Revive an iPad Air bricked

î have tried that several times before I asked the question here. No luck.

Sorry that is the only method I know of aside from sending back to apple

As I already said in my question, I already used 3utools, that's why we can see a screenshot (middle picture above) showing stuck at 20%.
I do not remember if I tried removing and plugging the USB cable, but I can definitely try that again today or tomorrow. Now the iPad has empty battery and I do not have a charger 2A near by.
I am bit skeptical.
I have tried also Dr. Fone and Reiboot. Both are stuck in restoring the iOS.
The error seems to appear on "Writing File System".
I will go today to buy also a new original Apple USB lighting charging cable.

Is there some reason you do not want to take it to the Apple store for help?

@Owen Rubin
Yes, it is at least 3 years old, so out of warranty and besides that I do not want to pay any money for repair, because I am the technical guy around and I am supposed to solve the problem, even down to open and repair at hardware level, but I have not always time and the particular right knowledge and is good to asked other experts that possible went through similar problems. It is more about sharing and brainstorming in the end.

Nevertheless, the problem was solved in mean time.
I have bought a new USB lighting cable, original from Apple.
I paid 25€ for it.
I find criminal that price. I bit my fingers several times, metaphoric speaking. That price cannot be real. I expect to be maximal 2€ when is produced, the rest is profit and virtual maintained high.
With that new cable I started 3utools again and it just jumped over the glitch at 20€ without doing anything. The flashing went fine up to 100%, but the iPad did not start. I could not go out of the restoring mode no matter what I tried. During flashing with 3utools I have seen several times changing the connection type from Restoring to Normal mode while the flashing was in progress.
After that I decided to try again iTunes and I flashed again. It seems the glitch was removed with that new original Apple cable. The iTunes flash worked fine this time. It took a long time and more preventive that necessary, when I considered the flashing was stuck, I removed the USB cable and after several seconds I plugged in again, but I am not so sure was necessary.
Anyway, the good news is that at the end of flashing the iPad started again with the latest IOS 12.1.
The iPad works now again normal.
There is one more thing to be mentioned.
Since my last try to flash it few day ago, the battery on the iPad became empty. I could not charge anymore with the previous cable and previous charger. It was not original charger from Apple, but worked fine for many months. It has 8A and 4 USB. The cable was also not original, but worked also fine.
Anyway, I had another charger, again not original. But 3 USB and at least 2.4A for one USB, so good enough for iPad charging the battery. This charger has a small LED display that show the voltage 5.03 V and then after few seconds shows the current. With the new bough cable I could see 2.23A and the charger became warm. Then I knew it was charging for sure. When the IPad was restored/repaired, then I have tried all the previous cables and chargers and only the last charger with display and the original cable worked to charge the battery while the IOS was on.
I think the battery discharged and then fully charged played also a role, beside the new original USB lighting cable, but is just a guess.
Now I have the iPad resorted at factory settings, as a new iPad, fully working.

Thank you, especially to Jackie.

Nevertheless, the problem was solved in mean time.
I have bought a new USB lighting cable, original from Apple.
I paid 25€ for it.
I find criminal that price. I bit my fingers several times, metaphoric speaking. That price cannot be real. I expect to be maximal 2€ when is produced, the rest is profit and virtual maintained high.

I feel your pain viki2000 as I had an identical reaction when I finally decided to purchase a genuine Apple MAC mouse for my MacBook Air laptop, which I didn't purchase at the time I ordered the MacBook because of what I considered exorbitant pricing. I used a cheap PC mouse for a time, but eventually tired of having a cable hanging from the laptop to the mouse and paid Apple their money.

$150+ (AUD) for a laptop mouse! Compared to $15 for a PC laptop's mouse. Apple's pricing is ridiculous to say the very least and one of the main reasons the Apple OS will never be a mainstream household or business preferred item like Microsoft Windows is today.

If Apple came down to earth with their pricing and admit to themselves that they are not the "Rolex" equivalent of computers and mobile devices, I believe their sales would increase tenfold and more developers might invest in coding for the OS. That rings true for the vast majority of other Apple products too.

For instance, I might enjoy owning an Apple wristwatch, I personally like the design and the way they look. But I blatantly refuse to hand over what amounts to a small 24ct Gold Nugget for the privilege of owning one, so I never will. Nor will tens of thousands of other people.

That’s fine Viki, but know that even if out of warranty, you can make a Genius Bar appointment and they might be able to kick start it for you. Often they don’t charge if they can do a quick try at the bar. Only if they have to repair it.

Andrew, there are dozens of mice, both Bluetooth and wireless with dongle that work just fine with Apple. Personally I’m not  a fan of Apple’s mice, they are too small and too slippery.  I use a Logitech - Marathon Mouse M705 Wireless mouse and it was about $20, and works beautifully with my MacBookPro and an iMac I just find Apple’s prices on accessories to be crazy. Like $100 for the iPad Pro pencil.. I’m mean seriously, 100 bucks for a stick of plastic with a small amount of electronics inside. So yea, I feel both you pains now.

On that cable, as any good engineer, I have accumulated a lot of lightning connector cables. The one that works best for me was a third part extra long, red colored cable. I just think your cable was faulty, as I have had few problems with third party cables.

Glad you got it back running again.

Thank you Owen.
At your suggestion "you can make a Genius Bar appointment and they might be able to kick start it for you. Often they don’t charge if they can do a quick try at the bar." I can only say that there is no Apple office/service in my town I would have to drive 70km to the closest one. Considering that, I prefer to try more to repair it by myself.

You are welcome. Thanks for your feedback.

@Andrew Leniart
Coming back to the price discussion, it just happen that in my business environment I went recently to a seminar given by a big manufacturer in electronics, particular switch mode power supplies, my company being distributor and we discussed a lot of “internal” things, not for the public/customers. One of the things was related with a particular power supply used in building automation in KNX systems. For the manufacturer, this is just a normal power supply with certain limits; nothing special compared with rest of hundreds of other models what they produce. When they decide to produce this type of power supply too, the big boss expected to sell it as usual for that type/wattage, around 15USD small margin for profit, max. 20USD. everyone advise him that is not possible. Such power supply is 100-150€ on the market. He refused to sell to such exorbitant price, but in the end after a lot of effort was convinced that if the other manufacturer/players already established already the price on the market and the customers get used and are more or less happy with it, then is in possible to come with a price 10% lower, because will destroy the market. If he maintain the price, even if it is unreal, everyone else still be happy and get his share of the market. This is story that I heard from the moth of a CEO, important company.
Many of the prices that we see are unreal. They are set on strange financial criteria and have nothing to do with (the price of the materials + labor + energy + certifications for that specific market + acceptable profit and handling & shipping). If the price would be according with the enumerated list/rule, then the USB lighting cable from Apple sold in high volumes should be 2€ for the end user and not 25€.

@Andrew

Pricing is the most important factor in marketing and when the perceived value matches the offered price, sales will happen and the transacted price has no direct correlation with the production cost.

@Owen Rubin

I use a Logitech - Marathon Mouse M705 Wireless mouse and it was about $20, and works beautifully with my MacBookPro and an iMac I just find Apple’s prices on accessories to be crazy. Like $100 for the iPad Pro pencil.. I’m mean seriously, 100 bucks for a stick of plastic with a small amount of electronics inside. So yea, I feel both you pains now.

Where were you when I was seeking alternatives for Apple-supplied mice ya mug?! :) I see examples of ridiculous pricing for genuine Apple products all the time and the iPad Pro pencil you mentioned is most certainly another perfect example. Some of that pricing I feel is justified in the superior quality of Apple hardware, but certainly not to the extent of being 10x or more of an equivalent alternative. I recall when I purchased my iPad2 many years ago, I bought a third party bamboo type pencil which did everything I needed for a tiny fraction of the price of the genuine product.

@Viki2000

We are most certainly of the same opinion about Apple pricing structure. Had I not needed an Apple computer for my own needs (helping out some clients who have purchased the products) then I likely would have never bought one. I find Apple's OS to be as good as Windows myself, just "different" and have no real complaints about the user interface.

Whilst I dislike the fact that they restrict a lot of things in the way of configuration to ones own personal liking, that's a fundamental strength that Microsoft Windows provides so I can live with the restrictions, as there are benefits to them, such as a more stable OS that faults less. In short, I personally believe Apple hardware products are excellent, just way overvalued and over priced.

@Jackie Mann

Pricing is the most important factor in marketing and when the perceived value matches the offered price, sales will happen and the transacted price has no direct correlation with the production cost.

Agreed to a point, though I would personally question Apple's marketing strategies because their sales figures are dwindling. As I mentioned in my previous comment, Apple seems (to me) to be trying to market themselves as the Swiss watch of computer technology. They may or may not be that, but until they make their products more accessible to the general population with regards to price, they will never be a serious contender to Microsoft. That's unfortunate in my view, as I believe the OS and the product itself has a lot going for it.

Regards, Andrew

It's supply and demand.

A segment of the population wants Apple products enough to pay the price.  You're just not one of them.  They make a profit and can charge that premium because of the demand.  It's a special niche that happens to be profitable because there's a good amount of demand.  You can complain all you want, but they didn't price it for you.  They priced it for their market demand, so it sells well enough.

There's a reason Gig Ethernet requires Cat5e or Cat6 instead of Cat5.  Cat5 can't handle the higher frequency signals that need to pass over the wires.  That similar issue exists in Lightning cables.  Don't buy the junk.  At least get the licensed versions.

The junk lightning cable don't have the proper bandwidth for the higher speeds.  There's a reason Apple's lighting cable cost more.  If you want cheaper, about half the price, you can by officially licensed copies and they work.  If you buy the $2 -$3 junk, they'll fail quickly.  I had to throw out a bunch of those that a previous admin bought because they would only last a few months to a few weeks.  I purchased the $7-$13 licensed cables and they work just as well as the Apple cables.  You can't just buy Amazon or eBay junk and expect it to work.  If you were just doing low bandwidth usb 1.1 speeds it won't matter, but lightning speeds require proper specs.

@serialband

A segment of the population wants Apple products enough to pay the price.

True - but a very small segment of the populations shares those feelings. As I mentioned earlier, the only reason I pad an exorbitant price for my top of the range MacBook Air Laptop is that of a need to stay up to date with what my clients are using so I can continue to offer them the support they seek from me. No other reason. Had that not been a consideration, I would not have considered purchasing an Apple computer.

It's a special niche that happens to be profitable because there's a good amount of demand.

My point is that the "good amount of demand" could (in my view) be increased substantially if they made their products a bit more affordable to the average Joe Blow.

They priced it for their market demand, so it sells well enough.

Not according to the available latest sales statistics I've read. If anything, sales have been steadily declining.

Regards, Andrew

Joe Blow is not their market.  They make plenty of money selling to their specific niche.  People buy Rolex, Gucci, etc... for the very same reason.

I also only have a Mac because of Support, but I do know how to use it, just as I know how to use Windows.

The declines are due to saturation and a general decline in phone and PC sales overall.  Samsung and other phone manufacturers are also losing ground, and the entire market is down.  You have to compare it to everything else and realize that it isn't just Apple.  It looks like global PC market share is steadily dropping as well, after reaching a peak number of shipped units around 2012.

I don't expect Apple's market share to deviate too much from their current and historical numbers, even when Apple almost died.  They've always maintained their niche since their inception.  Some of the previous switchers might switch back, but the core people that have bought Apple will continue to buy Apple.  It still sells well enough.  They're just making a profit instead of an obscene profit now.

@serialband

They make plenty of money selling to their specific niche.

Sure, but I'm quite certain their shareholders and the company itself wouldn't be averse to increasing those profit figures. Do you disagree?

People buy Rolex, Gucci, etc... for the very same reason.

Absolutely, but there's a very good reason for that. "Rolex, Gucci etc..." are "niche" brands and don't aspire to compete against cheaper offerings like Timex as an example. Apple, on the other hand, are in a totally different market and (as an example) their OS is hardly comparable to the features and software choice availability with Microsoft Windows. Your analogy is unfair IMO.

Don't get me wrong, I actually "quite like" Apple and have even recommended the OS to some of my clients where I thought the solution was worthy of the investment because of what they needed to do. Graphics manipulation for example. Until recently, Apple OS was a clear leader in that domain. As were iPhones in the realm of Smartphones because of their superior stability. No longer though and most certainly not on the mobile phone side of things.

Their only remaining stronghold is with the iPad in my view, but even that is now starting to lose popularity to Windows and Android-based tablets as well. I'm neither a Windows, Mac or Linux "Fan Boi" and tend to embrace and enjoy all available offerings. I have three different Linux flavours installed in VMs and see strengths and benefits in all of them.

I'd just like to see the MAC become a little more mainstream, but I fear that will never happen due to the direction Apple has taken in marketing themselves. They aspire to be something which in my opinion, they are not, and never will be. The UI is just too similar to what's readily available for a fraction of the price.

I also only have a Mac because of Support, but I do know how to use it, just as I know how to use Windows.

That was my reason for purchasing one as well and I could have gone for a considerably less expensive model. I only purchased the best and strongest available at the time because I wanted to ensure I wouldn't need to upgrade any time soon in order to keep up.

I actually prefer using the MacBook Air for doing certain things and do exactly that. Reading and responding to social media posts for example, while sitting in my favourite armchair, or watching YouTube videos - if not sitting at a desk, I prefer my MAC over my Windows laptops hands down because of its size and superior length of time that it runs before a recharge is needed.

I suspect a lot of people might share those same preferences, but don't get to enjoy the OS because it's just not as affordable as a Windows laptop. Doesn't make sense to me why Apple marketing chooses to over-inflate their prices to the extent that they do. Make it more expensive because of superior hardware quality by all means - that is easily justifiable. But not 3 or 400% more justifiable. That only serves to cut down on sales and reduced profits in my view.

They've always maintained their niche since their inception.  Some of the previous switchers might switch back, but the core people that have bought Apple will continue to buy Apple.  It still sells well enough.  They're just making a profit instead of an obscene profit now.

I'll have to just agree to disagree on that view.

Thanks for your views.

Regards, Andrew

There product is the iPhone and their App Store, where their profit has been for several years.  It took them to their billion dollar status.  iPad and Macs are a side thing to them.

https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/01/02/apple-incs-iphone-market-share-problem.aspx  They grabbed 60% of the mobile phone profits with a smaller global market share than Samsung in 2017.

In the USA, and Great Britain, iPhones are above 30% of the market https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/09/us-iphone-sales-ios-market-share-kantar/  Even in France it's around 20%.

In this recent decade, Apple computers have only ever reached 7.2% of market share of computers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_share_of_personal_computer_vendors

Apple's computers are a niche market only.  If you're seeing a lot of Apple computers, you're just seeing your own confirmation bias.  I work in multiple industries and it's definitely a niche.  Some companies, mostly smaller ones, will have all Macs, but large companies use Windows domain servers and buy Windows PCs to work in that domain.  They far outnumber Macs.

It's the iPhone where Apple makes all their profits, not their Macs.