My phone won't take photos

[AC Question]

My Huawei Ascend P6's camera just doesn't work, it neither takes photos nor videos. I tried turning the phone off then on again, but nothing helps. When I try to take a picture it makes the sound, the picture's thumbnails show up and when I try to open it it just says loading and stays like that forever. When I close and open the gallery again there's nothing there.

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! Try booting into Safe Mode, which temporarily disables all 3rd party apps. On most Android devices, while powered on, press and hold Power until the Power Off menu appears. Press and hold the Power Off selection until the Safe Mode prompt appears. Tap OK.

If the problem disappears in Safe Mode, then something you installed is causing the problem. You may have to uninstall apps one by one until the problem disappears. If the problem persists in Safe Mode, then it's more likely to be a hardware or firmware problem.

 

[Julian Serbezki]

Thank you, I followed your advice but here's what happened:

1) I started the phone under safe mode and the camera worked. So following your post I started deleting all of my apps.

2) After I deleted all of them the camera worked even without safe mode. But the play store wouldn't work since I deleted all of its updates.

3) So I figured since I've deleted all of my apps, I can just do a quick backup and restore the phone back to factory settings. And so I did.

4) Phone is restored to factory settings, I have exactly 3 apps in downloaded (Gmail, play store and google play services automatically updated) and then decided to try if the camera is still working. And it's not.

What do you suggest to do from here?

 

[B. Diddy]

Just to be sure, go through your App Drawer to make sure no other 3rd party apps got automatically downloaded after the factory reset. Sometimes, people think a factory reset has made their device pristine, but if they went to the Play Store right after finishing the Setup Wizard, they might see their old apps automatically installing.

I can't imagine that Gmail or Google Play Store would impact the Camera app, so if the phone is truly free of 3rd party apps, then it might be some conflict between the most up-to-date Google Play Services and the Huawei Camera app. Have you tried any 3rd party camera apps?

 

[Julian Serbezki]

Okay here's what I've done so far:
First I Downloaded HD Camera Ultra and then checked Manage Apps -> Downloaded and the only apps downloaded were HD Camera Ultra, Gmail, Google Play Services and Play Store. So I guess there are no other 3rd party apps. Then I tried the new camera app and once again it didn't work - just like the standard it freezes at loading when you try to view the pic you've taken. Just for testing, I tried safe mode once again and the normal camera app works fine, but when I clicked HD Camera Ultra under safe mode it had the same problem and froze when I tried to take a photo. After which I tried the standard app and it didn't work anymore. Any suggestions?

 

[B. Diddy]

My guess is that it has to do with Google Play Services. Hopefully this will be corrected in the next update. You could try installing a previous version of Google Play Services, but the problem is that it would probably automatically update again.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[Julian Serbezki]

You're right. I've installed several third party apps since the reset, but as soon as I uninstalled all updates for Google Play Services the camera started working again, no safe mode needed. It's a shame that there's no way for solving this problem in the long term, though...

 

[B. Diddy]

Give Huawei and Google your feedback about this. Probably won't lead to a quick solution, but at least you can make yourself heard.

 

[Julian Serbezki]

Something new happened this morning which I find very disturbing. I unlocked my phone just to see tons of new apps downloaded by their self. I'm sure I haven't downloaded anything that can cause this, somehow apps just download and install without my permission. I opened my downloaded apps drawer and I found some very weird apps:
Com.android.setting.confirm
Com.android.ap.sprovider
DU speed booster
Those are the only new ones listed but there are other apps I've found on my home screen that aren't listed there like an app called "native" that just says hello world when you open it and an app called "Blued - gay chat".
I have no idea how any of this got on my phone so please help.

 

[B. Diddy]

Not sure about the apps that start with com. Are you sure DU Speed Booster wasn't preinstalled? Can you uninstall it, or is that button greyed out? Or does it only allow you to disable it? DU Speed Booster is one of those kinds of apps that may be shady. Their utility is questionable, and they often have adware or worse associated with them.

If you can't get rid of it, try another factory reset. This time, before the reset, go to Settings>Backup & Reset, and uncheck Automatically Restore. After the reset and the Setup Wizard, go immediately to Google Play Store and stop any apps that might be installing automatically. Now see if those apps are there.

 

[Julian Serbezki]

Yes, I'm sure DU Speed Booster somehow got installed today on it's own, I've never installed it myself. What's funny is that since I've made my last post I see a lot of other new apps installing by theirself and ads showing up all the time. And the downloaded list still shows only com.android.ad.sprovider, com.android.setting.confirm and DU Speed Booster and none of the others. Could it be a virus?

The uninstall button isn't gray for any of them. Should I just uninstall them and hope that nothing like this will happen again or try another factory reset? Btw just tried the camera - it's not working again.

 

[B. Diddy]

I'd favor starting from scratch and doing a factory reset, following the steps I mentioned above. It's hard to know if that software is doing anything else that's unwanted or possibly malicious.