"Camera Unavailable" Issue - Verizon V20

[Almeuit]

Welp my buddies LG V20 bit the dust. Not the entire phone but mainly the cameras. No matter what we do he gets the "Camera Unavailable" error message. We tried the below....

• Camera cache clear.
• Camera data clear.
• OS cache clear.
• Phone reboot
• Other apps (such as a Verizon video call) -- that just crashes the call and says the same error.
• Last but not least... a factory data reset.

Sadly nothing seemed to work. The lucky part is we bought it less than 1 year ago (Feb. 17th last year) so Verizon does a manufacturer warranty replacement without much hassle & for free. They are sending us another V20 for my buddy and we will send them the old one back.

Glad Verizon has our back but sad the V20 did this to him. Also no he hasn't dropped it / done anything crazy to it. Case since day 1 and simply using it. No SD card in the phone either -- just internal stuff.

I am hoping the next one doesn't do this.

 

[Laura Knotek]

I'm sorry to hear this. That's a strange bug to occur. I've heard of bootloop issues with LG phones but not this. I hope it's not a widespread problem.

 

[Mooncatt]

This is the first I've heard of this on a V20, so I'm guessing it's rare. I have seen similar issues reported on other phones, and I think it was the camera module itself that went bad.

At least the exchange is going smooth. Giving credit where credit is due, Verizon does handle warranty claims expeditiously. Unfortunately it also means refurb roulette, and I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

 

[Almeuit]

This is the first I've heard of this on a V20, so I'm guessing it's rare. I have seen similar issues reported on other phones, and I think it was the camera module itself that went bad.

At least the exchange is going smooth. Giving credit where credit is due, Verizon does handle warranty claims expeditiously. Unfortunately it also means refurb roulette, and I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

My buddy found a good amount of people with the issue via a Google search so I don't think it's super rare. Seems to be a hardware failure.

Other then that it's been a solid phone that he has enjoyed. He upgraded from a V10 and G4 before that so he seems to enjoy LG.

 

[TNCattleDog]

I think as a result of the (not a) class action for the bootloop issues, all LG phones have had their warranties extended to 30 months by LG.

David

 

[Almeuit]

I think as a result of the (not a) class action for the bootloop issues, all LG phones have had their warranties extended to 30 months by LG.

David

Yeah that is nice and all but still doesn't make it convenient for it to fail. I went through Verizon simply for the ease of how they do it versus LG. They send me a V20, I get it all setup, and then send the old one back. Not send the phone first, wait forever, and get another -- that means my buddy would be without a phone.

 

[TNCattleDog]

@Almeuit, Absolutely right. It does not make it any more convenient. Its nice that Verizon is usually quick to ship out their replacements. When my first V20 failed, they sent a new one to me within two days. Same for my Wife's V10 that bootlooped. She got a new one from Verizon shipped out the next day.

From what I have read from people that have dealt directly with LG they have had to wait weeks to months for their phones to be fixed..if at all. In most cases, nothing was done.

I regularly use LG backup to create an image and save it on the SD card in the event I have to restore. Makes the process go a little quicker.

David

 

[Almeuit]

Update on the issue. Got his replacement and no issues so far. Sent the old one back to Verizon.

 

[ryan gilmore]

I've been struggling with my camera not working for probably a year and this is what I did to fix issue. Cleared camera cache, forced stop camera, turned off all camera permissions (saying accept to each one) then turned them all back on. This fixed my issue, hope it helps.