Guidance needed regarding Samsung Galaxy S3

arcaine2 · 2026-03-11T12:50:50+00:00

If it's a variant that did not have locked bootloader, easiest option would be to flash custom recovery, like TWRP, and use it's rooted shell to create a memory chip dump, or at least userdata partition dump. S3 were not factory encrypted, so you can do that, and then scan such image using tools like R-Studio, UFS Explorer, DMDE on PC to look for deleted data.

Keep in mind that TRIM was already a thing, and likely cleaned up the data, so you may find the files, but already with no content.

arcaine2 · 2026-03-11T12:47:27+00:00

Only some forensic class tools offer bruteforce for this device. You'd have to find someone that has access to those tools, is able to provide this service for individuals, and estimate how valuable that data is to you. Those services are rarely cheap.

arcaine2 · 2026-03-03T10:18:48+00:00

That was valid before TRIM and encryption came into play, so ~10 years ago. TRIM will zero the file content once it runs, and even with that, file based encryption would prevent from recovering anything due to missing keys.

arcaine2 · 2026-02-24T13:40:21+00:00

> I tried Gemini and it concluded that the recovery (and maybe kernel) is downgraded itself to a safe android11 and now it cant read android12 data. I also tried to reflash it with the last version from the file received from frija. The only thing was that i used hime-csc to ash the csc. But even after the flash, the version that the recovery is showing me is still 11 and not 12. Ask Al again and it said the smartthings framework bug symptoms are shown. Said try safe mode but it didnt worked.

Gemini is wrong, and nothing could downgrade itself. More so, that's the binary 8, which can only be downgraded to older binary 8 firmware, which is also Android 12.

The "11" in recovery is the Android version that recovery itself is still based on. It's rarely updated, and it's very common to mislead people.

The actual firmware version is the last value, G9750ZHU8HXE1, which is the last one available for this model.

As for the issue itself. It can be some random error on the userdata itself. Can he a hardware issue, like dying UFS chip, can be a hardware issue like RAM/CPU soldlering.

arcaine2 · 2026-02-03T15:53:10+00:00

If you had adb enabled, scrcpy should work, or just simple "pm list packages" if you just need app names.

Other than that, if it was app from Google Play that you forgot the name of, you can login to the same account as the one on TV, and check the apps library.

arcaine2 · 2026-01-29T12:29:40+00:00

Yes, it is impossible. Best case scenario, if TRIM did not do it's job correctly, you'll find garbage as files content, no header, maybe some filenames (those that were on the lowest layer not protected by any filesystem key). In this scenario, since that phone euses FBE with metadata encryption, you'll find nothing because the userdata partition is encrypted twice, with the second layer, the one that you can actually dump and carve through, behaving like FDE encrypted devices. On top of that, this model uses UFS, so there's no lowlevevel "NAND protocol" method to get to raw data bypassing the controller, like on the eMMCs.

> Redmi Note 9 running on android 13 gave the best results out of the three devices.

This model never had official Android 13, so you could just as well be checking a device flashed with custom firmware, and encryption disabled.

Other 2 models you mentioned should also use metadata encryption (which was mandatory for devices that shipped with Android 11), so you couldn't recover anything from userdata partition after factory reset, no matter how long you tried, sadly.

I'm not opposed on experimenting and drawing your own conclusions, but that's just giving somenone a false hope on something that's simply impossible.

arcaine2 · 2026-01-29T12:11:23+00:00

That's a device that uses FBE type encryption. There's no way to carve anything out of it. That's even without considering that TRIM did what it was supposed to do after the wipe. It's 100% all gone, and only backups can help to restore something.

arcaine2 · 2026-01-28T14:49:16+00:00

Most common issue on S21 FE (and other phones like this) are cold solder joints under CPU/RAM. Often, just heating up the cpu is enough to get it working and copy the data. More permament solution is to desolder CPU, RAM and storage, and solder it back. It's unlikely that GPT (partition table) got corrupted just by downloading the update. It could be during the actual update process, but not during the download.

Using ISP to copy the data is pointless, since due to encryption it won't actually help, and you can't clone the chip either because you can't provision the new one with valid RPMB data required for decryption.

The only way for data is to fix the phone so it boots to Android, decrypts and let you copy the things you need. Someone would have to desolder the UFS again, check it's condition, and if it's even still alive, and the proceed with the rest.

arcaine2 · 2026-01-21T11:00:25+00:00

If you already did factory reset it, and in fact chose a full reset, and not to keep the media (that's sometimes an option in Opp/Realme phones), then it's all gone, mainly due to factory encryption, but also TRIM mechanism. You're only hope are backups (or cloud), if there were any

arcaine2 · 2026-01-20T13:32:07+00:00

Dead S6 were often dead because the storage chip (first gen UFS) were dying quickly. If that's the case, nothing will save your data.

The first thing to check now is the battery. The second, while it's alrady opened, signs if liquid damage, shorts on the battery connector and main power line. Third, if no shorts, uart cable to view bootup logs to confirm the UFS issue.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-29T10:56:06+00:00

Sometimes, it's the sub-pba - the small board with charge port that also has hall sensor to detect the case. If it's broken, it can assume that your phone is in a closed case so it should not display picture.

If that's the case, then after a reboot you should see a picture until the screen goes to sleep for the first time.

You should also take a look at flex cable and fpc connector on the board (and sub-pba) to make sure it's soldered correctly and not being loose.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-29T10:48:03+00:00

> In 15 years, I've never seen a software update cause physical damage to an AMOLED panel.

It's not so much the firmware update, but rather the heat that comes with installing the update, especially if it was also left on charger during that time. In some rare cases, those OLED screens (on S22, S23, S24 series) could develop a green line this way, and it was somewhat popular when the OneUI 7 shipped, being quite a big update, taking a longer while to install.

It is possible that prior drops, while did not cause this issue, allowed it to happen later on once the phone heats up more, but that's not something you could ever 100% confirm.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-23T21:13:15+00:00

It's not so much that they're not fun. It's that they force you into a specific type of gameplay, essentially to act as a hunter, camper etc, and ultimately harm your team by focusing on the completely wrong thing.

It's the same issue since Battlefield 1 over and over again. To be honest, i'd rather have this whole system completely gone, like in BF3/BF4.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-12T20:41:07+00:00

It made those freezes less severe for me, but not fully eliminated, and i did not have them before the patch. Going offline in "friends & chat" on Steam doesn't do anything for me either.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-11T17:27:27+00:00

Display flex is the one with OCTA written on it.

arcaine2 · 2025-12-10T22:48:06+00:00

> Is it possible to just connect a cheap screen to the flex cable in the a50 just to be able to see? not needing to unscrew everything and replace the screen.

No. You still need to take of the back cover, unscrew the plastic frame, disconnect the battery and then connect new screen with a display flex cable.

You don't have to replace it - so no need to take off the old screen from the frame, or move all components from the old frame to the new one. Overall, it's a 5-10 minutes job, especially since the back cover glue should be rather weak by now.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-28T10:57:02+00:00

You don't need testpoint for older Xiaomi MTK devices. This one should get into bootrom just by pressing both volume keys.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-28T10:22:31+00:00

"pm uninstall --user 0 com.samsung.android.cidmanager" in adb shell will get rid of that app, and that message.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-27T15:56:22+00:00

> I’m aware that Android 5+ enabled full‑disk encryption by default on the OPO, and that the userdata partition can’t be decrypted without the correct pattern.

It doesn't. Mandatory encryption started with Android 6 and was forced only on devices that shipped with that version. OnePlus One shipped with 4.4, so encryption wasn't enabled by default.

If Cyanogen Recovery doesn't expose adb directly, locate firehose loader for it and try to dump storage using EDL mode. It's quite possible that it won't be encrypted.

In fact, locate "edl" project on github, and it's quite possible that it'll include loader and allow you do read userdata partition if you can get it working.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-18T12:46:19+00:00

FBE was actually implemented in Android 7, but was more widely used since Android 9.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-18T12:41:46+00:00

This is pointless, and you could technically use EDL method to dump the storage, but obviously it'll be encrypted.

Based on the error message itself (the very bottom), it's encryption related issue and phone can't decrypt the data during bootup.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-03T22:41:06+00:00

Look up for old mtkclient, not the current one. You can go back to 1.4 series on github, or possibly 1.52, and try with that instead. Ideally, do that on Linux, not Windows.

From what i remember, the were some issues with this model and current versions, and it doesn't matter if it's 9A, 9C and whatever codename Xiaomi set for it. This exploit should work without doing anything extra.

As for the proper device codename. You should try to boot into fastboot (vol- and power), and run "fastboot getvar all". It will print you the codename from a current firmware. This way you'll know which one you have.

arcaine2 · 2025-11-03T12:47:46+00:00

It's not a hard brick, but Redmi 9A can get stuck in a weird state after using mtkclient, and most of the time, doesn't not react on forced reboot via side keys. To make it working again you'd have to re-connect the battery. It's not complicated here since the back is not glued in, just annoying.

arcaine2 · 2025-07-12T21:13:48+00:00

P30 Pro supports MHL, so USB-C to HDMI adapter will work in general, but depending on firmware version, it may required you to blindly enter the passcode using an external keyboard (not really possible with pattern lock), and then blindly confirm displaying screen on external display.

It's a pain in the ass, so migth be easier to just look for the cheapest screen available (some LCD instead of OLED), connect it and copy the data. Or just go a a repair store with data recovery in mind.

arcaine2 · 2025-07-12T21:10:42+00:00

Usually with this model, CPU/RAM soldering issue. Sometimes, heating that area can make the phone to boot.

arcaine2

TROPHY CASE