my phone is doing anything, is that when I plug it in to my pc I can hear the connection sound. I can't access any files on the phone, and ADB doesn't recognize that the phone is plugged in. It's a Moto g7 power phone, and I used the latest versions of the programs. Also, I did do something of a ****ty backup before I started the process, but since my phone wasn't rooted I don't know how much that'll help me. All the stuff I find online says to just install a stock rom or whatever; but I can't even access my phone to do that. Is there ANYTHING I can do or am I ****ed?
Thanks so much for any and all help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
U are in edl mode u need to search for blank flash it should get u back up and running
Zacigator said:
So, I followed all the basic instructions of getting ADB, downloading and flashing twrp, and my goal was solely to root my phone so I went ahead and got SuperSU as well and installed it through twrp. Everything went fine until I went to reboot my phone and it wouldn't work, it would only boot into twrp no matter what I did. In a moment of foolishness, I decided to go to the reset section of twerp, and switched to partition A (it was on partition B, where everything had been installed). Now my phone only has a black screen, and no amount of trying to soft reset or anything is turning it on. The only indication I have that my phone is doing anything, is that when I plug it in to my pc I can hear the connection sound. I can't access any files on the phone, and ADB doesn't recognize that the phone is plugged in. It's a Moto g7 power phone, and I used the latest versions of the programs. Also, I did do something of a ****ty backup before I started the process, but since my phone wasn't rooted I don't know how much that'll help me. All the stuff I find online says to just install a stock rom or whatever; but I can't even access my phone to do that. Is there ANYTHING I can do or am I ****ed?
Thanks so much for any and all help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you get it running

Samsung s20FE somehow bricked

Hello
my sister's phone somehow broke down. It's not rooted or anything, was use for mainly day to day use. She called me yesterday that her phone randomly resets (like 1x per hour).
I plugged phone to computer, wanted to transfer pictures and "important" data to pc and during the transformation phone closed and I am unable to open it again. I managed to transfer around 60% of pictures but mostly important ones so the loss is not that big.
-phone started "looping" at start screen logo to samsung for like 30minutes. After a while it somehow booted into the system and I tried to do software update. Downloaded the update and then installed it but at some point phone closed down and started looping loading screen again. Since then im unable to boot it into the system....
-I entered recovery mode and did Factory reset. Doesnt help. Wiped cache, doesnt help.
-i know little to nothing about android but my guess is that i somehow bricked the system when i did factory reset just when the phone was updating?
is there any solution to somehow "install" fresh android on the phone via PC? Phone is not rooted but it has activated USB debugging options.
****EDIT***
I was thinking that it could be hardware issue but phone can stay open in recovery mode for hours so I suppose it is software problem?
Phone is still under warranty but i cba dealing with services and would rather fix it myself.
Thank you for any help
You should simply done a factory reset.
It will need reflashed. In the long run it may be best to let Samsung hash it out.
Yeah i should've done factory reset while phone was still usable. But I wanted to recover all of the photoa, thats why i tried to do system update first....
dehumless said:
Yeah i should've done factory reset while phone was still usable. But I wanted to recover all of the photoa, thats why i tried to do system update first....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Updates don't help especially in this case where the OS was teeter toddling on the abyss. Safe mode. The first mistake was not having the critical data redundantly backed up. All you can do is learn from the mistakes.
blackhawk said:
Updates don't help especially in this case where the OS was teeter toddling on the abyss. Safe mode. The first mistake was not having the critical data redundantly backed up. All you can do is learn from the mistakes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well, right now im trying to find android firmware images and will try to flash them on with Odin later.
But I am sure that i will face several problems on the way
dehumless said:
well, right now im trying to find android firmware images and will try to flash them on with Odin later.
But I am sure that i will face several problems on the way
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can use SmartSwitch to do that, but I'm a total novice at flashing Androids and the best method. Pick and use the safest method...
A Samsung Experience center at Best Buy can also do it. They might be able to give you more insight as to why it failed.

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