Samsung S4 crashes following update

[Torquaywill]

Hello

I have a Samsung Galaxy S4 on Vodafone which is approximately nine months old. In the last couple of weeks I have suddenly started suffering severe problems using the phone for more than a few minutes at a time off charge.

Despite the battery apparently charging properly and displaying a high charge (always over 70%, often over 90%) the phone crashes, switches itself off or refuses to connect to any network almost constantly. Trying to switch the phone on and off does not resolve the problem and if the phone does switch back on (which it does not always do) it will not connect to the internet or make calls.

This has been happening daily for approximately two weeks and I think that might have started happening after it downloaded software updates although I could be mistaken about this fact.

The only way to get the phone working again is to connect it to a power supply and reset while plugged in. Clearly this is massively inconvenient for a mobile phone where I can only guarantee a few minutes use before it will crash. Once connected to the mains power it works flawlessly again for the duration of the power supply.

The phone is in good condition and has always been looked after with no damage.

Is this a recognised problem? Is there a chance it's connected to a recent software update or is there something I can do to help solve the problem?

I'm in the military and given time away from home rely on the phone to contact home so could really do with resolving this problem ASAP prior to going away from home again at the end of the month.

Any assistance you could offer would be greatly appreciated.

Torquay will

[gt37]

Take the back off the phone and check the battery. If it looks fat and swollen that could be the answer to your problem. One of the dodgy batteries again. 

If not try the usual, factory restore.

[hrym]

If it was a major update, I'd try a factory reset.  This reloads the OS from ROM and clears out any bits of the old code that may be left over.   Remember to back up your content first and, if you have the camera set to save to an external sd card, change this to internal memory as it's been known for the process to treat the card as system memory and wipe that.

If that doesn't solve it and the doesn't appear to be a problem with the battery, you may need to get the phone repaired, but I suspect a reset will do the job.