Hello lovely people.
Not long ago, my wonderful Samsung Galaxy S2 dropped dead. Before I send it in for service, I would LOVE to get the data on the internal storage back.
The phone does not get hot while charging, and nothing else whatsoever makes it show sings of life.
Is it possible to swap out the internal storage chip from the motherboard, and place it on an another identical phone, and retrieve the data that way?
Any sort of tips for businesses that would do something like this is welcome!
As you can guess, I learned to back up my stuff the hard way. My last clockwork backup was 20 days ago. Precious 20 days ago
probability = 99,99% yes ... a SD-card no matter of where it was before. have good luck
psytr0nic said:
probability = 99,99% yes ... a SD-card no matter of where it was before. have good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And the deadly .01% is if the damaged part is the internal memory itself.
:good:
While emmc chip got like 20 important pads to solder (out of even hundred, when most are there being N/C) it is still BGA. A ****ass small BGA covered with glue. That would require someone really experienced with reworking such things. I do not know the prices but I would be prepared to pay even 100$ or more for such job, done right.
That from HW level. From SW+HW look: in theory there should be no trouble with properly swapped emmc ic from other phone. But you shall not forget about the said 0.01%, maybe more - reworking such chip might have influence on its content (I might be wrong) + GS2 had the emmc hardbrick bug - how did it die?
Please let us know how did it go.
Oh and btw - there must be companies working on such data recovery with proper HW to wire up to the unsoldered chip with sort of socket or other hackaround - I'd lookup there.
Max specified operating temperature of an eMMC is about 85 °C, there's no telling what happens above that... So whatever way you use to re-connect your eMMC, make sure it is not by soldering!
Of course it is possible but you need highly expensive tools for it to solder of the chip. it is BGA it's not just like a transistor..
It does have hundreds of micro balls under the chip. Did you try adb shell already? Or is it really 99% dead.
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You may find a company that can do it but it will cost A LOT of money. Because you need special tools for it.
Something like this
You best bet would be to try to use a heat gun on the main board. Just heat it up for a few seconds and cool it down to zero as quick as possible. Maybe the bga is cracked because it got hit by the ground when you accidentally dropped it. By heating it up you may temporarily fix this crack(will also cause slightly damage to the chips) in the soldering. So you can back it up and sent it back. I think it will void the warranty, but you have to decide for yourself what to do. Try to get back the data or get a new working main board from Samsung (if you sent the phone back they will just replace it with a new one most likely).
Bga soldering crack
0,1% of chance .. playing with Samsung EMMC chip = bye bye phone . look around forum or elsewhere 100% of bricked is due to it .
Question : what make you confident to say that your internal memory is good ?
to remind : it is also your phone flash chip which manage boot sequence and all . don't forget it .
Max specified operating temperature of an eMMC is about 85 °C, there's no telling what happens above that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course it is possible but you need highly expensive tools for it to solder of the chip
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
every time I tried with hot air , I removed chip with missing pads cause of glue under chip which make hard to remove .
why not to give a try ? have good luck
You best bet would be to try to use a heat gun on the main board
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Those are options you have instead of paying hundreds of euro's to a company that can recover it if it isn't the nand/emmc itself that is the dead part of the phone.
Of course i recommend him to go to a professional company and let them do recover it. Because they will do it the proper way but like i said before it cost you a lot of money.
So your best bet would be to try it yourself or just sent it back to Samsung for warranty.(by trying yourself i don't mean to solder it off because thet will not work out good. It will probably kill the chip, just try to reflow the mainboard and maybe you have luck.)
I know about glue in the corners of bga based chips in HP & Acer and other brands in laptops and such but didn't know that phones had that too.
But glue under the chip, never seen that before. And btw you cannot remove a bga soldered chip with a heatgun you need ir so that the whole surface under the chip gets loose. And you need to cover up all other components or they will get loose too or fry
Acer bga soldered chip -> glue in corners (this is not nand or emmc, its the chipset & cpu/gpu)
http://i.imgur.com/aIHNu.jpg
Irda soldering
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=RrA-trDZPNs#t=170s
Recovering data from snapped Galaxy s2 motherboard
Hi everyone, i really need some help
My galaxy s2 motherboard has snapped (around the long thin bit) with all other parts of the motherboard still intact. I really need to recover all of the data. The data has sentimental value and cannot be replaced. Is there any chance of recovering the data either through chip extraction and onto new board? Can the existing motherboard be fixed?
All i keep hearing is that it is too difficult, the motherboard is multi-layered and would be impossible to fix. I am reluctant to take this as an answer. Is there anybody out there that has a solution for recovering all the data? Who would i go to? who do i pay? Ive contacted samsung and they say it is impossible, when questioning them why it is impossible they state tit would cost too much and they cannot do it.
Please help. thank you.
EMMC reball and some other tips
Hey guys,
I know this thread is a little bit old but I'll try to give in my 2 cents maybe someone here may find it helpful
So I come from background where I do around 20 bga reballs per week, so I do know a thing or two I guess about this although my knowledge on Samsung platform is relatively low compared to an iphone logic.
So to begin with replacing the emmc chip alone is not enough as you'll need a programmer box which connects to a jtag interface which is able to rewrite the initial files like bootrom to the emmc. You can find these boxes at any prominent gsm repair shops; boxes named such as RiffBox or Z3X Samsung box are the best I found recently.
Having said that before any repair is attempted by mainly removing the flash chip it is imperative to try to resurrect the phone using these said boxes, to try to find whether or not the NAND chip is actually detected. As one may have simply installed a ROM which is not compatible with the phone and all that is required is to rewrite the bootrom files. If the NAND (basically the same name as a flash chip) fails to be detected then obviously something went wrong and it either could be the NAND is burnt inside, or the NAND has some cracks under its critical ball pins or even may be a problem that the main power management chip inside the phone is failing from supplying usually around 3V to power up the NAND.
The emmc chip at least found in a samsung is a 14 by 14 pins which only about 1/3 of it's pins are critical, the rest are dummy and do not worry if they eventually get removed, while removing the chip or cleaning the board after desoldering prior installing the new chip.
Some tips on reworking:
Always cover critical glued components like CPU + POP (package on package) RAM, baseband processor usually XGOLD found in Samsung.
Clean surrounding chip glue before attempting to remove by giving around 250C of heat and with a needle scratching the glue around
Do not exceed more than 350C to remove the actual chip to prevent more damage to the built in tracks inside the motherboard.
Last and not least a schematic for your phone would always be a lot of help to help you detect what voltages are missing on bootup to make sure that the boot up sequence is starting fine and also the relative points of each pin under a chip while knowing which pins are critical and which are dummies, or NC (not connected)
If you need any help you can always message me and I'll try my best to answer your questions.
Regards,
Ryan
solder with care
Solder with care mate, else it will be totally gone
psytr0nic said:
0,1% of chance .. playing with Samsung EMMC chip = bye bye phone . look around forum or elsewhere 100% of bricked is due to it .
Question : what make you confident to say that your internal memory is good ?
to remind : it is also your phone flash chip which manage boot sequence and all . don't forget it .
every time I tried with hot air , I removed chip with missing pads cause of glue under chip which make hard to remove .
why not to give a try ? have good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The glue in samsung is very easy to remove you just need to heat the board up to 250C and gently scratch the glued area with a needle. Do not worry on the removed pads as 1/3 of the pads under the EMMC are not connected and therefore not needed. Always clean the chip from the glue and use leaded solder for best shiny connections.
If you need any help you can always message me and I'll try my best to answer your questions.
Regards,
Ryan[/QUOTE]
Can you please explain more about JTAG.., types and the connections, how to get files for the different phones, where can we get the software etc. Thank you.:good:
richie16171 said:
If you need any help you can always message me and I'll try my best to answer your questions.
Regards,
Ryan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you please please explain more about JTAG.., types and the connections, how to get the files from different phones, where can we get the softare etc. Thank you.:good:[/QUOTE]
You will need special programmer boxes like riffbox to be able to rewrite the bootloader. JTAG is a dedicated space on the board where the riffbox will communicate with the phone.
AnArChYm said:
Can you please please explain more about JTAG.., types and the connections, how to get the files from different phones, where can we get the softare etc. Thank you.:good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You will need special programmer boxes like riffbox to be able to rewrite the bootloader. JTAG is a dedicated space on the board where the riffbox will communicate with the phone.[/QUOTE]
Thank you., what about the riffbox connections? Which pin to connect what and is it common to all devices?
richie16171 said:
You will need special programmer boxes like riffbox to be able to rewrite the bootloader. JTAG is a dedicated space on the board where the riffbox will communicate with the phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you., what about the riffbox connections? Which pin to connect what and is it common to all devices?[/QUOTE]
Edit: I already got the site. And everything is explained in forum there. If anyone wants.. you can find here http://faq.riffbox.org/showcat.html
Would like the learn how to reball
AnArChYm said:
Hey guys,
I know this thread is a little bit old but I'll try to give in my 2 cents maybe someone here may find it helpful
So I come from background where I do around 20 bga reballs per week, so I do know a thing or two I guess about this although my knowledge on Samsung platform is relatively low compared to an iphone logic.
So to begin with replacing the emmc chip alone is not enough as you'll need a programmer box which connects to a jtag interface which is able to rewrite the initial files like bootrom to the emmc. You can find these boxes at any prominent gsm repair shops; boxes named such as RiffBox or Z3X Samsung box are the best I found recently.
Having said that before any repair is attempted by mainly removing the flash chip it is imperative to try to resurrect the phone using these said boxes, to try to find whether or not the NAND chip is actually detected. As one may have simply installed a ROM which is not compatible with the phone and all that is required is to rewrite the bootrom files. If the NAND (basically the same name as a flash chip) fails to be detected then obviously something went wrong and it either could be the NAND is burnt inside, or the NAND has some cracks under its critical ball pins or even may be a problem that the main power management chip inside the phone is failing from supplying usually around 3V to power up the NAND.
The emmc chip at least found in a samsung is a 14 by 14 pins which only about 1/3 of it's pins are critical, the rest are dummy and do not worry if they eventually get removed, while removing the chip or cleaning the board after desoldering prior installing the new chip.
Some tips on reworking:
Always cover critical glued components like CPU + POP (package on package) RAM, baseband processor usually XGOLD found in Samsung.
Clean surrounding chip glue before attempting to remove by giving around 250C of heat and with a needle scratching the glue around
Do not exceed more than 350C to remove the actual chip to prevent more damage to the built in tracks inside the motherboard.
Last and not least a schematic for your phone would always be a lot of help to help you detect what voltages are missing on bootup to make sure that the boot up sequence is starting fine and also the relative points of each pin under a chip while knowing which pins are critical and which are dummies, or NC (not connected)
If you need any help you can always message me and I'll try my best to answer your questions.
Regards,
Ryan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi Ryan,
My son's galaxy s3 i9300 was inadvertently given a spin in the washing machine. When I realised what had happened I took it apart into its various components and put it in rice for a week. When I switched it on everything worked except the cell phone signal. From what I can gather the eMMC chip has been damaged and no software can fix it. I don't have it with me now but I think IMEI and baseband is unknown. The EFS folder is empty or corrupt.
Stumbling across your post I was interested in the fact that you seem to be an expert in re-balling. My son has since got a new phone and since I am a basic amateur in phone repair (for family and friends) I have been toying with the idea of replacing the eMMC chip on the s3 after watching this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s38vQxXv0GE
I don't mind if I buy the chip and it doesn't work I am more intent on gaining the experience and going through the stages. Do you think this is a good idea and do you have any tips or things I can research on the topic?
Yiannos
---------- Post added at 07:30 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:14 AM ----------
Sorry I meant this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ds04BTVL8i0&feature=youtu.be
yiannos50 said:
Hi Ryan,
My son's galaxy s3 i9300 was inadvertently given a spin in the washing machine...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi,
If the imei is available (null), it could be the case that it needs repairing rather than actually chaging the eMMC chip , however you'll need a special tool to do this, which honestly do not know which exactly is as I'm more into hardware repairs rather than software.
Another possible issue could be that the phone can also have corrosion around critical components, ie around the main baseband supply, which is stopping from the baseband switch on, thus no signal or any radio communication from starting up. It would be best to have a microscope and inspect each part of the board for bad components, rather than rushing to the eMMC replacement.
It's very important to read this post very carefully and understand it as it is not easy to be done, but it is very much possible. And find a lot of youtube videos before even trying so you'll be more familiar with the process and different techniques.
Anyways for the most interesting part
Basically the eMMC chip is a 14 by 14 bga, ball grid array chip which is fairly easy to reball comapred to other complex ones, like baseband processor or the main application processor, You'll also be needing a reballing stencil to put the balls on top of the solder pins, and solder paste to paste the solder onto the holes and a hot air gun to melt that solder into balls. (Basically the solder paste will melt between those holes inside the stencil and will form nice silverish balls.
The chip also has got a lot of not connected pads (aka dummy pads) so do not worry when removing the chip as you'll be more then likely to lift pads from the board especially if this your first reball job.
First of all, you'll need to clean the surrounding glue around the chip by using around 200C and with a needle scrape off the glue, be very gentle not to scrape any tracks or board layers.
Then to remove the chip from the board use around 350C (always ramping up the temp), very important to use kapton tape around the surroundings to reduce heat stress. Personally I use the following temperatures: (do not use any nozzle with the heat gun as the chip is large and you need the heat to dispersed all over the chip)
1st min 180C full air
2nd min 280C full air
4th min 350C full air until the surrounding components turn silverish and are easy to lift, at that time get a very sharp needle and gently (very gently) start to pry up with ease the chip from one side, until it is fully lifted.
Then you'll need to clean the board, basically put flux and with a fine tip soldering iron clean the pads gently until all underfilled glue is no more remaining and the pads are nice and shiny and set the board aside.
If you'll buy a new eMMC chip most probably you'll have it reballed from the supplier. If not pre reballed, you ll need to reball it using a reballing stencil and solder paste.
Finally align back the eMMC chip over the board in the correct way, always note where is pin A1 and solder it back by ramping up heat again, same process as removing the chip.
The last process is all based on software, basically you'll have to copy the bootloader from a good working S3 phone to this one, as the new eMMC chip is empty of data, and obviously without the bootloader so the phone wouldn't be able to switch on.There is a process somewhere on the net how this is exactly done.
Ryan
Ryan,
Thanks a million for setting me on the right path. I'll let you know what happens.
Yiannos
Data recovery - Siemens A31
Hello everyone,
this thread seems to be what I've been looking for. My Siemens A31 got some water from a torrential rain while it was on. When I got to removing the battery, the phone was already off. I dried all accessible parts but I did not have the necessary torx screwdriver, so some water stayed inside. It was Friday evening and I got the screwdriver no earlier than on Monday. There was some corrosion in the phone, of course. It could not be turned on and subsequent cleaning with alcohol and even ultrasound improved only the look of the main board, but not its behavior. The only sign of life was that it seemingly recharged the battery while connected to the charger.
I have asked several repair services and people and I am quite confused whether it is possible to recover the data by soldering the memory chip into another A31, a functioning one of course. Last time, I asked a laptop service and I was told it is impossible, not just because of the difficulty of soldering a BGA chip. They told me it would not work because the phone would get blocked due to IMEI mismatch! This was surprising for me. If it is true, it implies that the IMEI is stored in both the flash memory and some other chip. I was unable to find any evidence for such a claim on the Internet.
Can anyone tell me if the target phone with replaced flash memory will actually work, assuming the memory is functioning? The video referred to by yiannos50 suggests it may really work. Anyone else has tried it? Two people in this discussion were about to do so.
Hi guys!I'm not sure that I'm posting this threat in the right section, but i didn't find any other related to hardware.
I have a little problem with my galaxy s2....it overheats - a lot.After trying all official roms from 2.3.5 to 4.1.2 i know that it's a hardware issue.I gave it to a local service repair centre and they told me that the "power managment chip" has bursted and the damage is beyond rapair,but the phone charges up normally and I am able to use it.....probably they are wrong;
So I have a second galaxy which I can use as a donor, could you tell me where is this "power managment chip" located?Also, is the CPU built into the motherboard or it is just "plugged into" and can be "plugged out" ?Perhaps i should try changing the cpu first and see if the heating stops..........or directly replace the whole motherboard...?
I am attaching a pic of my phone with detailed explanation of my problem; PLS post your opinions!
umex said:
...I gave it to a local service repair centre and they told me that the "power managment chip" has bursted and the damage is beyond rapair,but the phone charges up normally and I am able to use it.....probably they are wrong;
So I have a second galaxy which I can use as a donor, could you tell me where is this "power managment chip" located?Also, is the CPU built into the motherboard or it is just "plugged into" and can be "plugged out" ?Perhaps i should try changing the cpu first and see if the heating stops..........or directly replace the whole motherboard...?
I am attaching a pic of my phone with detailed explanation of my problem; PLS post your opinions!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My opinions. Power management chips typically control charging and voltage regulation for other components and the system. The CPU (and I'd suppose most integrated circuits (ICs) on the board seem to be SMD (surface mounted device) type components, they look like BGAs (ball grid arrays). They are flow soldered on the board and the solder joints are located underneath the chips. So, manually resoldering them is .. well ... impossible? The solder bumps are between the chip's underside and board top side You can imagine that for manual re-solder, taking into consideration the scale of the components.
When service shops fix phones, if they need to, I suppose mostly they just replace the whole phone as it is easier. If they indeed do repair, the change whole modules, like mother board as one part. Even then it is difficult to find all the small connectors and loose them and re-insert the new mb.
My take on this would depend on the scale of heating. If you feel like wanting to try a repair, first identify exactly which IC is heating up too much. Then proceed from there. Due to small scale of things, even such analysis is total PITA But you wanted to, I understood.
Finally, I would simply buy a new phone or put up with heating. In latter case, take care when charging and otherwise, never to leave your phone unattended as it may in the worst case catch fire.
tapiov said:
My opinions. Power management chips typically control charging and voltage regulation for other components and the system. The CPU (and I'd suppose most integrated circuits (ICs) on the board seem to be SMD (surface mounted device) type components, they look like BGAs (ball grid arrays). They are flow soldered on the board and the solder joints are located underneath the chips. So, manually resoldering them is .. well ... impossible? The solder bumps are between the chip's underside and board top side You can imagine that for manual re-solder, taking into consideration the scale of the components.
When service shops fix phones, if they need to, I suppose mostly they just replace the whole phone as it is easier. If they indeed do repair, the change whole modules, like mother board as one part. Even then it is difficult to find all the small connectors and loose them and re-insert the new mb.
My take on this would depend on the scale of heating. If you feel like wanting to try a repair, first identify exactly which IC is heating up too much. Then proceed from there. Due to small scale of things, even such analysis is total PITA But you wanted to, I understood.
Finally, I would simply buy a new phone or put up with heating. In latter case, take care when charging and otherwise, never to leave your phone unattended as it may in the worst case catch fire.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Right.....so if I replace the whole motheboard with the one from the other device, it should boot up, right?It's exactly the same phone, but with broken screen
umex said:
Right.....so if I replace the whole motheboard with the one from the other device, it should boot up, right?It's exactly the same phone, but with broken screen
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can test it, yes, and I suppose there's good possibility that it will boot. But there's bigger possibility that you fail to change it correctly, missing a connector, breaking a fragile part etc. But sure, go ahead and try. Tell us how you managed, possibly take close-up photos of the process so that others can follow it. Or at least make a example how not to do things
Hi!
I'm new on this forum, and really happy to join the community.
I bought a Galaxy Tab A SM-T550 for my daughter, and I discover that there is no gyro/compass/magnetometer sensor that prevent using some apps.
After some cry, I decided to look for a DIY solution.
After some research, I found that some Android compass sensors have a I2C interface (e.g. AK8975) (sorry I can't post links yet).
I also found Android linux kernel drivers for this sensor.
As I have professional soldering skills/tool (even for BGA), and good Linux / kernel / driver skills, but nothing on Android (except modifying small programs and follow tutorial to install custom roms), I'm wondering if it is feasible to simply solder this sensor to the Galaxy Tab Mother board and directly have the compass feature in Android apps.
The requested actions I identified:
1. identify and order the sensor
2. Identify the I2C bus on Galaxy Tab A motherboard, plus power and ground signals
3. Identify a place to solder the sensor without risk to prevent casing mounting
4. Solder
5. be sure that the stock kernel supports this driver
6. Be sure that the driver is embedded in the kernel or the module is loaded
I'm wondering if someone with android and hardware experiences could help me to:
- tell me if this idea is totally crazy or seem feasible
- tell me if I identify the good tasks
- to find informations for some of the tasks (specially locate the I2C bus on motherboard)
- maybe propose another solution.
Thanks a lot!
Laurent.
In two years I have been the only other person sufficiently annoyed to look up something along these lines. I don't have your level of skill so I guess it would be pretty crazy for me to attempt this. I really wish they would have done something about this though, they have them in all phones so why not put them in tablets? They have more space to fit them in and I don't think they are hugely expensive.