Phone locked, SIM not responding

[tpapictures]

I need help on this and unfortunately, being my dad's phone, I don't physically have it with me. Basically, it won't read his SIM so it's in emergency mode only, and then on top of that it's locked him out. He doesn't want to hard reset because he has some photos on the phone itself that he would lose and the PC won't recognise the phone (no clue what that's about). He got another SIM card and that didn't help.

Does anyone have some things I can try to resolve at least the lock issue?

Thanks!

 

[Rukbat]

It could be almost anything - the carrier's repair center or another repair shop would have to look at it.

As far as the pictures, have him look on Google Photos (signed in with his Google account). If they're there, they're safe.

 

[tpapictures]

So there's no way to find out what that lock code is? He never set the lock, he says. So he doesn't know how he's supposed to know the code.

If he were to hard reset the phone, would the lock issue go away? I guess it wouldn't solve the SIM slot problem.

Also it's weird that the PC won't recognise the phone.

 

[B. Diddy]

When you say the phone locked him out, do you mean it doesn't recognize his PIN/password/pattern? Was it telling him he was entering the wrong password?