Phone stuck in infinite reboot loop

[Dimitri]

My phone seems to be stuck in an infinite reboot loop. I see the Samsung logo introductory screen, then the Samsung Galaxy SII splash screen, then back to the samsung logo, into perpetuity.

I don't know what brought this about, I didn't do anything out of the ordinary. It started while the phone was already on, I think.

I tried removing the battery repeatedly, but when I turn it back on it just goes back into the cycle.

 

[_Glitch]

Try holding home + volume up + power for about 5-10 seconds when the device is turned off.
i believe you will enter the recovery mode.

 

[Grantapus]

Try holding home + volume up + power for about 5-10 seconds when the device is turned off.
i believe you will enter the recovery mode.

going into recovery mode wont do anything. (Personal XP)

i would make sure that there is nothing on the phone you want to keep, and factory reset it and see if that works. (Disclaimer: this will delete everything on the phone and return it back to factory state)

 

[_Glitch]

And you do that in the recovery mode, no?

 

[Dimitri]

going into recovery mode wont do anything. (Personal XP)

i would make sure that there is nothing on the phone you want to keep, and factory reset it and see if that works. (Disclaimer: this will delete everything on the phone and return it back to factory state)

Oh, boy, I'd like to avoid that. I don't know how much of my stuff is on the card and how much on the phone and I can't see since I can't boot the phone up.

 

[Grantapus]

Oh, boy, I'd like to avoid that. I don't know how much of my stuff is on the card and how much on the phone and I can't see since I can't boot the phone up.

I don't see another way to solve it besides wiping the phone and reflashing the ROM (deleting all user data in the process)

 

[Grantapus]

And you do that in the recovery mode, no?

Yes, you do. I was just pointing out that just going into recovery won't solve the problem. The op probably does not even know what to do once in recovery mode.

 

[Dimitri]

Does anyone know a way around this without losing my data? I REALLY can't afford to wipe some of the notes I have on the phone.

 

[_Glitch]

Backup Backup Backup.

If it's on your SD card i should be easy to grab. Do you have a card reader on your computer? If not, they are super cheap on ebay.

 

[Grantapus]

Backup Backup Backup.

If it's on your SD card i should be easy to grab. Do you have a card reader on your computer? If not, they are super cheap on ebay.

Makes sense.

 

[Dimitri]

If it's on the card I'm good, but I suspect it's not. THe most imp stuff are these notes I took with some note taking app that came pre installed. I suspect it's on the phone, so I need to save stuff from the phone somehow.

 

[Grantapus]

If it's on the card I'm good, but I suspect it's not. THe most imp stuff are these notes I took with some note taking app that came pre installed. I suspect it's on the phone, so I need to save stuff from the phone somehow.

I forget how to do this, of if it will work, but just put the device in USB debugging mode with the right tools installed on the PC, and you should be able to get your files

 

[Dimitri]

I forget how to do this, of if it will work, but just put the device in USB debugging mode with the right tools installed on the PC, and you should be able to get your files

I'll look into that. Someone also mentioned to me a hard reset, as opposed to a factory reset.

Which is supposed to reset all settings but not touch any of the data. Anyone know anything about this?

 

[porterjw]

A hard reset is sometimes confused with a hard reboot (forcing the phone to power down by holding the power button until it turns off rather than shutting down via the UI). Perhaps that is what they meant. A factory reset involves wiping all data off the phone as mentioned above.

What note taking app? If it syncs with Google, your stuff should sync back after you reset/flash.

Galaxy S2's are notoriously easy to root... You can use Odin to flash the Rooted version of the stock ROM, install a custom recovery, and then you'll always have a backup on your SD card you can install from.

 

[Grantapus]

A hard reset is sometimes confused with a hard reboot (forcing the phone to power down by holding the power button until it turns off rather than shutting down via the UI). Perhaps that is what they meant. A factory reset involves wiping all data off the phone as mentioned above.

What note taking app? If it syncs with Google, your stuff should sync back after you reset/flash.

Galaxy S2's are notoriously easy to root... You can use Odin to flash the Rooted version of the stock ROM, install a custom recovery, and then you'll always have a backup on your SD card you can install from.

Agree. I hard reset is a hard reboot. It does not do anything.

 

[Dimitri]

A hard reset is sometimes confused with a hard reboot (forcing the phone to power down by holding the power button until it turns off rather than shutting down via the UI). Perhaps that is what they meant. A factory reset involves wiping all data off the phone as mentioned above.

What note taking app? If it syncs with Google, your stuff should sync back after you reset/flash.

Galaxy S2's are notoriously easy to root... You can use Odin to flash the Rooted version of the stock ROM, install a custom recovery, and then you'll always have a backup on your SD card you can install from.

I can't recall the note taking app's name, it's preinstalled and has a yellow notebook background. But it doesn't sync with anything.

Actually, I found that when I hold the home button + volume up + power it leads me to a menu which includes backup & recovery. I've created a backup, but is recovering from it gonna fix it? (I've created a backup AFTER this started)

 

[Grantapus]

I can't recall the note taking app's name, it's preinstalled and has a yellow notebook background. But it doesn't sync with anything.

Actually, I found that when I hold the home button + volume up + power it leads me to a menu which includes backup & recovery. I've created a backup, but is recovering from it gonna fix it? (I've created a backup AFTER this started)

If you made a backup after the problem, you could corrupt more files restoring from the backup. Is it system backup, or personal backup?

 

[Dimitri]

If you made a backup after the problem, you could corrupt more files restoring from the backup. Is it system backup, or personal backup?

I don't know what the difference is.

I'm using something called PhilZ Touch 5 (CWM Base version: v6.0.3.7) and it has a menu called backup and restore, and I just pressed on backup in that menu.

 

[porterjw]

I can't recall the note taking app's name, it's preinstalled and has a yellow notebook background. But it doesn't sync with anything.

Generic note app - I vaguely recall having that on my S2 as well. Switch to Google Keep moving forward - infinitely better.

Actually, I found that when I hold the home button + volume up + power it leads me to a menu which includes backup & recovery. I've created a backup, but is recovering from it gonna fix it? (I've created a backup AFTER this started)

Maybe? Doubtful, but perhaps worth a try. Not going to do anymore damage at this point, yeah?

I don't know what the difference is.

System backup is everything on the phone itself (Android files, App data, photo's, downloads, etc).

I'm using something called PhilZ Touch 5 (CWM Base version: v6.0.3.7) and it has a menu called backup and restore, and I just pressed on backup in that menu.

Wait, you already have a custom recovery and didn't make backups...?

 

[Grantapus]

Generic note app - I vaguely recall having that on my S2 as well. Switch to Google Keep moving forward - infinitely better.



Maybe? Doubtful, but perhaps worth a try. Not going to do anymore damage at this point, yeah?



System backup is everything on the phone itself (Android files, App data, photo's, downloads, etc).



Wait, you already have a custom recovery and didn't make backups...?

How the heck do you have a custom recovery and no backups? LOL!

Backing it up now and restoring it are not gonna do anything. I had the same problem with my nexus 7 2nd gen, after trying to flash a file, so I thought that if I made a backup, I could restore to the backup and the problem gone, NO, it did not fix it. Doing that pretty much just flashes the bricked version back on the phone. Not even worth trying...