I found my old Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 (T210r) while cleaning out my electronics drawer. It has been at least 3 years since I have last used it. It was fully charged when I put it away. To my surprise it was almost fully charged.
I got this thing when TD Bank had a promotion that if you opened a specific account with them you would get one free in 2013 or 2014. I loved this thing for many years but smart phones got bigger and more powerful so I had stopped using it since it was sluggish and out of date.
I started it up and made sure it was charged to 100%. For some reason it was not taking my password. It has been the same simple password for over 10 years. I still had the password written down for it. I did some reading and it was mentioned that since it wasn't used for years now it can have an issue with password or 3rd party apps? I restarted it into safe mode it still didn't want to take my password.
I'm at my last password attempt before warning me it will do a factory reset on it. I wish I could login using another method like my Samsung or google account but I think it is too old for this option.
I don't have important documents or info on this thing as it was mostly for games. One thing I wanted to make sure is that I do not have pictures of a couple pets that have passed since covid.
Thanks for sharing it’s amazing your Galaxy Tab 3 still powers on after all these years! Unfortunately, due to its age, features like unlocking via Samsung or Google account aren’t supported. Please try connecting it to a PC via USB.
Power on the tablet and connect it to a PC using a USB cable.
If the tablet powers on and stays unlocked even to the lock screen, some file managers might still allow partial access to internal storage, especially for DCIM folders.
If you see any prompt on the tablet (like “Allow access”), be sure to tap “Allow” though this may not appear until the device is unlocked.
If you're unable to retrieve anything, please consider reaching out to a Samsung Authorized Service Center they might be able to extract files.
