[Aquila1]

I was doing a factory reset of the Priv last night, because my credit card company approved my request for a full refund for the Priv under their 90-day return protection benefit.

It took 4 attempts and 1.5 hours to factory reset the Priv (unlocked AT&T branded, Marshmallow, build AAG783). Has anyone else had this problem?

Attempt 1:

Removed all Device Administrators and Google account. Go into Settings > Personal > Backup & reset > Factory data reset > "Reset Phone" > Confirm PIM > "Erase Everything"

After pushing the "Erase Everything" button, nothing happens. No reaction from the phone. I try pushing again, no change. I try the power button, no change. It stays that way with no change for a while. I hold the power button for 32+ seconds, for a battery-pull restart equivalent.

Attempt 2:

Try again. Go into Settings. Disable PIN security, just in case. Navigate back to "Erase Everything" button. This time, see window message: "Erasing Please wait..." for a few minutes. Then screen goes black for a while, no change.

Attempt 3:

It looks like the Settings menu for factory reset isn't going to work correctly based on the first two attempts, so I try to do a factory reset the old-fashioned way. I hold the power button and volume down buttons to enter the bootloader menu. But, unlike most Android phones, there's no factory reset option! So it looks like I need to do it through Settings.

Attempt 4:

Restart phone. Go back to "Erase Everything" button. This time, there's two minutes with the notification window "Erasing Please wait..." and then the screen going black. I restart the Priv, and on-screen is a drawing of the green Android robot with its internal gear popped out and rotating, and the word "Erasing..." below it. I check back on phone every 20 minutes. After about an hour, the screen is black. I power on the phone, and arrive at the Android setup process for new phones.

That is a much more difficult and lengthy process than on other Android phones!

A search of crackberry does show a few other people with Priv factory reset problems, similar to this but not as systematic:

http://forums.crackberry.com/blackbe...-priv-1080701/

http://forums.crackberry.com/blackbe...rking-1076141/

This is something Blackbery should improve, because there's a fear going into the factory reset process of accidentally bricking the phone.

[Bla1ze]

This is something Blackbery should improve, because there's a fear going into the factory reset process of accidentally bricking the phone.

Not really a BlackBerry problem. It's an Android problem that Google would need to address.

And..

That is a much more difficult and lengthy process than on other Android phones!

Makes no sense. It's a standard reset process put in place by Google.

[Aquila1]

Not really a BlackBerry problem. It's an Android problem that Google would need to address.

And..



Makes no sense. It's a standard reset process put in place by Google.

I dunno Bla1ze... this does appear to be a Blackberry specific problem, and not a general Google problem, based on two things.

First: At a minimum, Blackberry has removed the Android-native ability to perform the factory reset from the bootloader menu (Power + Volume Down).

I recognize Blackberry apparently did this to 'harden' the OS. In the process, it also removed a very handy, easy way of performing a factory reset without the baggage of an actively running OS.

When I've performed the bootloader factory reset on other Android phones, it was much quicker than the Priv's process.

Second: I searched the Internet for other people posting about their Android devices freezing or becoming unresponsive or stopped during a factory reset through the Settings menu. I tried a number of different Google searches, including searches specific to user forums like AndroidCentral and XDA-Developers, and with a wide variety of words describing the problems. And yet, even with the billions of Android devices sold, I found a very low number of posts dicussing anything at all like this.

But the Priv, with sales in the low millions of units (some of which were returned to carriers or are inactive), already has three posts on Crackberry discussing this type of problem.

The changes and modifications that Blackberry has made to the Priv's Android setup for security and 'hardening' play a role.

[cpvolvo]

I know this will sound bizarre, but did you have it charging when you were trying to erase? I tried it about five times with the same issue, had the goofy idea to unplug it from charging, and it worked.

Probably a coincidence, but worth a shot?

[blackbirdy]

Plug in. Remove google account. Reboot to get all running Google junk to begone.. Reset. Mine just worked. Now I have shiite battery life again. But at least it's workin' zippy. I wont send my phone back, they'll have to pry the BlackBerry keyboard out of my cold dread hands.