• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Nexus 5X won't boot up: red light only

Hi,

I haven't been able to boot up my mom's Nexus 5X since yesterday evening. She told me it wouldn't turn on, so I tried doing the old 'power button + volume up button' trick and it seemed to work. However, it never actually booted up after that, it only showed the Google logo for about 10 seconds and then the screen went black.

So I just let it charge for a while, then tried to boot it up by pressing both the power button and the volume down button. It gave me the recovery mode menu where it asks you what to do, but this menu looked completely different to me than I was used to, so I just pressed the power button, thinking it would reboot normally after that. But it didn't... and it's been over 12 hours now and the phone still won't boot up.

I tried several different methods that they suggest on the Google/Android support page. For most of the time I didn't get any response from the phone at all, but an hour ago I finally got a red blinking light, indicating that the battery just ran out of juice. But that wouldn't make sense, right? I've been charging it for hours, it should be fine. It only gave me that red light when it was connected to my laptop. After that, I tried charging it via the outlet, didn't get any response from the phone. Connected it to my laptop again, but now I'm not getting the red light anymore...

I really don't know what to do else. I can search the entire internet to try and find a solution, but that's just going to take a lot of time. Can anyone help me? Do you have any suggestions?
 
That sounds like a battery failure to me.
I think you may be right... which would suck, because replacing the battery is gonna cost a lot, I presume. She's going to the shop where she bought the phone and they'll most likely come to the same conclusion (dead battery) and then they'll take it in to fix it.
 
A few months ago I encountered a problem with my Nexus 5X finger print scanner. The sensor was unable to read my finger and presented a message that said " Hardware not available" in red. I ignored it and a few weeks later it started to work again. Recently the fingerprint scanner was not working again and this time it didn't have the red text. I went in the settings to try and re enroll my fingers and to my surprise the option was missing.
I have encountered numerous problems with this phone including the infamous boot loop problem, but this was fixed when I sent the phone to LG.
I have tried restarting the phone, booting in safe mode and wiping the cache as well.
 
ok so you did the first part of troubleshooting on phones which is great. now that only thing i can think of would to do a factory reset. if that does not work then it most likely be a hardware issue.
 
The Nexus Imprint option disappearing entirely generally indicates that the OS can't communicate with the fingerprint hardware anymore - like @ocnbrze says it's probably a hardware issue. Given the device's age, it's probably not worth paying to have it repaired again. Maybe check into the new Pixel 3a if you'd like an updated Google phone experience for half the price of a flagship device?
 
I have a broken power on my phone so i can not turn it off and now the system UI has stopped functioning and I can not unlock my phone. Any ideas on how I can reset my phone? I tried plugging it into the computer but I can not get into my phone as system UI is not working.
 
What exactly fo you mean? Is the UI there, but unresponsive to touch, or do you have a blank screen, or what? And what led up to this?

What do you mean by reset? Factory reset? Or something else?
Hi there . My phone is on but when i try to unlock it with my pattern it says system UI has stopped and therefor I can not unlock my phone at all. it then goes back to the unlock pattern again which is not working. this pattern is repeated. my screen is not blank it is on the unlock screen. I am wondering if an upgrade was interrupted as we had power failure last night.

I was thinking a factory reset on my phone might fix my problem of the UI?
 
I was thinking a factory reset on my phone might fix my problem of the UI?
Okay, thanks for the additional info. Yes, I think a factory reset would restore sanity!

There are several ways to reset your phone remotely--but they all depend on having proactively set them up.

I'm going to yield to others here because I've never done it and don't want to steer you wrong. I know it can be done through Google, but that's where I have to leave it.
 
The first thing we'll need to know is what kind of phone you have and did you modify it in any way? Also, are you sure the power button is broken? Or is it just unresponsive, too?
 
the problem is going to be doing the hard reset (factory reset) from your stock recovery. the are two ways to do a factory reset. one is within the phone's settings and the other is from the stock recovery. but to get to the stock recovery you will need to use a combination of the power and volume buttons. without a functioning power button, you will not get there.

so unless you can unlock the phone, you might be SOL.
 
The first thing we'll need to know is what kind of phone you have and did you modify it in any way? Also, are you sure the power button is broken? Or is it just unresponsive, too?
the power button is unresponsive. When I press the power button nothing happens so i have just dont let it go flat and keep it charged. I have a LG nexus 5x android phone about 4 years old now.
I have not modified the phone in any way.
Why is there a UI Failure do you know?
 
the problem is going to be doing the hard reset (factory reset) from your stock recovery. the are two ways to do a factory reset. one is within the phone's settings and the other is from the stock recovery. but to get to the stock recovery you will need to use a combination of the power and volume buttons. without a functioning power button, you will not get there.

so unless you can unlock the phone, you might be SOL.
SOL = so out of luck?
 
the power button is unresponsive. When I press the power button nothing happens so i have just dont let it go flat and keep it charged. I have a LG nexus 5x android phone about 4 years old now.
I have not modified the phone in any way.
Why is there a UI Failure do you know?
Likely due to the broken pwr button sending mixed signals to "SystemUI.apk" , which holds the code for Power menu. This is 1st, a hardware issue that needs fixed before any software fixes could be applied, even if still needed after said hardware fix.. Because you very likely need that power button fixed to get to bootloader mode and flash new OS or FW..
 
Likely due to the broken pwr button sending mixed signals to "SystemUI.apk" , which holds the code for Power menu. This is 1st, a hardware issue that needs fixed before any software fixes could be applied, even if still needed after said hardware fix.. Because you very likely need that power button fixed to get to bootloader mode and flash new OS or FW..
Do you know who fixes these issues because it's above my ability, I am not sure what to do other than throw my phone in the bin which is not environmentally friendly. this is my 4th phone and every time I buy a phone it eventually breaks down and I have to replace it. I am not sure what to do.
 
Do you know who fixes these issues because it's above my ability, I am not sure what to do other than throw my phone in the bin which is not environmentally friendly. this is my 4th phone and every time I buy a phone it eventually breaks down and I have to replace it. I am not sure what to do.
There are Cell/Tablet repair shops everywhere.. I'd google what's available locally and negotiate with them. To be completely honest, repair may cost as much as a new device itself or you may get lucky.. You'd have to talk with them to possibly gauge your financial path from here
 
I am surprised that your mom's Nexus 5X even works or has lasted this long
Is it even worth spending money on for repairs?
 
There are Cell/Tablet repair shops everywhere.. I'd google what's available locally and negotiate with them. To be completely honest, repair may cost as much as a new device itself or you may get lucky.. You'd have to talk with them to possibly gauge your financial path from here
thanks for the support and reply kind regards
 
SOL = so out of luck?
well in American terms it means $hit Out of Luck.....LOL

Do you know who fixes these issues because it's above my ability, I am not sure what to do other than throw my phone in the bin which is not environmentally friendly. this is my 4th phone and every time I buy a phone it eventually breaks down and I have to replace it. I am not sure what to do.
there is always Ifixit Nexus 5X Repair Guide but you have to be a DYI kind of guy. otherwise you might be able to take it back to your carrier, sometimes they have techs who can fix it for you.
 
Back
Top Bottom