iPhone XS Yikes! iPhone stuck on Apple logo start up screen

[frez]

Hi there,

I have a relatively new iPhone XS that is stuck on the Apple logo start up screen. It is repeatedly 'restarting' and has been in this state for about 7 hours.

Background: I just returned from a 2 month overseas trip where I took lots of photos and videos and wanted to backup the phone. As the phone was nearly full, I deleted a few apps and some unneeded photos/videos from the camera roll. The phone's capacity wasn't reflecting to show the deletions, so I did a hard reset (volume up/down/power). From that point on it has been stuck in this restart loop. I think the OS doesn't have enough space to boot up properly.

Here's what I tried:

1. multiple hard resets (vol up/down/power)
2. removed the SIM
3. multiple attempts at recovery mode and connect to the latest MacOS and iTunes to update the OS (received unknown errors 9, -18,28 and 2005)
4. incense and ritualistic dancing on a mountain peak

iTunes restore from backup is not an option as I would like to preserve the photos and videos from the oveseas trip.

I called a data recovery place and they estimate they can recover the data directly off the phone's storage chip for $1000-2000.

Any other suggestions on what I can try first?

 

[jagolden]

I’m no expert, but first I’d plug it back into a charger to make sure it has plenty of juice. All the restarts are surely using up a lot of battery.
Secondly, even though it wont fully start, maybe try one of those lightning photo vaults that can suck the photos off the phone. It’s a less costly start than the expensive data recovery services. If that doesn’t work, at least you’ll have addition off-load space when the phone is finally fixed.
Electronics with storage can become unstable when the available storage runs low.
Good luck and keep us updated.

 

[frez]

...maybe try one of those lightning photo vaults that can suck the photos off the phone ...

Thanks for the suggestion. I just tried the 'leef' memory stick but I think it just can't get to a proper boot.

Have had iPhones since 2007 and they've always proven to be robust - this is the first time I've encountered this issue - very surprising.

Someone who encountered this once before suggested letting the battery drain and charging it up. Ironically I'm now lamenting the long standby battery life of the phone - according to specs: it's 10 days.

 

[frez]

Update:

I took the phone to Apple. They were unable to fix it.

They recommended Drive Savers Recovery, who upon initial evaluation, thought they would be able to recover the data.

Wheb they went in to do the work, they were unable to get any data off the phone. Sadness.