I once tried to do a relatively basic repair on a phone, and ended up really breaking it. Like the touch screen won’t work because I broke some shit on the motherboard that now requires micro soldering broke it.
So I send it to a repair company that allegedly does some micro soldering, and they call me to tell me they can’t repair it because their diagnostic utility doesn’t work unless it’s the stock OS (I’ve been a GrapheneOS user for many years). What they do is… wipe my data and then tell me it’s not the screen so they can’t repair it.
Then I sent it to an actually good repair shop and they fixed it very quickly, easily understanding the problem. Good repair companies aren’t easy to find but damn are they worth it. They’re almost always smaller shops and they do not GAF what you do with your phone’s software.
That’s illegal under the Magnuson Moss Warranty Act.
Send them a certified letter. Inform them that they need to prove you caused the damage, repair or replace your device, or you’ll be taking them to arbitration.
They generally have to pay for the arbiter, so it’ll be cheaper to just replace your cheap phone even if they win.
He voided his warranty.
You can’t void your warranty by rooting your phone. They claim you can, but that’s only their extended warranty, not that statutory one.
Wait, I knew they usually can’t void it without proof, but that’s NOT the case for an extended warranty add on?
Even in cars it’s the same thing, if you tune it they don’t know where to look since it’s no longer the same, On rooted android you can install things like Advanced Charging Controller to fuck your battery, and many software that manage performance/temperature.
Maybe so, but under the Act, the burden is on the company to prove that the modification directly caused the failure in question.
They can’t just deny deny for no reason. But that’s the tactic as consumers are largely unaware of their rights under the law, and they typically get away with it until the FTC sends a bunch of nasty letters telling them that they’re breaking the law. See “warranty void if removed” stickers.
There’s some good discussion of this very issue in this article from a few years back. They touch on the sort of “overclocking” situation that you’re talking about.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/yp3nax/jailbreaking-iphone-rooting-android-does-not-void-warranty
In my personal opinion, even a modification that can be used to push the hardware to operate beyond it’s design limits doesn’t inherently void any part of a warranty if it’s not used for that purpose. Let’s think through a few examples.
Does obtaining root on a Windows PC void the hardware warranty since it’s now possible for you to install a kernel driver that lets you overclock?
Does the presence of MSI Afterburner installed on a machine void hardware warranties? Regardless of whether you use it for overclocking or just for graphing and monitoring?
Does installing Linux on a PC that you own void the hardware warranty?
In my mind, the car example is a bit different. I don’t quite know what you mean by “tune”, but I’m going to assume it’s something like ECU remapping. To me, remapping an ECU seems similar to the act of overclocking, since you’re modifying the physical inputs to the engine itself. And I can see how out-of-spec physical inputs could cause irreversible damage to an engine. But that doesn’t mean that every conceivable ECU modification would be grounds to deny a claim for engine failure.
(Disclaimer: I have no experience with ECU remapping so I’m making some assumptions)
As another example, let’s say your car comes with an ECU that has some security mechanisms to prevent reflashing. Could the manufacturer deny a warranty claim on engine failure just because you circumvented the security mechanism? Even if you never remapped the ECU parameters?
What if your ECU fails, and you decide to install a 3rd party ECU. The new ECU has no security mechanism preventing you from reflashing, but the map that it comes with, while provided by the 3rd party, is functionally equivalent to that in the stock ECU. Can the manufacturer deny a warranty claim on an engine failure, just because without the security mechanism you could have reflashed a new map designed for more performance than stock? Even if you didn’t? Could they deny the warranty due to the 3rd party map? Even if physical inputs to the engine stay within safe parameters?
I think you do raise a good point about the logical connection that Samsung could make between the modification (root) and the failure (battery). But the point I’m making is: the legal burden is on them to make that connection, and show how one caused the other.
On the other hand, some of the questions and examples that I raised are admittedly messy, and might not have a clear answer unless tested by a court.
I guess what I’m saying though is: if the cost to seek legal relief here is relatively low (e.g., arbitration or small claims), then if I were OP I would probably go down that route, personally, and make arguments based on Magnuson Moss.
IANAL
Yes, by tuning I meant ECU remapping or installing aftermarket parts.
btw like anything to contest, legal action is only worthwhile if the profit at least covers the lawyer’s fees and the time lost, unfortunately.
But under the Act, they have to show that what you did caused the malfunction. The burden of proof is on them.
It’s why “warranty void if removed” stickers on products are unenforceable in court.
It’s illegal for them to do that, BTW. They have to prove magisk damaged your battery.
I ran into this with Dell when they tried to claim after market RAM was the reason a CPU core wasn’t responding to interrupt requests.
All it took was asking for the diagnostic data showing that the aftermarket RAM caused it to get the warranty repair approved.
You just gotta push back until they cave. Maybe ask for their mailing address for your FTC report or for the number to their legal department (most call centers are terrified of escalating anything to the actual company).
But, don’t directly threaten legal action, because they’ll stop the call right there.
It’s illegal for them to do that, BTW. They have to prove magisk damaged your battery.
And you have to be able to afford those rights. If you can’t afford to sue them then you’re screwed.
That’s where the arbitration clauses they make you agree to are actually helpful.
THEY have to pay for arbitration. You don’t need an attorney, and generally they’ll just take care of you because it’s cheaper than hiring an arbiter.
Isn’t forced arbitration when the jury deciding on the case is on the payroll of the company you’re having the problem with in the first place?
Not exactly.
It’s when there’s a third-party arbiter. In the case of customers seeking damages against these companies, the arbitration agencies are paid for by the company, but often there’s a list of arbiters the complainant can choose between.
My personal strategy has always been to pick the most expensive one so that whether I win or lose, the company stags to lose more money on the process than by simply making me whole.
The real reason for forced arbitration is because it makes DIY class action suits impossible.
Otherwise, a company with a class action waiver would find themselves facing 10,000 cases from the same law firm instead of 1 case with 10,000 plaintiffs.
With forced arbitration they can skip out on the cost process entirely and make the defendant do more leg work.
And, importantly, there’s no precedent with arbitration. Losing the first case doesn’t necessarily snowball into you losing the next 9,999 cases with identical facts.
If you read further, I give suggestions on how to do that without a lawyer.
It’s going to cost the company more money to call their lawyers than just doing the repair, so it usually doesn’t even take a ton of push back.
Here in Brazil the hardware and software are technically two different products, in such a way that you can’t deny a hardware warranty repair due to software modifications. That’s the good part.
The bad part is that manufacturers do that anyway because they know you won’t pay the legal fees to challenge this in court. This strategy mostly pays off. If you’re particularly annoying, or somebody from our customer protection watchdog happens to take interest in your claim, the company will fold and repair the modified device for you eventually.
We gotta get EU on board this train.
This kind of thing is illegal in mist eu countries but they also dont enforce it like in brasil. Iirc norway enforces it because a bunch of people sued samsung together.
Samsung have been trying to dodge honouring under warranty for years - check the comments for how much work had to be put in to get them to honour it. It pays to fight sometimes.
Unroot, lock bootloater and bring it again, lol
Battery died and it doesn’t power on.
Then how the fuck do they know magisk is running on the phone?
They replaced the battery, saw then sent back the broken one?
So someone got payed to wait for the phone to be shipped to them, took the effort to carefully and meticulously disassemble the phone, install the new battery by micro soldering the battery leads to the mainboard, then booted it to see it blew a shitty security fuse but can still boot fine, then took the time and effort to uninstall by removing the micro solder from the battery and mainboard without damaging the phone, just to tell them they can’t do it?
I wouldn’t be at ALL surprised
Samsung puts fuses in their that blow when you install a different os
Source?
Knox https://samsung.gadgethacks.com/how-to/root-almost-any-galaxy-s6-s6-edge-without-tripping-knox-0161912/ tldr; samsung sucks, older phones are possible to bypass on but with caveats such as no OTAs and no custom recovery.
Oh I thought you were talking about a physical fuse lol.
It is kinda physical it seems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EFuse
Exposition time!
So I took it to the repair while the battery was about to die. Somehow, the battery just started working again (it kinda phased in and out of broken and not broken before dying at the time of posting) so they saw Magisk was installed. Fast Forward to the day I made the post. The phone finally died completely and wouldn’t charge no matter what, but I hadn’t uninstalled Magisk. Meaning I can’t unless its repaired. And if they repair it right now, I won’t have a chance to uninstall Magisk and will be forced to pay for it.
I fried the battery charging chip for my HTC dream when I rooted and used it as a router for the family in holiday. I felt it was hot to the touch but I thought “it’s gonna be ok, surely it has temperature sensors and it will throttle”. High draw for a long time when charging = the chip exploded and it wouldn’t charge anymore. Luckily the battery was removable and I already got an external charger for it from dealextreme. But HTC still repaired it for free under warranty even if it was my fault and I gave to them back rooted.
Same for LG when my rooted Nexus 5X boot looped, although that was an endemic problem caused by LG shitty manufacturing (they changed the stance a few months after that, never bought LG anymore)
Samsung should repair it, I thought they were the only ones root friendly left on the market…
I thought they were the only ones root friendly left on the market…
Not anymore.
Samsung isn’t root friendly at all. Most of their phones can’t be bootloader unlocked officially.
The only ones that do are google, moto and the chinese ones
While this is some bullshit companies pull, you don’t have third party repair companies in your area?
samsung does bullshit where the parts have serial codes paired to the phone or whatever and you need to match it using their proprietary software for it to function. apple does it too.
I bought a Samsung as well. We should both learn from our mistakes, and never do that again - this is simply the cost of doing business with them. Maybe Fairphone would be good?
where can I get a good phone like a pixel or fairphone or whatever in greece? phones like that cant be found anywhere.
Sadly I know very little there. I know I HATE my current Samsung (mostly due to the company practices like you mentioned), and I also felt incredibly betrayed by my OnePlus 7T before that (the device itself was amazing, until an update broke it and now it literally hurts my hand, like I wonder if it’s giving me cancer by radiating something through the shielding that it burned through), and before that I absolutely adored my Nexus 5 (but Pixels are a whole other thing entirely - far too much camera and too little actual phone for my tastes). The entire smartphone world is incredibly predatory. I mostly figure that the next one I get will be a cheap phone, maybe even a dumb flip… but on the other hand I do live in an area where Google (or whatever) Maps could really help out so… I don’t know what I’ll do when my current one craps out:-(. Probably I will research a Fairphone, but if you live in an area where that would be difficult to repair, then yeah that may not be an option for you:-(. At least you live within the EU though where such is being forced to change, so you have that going for you.:-)
Can you not buy one online?
γερμανος κ ξερο ψωμι!
BTW: please don’t root/install magisk on a phone you use <3
Fairphone removed the headphone jack so it’s pretty useless as a personal electronic device IMO
Wait, Samsung does that too now?
Whatever, it’s just iPhones with Android now.Do you have a source for this? I’ve tried looking up anything online to see if this is something Samsung started to do but couldn’t find anything. I am also seeing 3rd party batteries available on Amazon for the a32 5g.
Here’s an example that seems to have good reviews. Couldn’t find anything in the reviews that say the battery needed to be paired.
Edit: battery said it wasn’t for a32 5g here’s another https://a.co/d/7Zy2N88
iFixit article on part pairing (samsung is called out): https://www.ifixit.com/News/69320/how-parts-pairing-kills-independent-repair
Video about samsung actually implementing part pairing: https://piped.kavin.rocks/watch?v=zGLQ9ZRntZo
Looking though that it looks like Samsung made a comment
Samsung’s representative stated:
“I’m unfamiliar with the specific variables that could have come into play with this repair or the unsubstantiated comments from Mr. Jeffrey. What I can tell you is that there is no requirement to pair parts on our smartphones. If a repair were conducted correctly, a device would not lose functionality.”
I was checking to see if anyone made any additional comments on the Hugh Jeffreys video and someone said they replaced the screen but kept the fingerprint sensor and it still worked fine. I believe replacing the battery with a 3rd party option should still have the device working fine.
Hugh left a comment on the video as well:
Fuck Samsung. Not surprised though
I was going to suggest doing it yourself, but it is a bit involved.
you can absolutely do it yourself. be prepared and get the right tools, look up many many guides and videos before you start, but I honestly think it’s doable for someone whose never opened a phone. those batteries are an absolute pain in the ass to remove, but as long as it’s discharged below 20% you really don’t have to worry about it it catching fire or anything catastrophic like you’re lead to believe (just be careful ofc and wear PPE)
Would, but I don’t have the equipment.
I replaced the battery in my old Pixel 3a by myself without the tools with iFixit. They shipped me the battery and tools I’d need for like $50 and all I had to do was follow the guide.
where I live there are shops for laptop, console and phone repairs. I’d keep it simple and go to one of those
Been a while since I looked, but last time I checked around me, the starting price for any work like that was like $200 (maybe it was less?). Not exactly worth it for a $300 phone that’s already aging unless you need data off it or something. Granted, YMMV with pricing.
If magisk still works like custom stuff in the days of old, settings could very much change battery draw and charge rates that could cause premature wear of a battery.
So does installing a app that plays videos. Since watching videos drains more battery than say a typical phone call.
This argument is weak at best.
Removed by mod
There’s a wide gap between “rely on lies” and “be forced to lie”.
Any video apk you install can’t consume more than what the kernel allows for. It can’t change throttling parameters, cant change apu speed, and it can’t change how fast the battery can be charged or the upper limit it will charge to. All apks can only do what they’re allowed to do, and it’s a lot less than what flashed phones and custom kernels can do. Right now, for instance, your phones battery never actually charges to max capacity, or discharges to minimum capacity before powering down. Your “100%” is actually more like 90%, but it increases the batts lifespan because the most damage done to lithium batteries is at the high end and low end of what it can hold. Same for all the fast charge stuff. Fast charging is bad for the batt. That’s why even if you’re using the fastest charge option on your phone, by the time you hit around 50% it starts slowing the charge rate down. The phone is programmed to do that to save the battery from degrading quicker. A custom kernel and OS could change that.
Hadn’t installed any of that stuff. Just Viper4AndroidFX
I’m sure, but how are they actually supposed to know that? You unlocked your bootloader, installed something like twrp, and obtained root access to jiggle with anything you want at that point. I used to have a lot of fun doing all that type of stuff, but I knew I voided out my warranty doing it unless I could still roll it back to factory and remove root, first. Not to mention dealing with knox.
Except legally the burden is on Samsung to prove you damaged the battery. They don’t get to say “oh well you could have done xyz, denied”
No, it’s not. That’s an impossible standard for the company to hold.
You buy the product under the assessment that you will void the warranty by doing XYZ, if you want that level of access you have made changes that could have damaged the battery and they don’t have the time to grill every wannabe tech douche to make sure they didn’t fuck up the device themselves.
They tell you what you can and can’t do with the product AND still receive support up front, case closed.
At that point just do it yourself
Yeah I bootlooped my samsung phone and the service center didn’t gave a shit about it They said the circuit itself is damaged and is hardbricked I fixed it with some kind of unlock tool lol
I forgot the tool’s name Anyways i broke the screen just after few months fixing all this RIP💀
My battery broke earlier because I installed GrapheneOS and abused speed charging thr entire time at night.
A stock android would slow the battery charge till the first Alarm.
If it’s under warranty, they almost certainly cannot deny the claim for this or really many bullshit reasons manufacturers say like removing a “warranty void” sticker - which is still covered. You can sue in small claims. Check out the Magnuson Moss Warranty Act should you need to prove your point.
