Lumia 950 XL Random Reboots

JieXY

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Lumia 950 XL is a nice device. However, random reboot issue still lingers in W10M for both 950 and 950 XL.

What I've found is that some Apps, along with the SD card, are causing this issue.

Take The Guardian for example, which is pre-installed in the phone. It runs fine if installed in the device, but causes reboot as soon as it's opened if installed on an SD card. Windows Central App behaves similarly. However, this is not seen for Apps like Hill Climb Racing (which is another pre-installed App). Now this raises the question that whether simply the location of SOME Apps is causing random reboots.

To be more precise, the SD card I use is a Samsung Pro+ 64GB and is bought brand new from Amazon. The default file system is exFAT. I tried reformatting the card with the option on the phone, but nothing has changed and random reboots occur as normal.

I removed the SD card this morning and so far I have NOT seen any random reboots. Just in case I also reformatted the card on my PC to NTFS. Let's see how this goes. Will report later.
 

venki m

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So many bad reviews and issues for these Lumia 950... Wat a buggy phone Microsoft has produced... At least they can be good in hardware lol.. They are not capable enough to fill up the app gap...
 

realwarder

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We all know it won't take long for an OS update to come that addresses a lot of these little issues. The version on the phones is an early release and has issues. For Microsoft it was wait until next year for a solid release or get the phones on the street and then upgrade shortly after. I'm glad they chose to go this way because it gets phones in people's hands quicker and given the 2 years since we had a flagship, sooner was better.
 

cracgor

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I did the same thing. Formatting did not work. Installing apps on the SD card wouldn't even let me turn on the phone, it just got stuck in a reboot cycle, never making it to start. If iPhone or Galaxy did tho crap, no one except the sheep would be patient with it. I get the impression that a phone for fans is a nice phone on paper with serious flaws fans will overlook.
 

snakebitten

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Only opened this thread because my 950XL hasn't crashed, rebooted, or even frozen for a moment.
Then noticed your evidence of it being SD card related. Bet you're right. I haven't added an SD card yet. Probably will soon for saving data. But with 32 Gig local storage, my apps will all stay where they are happy.

As for this phone being labeled "buggy", I'll just let the critics say their peace, while I marvel at the most advanced mobile phone available.

(didn't know you could install apps on the SD card in an iPhone. Or change batteries. Or put 2 Sims in it. Or wirelessly charge it. Or get an octa-processor. Or Continuum. Or..........)

I greatly appreciate the mature stability and wonderful app quality of IPhone. It's the Toyota Camry standard of predictability. But as exciting as a refrigerator.

This thing is a Ferrari, with the high-strung issues that accompany that sex-appeal.

All just my opinion, of course.
 

cracgor

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Sure. But you can do things like visual voicemail or not have to explain to people you can't use an app (medical dictating for a real world example of something more useful than the many missing or bad social apps). The phone is great, and I even like the rugged design, but it is not a Ferrari. It is a Swiss army knife with a bunch of unusable bells and whistles like NFC which has been present for years and still has no ability to pay with it. Don't take me for hating on the OS, against all odds in sticking with Windows Mobile, but I felt a little ripped off after I got the 950xl.
 

JieXY

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Unfortunately, being formatted to NTFS or exFAT doesn't change the fact that some Apps on the SD card crash the phone and cause (random) reboots. To make it worse, the phone can sometimes go into a reboot loop. However in my case, my phone eventually started up after I saw the four-color Microsoft logo for the 3rd or 4th time.

I don't believe this is a Samsung SDXC-specific issue, but I will test other SDXC cards I have.
 

jzgroove

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I also was experiencing random, and regular restarts. After reading this thread I swapped out the SanDisk Extreme Pro 64 GB card for an older, slower 32 GB card and all has been well so far. The old card is slower than the Extreme Pro, but it's plenty snappy for pics, and apps. So if you have another card to try, it's worth a shot...
 

ceraf

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Phone rebooted when trying to take a picture (saving to microSD). It was working fine during the day up until that point.

Guess it's all the intermittent and random issues that Microsoft hasn't fixed yet. I think I would've preferred that they release this phone a little later and spend the extra time to resolve all these bugs, rather than release it early with issues.
 

James Maliki

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I actually just realized this as well!

I am using a Sandisk Ultra Pro 128 GB microSD card. I noticed that certain apps in general booted the phone and some in the SD card also did the same thing. Unfortunately my phone had unfinished app installs stuck on the SD card and so every time I tried to uninstall it, it would reboot. Had to completely reset my phone for the third time.

However this time with knowledge, I'm installing all apps onto my Phone and doing it one at time in order to test which of my apps cause the crash.

So far, very minimal crashes.
 

cracgor

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If it happens to anyone else you can fix it without resetting your phone. Take out the battery and the SD card. Delete the apps folder from the SD card on a computer. Uninstall the grayed apps. Set apps to install on the phone. Put the SD card in. You will still get a random reboot and an occasional errors noted on the SD card message. It really is a lot of bs to deal with for a $700 phone when a $40 Lumia 640 has none of these issues.
 
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Thorgal Aegirsson

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Sure. But you can do things like visual voicemail or not have to explain to people you can't use an app (medical dictating for a real world example of something more useful than the many missing or bad social apps). The phone is great, and I even like the rugged design, but it is not a Ferrari. It is a Swiss army knife with a bunch of unusable bells and whistles like NFC which has been present for years and still has no ability to pay with it. Don't take me for hating on the OS, against all odds in sticking with Windows Mobile, but I felt a little ripped off after I got the 950xl.

Unfortunately I have to agree with you. I also feel a bit ripped off. I was a big Windows fan from Windows Mobile 6.0 times but MS are really trying our patience these days. As for the Ferrari comparison I would say that hardware-wise it might be Ferrari but what's the use of that if you can't drive it because the engine stops every five minutes? A scooter will get you further. I honestly think that Microsoft shouldn't rush things so much if they can't deliver. Desktop version of Windows was also rushed and now companies like Dell and HP recommend to their clients not to install it. And I say the same thing to my clients. It's just not mature enough. W10Mobile is fine as a beta, for insiders but definitely not for general public. And I bought this phone expecting something more stable. How am I supposed to use it for work if the phone reboots every few minutes? And surprisingly W10 on Lumia 635 is slow but is much more stable. And in the meantime I will probably have to carry Lumia 920 with WP8 to work simply because I can rely on it. And my $700 Lumia 950XL is just another testing device for insider previews.
 

James Maliki

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An update...

The restarts kept happening again until I took my SD card out. I think this build on he phone isn't quite capable of using an SD card. For me this is my first phone that has allowed the use of a micro SD so it isn't killer for me but it does suck that it does that for the moment. :(

Aside from that, I've got no qualms from this phone. Everything everyone else has mentioned hasn't shown up. Like I am able to switch to Skype within the messaging app just fine.
 

anthonyng

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I've popped an old 32gig patriot microsd for the time being and no reboots.... stored maps on it and some photos, apps were installed onto phone before the SDcard showed up.

Will keep an eye out for reboots on me end.. I intend to order a lexar x633 64gig card soon even though there are some apparently known issues when plugging phone into the computer.
 

cracgor

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Unfortunately I have to agree with you. I also feel a bit ripped off. I was a big Windows fan from Windows Mobile 6.0 times but MS are really trying our patience these days. As for the Ferrari comparison I would say that hardware-wise it might be Ferrari but what's the use of that if you can't drive it because the engine stops every five minutes? A scooter will get you further. I honestly think that Microsoft shouldn't rush things so much if they can't deliver. Desktop version of Windows was also rushed and now companies like Dell and HP recommend to their clients not to install it. And I say the same thing to my clients. It's just not mature enough. W10Mobile is fine as a beta, for insiders but definitely not for general public. And I bought this phone expecting something more stable. How am I supposed to use it for work if the phone reboots every few minutes? And surprisingly W10 on Lumia 635 is slow but is much more stable. And in the meantime I will probably have to carry Lumia 920 with WP8 to work simply because I can rely on it. And my $700 Lumia 950XL is just another testing device for insider previews.

I couldn't wait for future updates. I don't trust things to get fixed anymore. I actually returned my 950xl, because my 640 is more useable. I may get it again if it gets fixed, but I really don't think the Nexus 6p should be $499 and the Lumia 950xl is $650. I really don't think the iPhone should by $750, but at least the Nexus and iPhone can say they have 10 times the demand when compared to windows phone. Another thing that people don't really measure is the wasted time trying to fix this crap or find work arounds. I don't have enough time to waste on this crap anymore in my life. I am for the first time in years struggling with deciding to switch to android or apple. I kind of feel like the only reason I don't want to switch is to justify 5 years of making a choice to use windows phone.
 

cracgor

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It only happens when apps are installed on the SD card. I had photos and maps installed on it without problem. but I started transferring apps to the sd card and got stuck in a miserable cycle of restarts. I tried it 3 times without being able to do it successfully.
 

Babs75

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I haven't had any of the problems that everyone else is having but I also didn't convert from a Windows phone. I was an Android user and set everything up from scratch. The only thing that doesn't work is LTE which is no big deal. I'm happy with 4G for what I do. So far this phone is doing great for me. I'm very happy with it. A definite step up from my LG Optimus G Pro.
 

Jonnie LasVegas

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It only happens when apps are installed on the SD card. I had photos and maps installed on it without problem. but I started transferring apps to the sd card and got stuck in a miserable cycle of restarts. I tried it 3 times without being able to do it successfully.

I've never put an SD card in my 950 and still have all of these problems. Along with the screen showing a bunch of colors, looking like an old school tv without a good signal. The touchscreen sometimes won't respond and nothing fixes it besides a soft reset. But then it does it again, eventually. Can't wait to get in Monday to trade it in on another iPhone. I'm bummed because I've been waiting for something awesome to come from Microsoft, but now I'm realizing they aren't capable of that in the phone sector.
 

Sargon Aelther

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Just got my Lumia 950 XL and it seems to be suffering from the same random reboot problem caused by SD card. I got SanDisk ULTRA SDXC 128 GB 80MB/s one. If I take it out, there are no reboots, except that File Explorer crashes as soon as I open it (Probably due to the pointless recent files feature, which sadly cannot be turned off, unlike on PC). Sigh... I'm going to try and see how it works with my older 48MB/s 128GB SD card once I back everything up...

I was really happy to finally get a premium lumia with an SD card slot, but It's been a huge disappointment so far... I hope they'll release some sort of software update soon.
 

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