Why won't my phone boot past colored symbols?

[AC Question]

Phone will not boot past colored symbols

I have had my fantastic Nexus 5 for some time now, and up until the Android 6 update I have had no crash issues at all. It may be coincidence, but since the update a couple days ago my phone has crashed three times, and with the last crash it will not boot past the colored symbols. In fact it will cycle the symbols without end at times, but sometimes it will cycle them for 30 seconds or so and then crash back to the black screen then to "Google" followed by the colored symbol screen. Rinse and repeat.

I have tried full shut off and re-start by holding down the power button and that does nothing new. I read on these forums a suggestion for a Nexus 4 user back in July to try holding down the power button and tapping the up volume once to pull up some options, but that seems to do nothing. Perhaps I am doing it at the wrong time though.

I read that Marshmallow handles permissions differently, so I wonder if it has to do with my third-party launcher. Though it seems strange that I was able to (until today) use my phone just fine between crashes for several days after the update.

 

[ptkelly]

Re: Phone will not boot past colored symbols

My Nexus 5 went totally berserk and I never did figure out why. So, I did a factory restore which used to require holding the volume down button while you push the power button and on and on but now it's an option in "Settings". Go to "Backup and Restore". First, make sure the backup is turned on. If it is, you can then to a factory restore. It take quite awhile but then your Nexus 5 is back to factory specs, except with Android 6. Then you restore your apps, contacts, calendar, etc. I had a number of passwords for public WiFi outlets and they are restored, too.

Now, my Nexus works fine again except the battery drains very quickly. I think it's because it is doing a ton of downloads of updates for apps. After two days the battery drain seems to have slowed. The big user was "Exchange Services".

 

[drworm73]

This is the OP BTW:

The problem is that it will not fully boot up android. It is stuck on the cycle of animated colored symbols that that you see when android it booting. There is no way to go to any settings to reset it because it never gets that far.