My phone seems to have caught a case of sudden death. There's no response to any hardware buttons, no download mode, nothing. That part I've given up fixing.
Being a smart user(I like to think so), I've got backups of my backups, including my EFS partitions, from TWRP.
I'm going to fix my phone by taking the logic board out of a broken screen phone I buy on eBay, but the seller isn't sure about the ESN status of the phone and hasn't responded to my messages. (seems fishy to me too)
In the event I do buy it and he is a dishonest seller and *illegally* sells me a stolen phone, but disappears off the face of the earth after I buy it so I can't get a refund... His profile has him listed as a top rated seller, but just in case...
Long story short, if I do end up stuck with a bad ESN/IMEI after all this, what would I be able to do to change the IMEI to the old, dead logic board's number? Would it be as simple as reflashing the EFS, or would that cause other problems?
Look guys, I know typically it is illegal to change an IMEI, blah blah, but I've done my research and (in the USA) you can legally do it if you own both devices, and you will never be using the "donor" device again. Seeing as it's broken, it certainly can't be used again.
I've seen some horror stories about data in particular and I can reflash it comfortably, I just need to know if there's any device specific issues with reflashing the EFS like on Samsung devices.
Related
Hello,
I fell in the not-so-rare problem of the broken microUSB female plug on the motherboard of my HD2: the phone won't charge or sync at all.
After searching around, I found that quite a few people have gone into my same trouble, because the sync plug is directly soldered on the mainboard and is also the phone part that gets most of mechanic stress during the device's lifecycle.
In a few words: seems that almost all phones will eventually break.
I tried with HTC repair but they refused to repair it both under warranty and under paid repair.
I don't want to throw away my phone after I spent 550€ for it!!! I would like to find a way to revive it!
I currently have two options:
Replace motherboard by myself or with the help of an expert technician
Buy a Powermat charger to charge the phone again
Third option could be buying a Chinese external charger I found somewhere supplied with 3 spare batteries, doing cold swap of each battery when one discharges: not a smart option.
I can't currently find a motherboard for replacement, since the only one on eBay that the seller doesn't refuse to ship to Italy is software-bricked, and I don't have the tools needed to unbrick it.
Option 2 allows me to avoid opening the phone and avoid potential disasters, but it won't allow me to sync the phone via USB. Not even to HSPL it (I love running Android dual boot sometimes when I need to run a certain program unavailable for WP6.5/7).
So, since I really need to synchronize the phone with my computer's Outlook for Calendar and Contacts, and after telling you about my current options, what do you suggest me to do?
Do you think it's possible to sync to WMDC using Bluetooth? (I read that wifi is not an option)
Or, do you know how could I unbrick a motherboard without buying expensive devices? I can travel easily around my country.
I'm open to almost any idea, thank you!!Buying a new phone at its brand-new price is not an option
what reason did HTC give for refusing to repair it?
If you didn't drop it or spill water on it how can they refuse warranty on it?
Warranty refused because they say the defect is unrepairable.
Initially, when they refused warranty repair I thought "OK, it could be wear..." but when I saw the photos of how the plug is soldered to the mobo, I found it's a design disaster!!!! Even I know that the plug accumulates so much mechanical energy during lifetime that if it's not strengthened properly that energy will make the very small solderings crash. This is also why keys are not physically embedded on the mobo!!! You know you could break the keyboard because of wear
HTC then asked me to send the phone for paid repair but again the repair lab refused for unrepairable damage!! Incredible!!!
this is bull****.
If it's "unrepairable" they need to send you a new phone...
I'd call back, that's why there's a warranty, for stuff like this.
I've been "calling back" since April... we are now in July and nothing yet happened
Also, I just found that plugging the battery again and doing a hard reset shown that the touchscreen is not working anymore!!!!
I couldn't even sell the phone for spare parts once the digitizer is broken (by the way, not even a single broken pixel ever!!)
They sent me a mail today, "we are investigating"
djechelon said:
I've been "calling back" since April... we are now in July and nothing yet happened
Also, I just found that plugging the battery again and doing a hard reset shown that the touchscreen is not working anymore!!!!
I couldn't even sell the phone for spare parts once the digitizer is broken (by the way, not even a single broken pixel ever!!)
They sent me a mail today, "we are investigating"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ya HTC can be so stupid about that sometimes. It's funny on Sprint they would have switched out the phone no questions asked, but with GSM they don't want to do anything for you.
whatever that means I hope they do the right thing.
djechelon said:
I've been "calling back" since April... we are now in July and nothing yet happened
Also, I just found that plugging the battery again and doing a hard reset shown that the touchscreen is not working anymore!!!!
I couldn't even sell the phone for spare parts once the digitizer is broken (by the way, not even a single broken pixel ever!!)
They sent me a mail today, "we are investigating"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Man it sounds like HTC is giving you a load of crap, sucks to hear stories such as yours. HTC should just exchange your HD2 for you in m,y opinion.
You asked about how to get a main board debricked, I just sent you a PM with some information on that.
Oh and "we are investigating", just what is it to investigate. Your HD2 is malfunctioning because of a hardware issue and is still under warranty, they should replace it.
I like your avatar pic too it is cool.
Just to tell you what it finished like.
HTC ultimately replied me "this device won't ever be accepter for repair".
I called a lawyer for that, because I just found that when I powered the phone on, the touchscreen was gone, and I have proof that the touchscreen was still working when I gave them the phone
................................................................................
So my awesome Venue Pro with an already sketchy battery is giving me trouble.
It has only happened lately. I'll turn on the phone from standby in order to, well, use the phone. But 95% of the time, the screen will within a split second go black, showing nothing on it. Funny thing is, every key works and illuminates and you can even interact with the touchscreen as I noticed it made sounds previously when I just started moving my finger along the screen, same with powering it back on when it likes to actually show what's on the screen and it'll be on a totally different app or screen itself.
Because I bought it on eBay, Dell, very ignorantly, is refusing to even deal with me in regards to warranty despite the phone being manufactured this year, so I'm hooped for sending it in at all for repairs.
If the touchscreen technically "works", then what could be the problem?
Thanks for your help, guys.
You might want to google something like "dell ownership transfer." Seems to me there was a way to transfer the original warranty term to another person. If you can get in contact with your ebay seller, he may be able to help you out.
Short of replacement, I say the first thing you should try is opening it up and making sure all the cables are connected internally.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1297315
The next step will either be re-flashing the original stock 7.0.7004 rom in hopes that it's a software problem (unlikely if you ask me,) or ordering another DVP off ebay and swapping parts until you have diagnosed the problem.
That's the issue- My eBay dealer didn't actually buy the phone himself. He took them as a donation for his not-for-profit business so the proof of ownership is pretty much MIA.
I'm starting to believe the backlight is failing or something close to that. Possibly due to the slider being used? Not any more often than someone else would use it, though. I looked at the disassembly guide and it's something nearly impossible with my lack of tools or understanding.
I'm pretty much hooped then?
Wow, shady. I bet he took advantage of and offer like this and then just sold the phone for profit.
http://forums.techsoup.org/cs/commu...ected-with-donated-smartphones-from-dell.aspx
I can't think of any other ideas personally. Selling it off for parts seems to me like the best course. If you decide to do this, you should wipe your phone with a soft reset as you normally would when selling this phone (in settings > about > more > reset my phone.) If what you're experiencing is a software problem (which, again, I very much doubt) this might fix it. If not, your personal data is gone, and you're ready to sell it.
You may want to let the other forum members weigh in on this, but I don't think there's going to be an easy fix that doesn't involve disassembly.
I have attempted a reset + restore and whatnot, so most likely it would be a disassembly issue then.
The issue with me taking it apart would be that I'd probably do more damage that way lol.
This may be an obvious and stupid question but I looked everywhere but couldn't find an answer to this.
I have a defective charger (bent at the tip) that keeps falling out of my phone when trying to charge it. The charger has to be OEM because my case is really tight and only fits the OEM ones, which are, shockingly, not on eBay or Amazon.
I never got around to calling Google until now. Today I have discovered that they have a policy that, if I want a replacement charger (free under warranty), I need to send in my phone and start over with a new one, which I think is ridiculous.
I of course have my phone's apps, data, and everything backed up with titanium, but I still prefer Nandroid for obvious reasons. If I get a new phone, would there be a difference in hardware or device ID that would make the CWM backup not work on a new Nexus 4 of the exact same model?
Thanks in advance!
P.S. If they find out the bootloader's unlocked, phone's Cyanofied, blah blah crap, would they bother replacing it? Or would they even look?
Hello,
I had my phone water damaged and repaired, but now my WCDMA/LTE doesn't work and I have some suspicions they had a faulty repair on my phone. Here's a timeline of the events to understand why"
1. Bought I9505 (I live in europe, hence the european version). All worked fine, had HSDPA (no 4g when I bought it 2 years ago, since my carrier didn't support it yet).
2. Did a small dent in the phone's screen (cracked glass in the upper corner, near proximity sensor, tiny piece of glass missing [1mm], but touch screen worked fine)
3. Dropped it in water while on vacation. Quickly took out battery, bought a bag of rice and held it in rice for ~20h, hoping the water would be absorbed.
4. Next day I fully charged then turned on my phone, it was connected to 3g, I was receiving facebook notifications, my mother called me at one point and ringtone was working. The only problem: touch screen didn't respond at all so I couldn't answer or unlock my screen.
5. Took it to a local service, they changed my screen (and did a full reset on my phone that I wasn't asked permission for - that I didn't understand why, but I thought who knows, maybe they needed it for the screen change). However, I wasn't upset since I was more interested in getting my touch screen to work, and it did.
6. HERE's THE PROBLEM: yes, they fixed my touch screen, but now i have to use it only in "GSM only" network mode, since the others don't work: whenever I choose any of the other options ("WCDMA/GSM, WCDMA only, WCDMA/GSM/LTE"), I lose signal completely, and I get "Not registered on network" message when trying to call. I should mention that APN setting are correct and I tried the SIM in another phone and it worked. I also tried another SIM in my phone and it didn't work.
7. Somehow I thought it might've been the water damage and I was ok (although upset) with it. But I searched the internet for answers since I thought maybe I'd fix my phone due to a software/bad config problem. I used ODIN to flash different versions of official firmwares with no success.
8. HERE's WHY I'm SUSPICIOUS: I found some piece of information that said the LTE/WCDMA(data) module is embedded in the display, not in the motherboard. Upon further research, i found the USSD code *#2663# that tells me the display is from a SGH-I337 (S4 model used in the US). Thus, if the data module truly is embedded in the display, that would render my data service useless, since the US frequency is not the same with EU frequency.
What do you guys think ?
Is it truly the display's fault or did I get erroneous information regarding the WCDMA/LTE ?
Am I entitled to negotiate with them because they put an incompatible component on my phone for a partial refund or is this my phone's fault ?
Is there any way to force the frequency somehow so my phone works (rooting & modifying some modem files maybe) ?
I'm sorry if I had some presumtious/loaded questions, but it's all information that I had from the internet.
Thank you for your patience to read all of this.
Do us a favor please? Enter download mode (Volume -, Home, Power) and read off the model number listed there. Reason being that I suspect your phone was totally replaced, with an AT&T model.
Did that just now, the product name says GT-I9505. The IMEI is also the same as before (checked with the product packaging it came with when I bought it). Could they have any way to overwrite this stuff ? Because your knack is not unfounded - under the battery, the IMEI/SN sticker seems to have been peeled and re-glued since it's wrinkly and misaligned.
Worst part is they're authorized Samsung service partners, that's the reason I went to them and not another service. (I can find them on the samsung website, when looking for service locations)
It sounds like they simply moved your motherboard into an AT&T midframe. I'd take it back to them posthaste and have them fix it properly. Because LTE isn't working, and it was before they did their work, they are responsible.
I've installed Cyanogenmod 13, didn't backup EFS and phone doesn't have correct IMEI when I use stock ROM.
so, I sent my device to Samsung service center, hoping they fix it
they called me today saying that they need to change the motherboard because there's no other way to fix IMEI, and they want 220$ at least.
are they correct?
Maybe ?
What is the issue with your phone ? Why did they need to replace the motherboard ?
Yes, OP, they will have to change that motherboard in an official service center. GSMA rules currently forbid changing the IMEI of GSM terminals.
You'll get a new motherboard, with a new IMEI and a new IMEI sticker on the back of your phone.
Alternatively, you can take it to a shop that has a Z3X-box/Octoplus box, and have it flashed with a new IMEI. Should be ~$10.
This happened to me back when I had a Note 3.
changing IMEI is illegal, but $220 is so dang expensive for a motherboard. You can say yes to samsung, or you can buy another phone with broket screen (same model) then swap the motherboard...
Seems I'm lucky to live in a place full of hackers and pirates xD
I found several shops that use z3x box, will try to look for the lowest price offer