A large number of LG devices have taken to bootlooping lately; that is, they’ve been getting themselves stuck in an endless loop of the startup screens shown before the phone boots up and is ready to use. In normal cases, this could be fixed with a quick reflashing of the phone’s default firmware or a custom ROM. For many of these LG devices, however, the issue is hardware-based. The problem has affected phones as far back as the Nexus 4 and LG G2, and has continued, with varying intensity, to this day. The latest victim of the phenomenon is the LG V20, LG’s Snapdragon 820-powered follow up to the beastly and premium, yet quirky LG V10. At least one of these cases, however, LG seems to be blaming on a bad USB Type-C cable.
The mass adoption of USB Type-C is still in the earliest of early stages, and some OEMs have been experiencing issues with integrating the standard. It has, in fact, become pronounced enough to warrant the definition of a higher standard of manufacturing to help steer consumers away from cheaply made cables; indeed, everybody up to and including Google have felt the growing pains of the USB Type-C standard. Cheap USB Type-C cables seem to be frying devices at an alarming rate, even more so than their predecessors. This is partly because of the increased data and power throughput that the standard makes possible, but also because, as mentioned above, OEMs and cable makers are still finding their legs.
According to an unnamed LG employee who got their hands on one of the few bootlooping LG V20 units reported thus far, the issue seems to have been caused by a cheap or faulty cable not meeting the right specification to match up with the phone’s hardware in a safe and effective manner, which could have issued a jolt to a critical component or even wiped parts of the device’s memory. LG is being a bit tight-lipped on the technical details of the carnage, and has yet to issue an official statement themselves. According to a prominent USB Type-C cable tester, Nathan K, the cable frying the device is somewhat unlikely, without some sort of anomaly occurring.