Can anyone advise me on if I have a hardware fault here on my HTC one m7

[hector 89000]

Hi, my HTC one m7 recently went wrong and I am wondering if anyone is familiar with the phone and can advise me on what sort of fix might be needed. I have not done anything to try to load new software to the phone, it was working ok in the morning faulty in the afternoon. It's state now is : it is slow to respond to the power button, eventually it vibrates, show the HTC screen, pauses there for a while then shuts off. This cycle repeats every time I try to power up. Recently it has been losing the network and needed to be restarted to regain communication.
I would dearly like to save the photos on the phone as a minimum if possible. I have moved the SIM to another phone and that works ok. I am hoping that some piece of hardware that can be unplugged and change has failed which is causing it to fail to start. Can anyone shed some light on the problem. Thanks H.

 

[fuzzylumpkin]

Sounds like a dead battery, which isn't surprising on a decade old device. Does it behave the same while a charger is plugged in?

 

[hector 89000]

Hi, yes the symptoms are the same when plugged in to the charger. The response to plugging the charger is not as before, sometimes the charge light doesn't come on, sometimes it comes on and stays red till trying to start phone then it goes out and stay out even after failure to start. Thanks H.

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! It sure sounds like a dead battery. You weren't backing up your important photos and other data somewhere? It's always a good idea to do so, since one never knows if/when a device will fail or be lost.

In case you hopefully had Google Photos auto-backup turned on, go to photos.google.com on your computer browser and see if the photos are there.

Assuming the battery has died, your only option would be to bring it to a repair shop and hope they can find a working replacement battery for such an old phone.

 

[hector 89000]

Hi, unfortunately for me I haven't backed things up for a while ( made more difficult by the lack of a memory card facility on phone) . I have a battery on order due sometime next week and looking at YouTube videos it looks like everything has to come apart to change the battery. So an ideal time to replace any other candidates for causing the failure to boot, the phone is in good condition, without crack screen which is a bonus. I hope I don't loose the photos when disconnecting the battery. Is a full onboard memory likely to be a likely culprit? Thanks H

 

[B. Diddy]

I doubt the data would be lost if you're just replacing the battery. But from what I recall, the M7 had a unibody design, making battery replacement challenging (especially if you're not a trained technician). Good luck!

 

[fuzzylumpkin]

Unfortunately, trying to accurately diagnose something like this over the internet without the device in hand is basically impossible. You will either have to take it to a repair shop or just trial and error it yourself.

The internal storage being full should not cause a boot failure, but being that old it is possible the module is corrupted.

 

[hector 89000]

Hi, yes it looks fiddly on YouTube but they make it look feasible. I assume that there is no way to access the files via the usb port unless the phone successfully powers up ? By pressing the volume button and the power button I can see the screen with fast boot options etc which stays on for a long time, would that be a way to get to the photos in the memory via the usb port?
Thanks H

 

[mustang7757]

Welcome to AC!
Even if you can find a battery today keep in mind battery degradation at this point , it's just very old hardware and device to bring back to life , it was released I believe 2013

 

[hector 89000]

Hi, if memory serves me well the morning the phone went wrong I didn't turn it off I just came back to it, it wasn't on so I tried to switch it on and it failed to complete the power up cycle.It was plugged in to the charger all the time so I assume something may have failed causing it to shut down, if I was a gambling man I would hedge my bet on something to do with the section that deals with recieving the network signal as that had been playing up and now it doesn't display the Vodafone logo etc after the HTC screen (but it's only a stab in the dark). If I can get it to boot even if it doesn't find the network, then I am hoping to be able to download any photos .

 

[B. Diddy]

Hi, yes it looks fiddly on YouTube but they make it look feasible. I assume that there is no way to access the files via the usb port unless the phone successfully powers up ? By pressing the volume button and the power button I can see the screen with fast boot options etc which stays on for a long time, would that be a way to get to the photos in the memory via the usb port?
Thanks H

The fact that the fastboot menu shows up and stays on does suggest that the problem may not be entirely with the battery. It could signify a problem with the motherboard, the SoC, and/or the memory chips. If that's the case, then unfortunately the data might be lost.

 

[Mooncatt]

That phone uses a micro-usb connection and those cables are notorious for going bad. If you haven't already, it may be worth trying a new cable before replacing the battery just to see if you can charge and get it running long enough to backup everything just in case the battery replacement fails.

I had the One M8 and I think it also had a poorly designed usb port that was also prone to going bad (I had mine replaced twice under warranty for this reason and saw others with similar issues). If a new cable doesn't work, you could consider replacing the USB board as well with the battery if you can source one. I'm not sure if it has the same issues, but wouldn't surprise me.

But this is just a suggestion for the immediate need of getting access to your data to backup. I know you like the phone, but you are at a big risk of more problems due to aging and old batteries, not to mention all the security risks it's now open to. You don't need to buy the latest and greatest, but even today's budget phones will surpass the M7 in many ways.