T-Mobile silently pulls latest Galaxy S9 update (ARC6) over bootloops

Are you wondering why your T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+ is still on the February patch (the one that the device arrived with), despite most news articles/publications saying the April patch arrived last month? If so, we are here to end the confusion and give you a clear picture of what all has been happening all this while in relation to software updates pushed by the magenta carrier for Samsung’s latest flagships.

ARC6 – the last official update

So it all started in the mid of April, when T-Mobile updated their official support pages, both for S9 and S9+, notifying the arrival of new updates dubbed G960USQU2ARC6 and G965USQU2ARC6. Soon after, the roll out was highlighted by mainstream tech-media, including Sammobile as well.

As the updates in question got live in the second week of April, they were presumed to be carrying April patches. But, that wasn’t the case. Rather, it later came to notice that they brought along the March patch, something which even Sammobile acknowledged by publishing an update on their story.

Here’s what they said referring to their original coverage:

the ones listed on the carrier’s website are older updates that included the March 2018 patch

Coming to the ‘older updates’ part in the above statement, Sammobile’s updated story also brought along the news about a fresh update (build no. G965USQS2ARD3), made available by T-Mobile only for Galaxy S9+. But, if you try searching on Google about this build number (ARD3), you’ll still hardly find a handful of references.

To top it up, a quick look at the comments section of Sammobile’s coverage about the update includes a discussion where majority users denied the arrival of any such new update. In the same string of comments, the person who claimed they tipped Sammobile about the update mentioned that they downloaded the ARD3 update through a zipped file.

So this, coupled with the fact that the ARD3/April patch never rolled out over-the-air, makes the update insignificant (even if a few users managed to install it somehow). So it’s logical to conclude that ARC6 was the last update that was officially rolled out. Even T-Mo’s official support pages for these devices also say the same, and if that’s not enough, one of the moderators on Samsung’s US help forum also confirmed this recently.

Hope that cleared the air a bit. Now let’s take up why T-Mobile S9/S9+ users are currently not receiving the ARC6/March update that started rolling out in April?

Buggy ARC6 update

The ARC6/March update reportedly freaked out many Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+ units (operating on the magenta carrier), for it left them stuck in infinite bootloops.

Yes it did, and here’s the proof:

https://www.reddit.com/r/GalaxyS9/comments/8c7kro/my_s9_is_in_a_settings_update_bootloop_and_i_dont/
https://www.reddit.com/r/GalaxyS9/comments/8cfn5q/s9_boot_loop_help/

Similar reports can be seen on Twitter as well (1,2,3,4,).

In fact, the update even fried the device’s motherboard in some cases.

T-Mo’s reaction – pull the update

While initially, T-Mo was reportedly replacing the affected units, what’s now coming to light is that the company has pulled back the ARC6/March update that triggered the entire bootloop/device bricking mess on Galaxy S9/S9+.

Some of the affected S9 users have confirmed the news on different help forums, as that’s what they have heard from T-Mo representatives. Here’s what a user shared on Samsung’s official US help forum lately:

I spoke with Tmobile after talking to different reps the update was pulled. No new information or updates have been sent. Apparently it was crashing some phones.

On XDA, one of the senior members confirmed the same while reverting back to user:

And Reddit also states the same:

As far as the official confirmation is concerned, T-Mobile hasn’t given any word on the matter yet (not even updated their official S9/S9+ update pages), which we hope they do sooner to avoid any more confusion among users. Rest assured, we’ll update as an when we hear anything regarding the matter.

Stay connected with us on Twitter (@PiunikaWeb) to hear about all related developments as and when they occur