Getting data off an Android phone with a dead scree

May 29, 2023 9:40 AM

A friend busted his phone screen and came to me since I'm supposedly the technical one. I told him I'd give it a shot, but I'm getting nowhere with it at all.

He has a Pixel 6 Pro. It seems to work except the screen. It beeps on notifications. I didn't think to get him to try voice commands. Voice commands (i.e. me saying Hey Google at the phone) don't trigger for me. I don't know if they are voice specific though? Plugging and unplugging from my computer makes it beep but it doesn't show up as accessible as a disk. I tried plugging in a USB C to HDMI and putting it on my monitor but it doesn't work (seriously, Google...).

The screen is non-functional for at least display. Touch may work in places but inconsistently, but I think I triggered an emergency dialer somehow by poking at it and it would beep. He did not have backups turned on (or at least when I asked if he saw backups in his Google Drive he said no). I cannot get USB Debugging turned on. scrcpy otg will connect and let me use mouse and keyboard, but there is no way I can do the steps to turn it on. It doesn't show as a device in adb with USB debugging, so I don't think I can get a screen mirror working. I think I can get it unlocked with the mouse/keyboard in scrcpy otg, but can't really do anything from there. I cannot get it to act like a disk when hooked up to my computer. I assume it has a prompt or something and don't know where to click. I do not have access to another working phone to practice on or see what I'm trying to do.

Mainly I think texts are what needs to be rescued. Pictures are on google photos and passwords in google passwords, contacts in google, mail in gmail, etc. So I think texts are the main thing that I don't think are in any cloud service. I'm fairly sure I have almost no hope of getting into this phone without replacing the screen, which was a $400 quote at the local phone place or it looks like I can order a kit for $200 and maybe do it myself.

Do I have any other options here? I don't need to end up with a working phone. He's already getting a new one. I really just want the texts off this thing, preferrably in a way that I can reimport into his new phone. Is the voice assistant locked to his voice? If I take it back to him can I ask him to say anything at the phone that will help? Can you trigger a backup with the voice assistant? Can anyone give me a screenshot of the prompt you get when you plug in to a computer and want to treat the phone as a disk so maybe I can try to tap the right place or use the HID mouse?

Thanks for any help anyone can give, even if it is just "Give up, you're screwed." Also if there is a better place to ask this stuff with an actual friendly community, I'd appreciate pointers. I've tried a couple places on Reddit and my posts are getting deleted.

posted by cmm to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

Try https://www.vysor.io/

Text should already be backed up as Pixel phones can access their text via the web if paired with a PC, so that should already be done.
posted by kschang at 10:31 AM on May 29, 2023 [2 favorites]

You could try plugging it into a screen using DisplayPort over USB-C but reports of that working for the Pixel 6 Pro are erratic and depend on what you're plugging it into. E.g. this reddit comment says you need a certified DisplayLink adapter for it to work.

Also, I've no idea if it just works, or if you'd need to tap something on the screen first.
posted by gible at 4:37 PM on May 29, 2023 [2 favorites]

For what it's worth, backups don't show up in Drive any more. If they've got Google One and didn't disable the backups, they're there, just hidden.
posted by wierdo at 4:39 PM on May 29, 2023 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Found backups in Google One (thanks weirdo!)! I also tried plugging the USB-C into the Thunderbolt port on my Caldigit TS3+, but it didn't work. The TS4 is DisplayLink certified but the TS3+ is not. I think I found a friend with a DisplayLink certified dock for his M1 Macbook so I'm going to borrow it tomorrow and see if I can get a useable screen.

The messages on the web thing looks like it needs to be paired and turned on, which it wasn't. So no luck there. Vysor needs abd debugging to work, which I cannot get turned on without the screen working.
posted by cmm at 3:41 PM on May 30, 2023

Response by poster: Finally had time to play with the DisplayLink dock. This doesn't work for me because it needs an app installed on the phone and the phone display is cracked so I can't load the app. I would imagine with the app it would have worked.

Still tilting at windmills...
posted by cmm at 8:14 AM on June 4, 2023

One more idea: get a OTG cable and a USB hub, and connect keyboard, mouse, screen, AND power to the phone. You MAY be able to turn on dev mode / debug mode that way.

If the phone can still be powered on, you may be able remote install something straight from the Google App Store.
posted by kschang at 11:58 AM on June 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: The screen is the kicker. I can get a mouse that works and a keyboard that works and power the phone. But the Pixel phone just doesn't want to output video on the USB port. The internet is full of people saying Google wants people to buy ChromeCasts. DisplayLink works, but it needs an app and I cannot install an app. I cannot managed to do anything except get past the lock screen with the external keyboard/mouse. I can't get disk mode on and I very much can't get USB debugging on.

I have managed to install Android Studio with the virtual device support and boot up a virtual phone and restore a backup and see text messages though! This was a nice step forward.

But.... the new phone I need to move things to is an iPhone. So I need to get if off android and into iOS. The Move To iOS app that moves them into the iPhone so I can sync them to iCloud requires a private Wifi network and the emulated virtual device doesn't do that. It just bridges a fake wifi adapter to the Mac it is running on. It also won't let me change the name of the fake adapter so I can try to fool Move to iOS. This feels like a dead end.

I have no idea why, but all the "Move my text messages from Android to iOS" paid application look sketchy. If anyone has any recommendations, I don't mind throwing some money at it.

Right now, what I'm was trying to do was:
1) Sync the new iPhones messages to iCloud then turn off iCloud sync for messages
2) Back up the new iPhone
3) Use Move to iOS to get message off the Android virtual phone and into the fresh iPhone.
4) Back up that iPhone again
5) Use iMazing to pull the texts out of one backup and fold them into the real backup
6) Restore the combined backup
7) Turn on iCloud sync and hope the messages fold together

But 3 is failing because the virtual device doesn't let me use Move to iOS. Move to iOS also seems finicky from reading the internet....

Still trying though!
posted by cmm at 3:36 PM on June 8, 2023