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Screen flashing

lhoward31

Newbie
At first I thought it was a glitch , but just happened again. Had the S6 for about 5 days now. First time this happened on the second day, and again tonight. I will be in the Home screen and trying to do something, like click on anything or swipe and suddenly the screen will flash, from the window that was on, to the one I tried to use, back and forth, about every half a second. During that time no matter what I do , won't work, because it flashes back and forth. I tried to restart or shut off, but if I press on the on/off button the window to restart will pop up but before I can even push on any button, it has flashed back. I can't use phone or anything, sometimes if I catch it just right between 2 flashes I can open an app, but it just goes to the first window, flashing nonstop. By accident I found the ONE way to turn this off...when a call comes in it shows the call and stops flashing. If I hang up it continues to flash, but if I push the off button during the call it will let me restart and its back to normal. How severely frustrating !! During this flashing I can do NOTHING with the phone, not even turn it off ! Since there is no removable battery...I have only put a couple of Apps on the phone, weather, facebook, nothing "weird", nothing I haven't had on other phones. I have had my daughter make a video of what is happening, I will try to upload it. I suppose I will have to return this dang phone, right when I finally got it set up the way I like...big sigh.
 
Super short video...I thought my daughter kept filming while I tried to power off or restart and couldn't do it, but apparently she only got the 4 seconds..but it shows it flashing
 
I have NO idea...I don't even know how to get in safe mode. It just happened randomly, and once it happened, nothing really could make it stop...I couldn't even restart it or turn it off and since there is no removable battery I couldn't stop it that way either. Only through accident did I figure out when a call came in it stopped flashing long enough for me to push restart. If I answered the call and then hung up, it went back to flashing. The first time this happened I thought it was a fluke. Then when it happened a couple days after that I became concerned. This has now been 2 days ago...I wondered if it had to do with the "lock it" app, which I removed since I don't even need it. But thats grasping probably, its most likely a glitch in the phone. I have another week to exchange it and I probably will. Kind of wondering though, if it will do it again ?? I so rather not go through the whole setup again, but I also cannot have it do this. If I'm out and about when this happens there is nothing I can do do make the phone work unless someone is nearby I can ask to "call me". Its ridiculous...Even if I learn to go into safe mode, there is no knowing when or if it would flash again...If it DOES happen again, I will try to get a better video on how rapidly it flashes and how pushing any button doesn't help or work...
 
My Note 3 just started with this screen flashing crap a few days ago.it seems to happen when I want to open Chrome web browser along with another app already open. Only way to get rid of this is pulling up my current apps so I can close them that way. Beyond annoying.
 
Hm...i just tried to do that but it just switches from chrome to a app or back ? Not sure if the app was "open" while I pushed chrome. I don't think thats what I did that time, either. I think what I did (not 100% sure) was trying to pull the info (top) bar down to check notifications. Not sure if the home screen was on, or something was open...while its flashing I cannot do anything. Not open or close an app or anything, I think one time I pushed something fast enough between flashes and it flashed the "kindle" home screen, but then it just flashed that around. The other times it was the home screen with and the notification being pulled down...What ticks me off is that I can't "interrupt" or stop the flashing unless someone calls me. And even then I have to answer the call and then turn the phone off while in call. Absolutely un-acceptable. They make these phones without removable batteries, so what are you supposed to do if they are "stuck" and NOTHING works ?? Is there some kind of "force shutdown" trick that would work even though none of the buttons will really work cause it rapidly flashes back to former window nonstop ??
 
Force restart for your phone is press and hold both the "power and vol down" buttons for several seconds until screen shuts off. Then it will restart.
 
Thank you ! Thats already very helpful !! I might just change out the phone today, as I'm going to the town where I bought it from (Best Buy 30 mins away) I still would like to figure this out, in case it had something to do with an app (doubt it, have only a few, nothing "weird") or the way its setup or becomes a "known problem" with the phone...In that case switching it out wouldn't really be a 100% fix...I really didn't want an iphone but it seems like with every android phone I've had, there had been a major flaw that could not be corrected (HTC Dna with the neverending sim card error, older Samsung that never got updated in time, horrible cameras, etc etc) If I end up with yet another android phone with such a flaw that doesn't correct even with switching it out, I'm done !
 
I understand your frustration. I've played with the kids iPhone and it just didn't have the same appeal for me as android. Good luck!
 
well, I went to the store and they "re uploaded" the software...not sure I'm so convinced that this might do the trick. Since it happened twice in 5 days I hope that it will show up within the week, if it ever will do it again. Thanks for all help and suggestions..
 
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