Many Android owners who managed to damage the screen on their phone are often at a loss for the right steps to do so today’s short #GalaxyS8 guide will help. Unfortunately, just like in the case mentioned below, screen damage will, 99.9% of the time, result to permanent hardware damage. That’s where the issue usually lies and the thing that a lot of people often refuses to accept. In an ideal world, you should just bring the phone to a shop or ring the manufacturer and set up a repair. In reality, many people would avoid to have their phone repaired as much as possible because, primarily they rely on it on day in and day out. There are other considerations as well that other users will have to deal with when faced without their devices. So, what exactly has to be done when you find your phone’s screen damaged after an accidental drop, or after you got it wet? Unsurprisingly, our answer is to repair but there are also a few cases wherein some remedies may work in the short term. In this post, we recommend trying these temporary workarounds although eventually, you still have to send the phone to Samsung for repair or replacement.
Today’s problem: What to do if your Galaxy S8 screen is cracked, showing lines, has discoloration, and won’t work
Hi. I recently fell over with my Android s8 in my pocket l. I have a crack in the upper left edge on the curved edge. I also have dead pixels near the center of the crack. However the thing I am worried about is the there are 2 thin lines running from the center of the crack directly to the right. One line is black and one line is silver. Everything lower than these lines is slightly brighter than the screen above the line and the screen below the lines shaking up and down at seemingly random intensities (sometimes hardly shaking at all, sometimes shaking a lot). — Lachie
Solution: Hi Lachie. Clearly you have a damaged display assembly. There’s really no way to sugarcoat this and if you want to permanently fix the screen, you need to have it replaced.
When it comes workarounds, there may be a few basic things that you can try but they won’t repair the crack nor remove the discoloration and lines though so you still have to eventually send the phone in. These remedies may or may not work in your case but if you want to give them a try, here’s what you can do.
Verify if digitizer still works
There are cases where the digitizer remains intact even if there’s a bad crack on the screen. There are three major components on your Galaxy screen — digitizer, LCD/monitor, and digitizer flex cable. The digitizer is a thin layer of transparent sensor that captures your touches so they can be interpreted by the operating system as commands. Sometimes, even if the monitor (the component that displays the images) is physically damaged, the digitizer may still work properly allowing you to continue interacting with your phone. As long as the digitizer is good and the phone still loads the operating system properly, you may still be able to back your files up and continue using your phone despite some limitations. To know if the digitizer still works, all you have to do is to check if most or all of the screen surfaces recognizes your touches. If you can do that, then be sure to back your files up right away to avoid losing them should your phone decides to stop working properly all of a sudden.
If the digitizer no longer works, or only a portion of the screen seem to detect your touches, try doing the rest of our suggestions below.
Remove peripherals
Peripherals in this case includes SIMcards, memory cards, and other connected devices. If you have any or all of them, consider disconnecting them and see what happens. Some damaged screens were able to work fine again after removing non-essential parts before so be sure to do this simple troubleshooting step. If you don’t have any SIM card, SD card, or anything attached, just skip this suggestion.
Boot to safe mode
Some apps may prevent the screen from working normally. To figure that out, try to run your S8 to safe mode and see what happens. Remember, safe mode blocks third party apps only. If your screen works normally only on safe mode, then one of your apps must be to blame.
To boot your S8 to safe mode:
- Turn the device off.
- Press and hold the Power key past the model name screen.
- When “SAMSUNG” appears on the screen, release the Power key.
- Immediately after releasing the Power key, press and hold the Volume down key.
- Continue to hold the Volume down key until the device finishes restarting.
- Safe mode will display in the bottom left corner of the screen.
- Release the Volume down key when you see Safe Mode.
- Let your S8 run in this mode for several hours and check for the problem.
To know which app is causing a problem, follow these steps:
- Boot to safe mode.
- Check for the problem.
- Once you’ve confirmed that a third party app is to blame, you can start uninstalling apps individually. We suggest that you begin with the most recent ones you added.
- After you uninstall an app, restart the phone to normal mode and check for the problem.
- If your S8 still refuses to power back on, repeat steps 1-4.
Contact a professional
Send the phone for repair. This might seem straightforward but a lot of phone users don’t believe in this wisdom. Most of the time, users tend to refuse to accept the fact that there’s a need to send the phone in to Samsung or to an independent service center. In many cases, financial situation is the main factor for avoiding repair. The thing is, none of these circumstances will actually help in fixing the screen damage issue for good. The longer you deny the need for repair, the longer you’ll be unable to use your phone.
Another good point to ponder is that the most effective way to resolve the issue is to let someone who does screen or phone repair for a living do it for you. Physically damaged screens can’t be fixed by doing software procedures. There’s no magic trick that you can do undo the crack on the screen. The lines that you see are most likely signs of a physical damage to the monitor. Any internal damage to any or all of the major components on your screen assembly can only be fixed by replacing the parts. Unless you can do the replacement yourself, we strongly recommend that you seek professional help.
Any phone damage automatically voids standard Samsung warranty so you can’t expect to have your phone fixed for free. However, we still recommend that you let a Samsung technician replace the screen for you to minimize the chance of having more problems afterwards. It’s not unheard of that third party phone repairs may sometimes result to more severe hardware troubles afterwards. Unfortunately, Samsung will no longer entertain any repair request if a non-Samsung tech did a repair on your phone first. Remember, there’s no guarantee that the damage on your phone is isolated to the screen only. Dropping or physically impacting an electronic device is never a good idea and can possibly result to other hardware troubles. Samsung checks the entire system during repair to check for damage outside the screen to avoid repeat repair. If a third party technician won’t do that, you’ll most likely have a problematic device after the initial repair.
Replace the screen yourself
Yes, replacing the damaged screen yourself is very possible. A lot of phone users with similar cases to yours usually think so too. While screen replacement is relatively simple, it’s not for everybody. A lot of times, amateurs end up damaging the hardware more than fixing the initial trouble. By deciding to replace the screen yourself, you’ll also be throwing the chance of allowing Samsung fix the device should you’ll find yourself unable to resolve it. Do-it-yourself (DIY) repair does not also mean free repair since you’ll need to buy the tools and materials to make screen repair successful. On top of all these, there’s really no guarantee that your phone will work normally afterwards. If you think you can replace the screen yourself though, try to look for good guides online on how to do it. YouTube has lots of videos that will show you how. Just do the repair at your own risk.