iPhone X boot loop resolution and findings.

Ok, so here was the situation. After an inordinately slow month of waiting for my iPhone X backorder to be fulfilled, it finally arrived yesterday.

Excited as I was, I opened the box, took out the phone and even without removing the manufacturer protective plastic, turned it on for the first time. It came on perfectly and presented me with the installation wizard. I followed the wizard all the way through to completion. It was done! the springboard loaded perfectly and there was my new fully functional iPhone X. This is where the problem started.

I went into settings / general and noticed the default installed iOS was 11.1.x. Apple had just released iOS 11.2 the past weekend, so I went to settings / software update and started the update procedure. After waiting for iOS 11.2 to download, the iPhone X finally started updating by restarting. The Apple logo appears the goes away. It comes back again with the little firmware updating progress line underneath it. After about 20 seconds, one little pixel appears in the progress line and the iPhone X restarts. Thats it. Its now in the boot loop.

The iPhone X restarts, Apple logo appears for 3 seconds, disappears for 5 seconds and reappears again. Endless...

As a first step in trying to fix this problem, I turned off the iPhone X using this procedure. I then connected the iPhone X to iTunes on my computer. The iPhone X powered on and continued to boot loop without any recognition from iTunes. Frustrating!

I then used this procedure to place the iPhone X into recovery mode. It took a few tries, as the iPhone X kept restarting, but eventually, the recovery mode lightning cable picture appears on the screen. I then plugged the iPhone X back into the lightning cable attached to my computer and iTunes now discovered the iPhone X.

iTunes had discovered an error with the iPhone X and presented a dialog box forcing me to "update and restore". I clicked and the newly released iOS 11.2 started downloading to the computer. When that completed, iTunes started the update process. The iPhone restarted, the Apple logo appeared again with the progress line underneath it. About 10 seconds later, the iPhone restarted again and the boot loop continued. On the screen of the computer was a dialog box with "iTunes has lost connection to device. Unknown error (9) update failed"

I turned the iPhone X off, put it back into recovery mode and tried iTunes again. Same thing!.

Totally and utterly frustrated now..

There is a mode the iPhone X can be placed in called Direct Firmware Update (DFU). This mode allows access to the iPhone X's low level firmware so it can be forced updated. This procedure is not for the feint hearted and is definitely not sanctioned by Apple. It could brick your iPhone X and void its warranty, so I wont discuss how to get the iPhone X into this state. I will say however, that I couldn't get the iPhone X into DFU mode whilst it was boot looping, so that was no help either.

Reluctantly, I phoned AppleCare to see what they had to say. I am an Apple service engineer myself, which is the cause of most of my frustration. I should KNOW how to fix this.. After a lengthy conversation with one of my peer AppleCare support reps, it was concluded that I have done more than most people would to try and restore this iPhone X and my only course of action, was to return it to to the place of purchase for a DOA (Dead On Arrival) swap or lengthy repair.

I asked the vendor for a replacement. Due to the obvious constraint issues at the moment, they couldnt oblige me and gave me the repair and wait as my only option.

No way!. I not doing that.

I called AppleCare again, grabbed the computer and sat down down for another very lengthy discovery session to try and resolve this manufacturer software fault.

This time, a few more facts presented themselves. The most important one, which was ultimately the path to the resolution of this issue, was the reason why the boot loop. I thought it was an iOS 11.2 software update failure, where the iOS was crashing and restarting, however it was in fact, the firmware failed to update and the boot loop was the firmware doing a checksum, finding an error, POWERING DOWN the iPhone X and rebooting it completely from scratch. This explained why iTunes wasnt recognising the iPhone X and why I could'nt get it into DFU mode. The iPhone X kept powering down and powering back on preventing all the electrical buttons and lightning connector from working.

I had a genius thought... Why not let the battery run flat in the iPhone X, then connect it to power and wait for the charging symbol to appear. That symbol comes up to show you the level of charge in the iPhone X until it has enough power to physically boot the iOS. Also, that symbol is always on until boot, meaning the iPhone X has power to the buttons and lightning connector and wont power down throughout the initial charging process.

After a day of boot loops, the iPhone X eventually went flat and powered down. I connected it to its charger and waited... As soon as the charging logo appeared, I waited for a little longer to get at least 2% or so charge into the iPhone X and at that point i placed it into recovery mode, successfully mind you. I fired up iTunes on the computer and proceeded to erase and restore the iPhone X. This time when the Apple logo appeared with the progress line underneath it, the iPhone X DID'NT power down, it remained on and the firmware successfully updated. The IOS updated to 11.2 as part of the procedure and now I have a fully functioning perfectly working iPhone X with the fix installed so that will NEVER happen again. Apple assures me the iOS 11.2 update was the cure for that issue, so lets wait and see, but so far so good.

I hope this little adventure of mine, helps some other iPhone X early adopters with the same issue.

Brett.