8200 Got wet - Service required Please call.....for assistance

Hi. Hopefully someone out there can help me out Here goes. Last weekend I was enjoying some fun in the sun on Prior Lake in Minnesota. Some people and I were hanging out on a boat, soaking up some rays. I thought it would be funny to push my buddy in the water, as he is very anal about his hair, and had not gone in the water all day. I pushed him in, we all laughed, and then he pulled his phone out of his swim trunk pocket. He has a pretty new (about a month old) green sprint 8200. The phone turned it self off, and stayed that way for 5 or so hours. Later that evening (Saturday), he was able to turn it on, and it worked perfectly until Friday morning. When he woke up Friday morning, his phone said, "Service required. Please call 1-888-211-4727 for assistance" on the internal screen. On the external screen it says "Service required." He brought it into the sprint store, hoping to have them warranty it out, and the found out it had water damage and said there was nothing they could do. I bought him a new 8200 on Friday. I now have his old phone, and am hoping to fix it, the thing is in perfect condition, and my girlfriend has a nasty old 8100 that we could upgrade. I have a data cable, and bitpim. I am able to get into the file system on the phone, send it rings, read the phone book, etc. I can turn the phone on and off, and the startup tones are the same, the boot screen is the same, everything is perfect. After the boot, it goes to looking for service, then after about 3 seconds of looking for service it pops up the service required message. When I push buttons on the phone, they make noise (numbers sound like dialing, other buttons make the Sanyo beep, etc.) I feel like this thing needs to be "flashed" or something like that (firmware?). Does anyone know of an app out there that can flash these phones, or somewhere I can download a new firmware? Is there some code I can put in the phone that will initiate a reset? I have tried these, ##786# - Phone Usage & Master Reset (##RTN#) ##3282# - Data Provisioning (##DATA#) ##33284# - Debug Menu (##DEBUG#), and they do nothing. I was also thinking of taking the phone apart as far as I can and letting it dry out for a couple days. Should I do this? I am just trying to do something with this phone, so I didn’t totally throw $200 away! Thanks in advance for any help........
Matt Urness
[email protected]

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See problem is that even if you were able to flash the phone with a new firmware/software, the circuit board is still the same so eventually you would end up getting the same message, to fix would probably cost you as much as a new phone, not worth it imho.

You don't think that the phone would eventually dry out?

Originally Posted by matty2244

You don't think that the phone would eventually dry out?

oh yes definitely, but once a circuit board is liquid damaged, the problem remains.

What a good friend you have, because we would have had a fight!
Buying him a new phone was the upstandard thing to do. I'm glad you learned.



JE

So, I took the phone apart, all the way apart, and let it dry for a week. Same problem, did nothing different. I was about to give up on the stupid thing, and one of my co-workers suggested "re-dunking" the phone in water. I figured why not, so i got a glass of water and dipped it in (with the phone powered on). I had the phone open, and just dipped the lower part in, just up to the screen. It stayed on for awhile, then the battery indicator went from full to 2 then to 1 bar then to red and warned me that I should recharge. I kept it in the water, and the phone actually powered off (it didn't just shut off, but actually went through the power down deal with the music and images). Once it was off, I tried to turn it back on, and got nothing except for the little red light on the front would be on when i was holding the power button down (which is what happened on the lake that day, too). I took the phone back apart, and actually placed it in the air conditioning duct for the long weekend. Got in today (tuesday), put it back together, turned it on, and it worked. Camera, everything works fine. Even called *2 and talked to a live person, just to test the ability to speak and hear, and the person on the other end said I sounded perfect. I am going to leave the phone powered on all week, just let it sit here at my desk. I dont want to jump the gun and activate it on my girlfriends account yet, as it worked for a week for shane before popping up that message. Im just gonna leave it on, and when the battery dies im going to charge it and leave it turned on. If it is still good to go next monday or so, I am going to activate the phone on my girlfriends account. Ill keep you guys posted on what happens. Boy would it be nice to get this working, my girlfriends 8100 is just terrible. Plus, it is the cool green phone that you cant find anywhere, and my buddy shane loved that color, and was mad I couldnt find him a replacement one (i bought him a blue one). So when he sees my girlfriend using it he will be ticked off, and I won't have wasted any money at all

Keeping my fingers crossed.....

^ Interesting, let us know the conclusion, that has to be a first for me, a liquid damaged phone brought back to life and lives for more than a month... good luck.

i would take the phone completely apart, and soak it in alcohol, even scrub it with a old tooth brush, and then let it full dry, and put it back together. this should fix the phone. its worth a shot.

Well everyone, against all odds, this phone is still working. It has been activated under my girlfriends plan for about a month now, with no problems to report. Readylink, vision, text messaging, all work perfectly. There is not 1 thing wrong with this phone. I will let the forum know if the status of the phone changes.

Originally Posted by matty2244

Well everyone, against all odds, this phone is still working. It has been activated under my girlfriends plan for about a month now, with no problems to report. Readylink, vision, text messaging, all work perfectly. There is not 1 thing wrong with this phone. I will let the forum know if the status of the phone changes.

That's one for the records...nice going.