Wi-fi error (wifi gone bananas!)

[Feroluce]

My wifi has gone completely nuts.

I put my phone in airplane mode yesterday (with wifi seperately turned off) on a plane.

When I switched airplane mode off, the wifi fired up on its own. 

It's displying wi-fi error and the phone keeps turning itself off and on again.

I left the battery out over night but when I put it back in this morning, the problem was there again.

My phone is completely stock (4.0.2.A.0.42).

[Alexander1]

Hi and welcome to the community! Since you're new please be sure that you have checked out our Discussion guidelines.

That sounds quite odd. I would suggest that you try to boot your phone into safe mode to see if the problem may be related to any 3rd party app that you have installed in your phone:

http://talk.sonymobile.com/t5/FAQ/How-to-boot-your-phone-into-safe-mode/m-p/348008#U348008

If the behavior persists in safe mode I would suggest that you try to update/repair the phone software using PC Companion: 

http://www.sonymobile.com/update

In PC Companion, press start on Support Zone > Start on Update the phone/tablet software > click on the blue highlight (Repair my phone/tablet). Follow the instructions on screen to perform the repair.

[Feroluce]

Thanks Alexander,

I booted the phone into safe mode and the problem was still there.

I did a full update and repair but the problem is still there.

It took me all day as fully charging a battery on a phone that is constantly switching itself on and off takes ages.

It's now fully factory reset but still 'wi-fi error' and switching itself on and off every minute or so.

I think at this stage I'm pretty close to performing a test for fluid ingress by throwing it in the river :smileysmileywink:

[Feroluce]

The phone is now effectively useless.

It turns on and off every 30 seconds or so, every time wifi restarts, and the option to stop it is greyed out.

I looked at maybe putting different firmware on it to see if I could reset it somehow.

Possibly rolling back to an older version then re-updating it again.

When I try to do that via the sony site, and follow the instructions, it tells me that bootloader unlock is not allowed.

Is there any other way to get new firmware onto it?

For my now necessary replacement, would I be an idiot to buy another Sony phone?

[Alexander1]

Sorry to hear that. it sounds like this may be caused by some hardware fault so I I suggest that you have your phone examined by a service center. Please contact your local Xperia support team for more information:
http://www.sonymobile.com/global-en/support/contact-us/

If you phone is branded or locked to a specific network provider, the unloock bootloader option might not be available. 

[Feroluce]

Hi Alexander,

I found a (not entirely legal) way to unlock the boot loader.

I managed to roll the firmware back to an earlier version (problem still there) then completely wiped the phone (dumped and flushed all caches).

I then put the latest firmware back on it with the PC companion, but it didn't work.

It did however stop the 'switching off and on again every 30 seconds' thing.

Since that was technically a clean slate, the problem has to be hardware.

It's strange that switching on airplane mode (software) can break hardware though.

I'll probably end up buying a new phone (I'm using an old one I found in my desk drawer at the moment), but I'll keep trying to fix my Play. It's the perfect phone for waiting rooms and train journeys.

Thanks for your help

John