Database Users

Screen stopped working, then magically fixed itself

Ok weirdest **** ever just happened. Touch HD was working fine, all day, came home, pulled the phone out and the screen wouldnt respond, coudlnt unlock the screen. Looking at the screen carefully, I could see these "swirly marks", looked like water was underneath the screen, or moisture, and i could move it all around, it was all over the screen in small dots.
I was looking for another phone to put my sim in with no luck. Was just sitting here flashing my HD2 and i thought let me try again with the touch HD, and while booting, i noted the "swirly marks" had disappeared, and sure enough, the screen responded!
Any ideas? maybe i should trade it in while its still working!

i used to work in a phone repair shop and ive seen loads of phones that have been dropped in water and then been fine.
i dropped my old kaiser in a glass of milk and it stopped working, so i took it apart and cleaned it all with a small brush and some alcohol. put it back together and it worked fine.
but on the other hand ive seen phones that have been destroyed by simply keeping it in a pocket.
moisture can build up inside the phone because of humidity and the warmth of the phone and your leg etc...
when the phone dries again sometimes the residue of the evaporated liquid is non conductive and harmless and the phone works normally again.
if the phone is powered (most are on, duh) or the residue is conductive it can sometimes cause temporary malfunctions, that can be fixed by 'washing' the phone like i did with my kaiser, or it might have caused permanent hardware damage. then you have to get new parts for it.
so basically you were lucky. try to keep it out of the sauna
oh yeh, just to be safe check all the features of your phone like gps, wifi, camera, etc... try to keep your phone in less humid or cooler places, like your outside pockets on a jacket, and try to keep it somewhere where it can get cool fresh air

ah cheers for that! good timing too since i just replied to another topic with a similiar problem, maybe they can read this too
Maybe the hot weather had something to do with it, i dunno, it was in my jeans pocket!

unresponsive touchscreen?

My nexus 7 currently has an unresponsive touchscreen. Almost none of my touches are working now and yesterday the tablet was working just fine but some of the touches were not working. Now almost all the touches arent working, did the hardware just fail on me?

lovenokia said:
My nexus 7 currently has an unresponsive touchscreen. Almost none of my touches are working now and yesterday the tablet was working just fine but some of the touches were not working. Now almost all the touches arent working, did the hardware just fail on me?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here is what I posted yesterday on another thread, but short answer is that yes it's most probably hardware fault (I don't have picture at work, so can't attach it here).
I purchased my Nexus 7 from Staples during business trip to San Francisco. My device started having touch screen issues after few hours. Factory reset did fix it and I liked the device a lot so I didn't return it as I thought touch screen issue was just a SW glitch. Issue came back at the airport . Unfortunately I didn't have time to return the device at that point. Issue wasn't manifesting itself all the time, but seemed to come up every time I plugged the device in charger. Symptoms were exactly as in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVkvCXDKU2M and the other one in which multitouch is demonstrated. I suspected different applications as a reason to the problem as well as faulty charger. Then I found this thread and became assured that this must be a HW problem.
As I'm living in Finland and don't know when my next business trip to USA will take place I decided to try and fix the problem myself. I took off the back cover and touch screen worked perfectly. Initially I suspected grounding problem but pretty soon came to conclusion that it can not be the case. The problem in my case was the "sponge" pushing (what I assume is) display / touch flex. I have marked that in the attached picture. Even a very light touch to sponge caused touch screen to go crazy. As I don't have the luxury of immediate warranty repair I decided to remove the sponge and my Nexus 7 has been working flawlessly ever since. I can even charge and everything works as expected. When I started charging the device I placed my Nexus 7 on the table. It probably caused slightly increased pressure on back cover and therefore to "sponge". After removing the sponge I can't see any of the touch screen problems I was having. Couldn't be happier as I don't have any of the other problems people have found and device is working as it should, at least for now.
I don't encourage anyone to do what I did, but if you are in the same situation as I was with imported device, you can try to take off back cover and see if the problems are fixed. You should be very careful though not to break the device especially when it's powered on with back cover off. Hope this helps someone.
EDIT: 22.8.2012. Forgot to mention, that turn of WiFi if using device with back cover off. Turning off NFC and GPS won't hurt, although GPS is receiving only. Reason is that antennas are located on back cover.

[Q] Anyone else have touchscreen problems

My phone last week wasn't receiving texts so I restarted it and when it came back on the touchscreen no longer worked. The little white light would go on when I touched it so it knew where my finger was but any movement would not unlock the phone so I couldn't actually do anything with it. Sure enough a factory reset fixed the problem but I am still waiting for them to get me a new one in case the problem happens again to me. Anyone else have this happen to them or just a freak occurrence for me?

My son has gotten a hold of my s4 twice now since I have owned it. Both times I couldn't get the phone unlocked even though the touch screen was recognizing my touch. Restarting fixed it both times for me. Not sure if this is the same problem you are talking about, just thought I would share.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk 2

Happened to me a few times. Both screen swipes and the capacitive button presses werent registering. Happened on lock screen, call logs (swiping to call wasnt working), and swipe to answer. Pressing the home button and going back to the app fixed it. Very random but annoying nonetheless especially when not able to answer a call

Seems like buggy software to me. I've had a different issue, my phone says I have data, but I don't, I've had to restart the phone to properly pick up a data signal. This has happened twice now. Seems to be like Samsung's touchwhiz is quite buggy...

Yeah restarting it did nothing for me, tried many times, took the battery out put it back in all that stuff. The same thing happened with my data, I had a connection that entire time that I was not receiving texts but none of them actually went through which is when the problem began.
sam2c said:
Happened to me a few times. Both screen swipes and the capacitive button presses werent registering. Happened on lock screen, call logs (swiping to call wasnt working), and swipe to answer. Pressing the home button and going back to the app fixed it. Very random but annoying nonetheless especially when not able to answer a call
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What app were you able to get in to to fix it? Would like to know in case the problem happens again when they get me a new one.

This happened to me last night, about had a major freak out.
First I have a couple questions for all of you who had this issue, so maybe we can pinpoint the actual cause:
1. Did you get any type of moisture (even just a little condensation) anywhere on or around the phone? Mine started acting up after I accidentally put my phone on the coffee table where some condensation had formed from a drink being there previously.
2. Any of you drop your phone at all? Even just a minor drop...as the day before I had a little drop (maybe from a foot off the ground), but I do have a case.
The reason I ask is because I started having this issue immediately after the phone was put on the condensation. Don't know if that was the cause, though, because I'm not sure exactly which of the steps below actually fixed it.
First I had to identify the exact problem...which I found by turning on "show touches" in Developer Options within the settings menu. This brings up a little white dot on the screen any time it registers a touch. Sure enough, I was getting "ghost touches" on the top left corner of my screen every 30 seconds or so - and it would generally last for 10-30 seconds or until I turned my screen on and off (that would fix it temporarily). The ghost touch was causing my drop down menu to pull down slightly every once in awhile, as well as not registering any of my other touches (including capacitive buttons). I knew the screen itself wasn't broken, because any addition touches were registering via the white dot - they just weren't interacting with the UI.
After doing some research online, apparently there are a couple main reasons that this ghost touching could occur:.
1. Faulty digitizer. Obviously this would Suck, and I really hoped it wasn't the cause. To repair would mean replacing the entire screen, as apparently the digitizer is attached to the screen and would be very difficult to replace by itself.
2. Any kind of moisture, whether water, skin oil, etc, getting in the cracks of the phone and staying under the screen, causing the pressure to indicate a false touch. Possible repair options included putting the phone near a WARM (but not too hot) surface for a period of time to hopefully cause the moisture to evaporate. Also some people said it just evaporated on its own after a few days (again, I hoped I wouldn't have to resort to this as I'm impatient and don't want to be without my phone for that long lol).
3. Software issue. Possible fix includes toggling HW overlays and/or GPU rendering.
Here's what I did:
Took the phone apart completely, made sure there was no visible moisture anywhere (there wasn't). Intermittently blew the phone (from the back and front, while it was disassembled) with warm air from a blow dryer. Left it alone, disassembled, for about 30 minutes.
Put the phone back together, booted up, immediately went to developer Options and (a) disabled HW overlays and (b) DISABLED "Force GPU rendering" (I actually already had it enabled).
BOOM - problem was gone!
So like I said, I'm not sure which of those did the trick - or which problem I had to begin with - but I'd be interested to know if anyone else had similar issues and/or fixes?

sam2c said:
Happened to me a few times. Both screen swipes and the capacitive button presses werent registering. Happened on lock screen, call logs (swiping to call wasnt working), and swipe to answer. Pressing the home button and going back to the app fixed it. Very random but annoying nonetheless especially when not able to answer a call
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
CPA Poke said:
This happened to me last night, about had a major freak out.
First I have a couple questions for all of you who had this issue, so maybe we can pinpoint the actual cause:
1. Did you get any type of moisture (even just a little condensation) anywhere on or around the phone? Mine started acting up after I accidentally put my phone on the coffee table where some condensation had formed from a drink being there previously.
2. Any of you drop your phone at all? Even just a minor drop...as the day before I had a little drop (maybe from a foot off the ground), but I do have a case.
The reason I ask is because I started having this issue immediately after the phone was put on the condensation. Don't know if that was the cause, though, because I'm not sure exactly which of the steps below actually fixed it.
First I had to identify the exact problem...which I found by turning on "show touches" in Developer Options within the settings menu. This brings up a little white dot on the screen any time it registers a touch. Sure enough, I was getting "ghost touches" on the top left corner of my screen every 30 seconds or so - and it would generally last for 10-30 seconds or until I turned my screen on and off (that would fix it temporarily). The ghost touch was causing my drop down menu to pull down slightly every once in awhile, as well as not registering any of my other touches (including capacitive buttons). I knew the screen itself wasn't broken, because any addition touches were registering via the white dot - they just weren't interacting with the UI.
After doing some research online, apparently there are a couple main reasons that this ghost touching could occur:.
1. Faulty digitizer. Obviously this would Suck, and I really hoped it wasn't the cause. To repair would mean replacing the entire screen, as apparently the digitizer is attached to the screen and would be very difficult to replace by itself.
2. Any kind of moisture, whether water, skin oil, etc, getting in the cracks of the phone and staying under the screen, causing the pressure to indicate a false touch. Possible repair options included putting the phone near a WARM (but not too hot) surface for a period of time to hopefully cause the moisture to evaporate. Also some people said it just evaporated on its own after a few days (again, I hoped I wouldn't have to resort to this as I'm impatient and don't want to be without my phone for that long lol).
3. Software issue. Possible fix includes toggling HW overlays and/or GPU rendering.
Here's what I did:
Took the phone apart completely, made sure there was no visible moisture anywhere (there wasn't). Intermittently blew the phone (from the back and front, while it was disassembled) with warm air from a blow dryer. Left it alone, disassembled, for about 30 minutes.
Put the phone back together, booted up, immediately went to developer Options and (a) disabled HW overlays and (b) DISABLED "Force GPU rendering" (I actually already had it enabled).
BOOM - problem was gone!
So like I said, I'm not sure which of those did the trick - or which problem I had to begin with - but I'd be interested to know if anyone else had similar issues and/or fixes?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I should not have had any condensation at all on my screen when it began. I was using the phone playing with WatchOn and setting it up for my TV, I was messing with it for quite a while and realized after a period I hadn't received texts in a long time (I normally get at least 1 every 10 minutes, I was going on a hour and a half with 0) which I thought was weird so I restarted the phone.
When the phone came back online I did not notice the white dot pressing itself anywhere, but anytime I touched the screen it would immediately know where my finger was and follow it around, but not actually press anything. When I held the power button and the little Shutdown and Restart options came up, if I sat there and just pressed either one of them constantly they would eventually recognize that I pressed something and do that action.
I was also able to get into the homescreen by getting the talk option to come up and backing out of it (The buttons on the bottom of the screen all worked fine) but once in the homescreen I couldn't actually press any buttons regularly so gave up on it.
The guy at the ATT store said he hadn't seen any other complaints about it so I did a factory reset while there (I had already backed up everything with Kies) and when it came back on there seemed to be no problems.
Like I said though I am waiting for a new one anyway, they are backordered at my local store (Should have got a new batch in Friday, not sure where my phone is now) so hopefully the new one I get doesn't have this problem nor the lag problem a lot of people have been getting.

bmroczka said:
Yeah restarting it did nothing for me, tried many times, took the battery out put it back in all that stuff. The same thing happened with my data, I had a connection that entire time that I was not receiving texts but none of them actually went through which is when the problem began.
What app were you able to get in to to fix it? Would like to know in case the problem happens again when they get me a new one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just the stock Phone app. My problem seemed like a software problem more than anything else.
But if you have to restart the phone in order for the digitizer to respond, thats a different story. A swap should fix your issue, since it seems so uncommon.

[Q] Please Help me troubleshoot this S4 problem!

Argh! i just spent the last 20 mins typing up a post and lost it! So lemme try this again...
Ok long story short, I goofed and dropped my s4 into a cup of coffee. It was submerged about 1/3 of the phone , on the top portion of the phone. I removed it immediately, pulled the battery and used a small vacuum to suck out as much of the liquid from the phone before i opened it up. Im pretty good with these kinda projects and have fixed many a phone over the years for friends who busted their screens etc. I hadnt been inside an S4 before this though, so i approached with caution. I used alcohol and a lint free microfiber brush to clean off anything that had coffee on it. All and all everything went pretty smoothly. After cleaning i put the phone in a bag of rice and silica gel for a few hours then put it back together and turned it on. It loaded up quick as usual, everything was pretty normal. But suddenly the screen would stop responding to my touches for a few seconds, and then start working again. So i turned it off, took it apart again and dug a lil deeper. I cleaned off all the contacts for the ribbons, and anything else that had any kinda sticky coffee residue on it. I put it back in the bag last last night and opened it up today and reassembled it. Turned it on , and like magic, everything was great! well 99% great. The phone is acting like it always has,and no more screen unresponsiveness or anything like that. All except for a small sliver of the top of the screen under the Samsung logo. Just a tiny sliver of the screen doesnt respond to my touches, which is a big pain in my butt because its just enough to not be able to swipe down the pulldown menu, and in some games i play, i cant click anything thats on the very edge of the screen in landscape mode. The screen looks normal, no signs of damage like ive seen in other devices when digitizers become damaged etc. Just that tiny little line of screen wont pick up touches.
I only went so far as to taking out the mobo and looking underneath that. I know i can go deeper, and would have to if i needed to replace the digitizer, but before i go through all that, i figured id seek the advice of the XDA Gurus first. Is there possibly anywhere else that i missed cleaning out the junk a that could be causing the problem in that area? Ive been very careful thus far and everything is working accordingly, hell the headphone jack even works still and that thing was full of coffee!! And all the other problems after the initial cleaning have gone away,and im left with this little line of screen that wont read my touches!! So i must have done something right so far! Im hoping that maybe i just overlooked another possible place to clean up any leftover junk and then will get full function of my screen again. if not, then i guess ill be ordering a new digitizer sometime soon.
Thanks for your time, anyone who reads this. I hope to hear some good news *crosses fingers* soon, and get my phone working properly again.

I'm impressed. Not just in your skills but with the build of the S4. Coffee is highly acidic. I once tore apart a keyboard that my wife spilled coffee on. The coffee etched the traces right off the P.C. board. If the S4 survived coffee on the inside workings they use a pretty good coating. It is possible they missed a spot and the coffee got it.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk

Alert Slider Weirdness

I have noticed, maybe not from the very start (I don't remember, actually), that I often need to slide my alert slider all the way up and down before it would actually start to "react" and put my device into the desired state of alerts.
For example, I need to slide it all up, then down, before it would actually start to register the position I want it to be and put the phone in either 'vibrate' or 'silent' or 'normal' mode.
The thing is, after I do this and continue to slide it, there is absolutely no problem for it to register its position; it's only after I've not been using it for some time and only the first slide up or down, so I don't think it is HW-related but probably something SW. No, there are also no dust or particles in it, as I take extra care of my electronic devices and they are cleaned several times a day. Could it be kernel-related? (I use Kirisakura, but I noticed it with some others before too).

I've noticed this too couple of times. Putting the slider up does nothing. I slide it back down, nothing. Repeat two to three times and suddenly the phone starts responding, and goes trough all the modes when slider is moved. Came here to see if anyone else has had the same issues. Maybeit started with the last software update 10.5.11.IN11BA ? Stock kernel and ROM.

patchmefirm said:
I've noticed this too couple of times. Putting the slider up does nothing. I slide it back down, nothing. Repeat two to three times and suddenly the phone starts responding, and goes trough all the modes when slider is moved. Came here to see if anyone else has had the same issues. Maybeit started with the last software update 10.5.11.IN11BA ? Stock kernel and ROM.
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Click to collapse
Interesting, that's exactly the issue I'm having, no idea what it's coming from.

Facing the same issue...any solution?

Also noticed a few times...

Haven't had this although I only use mine once a night and at times not in the day..
Slider seems to be of solid design, probably the same as previous 1+ models which themselves have been of good quality..
Quite odd, could if be debris? Seems like a tiny place for debris to be lodged though..
Have you altered what the positions do by any chance?

dladz said:
Haven't had this although I only use mine once a night and at times not in the day..
Slider seems to be of solid design, probably the same as previous 1+ models which themselves have been of good quality..
Quite odd, could if be debris? Seems like a tiny place for debris to be lodged though..
Have you altered what the positions do by any chance?
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Click to collapse
Nope, it happened immediately after I bought it, or hours after I started using it. So I'm not sure what caused the problem: a bootloader unlock, a root, a module, an app, an update? Can't say. What I'm sure of, though, is that it's not dust or debris or physical damage to my unit (I'm quite fussy about my phones' cleanliness and they're completely covered by cases and screen protectors).
Never had this problem with my previous 1+ devices.

The issue went away with system update to version 10.5.12.IN11BA. So for me this issue was only present in the software version 10.5.11.IN11BA.

Surfeur-des-Reves said:
Nope, it happened immediately after I bought it, or hours after I started using it. So I'm not sure what caused the problem: a bootloader unlock, a root, a module, an app, an update? Can't say. What I'm sure of, though, is that it's not dust or debris or physical damage to my unit (I'm quite fussy about my phones' cleanliness and they're completely covered by cases and screen protectors).
Never had this problem with my previous 1+ devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If it's been happening since you got it then I'd have thought it's more than likely an actual fault..I'd have sent mine back.