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Help Ding Ding Ding

E

Emul

Lurker
I have a Samsung Galaxy SIII on T-Mobile and beginning this morning it started having an odd problem. Every few minutes it goes Ding Ding Ding, not a beep, but a Loud ringing sound, out of the blue. The volume turns it down but it is still louder than any song that is playing or the other voice in a phone conversation. It gets more and more frequent, ranging from every five minutes down to every minute, with a more-or-less random increase over twenty minutes or so. If I restart the phone, it is fine for a while, but after an hour or so it begins again.
  • My notifications are set to Silent
  • My other sounds do NOT include any Ding Ding Ding
  • I've killed everything possible with Task Killer
  • Task Killer shows me plenty of free memory (700K+)
  • I've manually shut down other suspicious daemons
  • There are no messages or calls awaiting or missed
  • I've turned OFF (and ON) bluetooth, GPS, Wifi, etc.
  • I've checked the alarm clock and such to no avail
  • No messages on the shade pull (other than Lookout)
Does this indicate a handset problem? An Android OS problem? I see nothing in Lookout support indicating that it might be that. Has anyone experienced this?
Thanks in advance,
-Emul
 
Welcome Emul!
Just a thought, but I have heard of the Emergency Alert System notifications that people have been getting on thier devices.
Could it be that?
Does your pull down notification bar tell you anything?
 
Mikey gives a good suggestion, however if this ends up not being the case, do you weild the all might powers of root user permissions?
 
Mikestony - Nope, no notifications at all. But that was a good thought that I hadn't considered. No text messages, no email, no voicemail, etc. Thanks, though.

Boyo1991 - No root privileges. I bought the extended warranty and protection plan from Costco - all paid in advance - so I don't want to void it. Of course the protection plan is most often due to hardware issues like submarining or broken glass, but all the same. Out of curiosity, though, what do you suppose I could do to figure it out if I had root permission? It doesn't seem to be scheduled because of the erratic frequency. Are there daemons running that aren't listed in Task Killer or Settings:Applications?
 
Well, in order for applications to be going at all, theyde have to show up in task killer.. think of task killer as "ctrl+alt+del" on windows.. the reason i ask if it was rooted is because then you can modify system files.. therfor scheduled tasks that normally you cant change.. and the way you could fix it by rooting is by simply putting a different mod on the device.. the most popularized is cyanogenmod.. but other really good ones like clockworkmod do exist. Its basicly "reinstalling" android.. but if you have a warranty, id almost suggest using that instead of rooting, unless you have a need for it..
 
Check your cell signal when it does that. My wife's phone (a Samsung Transform Ultra) will randomly start making beeps without any notifications on the bar, and it usually corresponds to when we go through areas with little to no signal. It should make a noise both when it loses and re-aquires a signal.

And yes, it gets very annoying.
 
Boyo1991 - Thanks, but before I start screwing with software I think I'll wait and see if anyone else has had this same problem. I'm a jinx and if something can be broken, I will break it.

Joelgp83 - Most of the time I was just sitting at my desk. But next time it happens I pay attention to the signal strength (i.e. number of bars) as well as the data connection.

Thanks
 
this could be a phone related issue.

did you want me to move you to the s3 t-mobile forum? others with the same phone might have heard of this issue.
 
Maybe it's expecting some mind of voice input? Check your voice input settings, text to speech settings, accessibility settings etc...
 
XplosiV - I had killed everything several times and even restarted the phone, but it kept dinging. But next time it happens I'll see if there is anything waiting for voice input.

But...

Now it has stopped dinging. I pulled out the battery for several seconds and restarted the device. It no longer dings. Thanks for all of the suggestions.

If it starts again, I will revive this thread. Also, if anyone else is having the same problem, you may want to pick up this thread where I left off.

-Emul
 
Glad it's sorted. If ever I do have an issue with my S3, which is very rare, my first step is to restart the phone and, if that doesn't help. to do a battery-pull as you've described. It can often be all that's needed to cure niggles such as this.
 
john_g said:
Glad it's sorted. If ever I do have an issue with my S3, which is very rare, my first step is to restart the phone and, if that doesn't help. to do a battery-pull as you've described. It can often be all that's needed to cure niggles such as this.
Click to expand...

The older BlackBerrys were so dependent on "battery pulls" as a cure all, that they had an app called simulated battery pull. Users didn't have to actually take off the back cover, to get the proper results. HaHa.:p
 
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