Easy When You Know How Jane wipes the slate clean on her devices

This issue Jane Hoskyn tries to discipline her misbehaving Android phone with a…

Sometimes I envy my gadgets. If only I, too, could turn back time with a few taps of Ctrl+z, or run a mental reverse-image search on the person I was introduced to 30 seconds ago and whose name I’ve already forgotten.

But the big one, the function I really covet, is factory reset. Factory reset is an all-purpose get-out clause. It wipes the slate (or tablet) clean, undoing all your mistakes like Ctrl+z on steroids, or like Superman flying the wrong way around the world to bring Lois Lane back to life. In real life you can only currently reset electronic devices and not actual time and space, but I’m sure Google is working on that.

Pretty much any device, including your computer, can be reset with a click or two. This restores its software (data) to as-new (‘factory’) state, before you clogged it with apps, preferences, files and other system-gumming gunk. Most phone and tablet problems are caused by something in that gunk, so a reset is a reliable, albeit dramatic, solution. Actually, given that your mobile data is automatically backed up to the cloud these days (your Google account on Android, or Apple if you’re of the ipersuasion), it’s not even that dramatic any more.

So why did I need to do a factory reset? My misbehaving Moto G4 Plus phone left me with no other option. My Moto – officially an Android ‘phone’ but never used as one, and big enough to pass for a small tablet celebrated its first birthday by going into a restart loop. It would spontaneously switch off, beep, then start starting, then stop starting, then do it again. Every bit as infuriating as it sounds.

This re-re-re-reboot happened once or twice a day at first, and I managed to break the cycle each time by removing the SIM and microsd cards. But soon the loop took over and my phone became unusable. I’m not alone, at least - this is a common problem with Moto phones, whose parent company is now Lenovo. The Lenovo Community forum offered a few tips ( www.snipca.com/28288), including clearing the system cache via a secret expert mode (very exciting!), but again these tips only stopped the reboots for a few minutes at a time.

Then there was the Youtube guy whose ‘Moto G4 restart Solution Done’ video boasted a 100 per cent ‘like’ score (65 to 0), but whose steps involved taking the device apart with screwdrivers and fingernails ( www.snipca.com/28289). I for one was not going there, but thanks anyway.

There was only one thing for it. Factory reset. It’s almost disappointingly easy. Open Settings, tap ‘Factory data reset’, tap Reset Phone (see screenshot). Done. Wow. It was like emerging from a sauna four stones lighter. All those months of temporary files, redundant updates, ignored apps, played podcasts - all gone. The stuff I needed was in my online accounts, the stuff I didn’t need was wiped, and (in case you wondered) my Moto worked again. I felt magnificent, even when I was having to re-type all my passwords on touchscreen keys the size of rice grains.

The end? Not quite. This happened three weeks ago. My slimmed-down Moto and I enjoyed a second honeymoon, but old habits die hard and the reboot loop has started happening again. Only a few times, but enough to sink the heart. The loop seems to be triggered by the power button, so I’ve set up gesture controls (swipe, pinch, wiggle and so on) to avoid the need to use it. If I do end up having to buy a new device, I’ll share every thrill and spill of the setup process on this page.

Open Settings, tap ‘Factory data reset’, tap Reset Phone. Done. Wow. It was like emerging from a sauna four stones lighter