You put a lot of faith in your smartphone, if it’s your daily driver. You use it to connect with the world around you, entertain you in your downtime, and get things done. When it fails, it can be troubling, to say the least. When the failure is a simple bootloop, most seasoned Android owners would simply reflash their stock ROM with the manufacturer’s tools, or maybe make the jump to CyanogenMod. If the bootloop is caused by a hardware issue, however, the device is a lost cause, as some owners of LG devices like the G4 came to find out the hard way. As it turns out, that same defect has hit the Nexus 5X, but owners may not be able to get their beloved device up and running again. Instead, LG is offering a full refund of the purchase price.
A used or refurbished LG Nexus 5X these days may fetch somewhere between $200 and $300 depending on where you look and the device color and capacity, and they sometimes pop up at even lower price points. Early adopters, however, forked over a cool $350 for the 16GB model, or $400 or so for the 32GB one. Owners affected by the bootloop bug can now get their full purchase price back, provided they kept the receipt. Those who have can send their defective unit in to LG along with the invoice to get a refund. This means those who got the phone secondhand may well be out of luck, even if the warranty on the device is still in service.
The reason for this is that LG has stopped manufacturing parts for the LG Nexus 5X, since it’s been discontinued. Predictably, their stock of the part that needs replacing to stop the bootlooping issue has run out. LG also seems to be fresh out of brand new replacement phones, leaving a full refund as pretty much the only option for those whose Nexus 5X units have been left inoperable. Not all Nexus 5X bootloops are because of this particular hardware issue, of course, but flashing a custom ROM or otherwise playing around with the internal software can void your warranty, so trying to fix the bootloop on your own should be reserved for those who seriously love the Nexus 5X and are willing to give up the opportunity for a refund in exchange for a chance at fixing the issue.