Root [Verizon] Cannot make USB data connection to PC

[Zoandroid]

I have been running rooted stock Jelly Bean 4.1.1 for several months now, and have been making a nandroid and copying it and the files from both the Phone and Card folders as backups to my PC or notebook every week since I rooted the phone not long after getting it (when it first hit the market with Verizon).

Tonight, I am suddenly unable to get the stock USB cable, or any other USB cable, to make a connection, either to my same PC where I have made most of the file backups (Win7x64) or to my notebook, where I made a few of the backups (WinXP SP3).

Traditionally, when I would plug the S3 into one or the other computers, I would first hear the tone for connecting a charging cable, from the S3. Next I would hear the "USB connected" tone from the PC, oddly followed by the "USB DIS-connected" tone from the PC. But I was still able to copy files back and forth.

Tonight all I hear is the charging cable connecting tone. No USB action, and it never appears on the screen of the computer, or in Windows Explorer.

I did make this week's nandroid ( I use TWRP) without incident, but just can't copy files to the PC. So I tried restoring a nandroid made on July 27th. That works fine on the S3, but I STILL can't get a USB cable connection to a computer.

The only thing USB wise I have done differently was to buy a couple of right-angle (actually, they are "left angle" ) micro USB cables on Amazon, so I can hold the phone and use it while charging, without having the cable sticking straight out the bottom toward me. Could those cables possibly have done something to the USB circuitry inside the S3 and screwed it up? Aside from that, they seem to work fine for charging with a 1A charger.

I am stumped. Anyone have any ideas?

 

[breadnatty08]

Have you checked to see that USB Debugging is selected in Developer Settings on your phone?

 

[Zoandroid]

Thank you, yes it is enabled. I turned that on when preparing to root the phone, and have never encountered a reason to turn it off.

Googling this issue last night, I found a lot of discussion about it. One method of fixing it that has worked for some, but not for others, is to reboot the phone in "download mode", and then pull the battery. After powering it back up many had success in connecting with their previously working USB cable. I should mention here that I found people saying some USB cables are not actually capable of data transfer because they do not carry a connection on all 5 pins.

I plan to try this download mode later today, but I am hoping to find a way back from it that doesn't require a battery pull. My otterbox commuter case is very stubborn to remove and install, so I try to avoid taking it off the S3 when I can. If anyone here knows how to undo download mode without a battery pull, please let me know.

 

[TALONTRAX]

In the pull-down window, make sure the connection status is "connected as a media device" & not "connected as an installer".

 

[Zoandroid]

In the pull-down window, make sure the connection status is "connected as a media device" & not "connected as an installer".

Thanks, but I am a bit confused. Which pull down window do you mean? If I can't make any kind of USB connection at all to the PC, I'm not sure how this would apply.

Edit. Now that I have solved the problem (see below) I see you are referring to the notification menu while the phone is connected. Yes, it does say connected as media device. Thanks!

 

[Mikestony]

Perhaps an uninstall/ reinstall of the drivers?

After reading your first post again, when it comes down to it, this problem arose after you used the "right/left angle" usb cords?

 

[Zoandroid]

OK, I may have fixed the problem (if it doesn't return.....I have no idea what caused it in the first place).

First, a clarification on terminology. The information I read elsewhere said to "boot into download mode". For anyone not privy, that is the same thing as booting into the "bootloader", which can be done SO easily with the "Quickboot" app that I can't imagine why anyone would want to fight with holding the Vol Down, Home, Power, then quickly pressing Vol Up. Quickboot does the same thing in one simple tap.

Next, it said to pull the battery to exit download mode ( a.k.a. the bootloader, or also known as Odin mode). However, you can "appear" to exit this mode simply by holding in the power button. I had read that this was supposed to work as an alternate method to pulling the battery. It will in fact let you boot the phone and be back to your home screen. But..............

Having done that, the problem of not connecting was NOT FIXED.

So, I repeated the procedure, booting to the bootloader screen, and this time DID pull the battery for a few seconds. I then put the battery back in and booted the S3, and now I can once again connect by USB cable to my PC. I am copying files from my S3 to my PC now, while I type this.

So, it appears that physically removing the battery is an absolute necessity in this procedure if one is to regain USB cable file access by a PC when it had been lost.

For anyone else out there who likes to back up all the files in their Phone and Card folders to an external place, I have found some issues that, at least for me, were a part of the S3 not wanting to copy files, and simply stopping after only a few files copied. Within the Phone/Android folder I have some file names and paths that are a ridiculously LONG jumble of characters. The file transfer process chokes on them. The same thing also happens for me if I try to backup Phone/Evernote, for the same reason. ( I never understood why anyone would name a file with an unintelligible hodgepodge of a hundred letters and numbers as they do). So avoiding copying both those folders solves that problem.

Why would I even want to back up the Android folder? Why not? I prefer quick and easy backups, of the entire file set, so I can easily restore everything when something dies. Rather than devote a lot of time to sorting out which files I 'actually need' to back up, HD space is dirt cheap. So back it ALL up! Quick and simple. But, since the Android folder is ornery, I decided to do without that one. I doubt there is anything in it I would ever need to restore. I am sure there are other files and folders I don't "need" to back up, but this way is the easiest for me, and I am done in just a few minutes.

My primary interest is in backing up the SD card, without having to remove it. But unfortunately with the current architecture of the Android OS, naming the INTERNAL MEMORY "SD Card", almost every app currently in existence will default to storing its data THERE and NOT on the real SD card. Very few apps even allow the user to choose where to put backup files. That's why I make backups of the Phone folder. Otherwise I would lose all the "backup data" that apps put there when they think they are backing themselves up.

Thanks for your help!

 

[Zoandroid]

Perhaps an uninstall/ reinstall of the drivers?

After reading your first post again, when it comes down to it, this problem arose after you used the "right/left angle" usb cords?

Yes, that is the only thing I can think of that might have caused this. So you can imagine I have some trepidation about using them again. The only thing I can think of is if maybe the left angle cables have some kind of short between power or ground and one of the data lines, which perhaps the S3 tried to interpret in some way which made connecting as a media device impossible. Maybe I can try to make a breakout circuit and test to see if any of the cable's wires are shorted. I don't know that much about USB, but I would presume none of those lines should be connected to any other line within the cable, (when the cable is disconnected at both ends) should they?

Whatever it was, booting to the bootloader, then a battery pull, reset things so I can connect again. But if it is a short issue, that makes me nervous it could damage my phone.

Edit - Well, I tested both left-angle cables for any possible short between any of the 4 contact wires, and found nothing on either cable. I used one of them to charge the S3 back up to 100%, then used it to connect to my PC and access the files on the S3. No problem. So now I have no clue what caused this issue in the first place.

 

[breadnatty08]

Thanks for the info. I'll keep it in mind if I ever run across this issue.

 

[Mikestony]

Wow Zo!!
Glad you got it working again
I wonder how many more people with usb issues would get the issue resolved with your solution!
I need to bookmark this page and have someone try it if I see a thread about a usb issue.
Thanks for the feedback

 

[Zoandroid]

You're welcome! I like to share what I learn to maybe keep some other poor soul from having to slog through the same problem.

There is one other thing I had recently changed before this happened, but changing it back did not solve the problem.

I'd been seeing a much higher battery drain, like double what I normally see, so I was looking for a fix. I ran across an article that said there is a file that is GPS related, but seldom seen to be necessary, which can hog the battery, and cause Android OS in the battery stats to be very high. I did in fact see that. Mine was listed at the top, with around 53% of battery usage since the last charge. Normally Android OS clocks in at less than 20% for me.

The file is /system/bin/gsiff_daemon. It told how enabling Show CPU usage, in Developer options, will overlay a list of running processes on the display, organized by heaviest use. Gsiff_daemon would be at the top if it were the culprit, and I did see it there.

The article mentioned renaming it with a .bak extension, so I did that. Gsiff_daemon no longer appeared in the list. My GPS still works fine (possibly faster to lock than before - it locked instantly). What the article did not mention, and I had to dig online for this, is that the actual 53% listing for Android OS in battery stats will NOT change until after you go through another charge cycle to 100%. Battery Stats gets cleared and restarted after every charge cycle. So after I charged the S3 I checked battery stats and Android OS was back down in the low percentage of use. My battery usage seemed more normal.

All that was the middle of last week. It was not until Saturday night, when I make my weekly nandroid, and then back up it and the S3's files to my PC, that I encountered the lack of USB cable connection to my PC.

If anyone knows something about gsiff_daemon they would like to share, I am curious what it was meant to do. But much like an appendix, it does seem we can do without it - unless I encounter the same problem again. Then I'll have to suspect renaming it as a possible cause. But for now, I was able to charge the S3 with either of the new left-angle cables last night, and then connect using either of them to transfer files to my PC. And I have gsiff_daemon renamed with the bak extension again. So whatever made this happen might not be at all related to those suspected causes.

 

[Mikestony]

Wow again man! You are awesome! Thanks..:thumbup: I've heard of that GPS line but forgot about it until you mentioned it... I don't know what it does either..

 

[Zoandroid]

Wow again man! You are awesome! Thanks..:thumbup: I've heard of that GPS line but forgot about it until you mentioned it... I don't know what it does either..

Well, thank you. But I can't take credit for discovering any of this. I just tried stuff I found with the help of Google Search.