Samsung Galaxy Note 3: Problems, Questions, Solutions, Answers [Part 1]

It’s been more than a year since we launched our mailbag section and opened our mailbox to questions and problems our readers experienced with their phones. As soon as new devices are made available in the market, we expect to receive questions about them. So, basically, we have hundreds of problems in our inbox about the Samsung Galaxy Note 3. This post is the first part of the many series. You will be able to read 10 common GN3 problems here. The next part will also deal with problems and questions.

Therefore, if you have problems with your Samsung Galaxy Note 3, feel free to tell us about it by emailing us at [email protected]. I personally guarantee I read every email we receive but I cannot guarantee to respond to those emails. Posts like this will serve as our response. So, if you’re questions or problems weren’t answered in this post, wait for the next part because they might just be. To make sure you wouldn’t miss a single series, subscribe to our newsletter or follow us through Facebook or Twitter.

Now, for the problems, here they are:

Q1: Hello. I hope you can help me. I have two issues. First, under developer options there a option for transition scale. I have it set to off. But every day it goes back to 1 and I have to go back in and turn it off. Second, launcher defaults. I have a bunch set. But every time I want to open an email or my internet browser I have to re select the app I want. I always select always and then ok. They are saved but never work. Hope you can help. Any questions let me know. Thank you. — Seth

A: When an Android phone like the Galaxy Note 3 refuses to save user preferences, it means there are data in the system that is corrupt. You need to clear those because the phone would keep reverting back to the default settings upon reboot. In this case, I would suggest you wipe the cache partition first through the recovery mode. Inside that directory are data cached from apps and services that currently and previously ran on the device. After clearing the cache partition and while still in the recovery mode, do a factory reset. So, before you actually enter the recovery mode, backup all your data especially the most important ones.

Q2: I have recently purchased Galaxy Note 3 from Germany. My Note 3 has just started to continuously reboot and now it is also heating up too much. I’m seriously worried that this could potentially damage any internal parts of this phone. Please help. Thank you. — Regina

A: Well, too much heat could damage other electronic components inside the phone eventually. In this case, however, I think some third-party apps may be causing the problem that is why the phone randomly reboots and heats up. The best way to deal this kind of problem is to boot the phone to safe mode and uninstall recently installed apps. Otherwise, it is imperative to do a factory reset on the phone.

Q3: I was reading the article about the errors on Play Store on the S4, my phone is a Note 3 and the Google Play Store randomly tells me that play store must be enabled to run in background. Only options are ok and quit. Quit closes play store and ok takes you to settings directly into accounts. I always to the one that’s my play store account email and it gives me the option to sync all. But all are synced fine. I hit back until I am in store again and message still there. Usually restart phone then it goes away for a bit. Then comes up again. Any suggestions? — Stephanie

A: The related problem I experienced before was that the phone was asking me to enable Google Play Services in the background to be able to use the Play Store. I wasn’t prompted to enter my credentials though. While the Play Store is Google’s app, it comes as one of the stock applications on the Note 3 so it uses core services as well. So, we are limited to clearing its cache and data, if that doesn’t work, hit the ‘Uninstall Updates’ button inside the Play Store manager.

Q4: I have this Samsung Galaxy Note 3 since the 20th of December last year. Everything is fine until yesterday. The phone is on standby while I was a watching a movie, then I noticed that it went off. I just thought that I accidentally pressed the power button so I turned it on and thought that it was okay. A minute after, the phone is still silent and blank and I found out that it was off again. Then I turned it back on and observed. It happened again. I removed the battery and waited for 5 minutes (just to be sure) then placed it back in. From there, turning on the device is a problem. I tried turning on the phone every now and then and I’ve gotten 1 success of turning on the phone out of 20 attempts. And if the phone is turned on, every time I snap the back cover, it goes off again. I’m very positive that the phone itself never fell and never gotten any abuse. no liquid damage. Please help me. — Nico

A: Hmmm… sounds a bit complicated. But just to eliminate the possibility of not having enough power, plug the charger it and let the phone charge for at least 10 minutes then turn it back on. If the problem persists, remove the battery and clean with a soft cloth its connectors as well as the phone’s battery receptors. If those things won’t solve the problem, have the phone checked by an authorized Samsung technician because I have a strong feeling it’s a power switch problem.

Q5: I have a Galaxy Note 3 with AT&T. It shows -1 when it should be 0 and shows 1 when it should be 2. Always off by -1. — TRG

A: Apparently it is a glitch. This problem is also common to the Galaxy S3 and S4 as well as to the first two Note versions. If the negative number of notifications show on your email app, clear Email app’s cache and data. If it happens to your messaging app, do the same. Look, you may lose some data while doing the process so better back important ones up before you do this, okay.

Q6: I am a Galaxy Note series lover I used Note 1, Note 2 , and now I am using Note 3, but the latest one Is more unstable comparing to the 2 previous ones, it’s hanging all the time, at least once a day I have to either restart or remove the battery to use it properly. When I need to call someone from the phone book the phone hangs and get very hot until I restart or remove the battery. Is there a solution? — Christian

A: There are a lot of things that may causing the hanging or freezing problems in the Galaxy Note 3. In your case, however, since you mentioned the phone freezes when you call somebody, try clearing Phone Dialer’s cache and data then reboot the phone. If the problem persists, try clearing TouchWiz’s cache and data (which may result to losing your personalized home screens). Going further, clear RAM, wipe cache partition via the recovery mode and if all else fails, perform a Factory Reset. Of course, I assumed you have the latest version of Android installed on your phone already.

Q7: Hi. Right now I am facing really serious problem. A lot of my pictures in my gallery is missing just after I sort it through new folders. I have checked un hidden files and all and still cannot be able to find it. If I have deleted it, how come there is still some pictures left in that folders? Can you help me to restore and get back my pictures. Its all my holidays pictures. Thank you. — Ayu

A: Odds are you have saved those pictures in your external storage or SD card, so try looking for them there. If you cannot navigate well using your phone, take the SD card out and let your computer do the job. If your computer cannot read the SD card, then we can’t do anything about it. Secondly, you may have enabled syncs in your phone. If you did, you can find copies of your pictures in Google Plus, or Dropbox, or Picasa, or whatever cloud storage you may have used.

Q8: Hi. My Galaxy Note 3 data are not shown on Windows PC via USB 3.0 connection. I turned on the debugging option but not work. Help me fix this problem and what should I do? — John

A: Turning the debugging option on your phone doesn’t eliminate the necessity of installing correct drivers for it to be detected. So, make sure you have installed USB 3.0 drivers on your computer firsthand, then install Galaxy Note 3-specific drivers. Or, download and install Samsung KIES for Windows. That would solve this problem 98% of the time.

Q9: Hi I recently got my Samsung Galaxy Note 3 from Vodaphone on contract. I inserted SD card 32GB SanDisk which I had previously had in my Samsung Galaxy Note 2 tablet unused. Anyway all was ok and I never stored anything on the SD card from my phone however today phone keeps saying insert SD card.  We took the card out and back in, still showing the same. The other phone also does not see the SD card. We tried the card in tablet and now the tablet cannot see it either. Is this a card or phone problem? I need to know ’cause the phone is under contract with Vodaphone. Otherwise love Samsung changed from iPhone but now starting to seriously wonder if I made a mistake! I used iPhone 4 years no hassles. I really loved my tablet so decided to get the note 3 phone. Please let me know solution. My husband has ordered 64GB Samsung SD cards as well for my phone to use. Not sure if they will work now.

A: It only means one thing–your SD card may have been damaged and your mobile devices cannot read from it. Try inserting the card to your laptop and have the computer read from it. You may be prompted to reformat the external storage device so do that. But remember, you will lose everything in it when you do but that’s the last option you have to know whether you can still use the SD card or not. After formatting it, try to see if you can copy file to and from it via your computer. If you can, try inserting it to your phone. By the way, your husband’s decision of getting a new SD card will save you from a lot of trouble in bringing the dead SD card back to life.

Q10: Hi guys, I use Samsung Galaxy Note 3. Every night I will leave the phone at the side of my bed. And last night I slept and swept the phone down to the floor. Then I checked the phone and found that they had the “camera fail” shown when I turned on the camera. After that, I found the way to revise the phone. The ways you advise in the site it was really good. Now, I can use back camera or the main one. However, when i swipe to front camera, it still shows “Camera Fail”, could you give me some advise? Thank you so much for your kind consideration. I look forward to seeing your feedback. — Fah

A: It could be a software problem, a hardware issue or both. To troubleshoot it, go to your phone’s application manager, find Camera and clear its cache and data. Reboot the phone and use the front camera again. If the error message is still there, you have no other option but to do a factory reset before you can decide to have it checked by a technician or bring it back to where you bought it. It is better you backup your data first and do a hard reset because once technicians can lay their hand on the phone, the first thing they will do is to do a factory reset as well. Get the point?

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