yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
If you have VTU00M fwrev 0xf1 flash, you are probably at risk.

See here : http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=36242694&postcount=1881

if it's the 16gb version with a vulnerable eMMc just pray mate .

you mean "the rom you're working with" , actually till now there is no official statement from Samsung and no cause/effect related to a software bug causing the SDS . Thank you for your feed back , could you please install emmc check app (it's free) and post your actual eMMC chip info .
[Galaxy S III General] Egan:
My SGS3 died today. It wasnt charging, it was on the table of the livingroom and I was watching the telly. I was thinking about texting a friend of mine and turned the screen on but decided to wait and turn the screen back off. Then half an hour later I wanted to use the phone again and it was dead as a stone, nothing worked to give me a slightest signal of life. This is the info of the phone on the back: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0Bz0UYx8a8nvPOEFONjlZUnNwN28 (wish I could add eMMC chip info etc, but its too late for that).

Furtermore:

- Bought it the 19th of July (which is 171 days)

- 16GB version international version.

- It wasnt lagging or anything before SDS.

- Wasnt hot or warm before SDS.

- I did root the phone (used Triangle Away though :p)

- CWM flashed

- Running CM 10.1

- Always used stock charger.

So I didnt even make the 200+ days and now I need to send it for repair. Not amused, also had a motherboard issue with one of my previous phones the HTC Desire. I hope my next phone will cause no trouble at all :).

Follow up

Ok my device is sent for repair to Samsung. The repair center told me its a known problem and I probably receive a new one. I hope that new one will be a 32GB version and not the same 16GB version, cause that would mean another ticker. I'll have it back in 12 days .
[Galaxy S III General] jay_m3:
Here it is sir
[Galaxy S III General] philicom:
I agree but maybe they think it's a fix but not totally sure, for instance if they claim it's fixed and more sudden deaths occur would be a PR disaster.

Only time will tell. I have had my phone for about 160 days still going strong for now I'm a really heavy user, always charge overnight and I wont install the new bootloader until any official confirmation.
[Galaxy S III General] masterex567:
Mine is exactly the same..

Starting to worry. :/

---------- Post added at 01:43 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:42 AM ----------

Get a screenshot of the app emmc brickbug check please
[Galaxy S III General] krisse5844:
Here is my info ?

What do think guy's?

On stock 4.1.1

Int. Phone
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
Thanks for the screenshot , you seem to have the "alleged" faulty eMMC.. , your phone seems to be ok though . I wish you all the best mate , avoid overnight charging...I don't know if it's really relevant but avoid it . Good luck .
[Galaxy S III General] anibalk8:
Well it looks like i'm out of risk. i have MAG4FB | FwReV: 0xf1
[Galaxy S III General] Egan:
Its not relevant, see my previous post a page back. Happened while laying on the living room table.
[Galaxy S III General] alformiga:
My S3 16GB just died yesterday....It lived only 5 months...
[Galaxy S III General] jay_m3:
I used to make an overnight charging all the time and nothing happend:D

And even if it happens i won't bother and my s3 can go to hell :D its just phone
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
@jay_m3

Where phone was made ?

Where battery was made ?

@Egan

Thank you for sharing you experience .
[Galaxy S III General] jay_m3:
China
[Galaxy S III General] masterex567:
I have been reading a few pages back.

I have the 16gb one and the faultu emmc chip. Gone through soft bricks and all no problems

Phone is working fine. Been 74 days.

Battery is made in Korea assembled in Vietnam.

I do overnight charging.

Have XXELLA bootloader.

Any steps I should do to avoid the sudden death
[Galaxy S III General] milkobgd:
I've noticed on my s3 sometimes when I unlock the screen, for a short time I see a blue screen (like bsod on pc) but wery short time like part of second. did any of you noticed something like this and is this a siptom of sds on s3?

thanks.
[Galaxy S III General] Dean-xXx:
Do you have the ink effect on lockscreen? If yes , i remember that one old version had that problem...
[Galaxy S III General] jvc73:
That happens to me too however linking that to sd would be pure speculation.

It is probably just a bug.
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
no further steps ...maybe get the latest kernel too and don't forget to back up occasionally to avoid any data loss

are you using a custom rom or any UI customization ? Check your lock screen effects !

I've never seen something like that , it might be related to a faulty screen or like you said it's a symptom of the SDS .
[Galaxy S III General] masterex567:
Switched to stock kernel.

Phones got lag now..
[Galaxy S III General] krisse5844:
Somebody ? Sorry for hurry up ...:crying:
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
@krisse5844

Sorry to bring up the bad news but yes your emmc is vulnerable

http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=36242694&postcount=1881
[Galaxy S III General] krisse5844:
Thx ! :crying::crying::(
[Galaxy S III General] masterex567:
So incase I do hit the sds.

Does Samsung check whether device is Rooted etc? Or that red exclamation mark on top left corner?
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
God forbid your device sleeps for ever , and you can't boot it up (no download mode and no bootloader mode) your self , samsung care center guys can't either and you will get a replacement (and maybe a 32gb mobo) , a lot of xda user reported that .

to be safe use triangle away app to get rid of the exclamation mark . good luck.
[Galaxy S III General] masterex567:
Triangle away works with new bootloader?

I thought you must have stock recovery and stock rom for the mark to go.

Ill try going to old bootloader through the ota method
[Galaxy S III General] RectorReflector:
long snowitho

C'mon guys! Why don't you read through this thread before posting questions or non relevant info? I'm starting to get nervous of reading the same questions over and over (and over) again.

:eek:
[Galaxy S III General] joanquro:
Happenning here too. Since I flashed Omega V36 and new bootloader.

Enviado desde mi GT-I9300 usando Tapatalk 2
[Galaxy S III General] dzigy:
Same here, and my motherboard was replaced for sudden death.. heee.. my phone died after five months of use and probably it will die again :D
[Galaxy S III General] stetman:
sudden death

Happened to me.

I-9300 16gb

Stock 4.1.1

Bought in June

Charging overnight with original wall charger, found dead in the morning.

Sorry no more details as i can't access phone anymore
[Galaxy S III General] lukaaa47:
It's funny how there is no new reports of the death, like everyone updated new firmware /bootloader on release date.
[Galaxy S III General] milkobgd:
It happened ti me with stock rom only rooted with cf root 6.4 and now on coocked xlla (but old bootloader). And I don't know what is that ink effect on lock screen you are referring to.
[Galaxy S III General] 80000037:
Link please...

#facepalm .. lol....

You're totally a joker man.. hahahaha...

I also flash Omega 36, but not the bootloader. Dunno... just not sure yet with the new bootloader..
[Galaxy S III General] xufos:
What happened

The phone is NOT connected to charger. Before I go to sleep I set an alarm at 5 AM. This morning I can hear the alarm triggered at 5 AM, but the screen remain blank. I swipe my finger from bottom-middle to the right, the alarm stop, and the screen turned on. I press the power button and the phone locked as usual. That is the last time I see my phone alive. Now it cannot be turned it on. It's dead. I'm sure there is 50% charge, remove battery, sim card, memory card, tried charger but the phone is still remain dead.

Where phone was made

International GT-I9300 16gb Pebble Blue. Made in South Korea. Bought June 2012 (6 months 1 week).

Where battery was made

Made in Korea

Can you access download mode?

Nope

What firmware you were running

ROM: CyanogenMod 10.1 official nightlies. Build Jan 3, 2013 (cm-10.1-20130103-NIGHTLY-i9300)

Kernel: SiyahKernel S3 v1.8.6

Modem: XXELL4 (modem only, not bootloader)

Recovery: ClockworkMod Touch v6.0.2.7

Internet: Connected to wifi in wireless-n mode (mobile data off)

OV or UV

UV -50ma

I read few post in this thread that said the phone is dead during the night. I wonder if anyone else here got the same situation as mine, because of the alarm?
[Galaxy S III General] sak500:
There is no definite reason of what causes SDS. Some were on charger overnight, some were not on charger overnight, some were on table like mine in the afternoon, some with alarm, some without alarm, some in pocket, some in bed, some in toilet, some on stock, some on custom, some stock with custom kernel, some with custom and stock kernel. Only GOD knows what's causing SDS.

My replacement is 1.5 and still last 2 days it's conked off and i had to press power for 10 secs to make it boot up. I'm on XELLA but old bootloader. I dont think the s**tty bootloader is any cure for samsung's crap quality control on 16gb models. As you can see from the poll i started in the link in my signature about 49% of 132 users who polled have had their 16gb get SDS.

As bad as RROD on xbox360.
[Galaxy S III General] drakester09:
The poll is flawed, most of the users that haven't experienced SDS will not vote. ;)

Meanwhile the users that did have the flaw are more likely to vote.

Even then, the number is quite high... it's concerning but I feel this thread is a much more contundent message that something is wrong.
[Galaxy S III General] RSRivers:
I had my phone charging overnight, i woke up got to my car and made a call, then I locked the screen and went to work. After 5 minutes I arrived and was going to check the time. The phone didn't respond to home screen or power button, I tried to remove the battery, charge the phone tried to go to download and recovery modes but the phone is just a brick.

The phone was 16GB model manufactured in Brazil and was running stock JB from samsung.

I dont know the HW info

The phone was bought and activated in the 9th of June 2012 and died in January 2nd 2013.
[Galaxy S III General] fitipardi:
Then i understand, the new bootloader fix the inssue. But, how is it possible if samsung has not mencioned anything?

Regards

Enviado desde el bar con una birra en la otra mano
[Galaxy S III General] iridaki:
Exactly!

An interesting question would be "Does anyone have a i9300 16GB model that is alive for more than 8 months?" because I'm starting to believe that all phones are affected, it's just that the release date is relatively close.

iR¡D@k!* ? from i9300 via Tapatalk 2
[Galaxy S III General] Egan:
Good question! I believe all 16GB models are flawed and eventually die and Samsung keeps it quiet to make sure customers will continue to buy their flagship. I understand it though, it would be a PR disaster.
[Galaxy S III General] cyberdroxxx:
And the Galaxy Note 2 will follow eventually. My SGN2 has the same vulnerable eMMC chip VTU00M.

So yes the clock is ticking until samsung

release their new flagship.

I guess they manufactured their components to last about six months. They honour their warranty by repairing those dead phone to show the world that they have good after sales support. But their repairs will only last for another six months when warranty they have finally expire. They are sure that die hard galaxy fanboys will buy the new flagship. They are smart to announce new flagship models every six month.
[Galaxy S III General] UncleBeer:
Interesting: they should be dying too. Anyone know of examples?
[Galaxy S III General] nckeong88:
Just joined the sudden death club. Phone was fully charged but dead overnight. :crying:
[Galaxy S III General] cyberdroxxx:
So far I haven't heard of any SDS from SGN2 since they were on the market in early October 2012. Most SGN2 now are about less than 90 days old. We have to wait another couple of months to see whether SDS are related to he EMMC chips.
[Galaxy S III General] Sad56:
I've mine 16gb since 29 mai 2012. (pre order)

Always charge over the night.

No symptoms for the moment.

Fingers crossed (I don't have flash the new bootloader, but I use LLA firmware +kernel)

Envoyé depuis mon GT-I9300 avec Tapatalk
[Galaxy S III General] KeesStolk:
My 16gb white S3 is from 27 may 2012, 9 of 10 charging over night with the standard wall charger.

I did flashed the new bootloader and running Omega roms since v4 i think :)

Still running smooth and fast.
[Galaxy S III General] mark3d4death:
My S3 died this morning... No nothing! With XXELLA including Bootloader... Only had it since August!
[Galaxy S III General] MuertoKo:
Full LLA kernel rom and bootloader right? You got any info extra? First report and might be important!

Enviado desde mi GT-I9300 usando Tapatalk 2
[Galaxy S III General] clin81:
Are you sure that you had ELLA bootloader?
[Galaxy S III General] kintol:
does anyone here monitoring their cpu temp? mine having the so call "early symtoms" of SDS- restarting once hitting 50deg c.
[Galaxy S III General] nckeong88:
My SDS has no symptoms. Was on CM10.1 and everything was fast and smooth.
[Galaxy S III General] MuertoKo:
Mine hits 60 easily when gaming hard and no reboot or issue at all.

If you have any UV undo it, otherwise you might be screwed... :(

Enviado desde mi GT-I9300 usando Tapatalk 2
[Galaxy S III General] j0sefuz:
so, for those people who have VTU00M, like me, are we just gonna wait till our phone dies?

it's like our phones have cancer or aids, just waiting to end it's life.

pffft!
[Galaxy S III General] daTranquil:
This might be an impotent post. Can you pls give more details how you upgraded you device? Was it an OTA Update?
[Galaxy S III General] KeesStolk:
Yes i do, using Elixer2 widget for it.

Mine is with normal use about 30 degrees and with gaming it can go up to 40 / 45.

I am not a heavy gamer and never seen it above 47 degrees.
[Galaxy S III General] mark3d4death:
100% because I flashed through PC Odin... And I had the red exclamation mark that kept coming back even when reset with triangle away! I wasn't worried about it at the time because I would sort it out later... Now I'm too late! So I hope I can get warranty!

+ I checked bootloader version with Android system information as well!
[Galaxy S III General] migz012788:
How to check that VTU00M on stock phone non rooted?
[Galaxy S III General] fmtrx:
Yesterday, kies prompt me to install XELLA ROM to my phone and i did update it.

The phone i use is a very "clean" example: neither rooted nor even used Odin, i just bought it with 4.0.4 on it,

did all updates with KIES : 4.1.1, 4.1.2 and now the XELLA rom.

According to the above, if it dies on me we will be sure for two things:

1. XELLA did not fix sudden death

2. Service center cannot use the excuse that you used custom rom/rooted it etc for the SDS.

I am currently at 83 days and keep going on.

What i noticed is that with the XELLA rom, Contacts, Phone and Messages apps load instantly as they did with 4.0.4.

When i had updated to 4.1.2 i noticed that a lag was introduced when firing these apps.

I will let you know...:cool:
[Galaxy S III General] mark3d4death:
Yup... I didn't wipe... Not sure whether that's a factor... But I did have Siyah 1.8.6 as a kernel......

---------- Post added at 10:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:21 AM ----------

PC Odin...
[Galaxy S III General] kintol:
yeah.. me too.. can we put up a petition to samsung for a market recall and refund? will they admit it? :confused:
[Galaxy S III General] arkane78:
My phone is an SGS3, 16GB, Pebble Blue.

It arrived to me on 2nd August 2012.

Don't know where it was built or where the battery was built. (Not sure how to get this information or even if it will help anyone)

It's all stock and has the latest firmwares and such, but I also have the vulnerable eMMC chip (VTU00M - fwrev 0xf1).

I'm currently on 158 days with no issues, it has the XELLA bootloader + firmware.

I don't charge my phone overnight, in fact it's turned off at night.

It's only active for around 12-14 hours a day and it's not used heavily, I'd go so far as to say light usage would be more accurate. (Some days are more than others)

I will be keeping a close eye on my phone.

If it does decide to hang itself, then I assume I contact the company who supplied the phone and have them deal with it?

(In my case, that's Phones4U in the UK and I'm also in the UK)
[Galaxy S III General] _andrea_:
So the last hope is the stock ELLA Kernel, he has bootloader but not stock kernel (if there's a fix in the stock kernel custom kernel won't have it until upstream 7 kernel source won't be published by samsung). Or maybe stock kernel and new bootloader work togheter...Any XXELLA with stock Kernel already died?
[Galaxy S III General] j0sefuz:
i do not know, mate. my phone is rooted.
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
Crap, so now we know that XXELLA btl doesn't fix sudden death, yet it does make it easier on the service center to reject your warranty, and it doesn't let you downgrade easily (downgrading the btl is only possible by triggering an OTA upgrade to a region with no XXELLA update yet). Fu*ck!!! Why did i flash it? :(
[Galaxy S III General] vadonka:
My phone was died yesterday, so im take to the local service center. It seems only the battery had short circuit, so they gave me a new battery instantly and my phone working again now. But when im in the service center i ask about the sudden death and about the new update.

The service guy told me, that he hear about that issue but this new update not related to fix that, as far as he know. But it doesn't mean anything.
[Galaxy S III General] zigson:
Yeah, nightmare. I'm glad I installed the new kernel but rejected the bootloader. Now I'm just hoping my phone dies in the next few weeks while I am still in warranty...
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
I hope mine doesn't die. Israeli service centers are well known to use any possible excuses to reject a warranty service. This little "!" is going to be more or less like "aha... you are screwed... get lost!" for me, if still visible post-mortum.

Hopefully, if it is a wear leveler bug, the fact i've switched the internal and external sdcard mounts should help it survive until the real fix is ready (if ever).

:(
[Galaxy S III General] lokkinho:
A little help

Strange, I got no problem when using Triagle away 2.45 on my S3 omega V36 with new bootloader.

Did you bricked your phone ? If not, try install and run the latest triangle away again. Check the counter after the reset.

If everything's ran fine, flashed with the latest XXELLA stock rom.

Then everything should be back to stock again with 0 count of unofficial rom flashed.
[Galaxy S III General] malamen123:
When the phone bricked it is possible see the red "!" ?
[Galaxy S III General] moujibzinc:
Ok then it's obvious that the latest 4.1.2 has absolutely nothing to do with SDS !

Now just hit the "tip us" section on every mobile website you know and don't forget to email or better "flood" Samsung with complains .

I'm really disappointed , I love the galaxy s3 but for me and thousands of other people who bought their s3 (32gd is pretty expensive) off market (no warranty) it's really unfair .

​

---------- Post added at 11:21 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:15 AM ----------

No you can't .
[Galaxy S III General] mark3d4death:
Odd... But it's not that that's killed it... It was working fine last night... Woke up this morning... Dead as a dodo :P
[Galaxy S III General] vadonka:
the red exclamation mark mean your boot/recovery partition contained unsigned binary data. if your phone bricked and this partitions are unavailable, that means unable to determine the boot/recovery status so the red exclamation will disappear.
[Galaxy S III General] jody2k:
What did we told ya that it wasnt the fix, stop flashing the new bootloader guys...its useless and it will void your warranty because it makes it hard to reset your phone counter
[Galaxy S III General] b_henry:
Yes, some phones died after flashing the latest fw, but probably in all cases the phones were about 6 months old and perhaps with already damaged nand memory. In this case no fw fix cannot help in any way. Maybe XELLA isn´t the fix,maybe is..
[Galaxy S III General] lokkinho:
I think wiping is not a factor that did the damage but installing various of kernels may have brought harm to your S3.

As I'm one of the victims who always install different kernels. By the time I still remember I was using Siyah since its first release for ICS roms then I used Abyss.

Abyss was good at first but then I found out there was a tv-output (HDMI) problem in the new release. So I switched back to Siyah to obtain a stable HDMI connection. Unfortunately, nightmare has came. After some days of using Siyah, my phone was died suddenly in the middle of night when I was sleeping.

No matter how I tried using JTAG or samsung flashing boxes, none of them could bring the S3 back to live except replacement of logic board.

Sad.. never happened before since I was using Galaxy S, Wonder, S2 i9100, N7000 & HTC One X. I rooted these phones, flashed them plenty of times, put in different kinds of kernels to gain the best i need. The main issue was just only bootloops, none of them died like my S3. :angel:

Conclusion is may be I didn't do full wipe or kernel wipe when switching kernels on this sensitive S3 but I do heard some kernels may bring sudden death to phones like N7000.

So I'm using rooted stock kernel now to try to minimize the death rate of my S3. :p
[Galaxy S III General] jody2k:
If kernel is an reason for sudden death, then try to explain many other cases who had stock kernel when there s3 died sudden death... I dont think its kernel related
[Galaxy S III General] lokkinho:
Hoho.. you're not able to see anything on your screen, mate.

---------- Post added at 12:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:10 PM ----------

Please read carefully, I said 'IT MAY' not 'IT IS'. I'm here to share my real experience of how my S3 died !

Obviously, my phone was dead after changing kernel, no overclocking at all !

There are thousands of ways causing your S3 died not just only sudden death.

My friend bought the S3 in the same day I was. He stayed with his stock rom for safety, he told me. Yes he did, but it died eventually too, also a sudden death.

What I meant was he got his phone more life span than mine. With 3rd party kernel, it may boost up your phone performance or may bring you some unknown problems.

Then could you answer me which 3rd party kernel is 100% safe for our S3 ? Or which one more safer than the stock kernel ?

---------- Post added at 12:42 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:37 PM ----------

Able to enter Download Mode ?
[Galaxy S III General] vadonka:
almost every phone died at night. maybe just maybe something come out from the dark and smash our phone soul. if this is true we just need sunshine...a lot sunshine :laugh:

or just leave the light on at night :victory:
[Galaxy S III General] Ottoman52:
Mine has dead on friday after 210 days of usage.

for a few months there are some lags and auto restarts on my phone.

rooted when it had 4.0.4

updated only OTA or Kies

after 4.1.1 updates it isn't rooted.

stock kernel

stock 4.1.1(Turkey)

I9300 international version pebble blue 16 gb

charge was %71 when i was going to sleep. i always charge overnight but that night i didn't charge. When i woke up my phone was closed.I plug in there was only battery symbol.And did not charge.

I tried download mode. it opened .when i choose cancel ,samsung glaaxy s3 text shown and locked there.

when i enter download mode and try number of roms and re partitions ,there was no solution,i got only errors.

So my phone is at service now. I hope they repair it under warranty.

I will write my feedbacks about service process and post-service.