[Q] Recovering data from a Galaxy S3 with damaged screen? - Galaxy S III Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Yesterday I dropped my Galaxy S3 GT-I9300 softly on the floor, but immediately I noticed that there was a problem with the screen: the glass was not broken, but colours were abnormally green, with a horizontal white line at the top of the screen, and a little circular dead zone in the upper left corner. I could still use it. But a few hours later, the light intensity of the screen had progressively and drastically decreased, and the phone could no longer be used. Today, the screen is totally black…
All data was saved on the external card, and I thought that Gmail synchronization would have saved my agenda. So initially, it did not seem like a too big problem, except for the cost of screen replacement, but when I realized that my calendar synchronization had not been not properly configured, the problem suddenly became more serious! My main problem is now data, not screen!
When the phone is on, and connected to my PC via an USB cable, I can only access two folders on the phone: “Card” and “Phone” (the external card is still in the phone). I have the original ROM, the phone is not rooted.
Do you think that my calendar data is there somewhere? I don’t know where to find it.
I’m afraid that all data will be lost if I send back my phone to the reseller's after sales service.
Alternatively, is there a mean, with an HDMI adapter and an external screen, to use the phone anyway: only the display does not work, the rest of the phone seems OK. The touch screen still worked fine yesterday, when I could still see something. Will I see anything on the TV when touching the phone screen? It would be wonderful if I could just reconfigure my synchronization, in spite of that black screen, and thus recover my agenda data via my Gmail account, before sending the phone to the after sales service.
Any suggestions are welcome.

Search exact same question been asked before and i believe a workaround was found .
jje

You can use ADB to make a backup of all your apps + data. However USB Debugging must be enabled for this to work. Is it enabled on your device?
If yes, there are a lot of guides on how to backup your phone`s content such as Apps + Data.
One such guide is this: http://www.thesuperusersguide.com/adb-backup--restore.html

No, I had not activated "ADB debugging" and without screen, it seems a little bit difficult to do it now, thus precluding "ADB" use. That's why I was wondering if there was a possibility to use the phone with an external screen via a MHL-HDMI adapter, assuming the touch screen still works… Any idea?

yes, just do that. you can also access adb from recovery without having to enable anything

I am now pretty sure that touch screen is OK. Even if I don't see anything, swiping the screen to unlock it produces the usual sound. So I won’t do anything until I get a MHL HDMI adapter. I think it is the simplest way, if that works… I keep you informed in a few days. Many thanks

Related

Touch screen not working.

Hi guys. I'm totally new to the android/smart phone world btw. Anyways, I recently got my Samsung Galaxy S2... first thing I noticed, my touch screen wasn't working. I popped the battery in and out and then it started working as it should.
My phone was working fine this morning, then all of a sudden out of no where, the touch screen stopped working again. I've tried turning on/off the phone multiple times. I've taken out the battery and even my SIM card nothing... i'm worried.
Has this happened to anyone else? Is there a fix? Do i have to go through Samsung? I hope not. Incase anyone asks, I did not root my phone.
Any help/feedback would be appreciated.
When the touchscreen stops working... were you charging the phone at that time?
The first time i turned on my phone, was actually by accident and it was charging.
However, just earlier now, it was not. it was just sitting on my computer desk. The home button, lock button and touch capacitive buttons work.... but i can't get past the lock screen
you could try a factory reset to see if its software related, but it sounds like hardware. I would definitely Return the phone .
I guess I can't do a factory reset, since I can't get into any of the menus... man this sucks. I spent $900 *gulp*
To do a factory reset,
1. Turn the POWER OFF, pull the battery out and put it back again.
2. Simultaneously press and hold the Volume Up, Home and Power button
3. If the Samsung Symbol appears, release the Power button
4. A Boot Menu will then show, Use the volume up/down to choose wipe data/factory reset.
touch screen not needed this way.
oo that's interesting... I tried it. and it didn't get to a boot menu. maybe I was doing it wrong. I tried a few different ways, but no success. It turns out I have warranty with the store. They're going to replace it for me Thanks for the feedback guys. Awesome forums.
Something similar happened to me yesterday. When I had the in-box USB cable attached to a BoxWave VersaCharger (combined AC/DC charger), and the VersaCharger was plugged into 120V AC, the touchscreen would stop working. As soon as I unplugged the USB cable from the SGS2, or plugged the VersaCharger into a 12V DC lighter socket, the touchscreen would work fine.
I've got the same problem as the OP... I had my phone charging overnight and this morning when I first went to use the phone I could not unlock the screen. I could wake the screen via the home button, and see I had a missed call etc but it just wasn't responding to touch. BTW I can't remember if when I first tried to unlock the phone if it was charging or not but really this shouldn't matter.... oh and btw, I'm not rooted or anything either! Naturally I rebooted the phone but still the same problem....so I tried a battery pull and still the same problem. Just now I did a factory reset but the touch screen still isn't working! I guess this is a hardware problem so I'm going to get it fixed under warranty by Samsung! Gutted that I will likely be without my phone for a week or 2!
EDIT, UPDATE...
Well, I was just on my way to the repair shop Samsung warranty had told me to take it too, and I took my sim card out to put in my old Hero (the only thing I hadn't tried!) and I couldn't believe it but the touch screen started working fine again! Weird, but that is now my advice if anyone else has a problem with their touch screen not working - oh and I took the sim out whilst the phone was still turned on. Crisis averted!
UPDATE 2
Sadly this has happened about 4 times to me now and I'm just waiting for the inevitable next time. Each time doing a factory reset then taking the sim card out seems to bring the screen back to life (though last time not immediately) but I shouldn't have to put up with this. Problem is, I don't want to send off a seemingly perfectly working phone to get repaired as I fear they will struggle to notice the problem, never mind fix it! I'm hoping a new firmware comes out soon, in the hope that it may resolve my issues...
Me as well ...
I have had this happen to me twice now (Touchscreen not responding).
The first time I had just installed a game and thought it must have been related to that. Pulled the battery and no joy, left it for a while and it came back to life...
Second time I was surfing the web and it stopped responding, pulled the battery and left it for maybe a minute but no joy .... pulled the battery again and left it for probably 20min and it came back to life. When it came back up I noticed the livewallpaper had been turned off and my widgets were gone from the homescreen.
What I did notice when it wasn't working was it had "safe mode" displayed at the bottom left of the screen
Have the Same Problem
Have the same problem i Mine and was super exicedat first it worked fine and after charging the touchscreen stopped working i pulled the battery out and put it back in but no luckso im gonna return mine to the shop hope they replace it
Moral:AT FIRST SUPER EXICTED BUT NOW SUPER ANGRY
Same issue - Is there ANY way to save my data before I send it in for repair/replace?
Hi all,
As of this morning, I have exactly the same issue as the OP. Screen doesn't react to touch, with the exception of the capacitive buttons. I found a dude on YouTube that had the same issue: youtu.be/0oIdllWiV4I
The last thing I did with the phone before it started misbehaving was to answer a call. The phone was on the charger when the call came in - I can't recall whether I unplugged it before answering, or after, or at all during the call. Not sure it has any relevance anyway, only mention it because I've seen reports of people's screens no longer reacting to touch when the phone is plugged in to a charger (apparently it even states in the manual that this may happen).
Anyway, whilst all my contacts, SMS, photos etc are backed up to the cloud, the same can't be said for my app data. Before I lose hours and hours of progress in various games, or all my settings in numerous other apps, etc, can anyone think of any way to get access to the memory of the phone, bearing in mind the following:
I can't connect to Kies to pull a back-up because bluetooth is currently enabled on the phone and when one connects the USB cable, it says "Activating USB mode will deactivate Bluetooth. Continue?" but I can't click the Yes button
I can't connect in USB mass storage mode because I can't navigate to the settings menu entry to enable it
I can't turn Bluetooth off in order to get Kies working, becuase I can't get to the settings menu or pull down the notification bar to reach the power control.
I can't use Voice input to control the device (on the off chance there was a "bluetooth off" voice command) because (presumably with the most recent firmware I flashed via Kies a few weeks back) for some reason Vlingo is no longer the app on the double-home button action. Instead it calls Samsung Voice and wants to walk me through a first use tutorial, but I can't click the next/skip buttons
I installed via Android Market push the app belonging to www_remoteaccessphone_com as it promises to be able to remotely switch bluetooth off, but the website says I haven't installed the app yet, presumably because alrhough I was able to install it without touching the phone, it probably needs to be run at least once to set it up, and I obviously can't do that
I can't start Kies Air to try and get my data that way (starting it would require using the touch screen)
Kies via bluetooth isn't supported on Android
Needless to say, the data I'm trying to retrieve is on the internal memory, not the SD card. As you can see I've been trying all sorts of creative things, but I'm fairly sure I'm screwed. Any bright ideas I haven't thought of?
blaubeer said:
Hi all,
As of this morning, I have exactly the same issue as the OP. Screen doesn't react to touch, with the exception of the capacitive buttons. I found a dude on YouTube that had the same issue: youtu.be/0oIdllWiV4I
The last thing I did with the phone before it started misbehaving was to answer a call. The phone was on the charger when the call came in - I can't recall whether I unplugged it before answering, or after, or at all during the call. Not sure it has any relevance anyway, only mention it because I've seen reports of people's screens no longer reacting to touch when the phone is plugged in to a charger (apparently it even states in the manual that this may happen).
Anyway, whilst all my contacts, SMS, photos etc are backed up to the cloud, the same can't be said for my app data. Before I lose hours and hours of progress in various games, or all my settings in numerous other apps, etc, can anyone think of any way to get access to the memory of the phone, bearing in mind the following:
I can't connect to Kies to pull a back-up because bluetooth is currently enabled on the phone and when one connects the USB cable, it says "Activating USB mode will deactivate Bluetooth. Continue?" but I can't click the Yes button
I can't connect in USB mass storage mode because I can't navigate to the settings menu entry to enable it
I can't turn Bluetooth off in order to get Kies working, becuase I can't get to the settings menu or pull down the notification bar to reach the power control.
I can't use Voice input to control the device (on the off chance there was a "bluetooth off" voice command) because (presumably with the most recent firmware I flashed via Kies a few weeks back) for some reason Vlingo is no longer the app on the double-home button action. Instead it calls Samsung Voice and wants to walk me through a first use tutorial, but I can't click the next/skip buttons
I installed via Android Market push the app belonging to www_remoteaccessphone_com as it promises to be able to remotely switch bluetooth off, but the website says I haven't installed the app yet, presumably because alrhough I was able to install it without touching the phone, it probably needs to be run at least once to set it up, and I obviously can't do that
I can't start Kies Air to try and get my data that way (starting it would require using the touch screen)
Kies via bluetooth isn't supported on Android
Needless to say, the data I'm trying to retrieve is on the internal memory, not the SD card. As you can see I've been trying all sorts of creative things, but I'm fairly sure I'm screwed. Any bright ideas I haven't thought of?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
flash it with CF-root, boot into CWM recovery, do a nandroid backup after that, use CWM recovery again to mount USB storage, connect to your PC and pull everything off.
Nitrile said:
flash it with CF-root, boot into CWM recovery, do a nandroid backup after that, use CWM recovery again to mount USB storage, connect to your PC and pull everything off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the quick advice. I guess I'll need to use my girlfriend's phone to download CF-root and then transfer the SD card to my device. Quick question before I proceed though - is it possible to remove all traces of such tampering, since I've already made out with Samsung that I'm sending it in for repair, and I'm not sure they will honour the warranty if they see it has been rooted etc.
blaubeer said:
Thanks for the quick advice. I guess I'll need to use my girlfriend's phone to download CF-root and then transfer the SD card to my device. Quick question before I proceed though - is it possible to remove all traces of such tampering, since I've already made out with Samsung that I'm sending it in for repair, and I'm not sure they will honour the warranty if they see it has been rooted etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
get a USB jig off ebay or amazon to reset the flash counter. should not cost more than 5 or 6 euros, shipped.
anyways you need to flash CF-root through ODIN if you are coming from stock. instructions are all in chainfire's cf-root thread.
Nandroid Restore
So I successfully rooted, used CWM to do a Nandroid backup, mounted the sd_card and saved the contents (including the nandroid backup) to my PC, reflashed the stock rom & kernel, usb-jigged it to get the counter back to zero/original and sent the phone in for repair. My efforts paid off as they repaired it without question under warranty. I just received the phone back and today set about restoring my backup:
Copied the sd_card contents I'd saved to my HDD back onto the phone
Re-roooted it with Cf-mod.
Used CWM to restore the backup I took before sending it in
It restored boot/system/data/cache successfully
selected reboot now in CWM
The result is that it is still missing all my apps. It only seems to have the "data" like my camera shots and SMS messages, system settings like whether bluetooth is on or off, the volume level, Wifi networks etc. So something was restored. But there is no Google Account configured, the lock screen picture is the default not the one I had beforehand, and as I said, all the apps - the main reason I did this whole thing as my personal data is all backed up to the cloud on a regular basis anyway - have not been restored. Am I confused? I thought a nandroid backup took a complete snapshot of everything, apps included.
Finding out the list of Apps I had in order to reinstall them is not an issue - I have a list of everything I had installed saved on AppBrain. But if I reinstall the apps, all the settings (or progress in the games) within those freshly installed apps will be back to square one, not where I left them, right? Or should I reinstall the apps and then restore the data partition over the top again?
Are you guys using any type of screen protectors, cause if you are, that may be the issue s their have been reports that the screen becomes unresponsive with certain screen protectors when connected to a charger.
However, if you are not using a screen protector, then I would suggest getting the unit replaced as you should not have to do anything, root or otherwise, to get the touchscreen working on a touchscreen phone
achillies400 said:
Are you guys using any type of screen protectors, cause if you are, that may be the issue s their have been reports that the screen becomes unresponsive with certain screen protectors when connected to a charger.
However, if you are not using a screen protector, then I would suggest getting the unit replaced as you should not have to do anything, root or otherwise, to get the touchscreen working on a touchscreen phone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope, no screen protector or any kind of case for that matter. Anyway, that isn't my issue anymore. The touch-sensitive unit was defective, the phone was repaired under warranty. My issue now is getting my apps & settings back. I have meanwhile read elsewhere that Nandroid doesn't back up the apps - pretty deceptive "backs up everything!" "it is like time travel" etc comments around here then.
Anyway, I reinstalled all the apps I had previously, and thought by reapplying the data partition from the nandroid backup it might then bring back the settings for the reinstalled apps. Instead all it did was remove all those apps again - now I am really confused. How come the restore DOESN'T bring back the apps I used to have, but DOES remove the ones I subsequently install. Does Nandroid touch the apps or doesn't it?
Touch screen not working
So i am having a very peculiar problem related to the GT-I9100 Touch Screen.
I bought the phone from Saudi Arabia and I live in Bangladesh at the moment. So for now I don't have warranty.
I bought it on 4th of this month. It had 2.3.3. So I updated it to 2.3.5. I did not use the phone much before that so I don't know if this problem was there before.
So here is the problem.
First time I noticed it when i pulled the phone from my pocket and could not unlock the pattern. First I thought I forgot the pattern. After sometime I noticed that i could not touch the buttons. I was dragging my finger over the points but there was no connecting line. I restarted the set. But it still did not work. After sometime I took the battery out. And after that it started normally and unlocked. And the touchscreen is totally fine.
I tested it using *#0*#. And every single point in the screen registers touch.
After that this happened couple of times. First couple of days I thought it was a pattern unlock problem. But i tried PIN and Password even using no unlock. It happened in every case.
So after couple of days it totally stopped happening.
But from yesterday it is happening again. And today it happened 3 times.
So today as I had no unlock protocol i tried tapping Home twice. As this brings on the voice command menu. And for the first time i was in the phone without touching the screen.And first i noticed the Menu and Back Soft keys works.And the touchscreen still does not work. And i noticed some thing weird. Always some thing in the screen is Selected. In Menu the + Icon is selected. In first screen the Map icon is selected. Also in Recent Apps the first App is selected. So after a lot of reboots it is back to normal again. Now i see something interesting. In the Battery Usage Graph i can see some really sharp drops. 3 times. Looks like when this happens phones charge takes a nose dive.
So here is the Gist.
Info related the Problem:
1. Usually happens when the phone is my pant pocket for sometime. It does not happen if it is sitting on the table.
2. Touchscreen gets totally disabled.
3. I have no idea why this happens.The exact reason behind it.
4. Battery Charge takes a nose dive when this happens. See the attached images.
5. I still don't know how to bring it back. Sometimes a simple reboot works. Sometimes I have to pull the battery. And sometimes it works on its own.
6. Every other function of the phone works. Like music playback using my UE 200vi music keys using PowerAMP, Siri(Android version), Call can be received using headset.
Battery nose Dive:
dl.dropbox.com/u/30943431/SC20111115-203017.png
dl.dropbox.com/u/30943431/SC20111116-202913.png
Also the selection
dl.dropbox.com/u/30943431/SC20111116-202146.png
So this is the thing. My biggest problem right now is, I don't know why it happens and I don't know how to bring it back from this situation. If I knew I could make sure I don't get it again or I would just fix it every-time. As when this happens I cant make calls or anything which requires the touchscreen.
So guys help me if you can by giving ideas. As i will not go back to KSA in 6 months. So buying a $550 phone unlocked was a total waste. As i cant use it here.
Thanks a million in advance.
---------- Post added at 09:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:13 PM ----------
Sorry for this. But looks like i cant post outside links before i have 8 posts. So i removed the "ht tp : //" part of the links. Copy paste in browser address bar and it will open fine.
And also the next time it happens i will do a video to shou you guys.
Having the same problem while charging touch screen doesn't work
Stock charger and usb cable
i was on CM7 but that happend so i flashed stock but no luck
I will write more observations

[Q] S3 screen (possibly digitiser) issues

So I have a Galaxy S3 that took a drop, and while the glass is not cracked, the touch screen does not work (all physical and capacitive buttons still work). I was thinking its no biggie since my phone plan ended, so I bought an S5. However I realised that I had never made a backup of the contacts and messages on that phone, as I didn't use a Google account on the phone (I used the phone for just work-related calls, messages, emails, documents and photos - yes its a stupid mistake). Also the last time I connected my phone to the computer, it was in mass-storage mode instead of MTP.
Since the screen does not work, I have no way to salvage my contacts and messages. When I try to connect my phone to the computer, I cannot find a folder which stores these when I use Windows Explorer. Also Kies won't connect to the phone because it keeps saying that the phone needs to be in MTP. But since the screen doesn't work, I cannot change the USB mode. The phone is also not rooted/has no recovery installed.
I'm thinking about installing a recovery that requires the volume buttons to operate, so I might have a chance of accessing the stored contacts and messages which are currently hidden. However I believe to install this requires some interaction with the phone using the touchscreen, unless there is a way to do it. Does anyone know a way?
If there isn't a way to do this, I'm thinking of replacing the digitiser myself, but I'm not sure if this is the part that's giving the problem or if its some other part. I have taken apart the phone before and there were signs of water damage (rust) on some of the metal parts.
Can someone help me with what to do? Thanks in advance!
Flashing a recovery with Odin doesn't require touch screen.
Buy a phone with motherboard failure and swap the screen assembly over.
Ooh thanks, I'll try Odin, and if I can't retrieve contacts and messages through that, then I'll start searching for a phone with a failed motherboard
boomboomer said:
Flashing a recovery with Odin doesn't require touch screen.
Buy a phone with motherboard failure and swap the screen assembly over.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi again, sorry for this late response! I tried flashing cwm from the official site, but this doesn't seem to have an option to mount the data partition so that I could view it on my pc. Do you know which recovery could be used for this? It must be a non-touch version of the recovery.
Thanks in advance!

Galaxy S3 black screen after drop but still working

My partner recently dropped her SGS3 from about 2 feet onto the floor. It was in a rubber case (ZeroLemon battery case) but the screen is now black. It's not cracked at all and the digitizer still works fine and the phone rings and if you touch the screen in the right place you can answer calls etc.
For a few days prior to this there were occasional lines on the screen and I suspected a loose connection at the time. After the drop and the screen going black I took it apart and sure enough the ribbon cable to the screen had popped off. I have put the cable back on but the screen is still black. When turning the phone off and on, the backlight does flicker on for a split second but there is no graphics on the screen visible. Even booting into download or recovery mode nothing is visible on the screen.
It was running CWM recovery (I can't remember which version) and CyanogenMod 10 (unsure of the exact version) and we desperately need to access some data from the phone, particularly the contacts and text messages. Is there a way we can recover this or gain remote control of the phone from a computer at all? I've seen several posts about using the SDK and ADB to do this but USB debugging is disabled so this wouldn't be an option. I've also read that it's possible to get an adb shell to enable debugging from CWM but can't seem to find any clear instructions on how to do this, I've booted into CWM and tried the adb tools but it does not list the phone.
Can anyone advise why the screen wouldn't work after plugging it in again? Or is there any other way to control the phone from a computer without usb debugging being enabled? My partner is desperately trying to access her google account and this phone is the only device that's logged in and is her only hope to recover the account.

[Q] Recover files from Galaxy S4

Today the screen on my phone decide to finally give in (see link)
i62.tinypic.com/o5zt6b.jpg
I now have a slight issue.... I thought oh it will be easy to recover my photos and files from he phone and itll be a 5 minute job.. however this is not the case. I plugged my s4 in to my computer and it come up as a media device. I searched for videos and photos on the device but nothing came up.
After looking on the internet, i found an application that i can use my my phone via usb on the pc.... however it appears that usb debugging is NOT enabled, this is also tied with the issue that my phone had a pattern lock and a pin combination to access the system
Is there a way i can recover the files from my phone? It contains some sentimental photos of past family members and some really important documents for my assignments.
andy93k said:
Today the screen on my phone decide to finally give in (see link)
i62.tinypic.com/o5zt6b.jpg
I now have a slight issue.... I thought oh it will be easy to recover my photos and files from he phone and itll be a 5 minute job.. however this is not the case. I plugged my s4 in to my computer and it come up as a media device. I searched for videos and photos on the device but nothing came up.
After looking on the internet, i found an application that i can use my my phone via usb on the pc.... however it appears that usb debugging is NOT enabled, this is also tied with the issue that my phone had a pattern lock and a pin combination to access the system
Is there a way i can recover the files from my phone? It contains some sentimental photos of past family members and some really important documents for my assignments.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The media is not going to be accessible while the pattern lock is enabled, which is why it connects but does not display any files. There is not a way around this. Your only solutions will be to get the screen fixed or to find a friendly shop that can connect a screen long enough to disable the pattern lock and enable USB Debugging, if needed. In the future, it might be a good idea to look into syncing your pictures and other important data to a cloud service like Google+, Dropbox, etc. on a regular basis to avoid being stuck with less than desirable solutions during worst case scenarios.

Screen Broken need help to access the Data, Backing up and Reset

Hello folks, my display broke suddenly, cannot see anything except a line and some green flickering when display is on. I have most of the documents and everything stored on my SD card but the Whatsapp data is unfortunately not backed up. There are a few pictures and chat data that I would need to access from there.
The situation is like this - Display broke but the phone works also touch apparently works too since Double tap makes the display light up in green (cannot see anything), and double tapping again makes the screen off. There are notifications coming. USB charging works. Shows up on the PC but the MTP won't show anything since screen is locked. I rebooted the phone which was the mistake !! because now it asks for pattern. I cannot unlock this, tried blind so many times but since I disabled the vibration. It's hard to get the pattern. Fingerprint scanner works but it won't unlock with it (so it just vibrates saying need to use pattern on screen due to reboot, the usual behavior)
Phone specs and OS are in my sig - Stock OS, Rooted, TWRP.
Can anyone please help if there's any way to access the filesystem ? It would be great if there's a way for accessing the data. My other request would be, can I make a data backup of the ROM as is with LGUP ? then reset it all before sending to LG for a full repair as I like this phone a lot.
Thank you for your time.
boot to twrp and then plug it in on PC and browse the file there? if you cant go to recovery from power off, maybe go to fastboot first then do the command to go to recovery.
figure out how to cast the display on a tv? i think the usb port supports HDMI output so maybe plugging it to a tv would work.

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