Help Phone is unresponsive to charging or button input

[Jesse Keizer]

So my Samsung S7 active was fine last night. plugged it in to charge and went to bed everything was fine. I woke up and the phone still had a red light (indicating phone is still charging). I unplugged it and the red light stayed on and the screen failed to light up. none of the buttons yielded any sort of response. And any attempt to do any sort of reboot or soft reset had any effect. hours later the red light went off but still no response from anything.
I this a charging issue? A software Issue? or a screen issue? or any combination of those?

 

[svim]

https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s7_active-8004.php
Going by your description is sounds like there's a good chance the battery has failed. Your S7 Active isn't that old however so while it's not likely for the battery to fail so soon, it's not impossible either. Could be the battery is just faulty in some way, or if you tend to run it down to single digit capacity before recharging this will shorten its overall longevity significantly.
You might want to try replacing the battery and see if that solves the problem. Your model doesn't have a user-replaceable battery but if you're comfortable tearing down your phone, and you have the necessary tools, the ifixit site has a good, step-by-step guide:
https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Samsung+Galaxy+S7+Active+Battery+Replacement/108065
That said, I'm just making assumptions that this problem is due to the battery. It could also be some other hardware-related failure in your phone itself (i.e. the USB port or the integral charging circuitry on the logic board). Can you at least force it to restart? Try holding down the Power button for several seconds.

 

[lunatic59]

And any attempt to do any sort of reboot or soft reset had any effect.

Were you able to get the phone to reboot yet there was no improvement? Or does this mean the buttons remained unresponsive and the phone did nothing?

 

[Jesse Keizer]

No I cant force restart it unfortunately. Is there any way that I could just get it working to the point of being able to switch things to another phone? I really like the phone but it was getting kind of slow in general. Id rather not replace the whole battery but if that's the only option I might would attempt it.

 

[Jesse Keizer]

Were you able to get the phone to reboot yet there was no improvement? Or does this mean the buttons remained unresponsive and the phone did nothing?

Correct I couldent get the phone to respond to anything. Buttons or dropping it.

 

[lunatic59]

Did you try the simulated battery pull? It's power and volume down for 10 seconds ... sometimes when the phone locks up, you might have to hold it longer.

 

[svim]

No I cant force restart it unfortunately. Is there any way that I could just get it working to the point of being able to switch things to another phone? I really like the phone but it was getting kind of slow in general. Id rather not replace the whole battery but if that's the only option I might would attempt it.

If you can't even power the phone on there's not a lot of options to try. Even if you had previously set up ADB in a PC to do any kind of remote transfer, it's still a matter of the phone needs to be running to access the internal storage. All your data resides on a internal storage chip, and that chip is not modular and it's not readily removable, it's soldered onto the logic board. Even if you tear down your phone and remove the motherboard, it's not like you can just plug it into an adapter to access your data. Try replacing the battery and hope for the best.
If you can at least get it running again, use Samsung's Smart Switch utility to make a backup. And make a habit of doing backups regularly.
https://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/smart-switch

 

[sullencab]

yeah, that might be the solution!

 

[Jesse Keizer]

If you can't even power the phone on there's not a lot of options to try. Even if you had previously set up ADB in a PC to do any kind of remote transfer, it's still a matter of the phone needs to be running to access the internal storage. All your data resides on a internal storage chip, and that chip is not modular and it's not readily removable, it's soldered onto the logic board. Even if you tear down your phone and remove the motherboard, it's not like you can just plug it into an adapter to access your data. Try replacing the battery and hope for the best.
If you can at least get it running again, use Samsung's Smart Switch utility to make a backup. And make a habit of doing backups regularly.
https://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/smart-switch

Okay that seems to be the best option I can find anywhere. Thanks for all the help and options (even if there arnt many).

 

[dontpanicbobby]

That my good lad is an Ex-Battery!