Database Users

These Wizards are tough devices!

So, a while back, my 8125 went overboard into the icy waters of lake Michigan while we were launching my sailboat "Adventurous". Crap! My life was stored on that device! So, one day later, I suited up for a cold water dive plan, donned scuba gear and recovered it. Water temp at the bottom was 35 degrees with 6" visability. My goal was to recover the SIM and miniSD where I had a full backup, then restore into a new 8125. This I did with no problems and have been running this way since mid May.
Yesterday, I checked my original 8125 and the water had finally evaporated out of the screen, so on a whim I installed its battery and put it on the charger. Imagine my surprise when the charging light came on! Imagine my further surprise when 2 hours later that light changed from red to green!
Imagine my utter amazement when I pressed the power button and it came right up! It's been running perfectly for 2 days now.
damn.... 24 hours submerged at 33 feet in muddy 35 degree water... :shock:
Nice work HTC... It's now my mule for new rom testing. AKU 2.3 here I come!

*amazed :shock:

will give it a try over the weekend... :lol:

Awesome!! Now if only HTC could make the paintwork so tough!! :lol:

@meschle:
next time you take a screamer off the rock, try not to land on your wizard.....

most electronics are like that these days, all u need to do is qucikly pull out the battery, take it apart, adn low dry all the parts, then it should work fine, unless, the barrary fried it.
i droped my V600 in the water like 2 times, and it still works fine.

@Ray-jai:
That's precisely whats amazing about this incident: My 8125 sat underwater at two atmospheres, powered up for 24 hours! :shock: I couldn't get to it right away to remove the battery due to the dive difficulty.

I wonder what the signal strength was like at 33 feet down...?
Andre

wow! its just a thought ........ but why not email HTC with your story you get something in return (i.e. if they use your story)

wow, lucky you!

Sleuth255 said:
@meschle:
next time you take a screamer off the rock, try not to land on your wizard.....
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Sleuth - next time you fly over to this rock - don't drop your wiz in the POND - it's too deep to dive my friend :wink:

Great story, I've done similar things before and they have survived. Girlfriends Nokia went down the bog (clean one ) and it worked fine after a few days, buttons worked one by one hour by hour still working to this day.

I don’t mean to piss on your party here guys, but there is a high chance it will fail at some point soon.
You see circuit board is made from lots and lots of thin layers (waffers). What happens is that when these layers absorb water when things like that happen. That water will stay there and will slowly corrode the circuitry over time.
To stand a better chance of it surviving long term, as well as taking the battery out (good advice) to avoid short circuiting and fry sensitive components, you need to keep it in a very dry and quite warm (like on top of a radiator, with a towel between if it’s too hot) and leave it there for a few days (even a week or longer).
I was told this by a senior Nokia engineer after my old phone died. I was pushed into a swimming pool on holiday. I was amazed when the phone in my pocket was still working after being completly soaked. It worked for a week before starting to fail (backlight etc) and by 2 – 3 weeks it was completely dead.
You might be lucky, depends on how tight the outer casing is. My advice to you would be to stop using it and get it somewhere very warm for as long as you can. Keep us posted.

OMG i think i have this great idea
to prevent w00t dis guy up here sed
just put your wizard on the microwave... press like... PIZZA REHEAt.
instead of waiting it to warm on top of a radiator , u know.

zeuzinn said:
OMG i think i have this great idea
to prevent w00t dis guy up here sed
just put your wizard on the microwave... press like... PIZZA REHEAt.
instead of waiting it to warm on top of a radiator , u know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep and all the metal in it would go off like fireworks!!! BANG! :lol:

I had a Siemmens (sp?) phone that fell into the pool, the phone stayed at the bottom for several minutes while I cussed at it.
After retrieving it, I took the battery out and stuck the phone in a toaster oven. I set the oven one its lowest heat setting and left it in there for three 20 minute sets (the oven timer only went up to 20 minutes
60 minutes later, I put the battery back in and powered the phone back up. It worked, and continued to work to this day, approx 1 year later. I just semi-retired it in favor of my new 8125
I thought for sure that the chlorine in the pool would have corroded the crap out of the circuitry.

@dangerous_dom:
That's pretty much precisely what I did. I put it on top of the refrigerator (nice and warm up there due to proximity to evap coils) for 5 weeks before I tried powering it up again.

Just threw mine in with the dishes. Came out lovely and clean and still works perfectly.
Only problem being people receiving texts from me say they are wet. Sure they will dry over time though.

Best bet is to take the phone to a repair shop that will strip the phone down and acid bath the components as water damage can slowly corrode away at chips and alike. I done this with my old A1000. worked a treat after this

Great Story!

wet g1?

okay, I put my phone in my coat pocket when it (the coat)was slightly damp for at least 2 hours and later, I found that my phone kept showing the option to power off and my keys werent responding...the keys didnt seem to be stuck...I then wiped then reflashed, which in itself took a good while since my keys werent responding fast enough...but even the reflash didnt work...so did I ruin my phone because of the damp coat? And if so, anybody know how I can fix it? I'm thinking about blow drying my phone...good idea or not?

Don't try to turn the phone on anymore. Remove the battery, battery cover, memory card and SIM card. Place your phone in a bowl of rice to absorb moisture. Sometimes there's just a bit of water left in the system. Let it dry off, phones come back to life most of the time.

SolemnWishing said:
Don't try to turn the phone on anymore. Remove the battery, battery cover, memory card and SIM card. Place your phone in a bowl of rice to absorb moisture. Sometimes there's just a bit of water left in the system. Let it dry off, phones come back to life most of the time.
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Click to collapse
Im going to try this, but just in case anybody else has any ideas, here's a few more details on my phone...it'll turn on, touch screen works, but it's when i use the hard keyboard and press the keys that the option to turn off shows up on the screen...and the phone's green and end keys are flashing on and off like the phone is turning itself on and off, on and off...never seen anything like this on the forums...weird...

naars90 said:
Im going to try this, but just in case anybody else has any ideas, here's a few more details on my phone...it'll turn on, touch screen works, but it's when i use the hard keyboard and press the keys that the option to turn off shows up on the screen...and the phone's green and end keys are flashing on and off like the phone is turning itself on and off, on and off...never seen anything like this on the forums...weird...
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Click to collapse
oh and thanks for the quick response...

No problem. The lights on the buttons going on and off is the water interfering with the circuitry. I highly recommend you leave your phone off, or you run the risk of shorting it out.

If water is making it run wrong, it **IS** shorting out.

my G1 was completely submerged in a lake for 5 minutes while powered on. as soon as it came out of the water i powered off, and blew it dry with an air compressor. left battery out for 24 hours and, worked 95% ever since. only had some random touch screen sensitivity loss.

if you are ok with taking the phone apart and the rice solution doesn't fix it then send me a PM and i'll let you know how to make absolutely sure nothing MORE goes wrong. right now though you probably messed up the phone cause you turned it on and off repeatedly

ok...did the rice solution...didnt work, so does anybody know any good, reliable cellphone repair shops in chicago that does the g1? Googled , found a place called CPR(cellphone repair) but the yelp reviews werent really convincing...so I thought I'd ask the people on here... you guys seem very reliable and I thought I'd rather ask you guys' opinions than go to a repair shop with poor to average reviews...pretty please?

oh, tubaking...ty for the reply...but I looked up the service manual and taking apart the g1 seems to take a lot more skill and experience working with electronics than I have, so that solution's out....thanks a lot anyways....peace, bro

there is no fix for permanant water damage, any shop is just gonna do the same thing i said unless they have access to the main board and all proper pieces to the phone. usually at times like this i go on ebay and buy a real cheap G1 with a broken screen or some other defect that the seller wants to get rid of the phone quickly and cheaply

I left my phone in the rain for a couple of hours and had the same issue. I know this is not the best solution (due to heat) but it fixed mine completely. I removed sdcard, battery, and bback. Then placed it on an egg carton and put in my toaster oven at 150 degrees for an hour or so. Didn't touch it for another day then powered it on. Power button glitched the first time I pressed it but has worked great ever since (been about 3 months)

dumfuq said:
I left my phone in the rain for a couple of hours and had the same issue. I know this is not the best solution (due to heat) but it fixed mine completely. I removed sdcard, battery, and bback. Then placed it on an egg carton and put in my toaster oven at 150 degrees for an hour or so. Didn't touch it for another day then powered it on. Power button glitched the first time I pressed it but has worked great ever since (been about 3 months)
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Click to collapse
That is awesome.

G1 at bottom of lake revived!
I think we should have a sticky to this Thread! Or maybe a a wet willie.
This weekend I dropped my G1 to the bottom of Lake Conroe and was able to fish it out within 5 minutes. Fortunately I was docked in about 6 feet of water. I totally took everything apart and when I got home placed the phone and parts in the direct sun wrapped in a white cloth. I suppose this is equivalent to the egg carton and toaster oven method.
That night, I put the pieces in a box of rice and put it back together in the morning and voila it worked!! For a few hours I had issues with the backlight coming in and out but after about 8 hours of use it works perfectly. I didn't even have to wipe or flash anything - everything like new.
Whew!!!

well, if people stopped playing with there phones and fingering it, it wouldn't get so wet, maybe you should try a personal lube if you can't keep your hands off

gridlock32404 said:
well, if people stopped playing with there phones and fingering it, it wouldn't get so wet, maybe you should try a personal lube if you can't keep your hands off
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Click to collapse
Damn it you beat me to it. I saw the title and said damn this is to easy, wet g1. haahaha.

I dropped my phone in boiled hot dog water and here's what worked for me. I took my phone completely apart and wrapped it up in tin foil. I then put it in the microwave on med-hi for 1:32. Once that is done you take it out and put the phone (disassembled of course) in a bag of bbq potatoe chips (yes it has to be bbq or it won't work) over night. In the mean time you need to feed your dog a snickers bar (this is a must). The next day you need to take magic fairy dust (found a good deal on ebay) and sprinkle it over your g1. Then put your phone back together and slap your momma. Push the power button and bam a perfectly working g1 again. I can write a detailed "how to for dummies" on this if it will get stickied.

supreme, you forgot they need to eat the bbq chips while powering the phone on.

crpercodani said:
supreme, you forgot they need to eat the bbq chips while powering the phone on.
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Click to collapse
Oh yea, I also forgot to mention with a tall glass of chocolate milk.

I'd bump your guide, if I would have had this then I wouldn't have spank the neighbor's wife's ass instead of my momma's, no wonder I still have a wet g1. Wait. What are we talking about, something about crickets and penut butter, I'm confuddle. Oh well back to spanking his wife's ass, mmmm cottage cheese thighs

[Q] dropped vibrant into the toilet...

i was at a bar i didn't even want to be at in a small town in colorado.
at first i just stared at it for 10 seconds thinking "at this point i should just leave it there because the damage is done"
then all of a sudden it started goign crazy with lights and "samsung vibrant" flashing everywhere on the screen, so i decided to dive in and save it. then i violently washed it with hotwater under the sink and only after washing my hands did i finally open it and take out the battery (at this point, the screen shown brightly with "samsung vibrant).
3 hours later, hoping it had dried completely, i put the battery in and again it came to life with the samsung vibrant text. i quickly took the battery out.
i jsut tried it again and it wont turn on at all. is it over?

maeglutz said:
3 hours later, hoping it had dried completely, i put the battery in and again it came to life with the samsung vibrant text. i quickly took the battery out.
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Click to collapse
You shouldn't have done that, the phone was still wet. When you did that you fried your phone. If you would have put your phone in a bag of rice or let it dry out for a few days then it might have been ok. Hope you have insurance.

Yeah, I always heard that half the time, if you power it off and let it dry, and make sure it's dry before trying to power it on again, you can luck out.

omg omg omg!!
when you responded, my heart dropped and then i ran over to see if it would start again one more time (i plugged it into the charger) and i pressed the on button and it showed it was charging. i'm goign to leave it alone now in a bag of rice like you said. but i dont know if i can wait 3 days.... i never learn my lesson

Hahaha I dropped a phone in the toilet once. Good luck

i know i'm getting ahead of myself, but just SAY that if i finally do get it to power on, but nothing shows up except a "samsung vibrant" screen, is there a way to reinstall the OS?

My son left his ipod nano in his pants pocket. It got washed. I dried it and did the rice thing for 2-3 days (can't remember how many). Charged it up. Just like new.
The moral of the story? If you can't wait 3 days to see if it has been salvaged, you don't deserve a new phone...

Droidicus said:
My son left his ipod nano in his pants pocket. It got washed. I dried it and did the rice thing for 2-3 days (can't remember how many). Charged it up. Just like new.
The moral of the story? If you can't wait 3 days to see if it has been salvaged, you don't deserve a new phone...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ugh. fine. i'll wait. but i dont know what i'l do with myself in the meantime.

maeglutz said:
i know i'm getting ahead of myself, but just SAY that if i finally do get it to power on, but nothing shows up except a "samsung vibrant" screen, is there a way to reinstall the OS?
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Click to collapse
Uh, dude, it would not be a software problem... If it doesn't boot up its a hardware problem.

Just make sure its sitting nicely covered in the dry rice....wait...you did use dry rice right? Not cooked rice??? lol kidding...

Droidicus said:
Uh, dude, it would not be a software problem... If it doesn't boot up its a hardware problem.
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Click to collapse
if you read my question, i asked what i could do if it DID power up but only with a generic screen

I wouldn't even bother trying... It's fried man...

nearblack said:
I wouldn't even bother trying... It's fried man...
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Click to collapse
we'll see. the green charging light gives me hope. i will definitely not pay full price for a new one. this was $99 through costco-- which is what a phone should cost.

Don't over cook the rice. Stir-fry it with some egg, carrots, scallions, peas, and barbecued pork. Everything should be okay.

maeglutz said:
we'll see. the green charging light gives me hope. i will definitely not pay full price for a new one. this was $99 through costco-- which is what a phone should cost.
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This is why the data is so expensive in America. The companies need to get back the money they lost on the phone.
The phone might be fried since you didn't wait to turn it off. I've read the bag of rice will work. Next time wait until you phone is dry and just reroute you calls with Google Voice. I'd still try the rice too.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Did you say after you took it out the the toilet you then washed it under hot water? Seriously? You thought "oh, its wet, I shall now soak it some more?"
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

Arghh..kill this nasty thread...lol
Sent from my Samsung Vibrant using XDA App

To clarify a little... when you drop the phone in water, the FIRST thing you do is take out the battery and sim card. Then you let it dry COMPLETLY, this takes days, not hours. Like said above, rice does good, you put it in a zip lock, take out the air and seal it.. leave for AT LEAST 3 days so the rice can absorb the moisture, THEN you try to turn it on for the first time. If you try turning it on when there is moisture you will fry the phone, water conducts electricity and brings power where there is not supposed to be and burns circuits, so by putting the battery and attempt to turn it on prematurely, you are killing it causing short circuits internally.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

make sure you throw the rice away after you're done or better yet, feed it to some iphone fanboy

dq13 said:
To clarify a little... when you drop the phone in water, the FIRST thing you do is take out the battery and sim card. Then you let it dry COMPLETLY, this takes days, not hours. Like said above, rice does good, you put it in a zip lock, take out the air and seal it.. leave for AT LEAST 3 days so the rice can absorb the moisture, THEN you try to turn it on for the first time. If you try turning it on when there is moisture you will fry the phone, water conducts electricity and brings power where there is not supposed to be and burns circuits, so by putting the battery and attempt to turn it on prematurely, you are killing it causing short circuits internally.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
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Click to collapse
+1 and ty , I just read through this post and wondered when someone would point out the OP already turned it on to "check" it after being in the water.
Time to order a replacement, even if it does for some magical reason power on that phone is going to be issue city.

The Atrix is Waterproof!

I was at the bar on Monday night and dropped my phone into a pint of beer!
Bar tender very quickly gave me a bowl of rice to dry the phone out with. 2 days later and the phone still seems to be working fine.

so when I dump mine in water and it isn't waterproof are you going to pay me back?

Awesome!
My sister's iPhone 4 went for a drive and it most certainly isn't waterproof. It makes a sturdy paper weight now (not that it wasn't one before )

lasersocks said:
I was at the bar on Monday night and dropped my phone into a pint of beer!
Bar tender very quickly gave me a bowl of rice to dry the phone out with. 2 days later and the phone still seems to be working fine.
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Click to collapse
That is not waterproof -_-;;; The submerge your phone in rice is simply a trick to dry the phone.

The beer did not penetrate because the barley and hops were repelled by the locked bootloader.

I really hope so!
I dropped mine in the toliet last night and have had it sitting in a bag of rice all night. Fingers crossed!

GoodFoot said:
The beer did not penetrate because the barley and hops were repelled by the locked bootloader.
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hahaha that made me lol...kinda sucks no one can hack that **** i want custom kerns

thatoneguy247 said:
Awesome!
My sister's iPhone 4 went for a drive and it most certainly isn't waterproof. It makes a sturdy paper weight now (not that it wasn't one before )
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Why would it be waterproof? It went for a drive... Apparently it can't handle the speed, huh?

Fuuuuck...Just tried to turn the phone on and got stuck at the Motorola Dual Core screen.And a messege saying:
Modem did not power up(1)
Starting RSD protocol support
Am i ****ed?

TinyRK said:
Why would it be waterproof? It went for a drive... Apparently it can't handle the speed, huh?
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Click to collapse
If he is driving under water his phone is the last thing he should be worrying about

TinyRK said:
Why would it be waterproof? It went for a drive... Apparently it can't handle the speed, huh?
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Click to collapse
I meant to say dive lol. That's what happens when you bounce between xda and autoblog.
It can handle the speed. My Atrix went for a drive after my iPhone and came back with a speeding ticket. Apparently the Atrix is capped on how fast it can go even though it uses the same roads as the iPhone.

lol, my friends berry sat in the lake for 20 minutes, totally submerged, we finally found it, he left it off for 72hours, turned it on and it still works to this day....
so i guess.....

Yea.... Generally there is absolutely no issue with an electronic device that isn't waterproof actually getting wet and still being functional. The key, and probably what Alex2x3 did wrong, is letting it dry long enough. The device getting wet is one thing. Something will initially short and the phone will shut off. If it's not entirely dry though, and you try to turn it on, then you're powering up a damp device, and that's a whole different ballgame. A friend of mine got shoved into the pool with his phone still in his pocket. Let it dry for a while and it still worked.
Unfortunately for Alex, i don't believe letting it dry overnight was quite long enough. Think it'd usually be best to wait 2-3 days before attempting to turn it on.... if not a little longer depending on the size of the device. All it takes is a little bit of water that wasn't able to quite work it's way out, and *poof*.

Water damaged phone.. Help :(

UPDATE: The phone is magically fixed!
Hey guys!
So i was at a party 2 nights ago, and I lost my S2. I finally found it in the morning, it had been outside all night, and then I realised that it had been raining heavily.
I took the battery, sim card and micro sd card out and placed the phone somewhere warm and let it dry for about a day and a half. I plugged it in earlier, and it started charging fine, and then I turned the phone on.
It booted up. The hardware buttons are working fine, and the touch buttons below the screen also work, but the screen is completely unresponsive
EDIT: Just as I posted this, i got signal, so only problem i can see is the touch-screen
Is there anything I can do, or is this phone screwed?
I cant remember if I have Vodafone's insurance or not, I'm praying to god I do :/

Put it in a bag of rice and let it dry out even more

Look this thread:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1128594
You'll find some tips that might be useful

danstah said:
Put it in a bag of rice and let it dry out even more
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Click to collapse
I was gonna say.... put it in rice. Should dry up faster

Had good result with silicate packets (the little bags in shoeboxes and many electrical goods) and rice. But let everything dry for days and don't reassemble - left my old PMP for 5 days after a toilet swim, still working. Smells great too. Honest.

Thanks for the replies guys. I've now put the phone in a bag of rice so I guess I just have to wait and see.

Lol keep us updated!

The problem could by the fact that the digitizer on capacitive screens are very sensitive, it sounds as if that may have been damaged.l I would think that the only thing you can do is to replace the touch screen, because it is gorilla glass and the fact the entire phone would need dismantling, If it isn't insured I would expect it wouldn't be cheap to get replaced. But you should be thankful that you entire phone didn't die, I mean you were quite lucky there. I broke my old hero by leaving it out side for 5-10 min whilst it was raining.

Bad news guys, its still not working.
Cant believe I let this happen, I need some trousers with tighter pockets for this damn phone! (and perhaps not carry it with me when I'm drinking haha)
Luckily its covered under my home insurance.
Do I get a new one or get it repaired?
Edit: Its also bloody ironic that I had just put a pattern unlock screen on my phone, so now I cant back up the contents because its locked! Is there any way to get round this? Or external ways to control the phone so I can get into it?
Cheers

There's insurance that covers phone water damage?

Hazlynch, you really need to keep it much, much longer than one day in the rice.
Trust me, apart from my aforementioned toilet episode, I've also lost phones and PMPs in the snow - all have worked again, but the shortest dessicating time was 3 days.
One day is simply not enough - not saying 100% it'll work after 5 days, but 100% certain it won't after one.
For the record, lost my Cowon S9 (OLED touchscreen) in a snowdrift - 5 days dessicating and worked - still going strong.

Ah right thanks for that info! From what I heard about the digitizer being sensitive I'm not very hopeful, but it wont harm to leave it in the rice longer.

I wasn't with my S9 either, but it surprised me, especially also being a touchscreen device too.
Remember to disassemble as much as you can from the phone - all cards and battery out but also in the box/bag - you need to expose as much surface area as possible of the device to the dessicant.
Try my silicate bag tip posted earlier too!
Let us know wha'ppen?

Ready to give it a try? How's it looking/feeling?

I managed to find some silica packets like you said so I put them in with the rice.
Just turned it on, but still no touchscreen responce

hazlynch said:
I managed to find some silica packets like you said so I put them in with the rice.
Just turned it on, but still no touchscreen responce
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Shame - not optimistic.. A couple more days won't hurt if you have the patience!

Yeah, I wont be able to get anything done about the insurance stuff for a few days anyway, so I'll leave it in there for longer. Starting to miss it now! Haha.
Oh and thanks again for everyone's help on this!

My situation has taken an unexpected turn... Went into vodafone a couple of weeks ago and explained that the touchscreen had stopped working.
They tried to factory reset and do other things to fix it to no avail, so they sent it off to their repair centre to fix.
I received it back today, with a letter which stated that it was thoroughly tested and inspected, and that they found that the fault had been caused by water damage. They explained that water damage falls outside of the manufacturers warranty and they could not repair it.
They also sent a picture which helped to show the extent of the corrosion, which looked a bit nasty.
I turned on the phone anyway when i recieved it, and to my great surprise... it is working - apparently flawlessly.
So it is a happy ending - and has proved to me how badass this phone is

hazlynch said:
My situation has taken an unexpected turn... Went into vodafone a couple of weeks ago and explained that the touchscreen had stopped working.
They tried to factory reset and do other things to fix it to no avail, so they sent it off to their repair centre to fix.
I received it back today, with a letter which stated that it was thoroughly tested and inspected, and that they found that the fault had been caused by water damage. They explained that water damage falls outside of the manufacturers warranty and they could not repair it.
They also sent a picture which helped to show the extent of the corrosion, which looked a bit nasty.
I turned on the phone anyway when i recieved it, and to my great surprise... it is working - apparently flawlessly.
So it is a happy ending - and has proved to me how badass this phone is
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This has me worried haha. My SGS2 has recently took a bit of a bath as well. The phone worked perfectly fine after sitting off overnight drying out. However after about 3 days it started random hang up and shut offs. I sent it in to a repair center a week ago and i am just hoping for the best. I dont have high hopes that they will replace it as it was water damage but i suppose its worth a shot for a $600 phone.
If they dont replace/repair it i will be taking it apart and cleaning it in hopes that i can make it work.

Here is my old sgs2 after a dip in the ocean. No insurance either. What you guys think?
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