yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S III General] secable:
Hi all.

I don't know if this will help people.

But i found something.

Something about a week ago, i lanch Samsung app market, and it has do a little update.

Then i go to bed with something about 90% batt, and Chen i wake up, my phone was switch off, batt empty.

I charged it, and everything ok.

I check battery stats, and found all down due to "download" app ... ???!!!

I do a force close to that, and evreything ok afrer.

2 days ago, i launch again samsung market the morning. It has ask me again for an update, i do. Then maybe an hour later, half batt gone, and an our later again, alert due to batt around 5%.

I check again batt stats, and again 95% use from "download" app.

I force close it again, now everything is ok. Batt more than 2 days.

I think maybe people who has sudden death have this trouble and the phone brick because heat or something due to this "download" app on battery stats, may have broke a hardware thing because it have ask the phone too many task.

Hope this help people

Sorry for my bad english.
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
You aren't very optimistic about the S3 eMMC life expectancy, don't you :(

But... all i can say about the level of hacking you guys do in that thread is "wow".
[Galaxy S III General] dimi22:
I read your thread very nice! keep up the good work, but i don't think people will donate their galaxy because samsung replaces the main boards. Maybe you can help to determine what is causing this bricks every time.. maybe the charger? or what is you opinion in this.. as far as i can see you are the man that knows very much about the eMMC, so you can tell us why this is happening and maybe more...

---------- Post added at 01:08 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:05 AM ----------

Thanks for your help, on which android version are you?

did your phone heat up?
[Galaxy S III General] secable:
Im on last Samsung. 4.1.1

I just try again launch samsung market, there was no update, but in about less than 15 min, my batt go from 24% to 16% now.

I just run the samsung market, and quit it.

I saw samsung push services launched for 14 minutes .

There is something wrong with samsung market.

Now if i force close "download" or samsung push service my batt will stop losing .

Edit : no over heat.

Edit 2: i force close "download" and samsung push and i do exactly the same thing on phone, maybe more, i loose 3% batt in same time.

But this time no update on samsung market. .
[Galaxy S III General] Rockwell_:
I don't think I can get it on warranty or could I? Download mode tells me this:

ODIN MODE

PRODUCT NAME:

CUSTOM BINARY DOWNLOAD: No

CURRENT BINARY: Samsung Official

SYSTEM STATUS: Custom

Is it really bricked because I can get to download mode? Could I save it with right PIT file?

Nice christmas surprise indeed.
[Galaxy S III General] Sian:
Same problem here. Same message too. Sent in for repair. Got it back the next day. I'm in Singapore.
[Galaxy S III General] emmanueldmc:
Here are some data from my phone ... as you think of soon those affected by the brick?
[Galaxy S III General] Entropy512:
Any S3 with the same eMMC chip - and they ALL seem to be VTU00M fwrev 0xf1 (that fwrev looks funky, it could have moved elsewhere in the cid string maybe...

The problem is, there's conflicting info:

Devices that can enter download mode but not flash anything - This screams eMMC internal failure to me.

Devices that can't enter DL mode - It's less clear. It could be anything. eMMC failure that hit the bootloaders, bad solder joint on RAM, bad solder joint on CPU, bad solder joint anywhere. The fact that many devices die while charging (which adds thermal stress to the board) points in this direction.

The one report of a device that died and started working a week later - absolutely screams bad solder joint (a la Xbox 360 RRoD).

That's why from now on, it is VERY important if people who have issues state the results of an attempt to enter download mode. Also, unless people have a DIFFERENT chip than VTU00M fwrev 0xf1, THERE IS NO LONGER A NEED TO KEEP POSTING VTU00M 0xF1 DEVICE INFO.

Can the device enter download mode?

Sane chip in app DOES mean nothing - the app is checking for the old legacy Galaxy S2-era "Superbrick" secure erase bug. No GS3 was affected by THIS bug - but there COULD be a new bug in play.

But all of the eMMC stuff could just be barking up the wrong tree - see above. When people describe behavior like this:

1) Odd device behavior (poor performance, lots of crashing), almost identical to what people using PIT workarounds for Superbrick describe as problems with their device, followed shortly afterwards by

2) Device can enter download mode by any attempt to flash anything to the device fails

The above screams eMMC.

However, other failures say "bad solder joint" to me.
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Post your hardware revision and other details both before and after repair
[Galaxy S III General] bligui:
My S3 died again same problem left it charging next day dead they replaced the board again and I sold it don't need freaking problems.
[Galaxy S III General] shethsa:
Wonder what apple would have to say to this
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Apple was already risking people lives with Apple maps...:mad:
[Galaxy S III General] insty:
Mine died last week on the 18th. Put it into my pocket after locking it, pulled it out 3 minutes later and stuck on the Splash Screen.

Could boot into Download mode, unable to flash, etc etc.

Took it to my provider (Optus) and am waiting to hear back but they have said it should be fixed by the end of this week.

Using another S3 Cover Phone, hopefully this one doesn't bite the bullet.

Phone was used for 201 days.
[Galaxy S III General] semantsen:
So now the pros have entered there is HOPE!:good:
[Galaxy S III General] gauravinvouge:
hi semantsen my problem is mine is neither entering DL mode nor RECIVERY mode,sent to samsung custome care which says it's a case of water damage....they pointed to a square below the battery space which they said has a color change and this proves water damage so that's it my warranty is void...and i've to pay Rs 7200/- for replacement of motherboard...

another thing is that i had broken my screen 4 months ago but even then the phone was working very fine and now in december this death thing happened and am screwed.......
[Galaxy S III General] Payman_92:
It can be a problem with jelly bean roms or bad update installation.

I see some other devices like Iconia a500 and hox dead after going to jelly bean.

Most of people have this problem report they are on jelly bean 4.1.1-2.

If there is a hardware problem, Samsung change the hw, in new devices. They are best hw producers and have advanced technology.

I think battery or charger (something with overheat) problem have more possibility.

Is this happen to some particular region? :confused:

No problem here, 6 month of usage, ics 4.0.4, hw: mp1.10.
[Galaxy S III General] AaronMichael:
Well from what we understand it has something to do with the bugging out of the os and possible complications of the mobile encryption error that somehow fried the phone. Though the charging theory is sketchy. Cause my phones never go hot when charging. If it does, like someone said in the thread, can be because of bad soldering.

But interesting perspective you got there that most devices that bricked are on jelly bean. Though how can jelly bean cause such catastrophe and kill a phone at this big of a scale?

Sent from my GT-I9300
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Point those ****** to this thread.
[Galaxy S III General] javier13javier:
it can't be software. i'm from Chile (LATAM) and they are some cases.
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
No, it is not related to JB update. Many phones were not on JB.
[Galaxy S III General] hansmrtn:
I was just playing #sorcery and it just suddenly shut off without warning. Now when I try to turn it back on, it vibrates...and nothing. Had ParanoidAndroid on the AT&T version.
[Galaxy S III General] STELIOSFAN:
Vibrating is a good sign. Maybe it overheated, maybe battery went crazy. Pull of battery, wait some minutes, place battery, charge and try again.

I really hope your phone is not dead
[Galaxy S III General] Payman_92:
OK.

And something more : I have 2 GS3, one of them for 6 month ago and second for 5 month ago.

The older one (white 16GB) 2 days after when I buy it start to freezing when it's locked and nothing worked when you want to unlock it, just splash screen and nothing (overheat like hell around cpu and nand flash, physical keys doesn't work at all), I forced to remove the battery and turn on it after 5min (this happened 3 or 4 more times).

2 weeks after that Samsung update the phone to another 4.0.4 and that problem never came back again (I do a factory reset after update).

Second device (blue 16gb) no problem at all, It have that update from factor, same apps on two of them and hw rev is same, two of them made in Vietnam by Samsung.

Because of this experience i said it's related to software.

Hope this will help. :good:
[Galaxy S III General] alfchin:
have anyone tried this to fix your dead SGS3?

it seems work on some sudden death
[Galaxy S III General] vasp3690:
reading through as much as i can, it may be that some software bug could be making the CPU run overtime and thus overheat and create the problem? If that is the case, wouldnt all S3 that had the problem at least overheated before dying?
[Galaxy S III General] AaronMichael:
I don't know about you, but I have never seen software to cause so much devices to die like this. It can also be because of a certain batch of the phones.

However the funny thing about this issue is that there is no warning or anything. It just dies, it's unexpected and personally never seen nothing like it.

Sent from my GT-I9300
[Galaxy S III General] Payman_92:
I doesn't say there is just software problem but in time like six month, overheat by software or anything else can kill any electronic chip and it is not without warning in all phones, you see some lags, overheats, phones speed become less than before and more.

If you read posts you see some people that they say, see something like freezing and lags two days or more, before phone going to die.

Maybe there is two kind of dead phones because some people can turn on phone and some can't (this phones kill without warning (can be factory defeat)).

I write something about it on Samsung Facebook page and they doesn't answer truly.

Hope someone find a solution for us.
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
this seems similar to Adam Outler's method. http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2061437.

:fingers-crossed:
[Galaxy S III General] emmanueldmc:
Please tell me your opinion...
[Galaxy S III General] veksx:
Just out of curiosity,how do you charge your phone? (the ones with sudden death) In samsung quick guide it says first you need to insert usb in phone and THAN to wall outlet. After charging its vice versa. Can this be cause of burning something inside mbo if done by plugging to wall and than to phone?
[Galaxy S III General] danielhtc:
Wow this is scary. I have only just come across this thread today. I've had my SG3 for a few months now. I have a battery charging dock that I use to swap batteries between my phone when it goes flat sometimes so I don't have to leave it plugged in.

I'm thinking I might permanently swap them out for the time being just encase it is something to do with it. Good idea?
[Galaxy S III General] dimi22:
I never do that, always just first in the wall then in the phone. but atm i need my phone so i try to only charge on usb maybe that helps.

Now i have 83 filled in reports and i can tell to you all that most of them died overnight charging. :confused:
[Galaxy S III General] jay_m3:
dont worry it has nothing to do with firmware;)
[Galaxy S III General] veksx:
What my point is that maybe when you put it first in the wall than in phone,phone gets sudden power instead of when pluggin in phone than in wall. Maybe this is dumb assumption but i am reading this thread and thinking about all possible reasons.
[Galaxy S III General] alfchin:
yeah. this is official loader fix up guide,which could fix many devices which odin can not make it happen
[Galaxy S III General] dimi22:
Maybe someone knew about the exploit a lot of time ago and made some virus that turns on the cpu and heats up the phone when its in deep sleep so one could notice, and that's why phone get fried like chickens :confused:
[Galaxy S III General] DeHAWK:
Not sure if this helps in any way since mine is the GT-I9305

View attachment 1588298
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Why do you have to load bootloader in working galaxy S3 ?
[Galaxy S III General] JohnM1973:
It's a different eMMC chip in the i9305 to the i9300
[Galaxy S III General] keloglu:
My S3 too

Hello,

my Samsung S3 dies 2 weeks ago, too.

It beguns with the last further updates of ICS. Until that time the S3 works fine with ICS. In the first weeks S3 works fine with the Update to Jelly Bean. But later the S3 begun to hang. This goes several weeks and the S3 don't want to start.

Now I sent it to repair and now I'm waiting until january.

Thanks

guys
[Galaxy S III General] _delice_doluca_:
So no one is suspected from the security breach found in Exynos chips?

I mean it started to look like 2 + 2= 4 to me.

Samsung has this bad manufacturing since Galaxy S2 (the very first Exynos device)

+

Many devices has died on Superbrick and many people lost their valuable datas. Samsung quickly answers "They are working on it"

Guess what? XDA fixes it before Samsung con go to their keyboard and type "We are working bla bla bla"

+

Samsung is not sharing the right codes for their famous Exynos chip and some people already said it could be that " Samsung would be even more ashamed if people would find more bugs on the codes if released"

Samsung again says "they are listenning the customers and will think about it" and right after it they release a fake and useless sofware! Mocking!

+

There comes brand new security problem buried inside of the chip.. It is clear that no ona and no phone is safe with this breach. No matter if you root or modifiy your phone or NOT. So no customers to blame when a business man lost his valuable data in the middle of a meeting!

And JUST LIKE the old Superbrick problem Samsung immediately responds "They are working on the problem". Sounds familiar? Than hear this; Again XDA fixes it before Sammy makes the announcement. Familiar too?

+

And now the Galaxy S3s are dying one by one. Don't care how much of them. Everyone knows if it was (let's say) Sony they would immediately apologise and solve the problem. (And if it was Apple they would send an update to lower the CPUmax to 1200Mhz or something and stretch the signal bars %30 :D )

=

As a Note 2 user i do not know what will happen to my phone. But as a Samsung user i definetely know i should worry since this company is losing its interest to make "good" products in any aspects and also to listen to customers. They are just becaming more and more interested in money and money only..
[Galaxy S III General] G4neStarT:
Oki yesterday my phone when off just like that plus I had a blue notification LeD ..it was stack and I removed the batt then put it back again and I was stuck at the samsung logo no marter what I did it couldn't boot onto the os. Aince I was having siyah kernel 1.8.6 though that it might be a bug with the kernel so I reinstall the stock kernel still nothing no boot stack at samsung os I event reflash the entire stock room still the same problem but I when on stock recovery did a factory reset then wipe davlik cache and voila the phone worked ...I was afraid that it might the the sudden dead but lucky me it started to work again after a wipe

This a pic of my eMMC

Though I might share this with u guys also I was on stock android jelly bean 4.1.2 plus syiha 1.8.6 kernel and my S3 version is a 32GB blue

Cheers
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Do report God forbid If it suffer from SDS.
[Galaxy S III General] G4neStarT:
What you mean by Sds?
[Galaxy S III General] DeHAWK:
Yes, I see. And only time will show if us on this model will suffer the same as you guys. Never the less, I think this should be made public. I just don't like the way Sammy is handling this. We are talking about top devices breaking down due to some kind of of defective chip, charger or battery...but at the moment nobody knows what causes the sudden death....does Sammy??

Best regards and a Merry Christmas to alll of you.
[Galaxy S III General] drraptor:
Sudden death syndrome :)
[Galaxy S III General] druganticus:
It's fine if this thing has happened (that's life, **** happens) but if in 6 months the problem represents I'll get really angry and Samsung will miss me as a customer. I'm still waiting for the device to come back from samsung (btw mine is a GT 9300 white, bought in Italy)
[Galaxy S III General] AaronMichael:
I am disappointed and regret giving Samsung another shot. I am setting up a meeting with a Samsung executive in Indonesia. Guy in charge of hardware or something. Said I am able to catch him after the holiday season.

Hopefully he can get someone higher up to address this issue. I am also very disappointed at how Samsung is taking this. After this point on, I think it's wise to go with other android options (been and was always an iOS user)

Will update you guys on how the meeting goes.

Sent from my GT-I9300
[Galaxy S III General] azrieqb:
But then again, this cases here only +-100 s3's. There's still around 30 millions s3's working just fine.
[Galaxy S III General] underwasin:
1.- Not all the s3 owners arround the world know this forum ,or even another forum , they only use their phone for facebook or tweeter

2.- Not all the s3 owners have the enough android or smartphone knowledge to know why their s3s are dying

3.- here in chile , the operators sat (technical services ) are plagued with s3 units that from a day to another simply stop working

4.- the problems seems to be in the soldier joints between the mainboard and the nand chip (something like the xbox 360 rrod problem)

caused by overheating the main pcb during a charge malfuction or during intense use
[Galaxy S III General] r1ch04:
Gutted isn't the word. I have contacted my local repair center and asked them if they have sent the phone as yet only to be told its not going to get sent until the 2nd Jan. This means i am longer without a phone which i am not going to trust 100% due to the failure.
[Galaxy S III General] chalae:
Mine seems to have the little brother of SDS....

It dies randomly on me and i cant get it to work again (different chargers, outlets, USB Cable, Battery of a Friend, tried everything). Not even Recovery or Download Mode do. Then randomly hours later it boots up. Brought it back to the store where i purchased it the 3rd time now. And they never find any Error. First time i got it back it was still dead, right out of the repair box. Second time i got it back it worked for a week. And now i turned it over to them for the 3rd time.

What happened: Turned off while checking e-mails (The last time the other 2 while charging)

Where phone was made: No idea dont have it at hand now

Where battery was made: No idea dont have it at hand now

What firmware you were running: No idea

Can you access download mode?: No, every time it happend everything stops working.

It was bought in Germany on 29.06.2012.

For me this feels awfull similar to RRoD back then with the X-Box.
[Galaxy S III General] gauravinvouge:
hi drraptor the point is am on back foot because of the screen damage and this is INDIA which has zero customer service values.....nevertheless am on it and will keep on pressurising them even if i have to reach the CEO of SAMSUNG KOREA also.

I would highly appreciate if you keep me posted on it...... and they say they don't recognize third party blogs and websites and would take action on the physical condition of the phone which they have declared a case of water logging....
[Galaxy S III General] dajumper:
Does the note 2 also that problem?
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
Where is this info coming from? Or is it just a speculation/assumption?
[Galaxy S III General] AaronMichael:
Why not we open up an S3 to find out? I have a small technical advising service and I have a client who might just let me crack it open, his died just an hour ago. Died while in use. All stock. Running 4.1.1

Sent from my GT-I9300
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
Have you happened to have an x-ray machine for BGA inspection or do you simply have no idea what kind of "solder joints" are mentioned?
[Galaxy S III General] Lynchy30:
Mine is on its way back to me, sent it in for repair to vodafone UK. The job sheet states the following...

20 MAIN PCB/LOGIC BOARD REPLACED
[Galaxy S III General] Entropy512:
No... All of the evidence points to severe hardware design or manufacturing flaws that no one here can solve.

If it's a "timebomb" eMMC wear leveller defect - nothing we can do.

If it's bad solder joints (RRoD style) - nothing we can do.

Given how similar I9305 is to I9300, if it's a solder joint problem the I9305 will likely suffer the same problem. If it's an eMMC bug, the I9305 may be safe. We probably won't know until the I9305 is on the market for as long as the I9300.

Yeah, your description screams "bad solder joint" to me. If it weren't for the people who can enter download mode but not flash anything, that's 100% where I'd be leaning.

Of course, the underlying problem could be one thing, and this thread is just also catching all of the users who are having other problems unrelated to the primary defect.

Note2 hasn't been on the market long enough to know. Unless we get a clear description from Samsung of what is going on here, Note2 will be unknown for months. Remember, I9300 launched in spring and failures are just starting now. Note2 didn't launch until 1 month before I9300 units started failing.
[Galaxy S III General] InfX:
In this case we can do something... we can make the timebomb tick much slower by using the flash less aggressively. And, you know, just in case, i actually did mount the external sdcard on top of /mnt/sdcard, that accounts for a huge chunk of the flash writes.

BTW, if it's the solder joints, there is a chance a skilled "hardware hacker" would be able to try & reflow it with some chance of success, but, well, i wouldn't even dare to think about "reflowing" in a home oven or with a heat gun.
[Galaxy S III General] dimi22:
Oke Fellows before Christmas i would like to say this:

- If you still have the ''Great'' ''Mobile phone of the year'' and its not dead, Save all your Christmas pictures on an external sd card.

- Move everything you need to your external sd card.

- Things you need and cant move backup every nanosecond!

- Trust in yourself but not in Samsung, Count on many things in your life but forget your phone :good:

- Get your Nokia 3310 ready because you might need the thing.

- Don't think you will ever know what causes the death of your phone cause its Samsung. But you get a free repair, and then you can go for 2 months for sure (if you got luck)

- And last but not least tip: Don't charge your device or don't go to sleep at all! buy new battery's all the time their empty because most deaths occur while sleeping and charging.

Great and happy Christmas to each of you!:laugh:

and keep reporting if your ''Multiple award winning'' Phone died too!
[Galaxy S III General] JepeP:
You speak from my heart ...

Merry Christmas to all of you!