HTC Evo 4G LTE - SCUBA edition - totally dead - phone, or at least data, recoverable?

[greeneggman]

Son dunked my Evo 4G LTE under a foot of water. It was still on, so powered it off by holding the top button down, then dried it out in rice for several days. Plugged it in, powered it on - amazing! Looked great! Had to leave for work, by the time I arrived the phone was a brick - no power, no reset holding top button (with or without volume up or down), did not register at Sprint store when plugged in via USB.

Questions for the pros:
1. Is there any hope for the phone? Could it just be the battery is trashed? Is it possible to get/replace just the battery?

2. More importantly, I have my daughters first four months of life in video and photo on the phone's internal storage. I know, I should have backed it up, but I have two in diapers so best practice sometimes falls by the wayside. Does anyone out there know how to get to and read this phone's internal storage? Is it a chip that can be removed and accessed? Can I solder some wires somewhere on the phone? I'll certainly try anything, links to video or written narrative from someone who has done this would be greatly appreciated.

The phone is under warranty, sprint offered a refurbished for $35 - so I know I can get a working phone back, but I'll gladly opt to pay for a new phone and rip this one apart to get my data back.

Thanks!

 

[Va1ha11a]

The battery is labeled as non removeable, but according to some guys here it can be removed without much trouble. I personally haven't done it, so you should wait until they chime in here. If it's just a trashed battery, you'll be ok. Best of luck.

 

[kronosqq]

I'm not sure about how you can fix it or what might be wrong, but if it is the battery then the take apart and replacement is pretty easy. I'd equate it with the difficulty of replacing a hard drive or processor in a laptop. I believe there's a teardown video on YouTube that you could check out.

Sent from my EVO using Android Central Forums

 

[Mikey47]

I don't know either but my guess would be not the battery. If it doesn't work when plugged into USB, then most likely not the battery.

Dumb question, but did you have Dropbox set up where it would automagically upload your photos and videos and you might have forgotten about it?

 

[greeneggman]

Va1ha11a, kronosqq - thanks for the tips. I'll look for the video and compatible battery online.

Mikey47 - thanks, that was my fear too - that if USB power wasn't doing anything, would be more than just the battery... but maybe some circuitry related to the power "subsystem." I was using dropbox, but not to automatically upload lame lame


Anyone out there know anything about physically / electronically accessing internal storage from an Evo 4G LTE that can't be turned on?

 

[Va1ha11a]

Check google+ as well, I think instant upload is automatically set to on.

 

[biggdogg9]

Did u sign up for drop box u pics and vids should be there

Sent from my EVO using Android Central Forums