What causes a crash loop? Is Android really this unstable if you're not an advanced user?

I dont think it is a software issue at this point, so not android..
maybe your battery is below minimum level of charge.. so it keeps loosing power.

trying letting it charge for a few hours... without interruption.

or the battery could have gone bad.

 

Android is just fine. If it had severe stability problems hundreds of millions of people wouldn't buy and happily use Android devices. I'm typing this on a HTC G2 (T-Mobile version of your Desire Z) and it has been totally stable for over a year.

Do as dan330 suggested - charge it fully and try again, without pushing anything but the power button. If it fails take out the battery for 15 seconds, replace and reboot. If it still fails post again here with the error.

For backups to SD card without root I like MyBackup Pro. You don't need backup software for your Mac. After using MyBackup just connect to the Mac via USB in mass storage mode and copy the 'rerware' folder from the SD card.

 

low battery can make the phone act strange...

since you said it is boot looping at the beginning.. i am guessing it never get past the phone's initial start up before it goes into android. so android is not involved with your current issue.

you said this started when you could not reach a charger in time.. and it shut down. when you tried to get the phone to boot up, after that.. this is when your boot loop started. so.. we are guessing it has to do with low power.. on your battery.

we have also see others that have issues with their battery.. and it took a long charge time for the battery to start to respond again.

you do know... this is just us giving you our best guess at what might be wrong.
you can try it out.. or...

 

go to your computer... go to google.com.. go to the mail site
login using the google account you created for your phone.

all your contacts should be there.. if you let it sync...

 

I had other guys on the Nokia forums have this issue before, and it also happened to me as well, on Symbian phones. I also thought it was the system, but apparently its just the battery. The battery went down below the minimum critical charge left (for some reason I can't explain, as they shouldn't go down that normally even when shutting down, unless the battery was already deteriorating from over use or excessing charge cycles) and no matter how much you try to charge it, it will say full or half full but the charge contained is less than what is needed to boot the phone up, leading to crash cycles. In my research then, I found out this can happen to all types of rechargeable batteries, so I stopped blaming the system, especially after the same thing happened to my old laptop's battery.

At this point you need to try booting up the phone with a new battery to see if the diagnosis of bad battery is correct.

 

That means that the phone is not able to talk to the battery or it detects an error with the battery. The easiest solution is to replace the battery and see if it fixes your phone.

Of course, you can take it back to the store you got it from and have them try a new battery, first. If your device is still under warranty, they should replace the battery free of charge. Cell phones usually have a 1-year warranty.

 

My guess is somehow the charge control chip in the battery was fried when you plugged it into the charger as it was about to shut down. Unfortunate timing but a new battery should fix things.

 

take it in for warranty

 

process com.android.phone has stopped unexpectedly
Case 1
If you have recently returned from travel in a country outside your own it may be a service book error
Solutions

1. Choose SETTINGS

 

Glad to hear that you got to the bottom of the issue. And that you get a free replacement for the defect.

 

Glad this issue was resolved.

Just want to throw another heads up out there, using a charger not properly rated for your phone can damage your device as well. Not all MicroUSB chargers are created equal, and some of them go bad over time as well...

A bad/mismatched charger can lead to fried batteries.. motherboards... etc.

 

>_>;;; *argh* Hopefully the (unknown) charger that I'm using isn't damaging Artie.