Yesterday I received my Samsung Galaxy S6 Active. I've been on the fence about getting one, especially since I have the S5 Active. There didn't seem to be enough of a difference to switch, but I figured I could get it and return it if I didn't like it. Well so far I really like it. Here are items that are making the switch worth while:
Camera - The camera is awesome! Fast and takes great pictures (although the S5 Active does take great pictures also.).
No port covers - It was very nice not having to open the cover every time I need to plug in the USB.
Themes - This is really cool. I didn't have to add anything to install a theme and it's complete. Pretty much everything is themed. The Avengers theme is pretty sweet.
Wireless charging - Although I haven't tried it yet, I'm getting a charging pad as soon as I decide that I'm keeping it.
Some downsides (although I'm good with them):
No micro sd card slot - This one, I can go either way with. I have always added an sd card to any device that had a slot for in case I needed it. So far, I haven't had a time that I actually had to have one. With cloud services and a data connection pretty much everywhere I go, I'm ok with it. Also, I keep a thumb drive with a micro usb connector on it with me most of the time in case I need it.
No removable battery - Again, I can go either way with it. It's nice to just pull the battery on lockups, but that's about it for me. I'm not too worried about switching it out, I normally don't keep the phone long enough for the battery to go bad.
I'm not sure about the battery life yet, but so far so good. After 7.5 hours of medium to heavy use, I'm at 81%.
All in all, I'm pretty happy with it so far.
One week update.
I'm keeping the S6 Active.
The phone is solid and feels good in the hand. The "newer" TouchWiz is ok, but I prefer to use Nova Launcher and the cool thing is that the themes work with it. Again, the camera is outstanding! The battery life is really good. Today I used the phone quite a bit and after 9 hours I'm at 68%. I did notice the occasional lag, but I cleared the cache and it seems to be a lot better.
So, after two weeks with the S6 Active, it's going back to AT&T. There are problems with the touchscreen, especially on the right side. Swiping and scrolling on the right side lags and sometimes dosen't work. There are some issues with using it in water: The dock connected notification pops up when it gets water in the charging port. After the phone was wet, audio from the ear piece and the speaker was really low for about an hour. The phone would not transfer data with a usb cable, even after 8 hours of being dry. It would charge, but not transfer data (I did try 2 different cables and it worked fine with my S5 Active).
Also, earlier today, I had the phone in my pocket and heard it stating that it was going into "VR mode", the screen went black and I could not use the phone. I tried restarting the phone by holding the power and volume down buttons, but it would go back to the black screen when it would reboot. It wasn't until I plugged in a usb cable to try and backup the phone that it started working again.
At this point, I am back to my S5 Active and I'll decide over the weekend whether to exchange the phone or just return.
Sent from my SM-P605V using Tapatalk
Samsung really screwed up removing the port covers.
Disagree completely!
Port covers are just something that breaks causing the phone to fail. Just a matter of common sense to dry your phone off before plugging it in!
Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk
Picked mine up Saturday. Got 5 hours SOT the first day. Gonna hammer the usage today and see how much I have left after 6 hours SOT. Pretty sweet device so far. If it had 64GB of storage, it would be about the best phone I have used in a while!
Sent from my S6 Active!
I completely agree! I used my S6 Active in fresh and salt water this weekend and had no unexpected issues at all.
Once submerged, while recording, the audio was distorted until I blew into the mic sharply to clear off the water. Completely expected and unpreventable and a non-issue.
I may have gotten a bad phone. I blew out the ports and waited at least an hour before plugging it in and still had problems with it. I will probably exchange it later today or tomorrow. I contemplated returning it, but I really did like it before the problems.
I went from an N5 to an Active and I like it, but the new update seems to shoot out the "Connected to Dock" a lot and that is very annoying considering it stops you from doing anything at that moment. It'll just pop up like 20 times in a row.
TommyStarwind said:
I went from an N5 to an Active and I like it, but the new update seems to shoot out the "Connected to Dock" a lot and that is very annoying considering it stops you from doing anything at that moment. It'll just pop up like 20 times in a row.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What are you doing when that pop up comes up? I have the latest update and haven't seen anything like that on my S6 Active.
MarineSSGT0629 said:
What are you doing when that pop up comes up? I have the latest update and haven't seen anything like that on my S6 Active.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It'll just pop up randomly, but when it does it isn't just once. Even restarting the phone doesn't get it to go away. It hasn't done it for a few hours. I'll have issues with it charging and it'll say that with the fast charger. I have a regular usb plugged into it right now and have zero issues. I was however in the pool with it on Saturday to play with the camera underwater. Pocketnow's review on the phone mentions the same thing, but theirs went away after 30 mins.
http://pocketnow.com/2015/06/23/galaxy-s6-active-review
"Take the phone out of the water and you’re bound to see a flickering notification at the top of the screen informing you that the “dock is connected” – an error that doesn’t seem confined to waterproof Samsungs. Considering how long this bug has been around, it’s disappointing that Samsung didn’t correct it before releasing such a supposedly rugged smartphone. Fortunately, the fix is relatively easy: just take a deep breath and blow some air into the USB port like it’s an old Nintendo cartridge, then leave it in front of a fan to dry."
I just picked my active up yesterday. I really really love the phone and the camera and the waterproofing. I had an s6 edge but I was sold a financed (unlocked tmobile) phone without my knowledgd. I really miss the capacitive buttons and the fingerprint reader, as well as the bottom facing speaker. But still an amazing phone. I almost wonder if I should exchange for the leather back g4 though... I'm very Conflicted... what do you guys think? Stick with the active? Or try the g4? (I only get one exchanhe)
I went a head and exchanged mine instead of returning it. This ones to run smoother, the screen seems to be working properly. I did the latest update, but I don't see any difference yet.
Craleb said:
I just picked my active up yesterday. I really really love the phone and the camera and the waterproofing. I had an s6 edge but I was sold a financed (unlocked tmobile) phone without my knowledgd. I really miss the capacitive buttons and the fingerprint reader, as well as the bottom facing speaker. But still an amazing phone. I almost wonder if I should exchange for the leather back g4 though... I'm very Conflicted... what do you guys think? Stick with the active? Or try the g4? (I only get one exchanhe)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you want the waterproofing, you will have to stick with the Active.
The s6 active is the best Samsung phone out right now...it's battery is a beast and it's tough as nails...love it!
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using XDA Free mobile app
Kindly Vote for root...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/general/xda-assist/root-samsung-galaxy-s6-active-sm-g890a-t3257656
I have a nickname for this phone: "Perfect" ? that's how great this phone is in my opinion, still waiting for root though to unleash the beast.
Still missing battery and SD card access not because I really need them (yet) but not having access to all your phone's hardware and software features it feels like the phone is not your property entirely.
Things that impressed me so far are build quality, great grip, screen is amazing making reading and video rendering a pleasant experience, sound quality for calls is great too, not so impressive for music play on speaker or aux on car speakers but good with headphones, pretty fast CPU and RAM, battery life is an improvement I was waiting for for years but missing solar charge (still waiting for this technology to be implemented in smartphones), wireless charging is not my thing because it takes too long.
And of course being a "not bent friendly" device is like having wild berries instead of... you know what ?
Just picked up the G6 yesterday. I hadn't done much research, but I wanted a newer LG device (my 2nd V10 fried).
I offered $300 and the phone is like new. The guy hadn't used it since January. So far my impressions are as follows
Cons:
-Most obvious the non-removable battery!!!
-Volume buttons are on the side (like any average phone, but apparently this is what LG's doin' now since the G5)
-Headphone jack is at the top (I didn't know I had a preference, but I guess now I do!)
-Phone feels very small, but probably because I always grab an extended battery
-32GB internal storage
-No DAC
-ZeroLemon is basically a power bank. I suppose the phone will always be "charging" while the bank is active. (Thinking about it now, it might be convenient to have the ability to charge the bank separately and still have the oem battery powering the phone. Sort of like modular devices.)
-I definitely don't feel the "wow" factor I usually get when I upgrade to a new device. I remember starting since the Optimus G Pro, the screen blew me away! Then the G2, G3, V10 etc etc
-This is a big one. No root yet! And by the looks of things, root might not ever come? I really feel like I'm walking around missing a finger. I always root my devices, customizing shortcuts, colors, modded apps... I truly need root.
-I forgot to mention, all this glass stuff. Like the back cover, why was this done?! I miss having a 'sticky' cover like the V10!
Pros:
uh... to be determined? I can't think of any positives at the moment.
Anywho, the question I pose is this: Should I keep it? Sell it? Trade it? Burn it? Eat it?
I'm not exactly hurting for money, but I do have my sights set on a V20 and a G5. Would be nice to make the money back... And if I do sell it, better sooner rather than later because the phone won't look this new for long. Also, considering that the G6+ is finally getting around...
What are your guys' impressions, the people who have been using it for awhile now? What phone did you come from? I wanna stay away from Samsung because ever since the Note 2 I've noticed that Sammie is more gimmicky, and maybe geared toward a "teenage" mind while LG was more "business in front, party in the back." And don't get me started on Apple. What a joke.
Maybe I should look into this "Pixel" I keep hearing about. Or Oneplus?
Well since you have no good assumptions about the phone, I would say sell it. I came from a 3t to this phone and it's pretty good without the root. The phone is supposed to feel small. that was the whole point of the design, 5.7in screen in a 5in screen body. You will get used to the volume buttons being on the side since they have multiple programmable functions besides just volume. If your screen looks blah, you might want to adjust your settings. Since it was bought used, i'm not sure what may have happened to it. Think of the 32gb as a hybrid ssd. You want it to run fast for programs and use your SD card for storage. Bigger the space, longer the process. Dac? I'm not a big headphones person, my phone connects to Bluetooth.
I have a Samsung Galaxy S7 (SM-G930F) that appears to be dead. I found the service manual online and I'm now trying to follow the troubleshooting flowchart for power issues. I am stuck at the third step (already), where it tells me to check the voltage level at a resistor.
"Check the voltage level at R7027 while pressing power key. Is the voltage high?"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So my first question is, how do you check voltage at a resistor in circuit without shortening something out? Ground to either side of the resistor? Multimeter in voltage metering mode?
Second question, what is a "high" voltage? How high is high? High as in digital circuit, like one (high) vs. zero (low)?
Two possible answers are given for this question in the flowchart. One is "No" and the other is "Abnormal". So my third question is, what does "abnormal" voltage look like?
Use a good set of probes and don't shake
Clip one to the ground plane so you only need to hold one probe instead of two.
Abnormal is under 2 VDC... I think.
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No worries, it all went well. Thanks for the tip about ground plane! I didn't find a plane, but I did manage to land on the ground. (I think got that in-joke right.)
I actually tried using both test leads directly on the resistor and while it did give me a reading, it also started to smell funny after a while. It also read something like 0.44 V. But after putting the negative lead on the metal shield, and positive on either side of the resistor, I got a very different reading. I got something like 3.7 V. Now that I understand the expectation, I know this is normal value. Because it's just the voltage from the battery which is rated 3.85 V nominal voltage. It's a bit discharged but it's OK (Samsung original replacement battery).
I do wish they had put more effort into writing these "service manual" things that they keep so secretive. They got me wondering what they mean by "abnormal" voltage. I admit do being a complete noob when it comes to repairing phones and electronics in general, but they could have used proper English and I would have understood (even though it's not my first language either). Now I understand this "abnormal" to mean "way above 3.8 V or way below 3.8 V". I get the impression they just slapped together some images and text, and they could not even spell things right or draw the little boxes in the flowchart with pixel perfect attention to detail. I do get it though. Why bother when no one else is supposed to even look at this except Samsung authorized service technicians?
Why below 2 V? How do you figure it's TTL and not RTL or DTL? Full disclosure: I have no understanding of what either of these things mean. I just looked it up on Wikipedia. I do know it has to do with the way electronic circuits are designed, it's engineering jargon. TTL stands for Transistor-Transistor Logic.
Pretty sure it's TTL protocol.
You really don't want to muck with most of everything on the mobo. Keep the phone in a good case at all times and keep it away from water. 99% of the time it's easier to replace a defective assembly rather than try to fix it.
Protocol? As in data transmission protocol, like USB? Can you elaborate please? I am only familiar with the term "TTL" in the context of UART interfaces, where you use some kind of USB or RS232 to TTL adapter in order to communicate with defective devices and things of that nature. I have used an adapter like that many years ago to clear a firmware error in a Seagate disk for example so I could recover the data.
I am in a similar situation this time. This phone is not powering on and I need to recover my data. It died suddenly while it was charging. What do you suggest I do to extract the data? I don't care about MOBO or assembly, I just want my data back. But I have no experience with phone repairs, and I have learned that the UFS storage chip is encrypted too. So I can't just pull of the storage chip and put it in a chip reader, do a data dump and then take it from there. I need to repair this board to get to my data. Or is there an alternative?
Protocol; voltage specs for different states.
A data recovery specialist may be able to retrieve the data. For you as it it is now, no boot, no data.
Not backing the data up redundantly was a big no-no.
As Dirty Harry said: "A lot of things can happen to an Android...".
I may not get it to boot in the end and recover the data, but neither will IBAS Ontrack. I doubt they even know what's involved in recovering data from such devices. They are probably still doing HDD data recoveries. Those guys don't even know how to answer the phone properly when a customer calls in. I called in three times and spoke to some weirdo at a switchboard, telling me that the people I need to talk to are busy. But they are always busy! And each time they give you this switchboard operator. They also don't call you back either when they promise to get back to you and you leave your phone number. I haven't called Drive Savers yet. I may try that some day, just to compare how they treat incoming calls for help. That's my experience with these data recovery specialists thus far (they don't exist!).
I agree, I should have had a fresh backup of the phone or at least a backup of the most important files. Should have, could have. That's not going to help me with what happened in the past. I made a mistake, and I didn't think my smartest phone of all smartphones would die so soon. Expiration date on these things seems to be one to two years, which is insane! So we keep buying and trashing them and creating e-waste. No one knows how to make make things or fix things, they only know how to buy and consume. We only have our theories and we know how to sell fog (ideas). All manufacturing is still done in China (they are the ones with the tools and the brains). I don't think it's right on any level. But here we are. A simple thing like changing the battery on these devices is intentionally made impossible.
It's not that I don't want a specialist to have a look at this and have my money. It's that there are none around, and those that are and do this type of job, they don't want it. They only want easy and quick jobs for big bucks. I had two of these phones sent to two different microelectronics repair shops, they both sent them back, on both occasions, saying it's a dead ROM chip. I don't believe them. How could I? The last guy didn't even send me back the 12 screws that I sent to him in a zip back along with the phone. Only because I told him to send it back disassembled, after he asked me. He asked if I wanted disassembled or assembled. Where assembled is twice the price. Why would I want it assembled? I already had disassembled it myself. Not fully, I just took the back cover off and tried putting in a brand new battery. I know how to assemble and glue it back together myself. He didn't tell me he would omit the screws if I opted to have it send back disassembled. It's a complete bull**** of repair shop, and he has like 40 thousands subscribers on YouTube. None of these guys will show you their failures. They only show their success to promote themselves. In my opinion, failure is where true learning takes place.
Anyway. I will take my chances and try to repair it myself. It's a costly experiment, and it's going to take time, but I am learning a lot in the process, and little by little I am actually putting together my own little microelectronics repair lab at home. I even got myself a thermal camera so I can inspect and locate overheating components. Hot air station and microscope is next. After that I may even start my own business and do phone repairs at a level that's simply not offered where I live.
There are recovery specialists that go as far as pulling the SOC to attempt to recover data. No small or easy task.
Otherwise if you can't get that mobo to run I would write the data off... and save myself a lot of time and trouble for nothing.
I'm stuck in a similar situation with my GT-i9060 (Galaxy Grand Neo) where I could care less about the board or phone and just want my data recovered.
This would be my last-resort attempt to repair but you could try it out maybe. I am attempting to figure out what's wrong with the mobo first and try to get that thing started.
Here's my post. Any inputs would be helpful.
Rizzi87 said:
I'm stuck in a similar situation with my GT-i9060 (Galaxy Grand Neo) where I could care less about the board or phone and just want my data recovered.
This would be my last-resort attempt to repair but you could try it out maybe. I am attempting to figure out what's wrong with the mobo first and try to get that thing started.
Here's my post. Any inputs would be helpful.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice find. Last resort time... you see what a pain it is. Very involved and no guarantees.
Is the sim card still intact; are your contacts stored on it?
blackhawk said:
Nice find. Last resort time... you see what a pain it is. Very involved and no guarantees.
Is the sim card still intact; are your contacts stored on it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply.
The SIM is still intact but no, my contacts aren't saved on it. My Whatsapp backup is on there too and yes, I was ignorant enough to not have backed it up
As I mentioned, if I try to switch it on using the battery or even plug the charger, certain areas of the mobo get hot which points out to some component being shorted (according to my limited knowledge)
I'm trying to test each component using the schematic diagrams because the repair flowchart mentions some equipment that I don't have access to. Gonna pop open the emi shields today so I can test those components too.
I also have a G930F with a bad display (I think) but that will have to wait
You can't repair a mobile with just a flow chart. You need to be proffessional and also need some basic tools like dc power supply. Mobile pcb's most DC bus lines will normally shows below 30ohms resistance.
Connect phone to pc with charged battery and check phone's SOC detects or not, if detects probably emmc/bootloader failure.
Rizzi87 said:
Thanks for the reply.
The SIM is still intact but no, my contacts aren't saved on it. My Whatsapp backup is on there too and yes, I was ignorant enough to not have backed it up
As I mentioned, if I try to switch it on using the battery or even plug the charger, certain areas of the mobo get hot which points out to some component being shorted (according to my limited knowledge)
I'm trying to test each component using the schematic diagrams because the repair flowchart mentions some equipment that I don't have access to. Gonna pop open the emi shields today so I can test those components too.
I also have a G930F with a bad display (I think) but that will have to wait
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're welcome and welcome to XDA
That link was an interesting read.
If you really need the data just stop now and send it in. If you have already or do damage the memory chipset it will be game over. One price quote I heard was $800 from another member here. Can't recall if they had to hot air the memory chip off or not.
Many people have no idea the trouble not backing up critical data causes or how fragile digital data can be. I have at least a dozen backup drives, many are redundant copies. No such thing as too much.
@blackhawk Yeah, I will probably head over to some recovery specialists and then experiment with getting the board to work again.
@R7027 - If you have the service manual for the G930F, can you check if it lists the main parts and exploded view for the phone?
blackhawk said:
There are recovery specialists that go as far as pulling the SOC to attempt to recover data.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know. That's a chip-off procedure. But that doesn't work on devices running Android 6 and above because of hardware based encryption of storage chips. This is enforced by Google. Manufacturers must comply with Google's demands if they want to receive Android certification.
Rizzi87 said:
I'm stuck in a similar situation with my GT-i9060 (Galaxy Grand Neo) where I could care less about the board or phone and just want my data recovered.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sorry to hear. I know the feeling.
Rizzi87 said:
This would be my last-resort attempt to repair but you could try it out maybe. I am attempting to figure out what's wrong with the mobo first and try to get that thing started.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm familiar with FlashFixers. I have seen the video version of the article you linked to, seen their website and read most of the information there.
For example, this information:
"Chip-off data recovery is only an option for Android OS 2.3-5.1."
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is why they stopped doing that after Galaxy S6, because Galaxy S7 came with Android 6.
I also know what software they're using, what adapters, what readers, etc. So I can tell you what's possible and what's not. Your phone shipped with Android 4.2 and was upgradeable to 4.4.4. Therefore, your phone can undergo a chip-off procedure. GSM Arena is source number one for mobile phone specs. Head over there and check it out. Since this is an older phone model and spec data submitters (users) at GSM Arnea didn't pay much attention to type of internal storage, there is no info on the type of internal memory. But I believe it's eMMC. I know for a fact that Samsung switched from eMMC to eUFS when they released Galaxy S6. The relevance here is that the chip reader you use needs to support eMMC, and virtually every one of them supports eMMC. Only a few readers support eUFS, the new standard that no one in phone repair community cares much for when they can't do chip-off procedures on anything running Android 6 or above, due to Google's enforcement of hardware based encryption.
So if you turn your phone in to FlashFixers, or anyone else with the same equipment, skill and know-how, they should be able to dump, read and recover all your data from the chip. They can even write the whole lot back to a new chip and put it back on a donor board and install it into the phone frame, and deliver a working phone with all the data on it.
But as for me, I'm not so lucky. It doesn't work on Galaxy S7 because of Android 6. Mine was running Android 8 when it died, but it shipped with Android 6 and that's reason enough not to try it, as it is encrypted, for sure. They need to either repair the original board, or transplant the CPU/SOC and ROM/UFS to a donor board. This is true for all the newer phones. It's a new era.
Rizzi87 said:
The SIM is still intact but no, my contacts aren't saved on it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are they stored on the internal memory of the phone? Thankfully I have the master copy of all my contacts, some 250 of them, all well documented and manually edited. I decided to switch to Google for storing all my contacts about 10 years ago, and I have not looked back since.
Rizzi87 said:
As I mentioned, if I try to switch it on using the battery or even plug the charger, certain areas of the mobo get hot which points out to some component being shorted (according to my limited knowledge)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a good indication of a short. Problem is in knowing your reference points. How much is too much? Similar to voltage, how high temperature is too high? How low temperature is too low? If you don't have a reference, it doesn't tell you much. Unless it's in the extreme. Extremely low, or extremely high. Reference point for that might be if you get a burn mark if you touch it or a frost bite. But in general, abnormal temperature is a good indication of a short circuit. If you can rule out overheating.
Rizzi87 said:
I'm trying to test each component using the schematic diagrams because the repair flowchart mentions some equipment that I don't have access to. Gonna pop open the emi shields today so I can test those components too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What equipment is that? What components have you tested if you have not removed the shields yet?
EMI shields? Is that what those things are called? I hate those. They are troublesome to remove. Some of them have a top cover that can be lifted and put back on, others don't. I knocked off a tiny capacitor on one of my test boards while removing the shield with pliers (expensive precision pliers for electronics by Knipex, "Made in Germany"). That board took a turn for the worse because of it. But I have saved the tiny capacitor. Good thing is I saw it and didn't digest it or something, it's almost invisible, it's like 1 mm x 0.5 mm.
Rizzi87 said:
I also have a G930F with a bad display (I think) but that will have to wait
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does it have power? The first thing you should get in terms of equipment is a USB power meter.
engage4 said:
Mobile pcb's most DC bus lines will normally shows below 30ohms resistance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What does that mean? Can you re-phrase that please?
engage4 said:
Connect phone to pc with charged battery and check phone's SOC detects or not, if detects probably emmc/bootloader failure.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Check if phone detects PC? Not if PC detects phone? I don't understand this. Assuming PC is working and phone is not working, then how could phone detect the PC? Where do you even begin to look if you don't have anything on display (of the phone)?
blackhawk said:
One price quote I heard was $800 from another member here. Can't recall if they had to hot air the memory chip off or not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think iPad Rehab takes like $999. You can also check the FlashFixers website. They have published their prices on there.
"Data recovery service of photos and videos from Android phones starts at $399 for Android OS 2.3-5.1, and $499 for Android OS 6-10, and $599 for Android OS 11 and newer."
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For Android 4, they take $499 and for Android 6 or newer, they take $599. They have more on their Android Phone Data Recovery Service page.
Rizzi87 said:
Yeah, I will probably head over to some recovery specialists and then experiment with getting the board to work again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't rush to send it in to a "specialist". I guess it doesn't matter much in your case, since your phone runs on Android 4 and any data recovery/microelectronics "specialist" should be able to do the job. But in general, and especially in case of Android 6 and above, I suggest you try to find someone who knows how to do repairs, first and foremost. Not data recovery.
In the past, anyone with the right equipment, steady hands, and good mental or cognitive functions used to be able to do data recoveries in a chip-off procedure. That's until Android 6 happened. After that, they were all faced with a decision: go out of business or learn how to do actual repairs. I have no insider information on this, but I can read between the lines and I can think. I suspect that Android 6 was a big blow to this type of businesses. Some of the old timers went on to do board swaps instead. That's the new default procedure for anything newer than Android 6 where data recovery is the priority. Board swaps essentially replaced chip-off procedures, starting from Android 6.
There is another guy on YouTube that used to do data recovery on Android devices. He no longer does that, not if your device runs on Android 6 or newer. He specifically states that on his website. He's from Canada if I recall correctly. I think he mostly does data recovery on USB flash drives and HDDs.
Apparently, FlashFixers offer data recovery on Android 6 and above. That's a good indication actually of a good service. They charge more for it, of course, but rightfully so. Because the name of the game is no longer "take the chip off, dump the data, mount it, read it, copy or upload and ask for payment". Now they have to do proper diagnostics and troubleshooting, repair the original board, or do a board swap and risk damaging the chips.
Board repair is really the territory of guys like Louis Rossmann. Most of the other guys will just do a board swap and hope for the best. But even that is a tall order. You can easily damage a chip in the process. I looked at my Samsung Exynos chip and it's like 1 mm thin, and it sits on top of a 1 mm thin RAM chip. I don't really want to mess with that if I want to preserve the data. So to increase my chances of recovering data I would leave it to someone else. Or! Skill up! I would need to practice on less important phones first.
To tell you the truth I have already ruined two SM-G930F boards. Not beyond repair, but I made them worse. I knocking off a tiny capacitor on one of them, and I ruined the connectors on the other one with what turned out to be fake Kapton tape that didn't stand the heat (I didn't know people made fake Kapton tapes and I didn't test my tape first). Both boards were already having the same issue as my main SM-G930F board. I now have 4 boards, 3 of which are not working. I purchased a fully functional SM-G930F that I plan on taking apart just to learn more about how it works when it's normal. In medicine, you study anatomy first, then physiology, and then pathology. It's same thing here.
All of this is very involved, I'm aware of it. It's not for the faint of heart or for people without stamina to continue when it gets difficult. I have the curiosity, drive and energy to pursue this. Little by little, I'm improving every day. I'm actually thinking about going for an electronics engineering degree. I have always been interested in electronics. I ended up working as an electrician instead, and then IT technician. I don't need to tell you my life's story, I'm just saying that there is more than one reason why I am pursuing this path.
Rizzi87 said:
If you have the service manual for the G930F, can you check if it lists the main parts and exploded view for the phone?
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Click to collapse
There is one or two pages dedicated to listing only the components. Not sure if that's what you mean. A parts list? There is no exploded view, but there is a picture of the phone on one or two of the pages, with everything marked up for overview (anatomy). Then there is also board views, front and back, and also each side of the the sub-board (I think it's called). I don't know if I'm allowed to post it here? But you can find it online. What would you like to know from it? I can check it and get back to you.
Forget "TTL" and 5V. There is nothing on your board that is at that level.
Sometimes signals that are designed for external things run at 3.3V, but they usually use a converter.
An actual SD card (if it's from the stone age) uses 3.3V levels.
Normally the system will just say, "Can we just talk at 1.8V levels?" And they do.
Most processors of the last decade work at 1.8V or less.
If a signal comes right out of the processor it will be at that level.
For instance, my Onyx Poke3 has UART running on 1.8V levels.
So, back to your power button. That's internal. It connect directly to a GPIO on the SOC.
That means the voltage levels are probably 0V to 1.8V.
I'd guess that "R7027" is a pull-down resistor to ground.
That means the power switch is connected to 1.8V and it pulls the input on the SoC up.
(Many other things tend to have a switch ground things and they use a pull-up resistor to 1.8V)
Did you find the test point for the power switch? Did you see what happens when you push it?
It should go to 1.8V (obviously).
Renate said:
Forget "TTL" and 5V. There is nothing on your board that is at that level.
Sometimes signals that are designed for external things run at 3.3V, but they usually use a converter.
An actual SD card (if it's from the stone age) uses 3.3V levels.
Normally the system will just say, "Can we just talk at 1.8V levels?" And they do.
Most processors of the last decade work at 1.8V or less.
If a signal comes right out of the processor it will be at that level.
For instance, my Onyx Poke3 has UART running on 1.8V levels.
So, back to your power button. That's internal. It connect directly to a GPIO on the SOC.
That means the voltage levels are probably 0V to 1.8V.
I'd guess that "R7027" is a pull-down resistor to ground.
That means the power switch is connected to 1.8V and it pulls the input on the SoC up.
(Many other things tend to have a switch ground things and they use a pull-up resistor to 1.8V)
Did you find the test point for the power switch? Did you see what happens when you push it?
It should go to 1.8V (obviously).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What's the name of that protocol? The low/high threshold ranges for 1.8VDC?
CMOS or LVCMOS
Earlier logic families didn't generally go rail-to-rail, i.e. the full range of the power supply.
Since CMOS (complementary metal oxide semiconductors) the logic swings from the negative power supply (usually zero) to the positive power supply.
Over the years the voltage has gotten lower to reduce the power needed to swing the parasitic capacitances.
Your desktop probably runs at less than 1V
There is 5V on your cell phone motherboard, for the USB power in and the USB power out when powering peripherals.
Even then the actual logic on the data lines only swings from 0 to 3.3V (in USB2 low and full speed).
In USB2 high speed, it's 0.4V
Renate said:
Sometimes signals that are designed for external things run at 3.3V, but they usually use a converter.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What do you mean by external?
Renate said:
Normally the system will just say, "Can we just talk at 1.8V levels?" And they do.
Most processors of the last decade work at 1.8V or less.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
By system you mean the processor? That's assuming the signal is coming out of the processor and not going into the processor?
Renate said:
Normally the system will just say, "Can we just talk at 1.8V levels?" And they do.
Most processors of the last decade work at 1.8V or less.
If a signal comes right out of the processor it will be at that level.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So by "system" you mean the processor? That's assuming the signal is coming out of the processor and not going into the processor?
Renate said:
An actual SD card (if it's from the stone age) uses 3.3V levels.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So this would be pulled down to 1.8 V if it's going into the processor? And if it's below 1.8 V it may need to be pulled up if it's going into the processor? In other words, a processor simply talks at 1.8 V? Unless it's overvoltaged to 2.0 V or even up to 2.2 V for added headroom for overclocking (and shorter life span). I'm referring to PC processors (x86).
Renate said:
So, back to your power button. That's internal. It connect directly to a GPIO on the SOC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What does internal mean here? I recognize the acronym GPIO from my Arduino experiments. That's General Purpose Input and Output. I didn't know ARM SOCs have that too. I thought they had purpose built ins and outs, not generalized/universal varieties. You can tell how little I know, right?!
Renate said:
That means the voltage levels are probably 0V to 1.8V.
I'd guess that "R7027" is a pull-down resistor to ground.
That means the power switch is connected to 1.8V and it pulls the input on the SoC up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure we're on the same page here.
The chipset is Exynos 8890 Octa (14 nm). The CPU of which is an 8 core (4x2.3 GHz Mongoose & 4x1.6 GHz Cortex-A53) and the GPU is Mali-T880 MP12.
Mongoose 1 or M1 for short is an ARM microarchitecture designed by Samsung and their first in-house design according to WikiChip. Exynox 8890 features one "big" core cluster of 4 of these and an additional "littl" core cluster of Cortex-A53. Interestingly, "big" and "little" qualify as technical terms. Very technical! LOL. For someone who can't tell size. Anyway! I could not find any specifics on M1, but if the "Juno ARM Development Platform SoC Technical Overview r2p0" document is anything to go by, the "core supply to the quad core Cortex-A53 cluster" is "0.8-1.0V". I believe the "Juno" is a device people in the know (and in need) use to develop their own electronic products based on ARM processors.
I will not pretend like I know all of this. I am just a good researcher and a decent google-fu practitioner. On the grand scheme of things, I still fail to see the relevance of this to my question of what the voltage should be level should be at that resistor.
Renate said:
Did you find the test point for the power switch? Did you see what happens when you push it?
It should go to 1.8V (obviously).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What do you mean by test point? If you mean what end of the resistor I put the positive lead on, then no. Such information is not given in the service manual and I don't have the board view software needed to go in depth on that. But either side will give a similar reading of around 3.7 V.
I quote myself:
"I actually tried using both test leads directly on the resistor and while it did give me a reading, it also started to smell funny after a while. It also read something like 0.44 V. But after putting the negative lead on the metal shield, and positive on either side of the resistor, I got a very different reading. I got something like 3.7 V."
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Click to collapse
So negative lead on one end of the resistor and positive lead on the other end is the wrong idea.
The correct way to measure is to have the negative lead touch some point that connects to ground, like the metal around a screw hole or these metal shields, and then the positive lead on either side of the resistor. The difference between them is very small. It measures maybe 3.65 V if you put the red probe (positive) on the left end of resistor and it measures 3.70 V if you put the probe on the other side of the resistor. Can you maybe answer which value to note down? I keep running into this issue, and I keep notes of my findings (like a proper professional will do), so I keep writing down both. This I think is something I will learn with time, and once I get proper schematics of the things I measure.
I also wonder why some people will write down voltage as "5V" while others will write "5 V"? Is there no standard to this? Do you travel at 60mph or at 60 mph? I don't travel at either, because I use Km/h and there is always a space between measurement value and the measurement unit. But we have "Km/h" wrong too, because "kilo" is the only SI prefix that uses a lower case "k", so it should be "km/h". But Microsoft has it wrong too, because they write "KB" for kilobyte, instead of "kB". This depends on what version of Windows OS it is I think, or if it's MS-DOS. Anyway. I got carried away here. But please do tell me if there is a right and wrong way to write out 5 volts with unit symbols, I'm curious.
Renate said:
There is 5V on your cell phone motherboard, for the USB power in and the USB power out when powering peripherals.
Even then the actual logic on the data lines only swings from 0 to 3.3V (in USB2 low and full speed).
In USB2 high speed, it's 0.4V
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Swinging logic sounds like fun.
Speaking of powering peripherals, maybe you can help me understand why my brand new Seek Thermal Comapct thermal camera doesn't work with my brand new Galaxy S22 phone? They both use USB-C connectors. But the Seek Thermal app doesn't see my camera when I plug it in. It sees is sometimes. It saw it the first time and Android prompted me to decide if I wanted Seek Thermal to auto start each time I plug the device in. I said yes. So now the phone does see something being plugged in, because it auto starts Seek Thermal, but the app complains that camera is not plugged in. If I leave it plugged in, reboot, and then it auto starts again and sees it. If I unplug, plug back in, sometimes it sees it again but most often not. So I have to reboot each time I want to be sure I will be able to use it.
It's something odd going on and I'm not the only one affected by this. Customers of FLIR ONE PRO (not caps scream, it's actually name of the product) have made similar complaints. One FLIR ONE PRO user said that this is due to lack of support for USB OTG on "modern" Android devices. Do you think it's related to OTG? What's the the current status of OTG? Is it deprecated? He suggested using a OTG adapter. Except there are none for USB-C to USB-C. They only exist for connections between USB-A to USB-C or micro-USB (B?) and vice verse. Not between USB-C and USB-C. Because USB-C devices don't need training wheels to enable compatibility, right?