Galaxy S5 Bottom Right Capacitive 'Back' Button/Icon Not Working

[AzAssassin]

I just bought a used Samsung Galaxy S5 (SM-G900V) phone about an hour ago and after I got home and thoroughly checked out the phone, I noticed that the bottom right capacitive 'Back' button/icon was not lit up and was not working. To clarify, I am referring to the little sideways fish-hook-looking icon that allows you to go back on a webpage or while in an app, etc. The other capacitive button on the left side of the bottom of the phone, that allows you to pop-up the recent apps/pages/features you've used lights up and works properly, though.

I just got5 off the phone with Samsung and they told me that the phone is still under warranty and that I can take it to the local Best Buy in my area and that they should fix it for free, and I plan on going there tomorrow. But since that best Buy is closed now and I work tonight and will be up all night and in to the early morning hours, I wanted to ask if anyone else has had this problem, and if so, is it a simple fix that is likely to be covered under the warranty?

I will also add that I can't help but be nervous/skeptical about them fixing this issue under the warranty, so that's another reason I'm asking about this on here, in case they will not cover this under the warranty. And, after just taking a picture of this phone with my flash on, I noticed that there appears to be a dent in the back of the phone underneath where the battery sits. So, I'm also worried about that potentially being a problem with the warranty coverage at Best Buy.

I'm going to try to upload a picture of the bottom of the phone with only the left capacitive button lit, as well as one of back of the phone showing the dent. So, hopefully, that will work and y'all can see exactly what I'm talking about.

If anyone has any ideas, suggestions, helpful information, or thoughts about this issue, please know that all helpful replies will be very much appreciated!

 

[B. Diddy]

Did you buy it used from a private seller? If it was an actual store, what's their return policy?

 

[AzAssassin]

Did you buy it used from a private seller? If it was an actual store, what's their return policy?

It was from a private individual. He was very patient while I was checking it out, and even offered to give me my money back, if something ended up being wrong with the phone. I realize not like actual guarantee or anything like that, but that may be an option, if I decide to try to ask him for my money back. Although, he probably needed the money and spent some or all of it already. I'm really just hoping that Best Buy will be able to figure out what's wrong with it and be willing to fix it for free under the warranty.

Do you or does anyone else have any idea what might cause the Back button on the bottom panel the stop working? And does anyone think that the dent on the back of the phone in the battery compartment area might prevent them from honoring the warranty?

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[B. Diddy]

The fact that the button and its backlight don't work suggest to me a hardware problem. It's hard to say how the Samsung Store will regard that dent. One option for you is to find out how much the repair would cost (if they don't honor the warranty) and then contact the seller back and try to negotiate for the seller to pay the repair cost (or at least share in the cost).

 

[AzAssassin]

The fact that the button and its backlight don't work suggest to me a hardware problem. It's hard to say how the Samsung Store will regard that dent. One option for you is to find out how much the repair would cost (if they don't honor the warranty) and then contact the seller back and try to negotiate for the seller to pay the repair cost (or at least share in the cost).

Thank you very much for replying, B. Diddy. I actually just got back to the Best Buy store a few minutes ago, only to find out that I had driven there for nothing. The guy with Samsung Customer Support misinformed me when he told me that I could take the phone there and have it looked at and repaired in the store. It turns out that they have very little means to actually fix Samsung phones, despite it being a Samsung Experience location. So, now I have to mail the phone to the Samsung headquarters in Texas, expecting to get it back in about a week and a half, and hope that they actually fix it under the warranty.

As for the warranty situation, there's no damage to the screen and there does not appear to be any water damage, but the dent in the battery compartment is really making me nervous and concerned that they might void the warranty and not repair it, because of that. If you can clearly see the dent in the photo I attached, what do you think about that? Do you think a dent like that is likely to void the warranty?

As always, helpful replies will be very much appreciated!

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[Miller6386]

Thank you very much for replying, B. Diddy. I actually just got back to the Best Buy store a few minutes ago, only to find out that I had driven there for nothing. The guy with Samsung Customer Support misinformed me when he told me that I could take the phone there and have it looked at and repaired in the store. It turns out that they have very little means to actually fix Samsung phones, despite it being a Samsung Experience location. So, now I have to mail the phone to the Samsung headquarters in Texas, expecting to get it back in about a week and a half, and hope that they actually fix it under the warranty.

As for the warranty situation, there's no damage to the screen and there does not appear to be any water damage, but the dent in the battery compartment is really making me nervous and concerned that they might void the warranty and not repair it, because of that. If you can clearly see the dent in the photo I attached, what do you think about that? Do you think a dent like that is likely to void the warranty?

As always, helpful replies will be very much appreciated!

Posted via the Android Central App

My initial thoughts on the dents before reading any of the thread was that a dog got ahold of it and had bite it. Which makes me wonder if that wasn't the case and the screen had been damaged and replaced or repaired. I have seen this with other Samsung devices where after a screen/digitizer being replaced the capacitive buttons would stop working. Although usually it is both of them not just one.

Note 4tified

 

[B. Diddy]

From that photo, it looks like only the battery is dented. Are there dents on the actual back cover of the phone? If it's just the battery, you might be ok, because who's to say that this isn't some other battery that the previous owner swapped in, unrelated to when the button defect occurred?

 

[ironass]

From that photo, it looks like only the battery is dented. Are there dents on the actual back cover of the phone? If it's just the battery, you might be ok, because who's to say that this isn't some other battery that the previous owner swapped in, unrelated to when the button defect occurred?

That 3rd photograph in post #1, although not obvious at first glance, actually depicts an empty S5 battery compartment and the dents are in that.

I am inclined to agree with Miller6386, that it looks like a dog has had its teeth into it. I would be inclined to go for a refund as there could be internal damage which might prove costly.

 

[B. Diddy]

That 3rd photograph in post #1, although not obvious at first glance, actually depicts an empty S5 battery compartment and the dents are in that.

Ah, thanks for clarifying! I actually thought that was the battery itself.

 

[AzAssassin]

I just wanted to say thanks for the replies to those of you who took the time to reply to this thread. I ended up mailing out the phone to Samsung yesterday (8-24), so I'm hoping to hear something back from them about the warranty coverage for this 'Back' button issue within the next week or so. I'll be sure to update this after I hear something from Samsung.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[AzAssassin]

First off, I got the phone back from Samsung and they not only did not repair the 'Back' button, claiming that the damage was not covered under warranty, but the phone is no longer factory unlocked, due to some sort of software flash that Samsung does when they receive a device to work on.

Second, I just wrote a really long post about this, but my browser froze up before I got to post it and after restarting Firefox, I can not find the draft. Can someone tell me if I can access the draft that was auto-saved for the long message I had written? So that I don't have to write another long post to describe this issue.

A helpful response would be very much appreciated!

 

[AzAssassin]

First off, I got the phone back from Samsung and they not only did not repair the 'Back' button, claiming that the damage was not covered under warranty, but the phone is no longer factory unlocked, due to some sort of software flash that Samsung does when they receive a device to work on.

Second, I just wrote a really long post about this, but my browser froze up before I got to post it and after restarting Firefox, I can not find the draft. Can someone tell me if I can access the draft that was auto-saved for the long message I had written? So that I don't have to write another long post to describe this issue.

A helpful response would be very much appreciated!

Well, seeing as it's not likely that I'm going to get a response about how to find the auto-saved draft that I was writing earlier (if it's even still accessible at all) as quickly as I'd like to, I wanted to try to elaborate a little on what happened and see if someone might be able to help me get this S5 to be unlocked again.

Basically, I got the phone back from Samsung and I spent spent about 3-4 hours yesterday trying to get my T-Mobile SIM card to again work in this phone, but the phone would not detect a T-Mobile cell signal. So, after going to 3 different Verizon stores close (including 1 corporate store) and calling Verizon 2-3 times, and getting nowhere, I finally called Samsung Tech. Support and waited on hold for literally over an hour (I even took screenshots while on hold, because I was so pissed off about being on hold for over an hour). After someone finally answered the line, I was told by a Samsung Tech. Support supervisor that whenever they receive a phone to do work on, they do some sort of software flash to it and that, apparently, this software flash caused the phone to lose its unlocked status. So, this S5 phone is evidently no longer an unlocked device. The Samsung Tech. Support supervisor told me that she does not know how Verizon makes their devices unlocked, as phones are specifically locked to the specific carrier they are being sold to when they leave Samsung.

After having this conversation with Samsung Tech. Support, I called Verizon for a 3rd or 4th time, only to be told that she did not know how Verizon unlocks their phones and that she recommended I take the phone to a cell phone repair shop and have it "flashed" to be unlocked again. This would most likely cost me money, so I'd like to try to find a free alternative, if possible. Plus, I am of the impression that "flashing" used to specifically be for CDMA phones, so I don't know that getting this Galaxy S5 "flashed" would even unlock the GSM feature on it.

So, can anyone comment on what I might be able to do to get this Galaxy S5 to be GSM SIM carrier unlocked again?

Is there possibly some sort of software flash/update/anything that I can download and install myself, so that this phone will again be unlocked?

As always, helpful replies will be genuinely appreciated!


P.S. I was really hoping to be able to test out a Verizon SIM card in this phone, not only to at least verify that the phone still works with Verizon, but also because I was thinking that doing that might connect the phone to Verizon's network and then bring it back to a factory unlocked state. Is this realistic or possible? Or likely not?

And I should also add that after adding the T-Mobile APN to the phone, the default Verizon APN for the phone is greyed out and is not clickable, which, I'm assuming, is because there is not a Verizon SIM card in the phone, so it will not allow access to the Verizon APN. So, if I were to insert a Verizon SIM, might it somehow connect to Verizon's network and activate the phone and possibly open back up the unlocked state for the phone? Or is this unlikely to change that, and will only make the Verizon APN accessible?

And I'd also like to add that after dealing with 4 different employees at the 3 different Verizon stores I went to yesterday, 3 of them had cell service other than Verizon, and the 1 guy who had Verizon service actually had a different SIM card than what the S5 takes, so I could not even use one of their Verizon SIM cards to put it in my S5 and test it out. And I was told that they could not let me use a new Verizon SIM card form the store, because it would have to be activated and that they could not do that without me purchasing the SIM card.