My wife is a happy user of a FP3 since spring 2020.
Since a few days (end of january 2021), her microSD is not recognized anymore. Analyzing it with Testdisk on a pc revealed errors on its bootloader. I replaced it with the same model, new. (Sandisk microSDHC Ultra 32GB). But again the problems reappeared.
When the problem appears, SIM is not detected anymore (at least SIM1).
When the phone is cold no problem. But it heats a lot around PMI632 IC (or the area, according to ifixit’s description). Whenever the battery is charging or not.
The battery looks good and is the original one.
Could you please help us?
Thank you!
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Welcome to the community forum. 
Could you please make a screenshot of Settings > Storage and post it here? To make a screenshot, you can either hold VOLUME DOWN and POWER or briefly hold POWER and then select the screenshot button offered.
This would allow us other users here to find out if your wife’s SD is formatted as phone storage or as portable/mobile storage which can affect the functioning or malfunctioning of the FP3 a lot.
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Thank you for your quick answer.
I can’t, right now.
The card actually is formatted (by the phone itself) as an extension of internal storage (-> you can install apps on it, not only data). I know that therefore it can’t be unplugged and be visible on another device. There is also a problem of SIM unrecognized (not at startup, but after some minutes of phone usage). Connectors of both cards slots look as new (she never opens her phone).
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SD cards formatted as internal storage (phone storage) have recently caused various issues with FP3s. I always recommend to format SD cards as portable/external storage instead. However, I only ever formatted my own as external storage right away, so I have no experience with what to pay attention to when switching them from external to internal. I’m mentioning this because just yesterday, the switch seems to have caused problems to one Fairphoner.
EDIT: The aforementioned problem with the switch from internal to external storage has been solved (see same link). After the switch, the former internal SD card needed to be removed in Settings > Storage in order to make the system fully realize and implement the switch.
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Sadly that post is in German and I wonder when that was fixed as I don’t remember an official update mentioning that. Thanks
I described the user’s actions, not a software fix.
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Thanks for the links which I could have found, but sadly it’s not in my nature trust translators if they are not people I know and they are not people. And the issue, I suppose, is not important enough for me to use a robot service and then find a friend who speaks German to confirm.
But I do thank you for prompting me to more open about who I am
Thank you for your answer. I’ll go through the post (and yes, deepl.com is surprisingly efficient).
She still has the problem with her SIM card.
And the overheating near the power chip. She noticed that it continues to be hot after unplugging USB charging… Battery didn’t stand long (even without using demanding applications), but when powering off/on the phone, each time, it stopped heating that much and battery duration remained much better.
I was thinking that µSD and SIM problems may be related…
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Just and idea about narrowing it down. If you can use the phone without the SD card and it doesn’t get hot then it looks like some activity is not being stopped and continuously producing heat. Likewise you can use the phone for a while without the SIM and compare.
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I guess, that @urs_lesse was referring to this posting:
The user switched the SD card from internal to external memory.
But then the card wasn’t accessible anymore.
Here’s my translation of that posting.
The first sentence is about the problem, that the user could only upload one picture per posting and that the forum-software does not allow for more than 3 postings by one user in a row.
I would translate the next sentences as follows.
After formatting as mobile storage one has to click on the SD-card by SanDisk. Then you find a button labeled “remove card”. At this point you have to remove the card additionally. Then it works. Right now everything seems to work finde. I could install Telegram anew and can download pictures there. So far so good. …
Now it depends, if you trust me more than deepl (which in fact I use, when I want to translate other languages like French, Italian etc.). 
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Hello !
I write to Fairphone because I have seen a lot of messages about this problèmes of SD dysfunction on FP2.
Any réponse since 4 days.
Fight against programmed obsolescence ? Doing nothing against a problem affecting FP2 owners is quite outrageous.
Where is ethics: priority to values or to technological race(FP3).
Fairphone will only be credible if FP2 owners are not rejected…
Cheers
Hello and welcome to the forum.
Just a few remarks:
- This thread is about the FP3, therefore a posting on the FP2 is a bit misplaced.
- Fairphone is working on getting Android 9 to the Fairphone 2 and they already have a beta release candidate. I wouldn’t call this doing nothing.
By the end of 2020 the Fairphone Android 9 beta completed all the 477000 tests (no joke, the real number) needed to achieve Google certification. Since then it’s possible to focus on removing bugs and problems in practicality.
The blogpost announcing de development of Android 9 dates from 18 June 2020.
Therefore:
Please don’t feel rejected but supported as much as possible.
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