Stock Xoom won't turn on even with forced reboot

[Riddller]

So I've had my Xoom pretty much since it was released and love it. My job requires me to study and know about 1.3 Gb of pdf files and the ability to highlight/bookmark/search is wonderful.

Anyway, yesterday I went to turn it on and had problems. Sometimes I'd just get the Motorola screen for a few seconds, then nothing, and sometimes I'd get to the honeycomb screen for a few seconds before it would shut itself off. I'd just fully charged it the night before. After about 10-15 tries of turning it on, it finally just worked. All my stuff was there, no problems. I used it for a few hours, then powered it off, no problems. Today I just get the Motorola screen for a few seconds before it turns off, no matter what I do. I've searched all over the internet for solutions and found the "forced reboot" trick, and nothing changes. I've tried "Vol Up + Power", "Vol Down + Power", hold the power for 30 seconds or more, quick presses, double presses, power until the motorola screen then switching to "Vol Up + Power", nothing changes. ONE TIME I got a few words in the top left of the screen when I tried the "Vol Up + Power" but it was gone in a second when everything shut down again, I don't know what it said.

Plugged into power I get the charging LED no problem. I don't get anything when it's plugged into my computer. It's totally stock, I didn't see a need to root it (although I did my Captivate and love it). I have had the Amazon Marketplace on there for a few months but haven't had any problems with it, even though I have a few "non-market" apps (normal stuff: Angry Birds, etc...).

Somebody please help, I NEED this thing for my job now!

[Ads]

[dirtymindedx]

so does it hang on reboot. or does it just goto the dual core screen? feels like the stock is messed up. you have a wifi or verizon xoom?

[Riddller]

It goes straight to the "Motorola Dual Core Technology" screen for anywhere from 2 to 10 seconds before shutting down. The unit itself has the Verizon logo (I thought they all did) but I only use wifi, no sim card. It has been auto-updated to 3.1, and the latest app I downloaded was the Google Music Manager Beta version at the beginning of last week. No immediate problems with that though. The only thing different I did lately was use my "Audiobook Player 2" app. Normally just use my Captivate for that, but figured I'd try out the better speakers on the Xoom. Nothing unusual happened while I was using it or for the day after. I'm just trying to give you everything to try and figure this out, sorry if it's too many details!

[kris]

Oops .. I see where you tried the Forced Reboot .. time to call Motorola tech.

[dirtymindedx]

can you plug in your xoom to the power cord and force reboot your xoom. then when it begins booting hold the volume down and power button and tell me if you get fastboot.

[Riddller]

Yup, I held "Vol Up + Pwr" for 3 seconds and when the Motorola icon appeared I pressed "Vol Down + Pwr". I got text in the top left saying "Starting fastboot support protocol". But after a few more seconds, everything just shut down again, just like every other time. I tried it multiple times, same result. I tried it while the USB was plugged into my computer a couple times too, with the result being that for the few seconds it was on, my computer recognized it. Then it went away once it shut down again. So I unplugged it from power and tried again. Same result.

[Riddller]

Fixed! (Sort of)

After lot's of help from my IT buddy yesterday and today (you know who you are, thanks!), I'm back in business. Yesterday, after multiple restart attempts, attempting the "fastboot oem unlock", pressing every button config possible, I still couldn't get it to stay on longer than a few seconds.

I left it plugged in all night (the green LED never changed) I tried again this morning. This time I got all the way booted up, had enough time to see the battery was still 100%, and it shut down again. I did get the "Fastboot protocol starting" to stay on for a few minutes after that, then nothing. I left it plugged in the rest of the day. After work, I tried again, multiple times, nothing. After more discussion with previously mentioned IT buddy, I was able to get it into "Starting RSD protocol 0" ("Vol Down + Power, then selecting it") where it actually stayed for almost an hour (the longest it had stayed on since this problem started). I then just restarted it (nothing had happened after the hour) and everything started up fine.

My laptop could see my Xoom, but not any files in it. I used Bluetooth to hastily transfer all my "can't-do-without" files to my Captivate, then did a factory-reset from the settings menu. Once it started back up, I activated my account again, it automatically downloaded all my apps, and there was great rejoicing in the land! I did multiple shut-down/restarts: no problems!

I would have preferred to do without the factory-reset, but as I got all my important files and had everything back to normal in about 15 minutes, I can't complain too much. Never underestimate the power of Captain Morgan, cigarettes, hair-pulling, and an IT buddy!

[dlwhtrose]

Hey Captain Morgan is a close personal friend!!!!!

Glad you got it fixed and back running. I have a feeling one of your apps may have gone rouge on you and caused the issue. Just asking but do you have a task killer installed??? If so, get rid of it asap!! I have seen task killers cause these kind of issues with Android phones.

[Riddller]

Thanks dlwhtrose! I do have a "Advanced Task Killer" installed. I was just about to post that maybe some combination of my apps was bad because the whole thing happened again yesterday! Once again, I tried everything to get it to boot up with no luck. It would come on for anywhere from 2 seconds to a minute or two before shutting down again, never getting past the Motorola screen. I could get it to go into "Fastboot protocol" a couple times, but it would still just shut down after a bit. So I started playing around with the "...android-sdk\tools" cmd line while plugged in and was able to fix it. I wiped everything with a "fastboot -w" command (I didn't mind wiping my user data and cache 'cuz I'd just backed all the important stuff up the day before) then did a "fastboot reboot". Everything came back up fine, except it was obviously back to factory settings. I didn't load any of my apps though because I wasn't sure if one of them was the problem.

Now that you said the task killer might be it, I'll be SURE not to load that one. Thanks!!

[Riddller]

OK, it's happened again, this time after resetting it and not downloading anything! Is there anyway to completely wipe it, including the OS, and reload it from a clean copy? My only other option is to take it back to Best Buy and ask for a replacement.

Any ideas?