Develop Bugs

O2 XDA Orbit - Upgrading/Backup/Flashing

Sorry if the post has already been mentioned in another forum before.
I have an O2 XDA Orbit and i'm looking to put Fracoons Artermis rom on it http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...o♦.
I'm pretty new to flashing phones and PDA's but i'm quite experienced with a PC so shouldnt need to much help!
I was wondering what steps I should ensure to take to make sure that I dont turn it into a brick, I could do with a complete guide! I've also been told that i'll need to run the Artermus USPL program after connecting the phone. But any help and advice would be a great help. Is there anyway to backup the phone in the state it is at present if or if it doesnt go wrong?
Thankyou for the help and sorry again i've this has already been asked by someone else! Will really appreciated it!

There is no assurance that the process will not make your device a brick. But it happens only on a rare case. Many 1000s of users have upgraded without problems however a few has got their devices a brick.
There is no point taking a backup as the new ROM will give you different files. Anyway, to make sure you don't end up with a bricked device:
-Charge your device fully
-Run USPL
-The process should complete successfully!
-Upgrade ROM.
-Never disconnect your Pocket PC or turn of your PC when the upgrade is going on.
-If your stuck anywhere, don't try to do anything stupid but come here and post.
-Your device should be fine
-Even if some devices get bricked during one of the upgrade process, there is still a high chance of bringing your device back to good working condition with the help of a Factory ROM and so don't worry and go ahead.
Regards,
Carty..

that's my biggest concern so far... my XDA II SHOULD be able to run WM5 but i'm very concerned that i could turn it into a brick... the reason for this is: the XDA is the only phone i have at the moment.
If it bricks, then i'm literally screwed... i have the HimaUpgrade File that does not need an ID, and as i'm pretty fluent with English, i see no problem in using an English ROM.
The Wiki is a good place to start... but i still don't know if i REALLY need active sync to be running or not, since i cannot understand what good that would do if the device is in Bootloader Mode anyway.
Reason for this is that sometimes i read "Active Sync should be on" and sometimes i read the complete opposite... it's freaking me out.

Device should be Synchronized always for the best choice. All un-official ROMs will require this. However, factory ROMs can be flashed directly from Bootloader mode.
That is why I said when you think you screwed the process of upgrading, mostly your device will be stuck at bootloader or you can access bootloader screen and only a factory rom can go from here.
PS: I wont guarantee if the above will be true on all conditions.
Regards,
Carty..

I flash all my ROMs in bootloader mode, including my own, so it's not restricted to the official ROMs. But you need a working ROM to get it back alive.
I'd recommend using a laptop for flashing or use a USV. If some guys cut your power your computer would crash right in the middle of the flashing process - won't happen on a laptop with a working battery.

This is what I want to know. How do I flash in bootloader mode?

okay, i did it this way: first of all you need a rom to flash your device with, but i guess that should be clear
To put your device into Bootloader Mode you have to press the On/Off Button, the Directional Pad AND the reset button (mostly at the lower left corner) simultaneously.
Release the Reset Button first after about a second, and then the other two Buttons.
Your Device should say "Serial" on its Screen... by that time you can put your Device in the Cradle or connect it via a USB Datacable to your PC.
Also: connect the Cable/Cradle directly to your PC, not to a hub as that could cause Problems during the Flashing Process.
Now you can start the Flash-Program, wait approximately 30 Minutes (if you are just flashing the ROM and nothing else) and follow the Instructions that came with your ROM WORD FOR WORD as these instructions are working for most people.
I'm not saying that flashing is without Problems though... when i flashed my XDA II with WM2005 yesterday, i was not able to send/receive Textmessages (SMS), so i had to reflash the device again with the last ROM released by O2, which sucks.

[Q] Did I brick my phone?

Hello,
I was trying to flash a new Rom onto my phone (Superfly) and installed the .zip file from clockwork, however, when I try to boot the phone, it sticks at the Mytouch slide screen.
I cant load into the card nor the phone.
Is there any way to reverse this?
Thanks in advance!

Hopefully you made a backup. You should still be able to boot into recovery and restore your backup or even flash a new rom.

sandpaperback said:
Hopefully you made a backup. You should still be able to boot into recovery and restore your backup or even flash a new rom.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The problem the OP and myself are having is that we cant load Clockwork recovery, and I think its cause when we flashed the new rom, it did away with USB debugging mode, and now we cant get back into the OS to select it again. I too am stuck in this loop, and I might just have to bite the bullet and bring it in to tmo and tell em it just stopped working for no reason...

dion20 said:
The problem the OP and myself are having is that we cant load Clockwork recovery, and I think its cause when we flashed the new rom, it did away with USB debugging mode, and now we cant get back into the OS to select it again. I too am stuck in this loop, and I might just have to bite the bullet and bring it in to tmo and tell em it just stopped working for no reason...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The USB debugging option means nothing while booted in to recovery. If you haven't flashed the engineering rom before you will need to redo the loop/ota.zip/update.zip spoof to get back in to clockwork.

I did do a nandroid backup, but the phone magically can not find it now. And It took forever to get to work, but I was finally able to get back into clockwork and tried to install another a different rom (Kanged CM6 ROM) but ended with the same results of sticking on the mytouch slide startup screen. Frustrating, because it probably took about 3 hours to get back into clockwork!
Any other suggestions???

wipe everything on the phone, find the thread that walks you through that

cursexcore said:
I did do a nandroid backup, but the phone magically can not find it now. And It took forever to get to work, but I was finally able to get back into clockwork and tried to install another a different rom (Kanged CM6 ROM) but ended with the same results of sticking on the mytouch slide startup screen. Frustrating, because it probably took about 3 hours to get back into clockwork!
Any other suggestions???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As was noted previously, if you haven't flashed the ESPRIMG rom, you're basically looking at re-rooting your phone every time you want to install a different rom. This means going through the whole process again and again and again.

falken98 said:
The USB debugging option means nothing while booted in to recovery. If you haven't flashed the engineering rom before you will need to redo the loop/ota.zip/update.zip spoof to get back in to clockwork.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thats weird, cause before I could get into clockwork after 2 tries max, not I tried repeatedly for 10 mins and it didnt work, so I should just keep tryin to get into clock work then?

Yes, keep trying. And when you do, please flash the engineering rom and keep the proper update.zip on your card! It will save you a lot of trouble in the long run.

sandpaperback said:
Yes, keep trying. And when you do, please flash the engineering rom and keep the proper update.zip on your card! It will save you a lot of trouble in the long run.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
will do, theres alot of assumptions around here tho, and newbs to android are kinda expected to know things without them being stated in the threads..
Now I know theres something that makes it so I dont have to go thru the pain of rooting to get into clockwork I'm def gna use it..
what method should I use? Ive been doing the following and no luck so far
1 - cd to android sdk tools folder
2 - vol down + power for recovery
3 - highlight recovery
4 - run loop in cmd
5 - plug usb into phone
6 - plug usb into pc, and before it changes to HBOOT from USB i hit power to select recovery
7 - adb devices sees it as an offline device for a few cycles, then it disappears.
after step 7 I've tried running update.zip
unplugging and plugging back in
ctrl+c to stop the script when its offline
unplug when its noticed as an offline device
whats the best way to get into it now?
======
EDIT - finally got it into recovery, i loaded up htc's recover with it plugged it to the pc so it loaded up HBOOT from USB

normally your are not bricked if:
1. you can boot into recovery
2. you can not boot into recovery yet you can boot into bootloader [HOLD (power + volume down) to boot]
Don't worry I got a black/blank screen of death the other day for flashing the wrong boot.img fortunately I was able to boot into bootloader and start from scratch using the ESPRIMG.zip

dion20 said:
will do, theres alot of assumptions around here tho, and newbs to android are kinda expected to know things without them being stated in the threads..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree to an extent, but if you take the time to read through things thoroughly (as in every post in the How To Root or Engineering Build or even Rom Bible thread), you'll be okay. This is my first Android device as well. I put off rooting for a solid couple of weeks while I read through everything I could. I was completely paranoid about bricking my phone. Eventually, I went for it. Even then I had a couple hiccups along the way (including have to re-root two more times), but all the information is here.

So an update:
I went to a Tmobile retail store to see if I could do a direct swap and am having a new phone sent out to me. I will definately take all the replies into consideration when starting the root process on my new one! My final question is, since I am afraid Tmobile will not find my phone valid to be replaced under warranty due to it being rooted, is there any way to unroot and go back to stock? I have googled it, but cannot find anything specific for the slide...
Thanks!

cursexcore said:
[blah blah blah....] My final question is, since I am afraid Tmobile will not find my phone valid to be replaced under warranty due to it being rooted, is there any way to unroot and go back to stock? I have googled it, but cannot find anything specific for the slide...
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My question: did u search here?
http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=660
And found items about the champion build and this little file named ESPRIMG.zip?
U can also check out the ROM BIBLE stickie post.
u can try this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=713507
or you can try this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=713507
now if you really searched you would of found your own question:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=744709&highlight=unroot

cursexcore said:
So an update:
I went to a Tmobile retail store to see if I could do a direct swap and am having a new phone sent out to me. I will definately take all the replies into consideration when starting the root process on my new one! My final question is, since I am afraid Tmobile will not find my phone valid to be replaced under warranty due to it being rooted, is there any way to unroot and go back to stock? I have googled it, but cannot find anything specific for the slide...
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had the same problem you did, and fixed my phone, so its possible. refer to my post on the first page and then refer to this post and use the mirror that Wes himself posted.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=7001053&postcount=7

Is it common to brick your device?

Is bricking your device easy to happen? I'm scared of bricking my phone. Can the phone still brick when you do everything correctly?

Anything is possible.
I took chances on all my phones and never had a problem .
sent from the Dark §¡3€

MarsHD2 said:
Is bricking your device easy to happen? I'm scared of bricking my phone. Can the phone still brick when you do everything correctly?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you do everything correctly, most likely not. A lot of bricks occurs because of user error. Flashing the wrong Galaxy s2 ROM/recovery etc, on our devices... there are a total of 5 variants i think.. only two works with ours.. skyrocket and hercules (i727 and t989)
I haven't heard of any bricks that occurs for doing everything correctly.
I have read up on some rare cases where a phone just blacks out from normal use... from heating up... or just random stuff.. some of the users aren't even rooted. That is purely the fault of the hardware simply giving up.
It is very easy to Root our phone:
ODIN
Flash Recovery
Flash ROM or Superuser
you can even mess up on flashing the recovery but you can actually recover from it. You will get the message where it says "firmware update failed, please connect to kies and recover," this is easily recoverable.. You just go back to ODIN Mode and flash recovery again.
The only way you can BRICK the phone:
1. Flash a ROM that doesn't belong to our device.
2. Mess up on Flashing a Stock ROM (user fault) such as battery falling out.. battery dying.. cable falls out. cable is loose etc.. while in the middle of flashing.
I remember reading that people tried to flash a Modem that didn't belong to our device, but ODIN either prevented this from happening or you get the "firmware update failed..." message.
TL;DR: No it is fairly safe and the only chances of bricking is when flashing something that isn't for our phone.

1. Flash a ROM that doesn't belong to our device.
2. Mess up on Flashing a Stock ROM (user fault) such as battery falling out.. battery dying.. cable falls out. cable is loose etc.. while in the middle of flashing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I still don't see how those two things can mess up the phone? Can't you just use odin to reflash? You would think that they make the download portion of the phone non-writable so you can always use it with odin to reflash in any state. I must be missing something here. Does flashing a ROM mess with the "Download" partition also?

It is normally unwritable to prevent such problems. By using odin, you are bypassing the safety feature of the ROM area. By interrupting the process mid-way, you might not do not copy over all the 'necessary' files for the phone to function at it's lowest levels of operation. IE turn on when you tell it to. Flashing a rom doesn't mess with the user accessible partition.

Is using ClockWorkMod to flash any safer?

Catch-22.
If you want to use the ClockWorkMod app to flash, you will need to grant it superuser permissions. How do you get superuser? You need to be rooted by installing ClockWorkMod.. odin is pretty safe. Make sure to have a half-way charged battery (at least), and click the pda button.

True but how about subsequent flashes

Look bro its hard to brick these samsung but its not impossible trust me i know from experience, my first ever phone i rooted and played with was the galaxy s 4g and lets just say i bricked the **** out of it. think of it like this you flash a rom for a phone that is not yours this phone has a physical keyboard and the only way that phone can get into download mode is a combination of keys on the keyboard (this is just hypothetical) and the only way to get odin to recognize device is to be in DL mode...How can you be in DL with a phone that doesnt have physical keyboard but requires use of it to get into DL mode.

I've never bricked. Been in a bootloop, but just had to wipe and flash again
Sent from my SGH-T989 using xda premium

jdubb1106 said:
Look bro its hard to brick these samsung but its not impossible trust me i know from experience, my first ever phone i rooted and played with was the galaxy s 4g and lets just say i bricked the **** out of it. think of it like this you flash a rom for a phone that is not yours this phone has a physical keyboard and the only way that phone can get into download mode is a combination of keys on the keyboard (this is just hypothetical) and the only way to get odin to recognize device is to be in DL mode...How can you be in DL with a phone that doesnt have physical keyboard but requires use of it to get into DL mode.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Get a jig?
Sent from my SGH-T989 using XDA App

jig didnt work on my sgs4g. And all that example was purely hypothetical, just using as example so op understands what people are trying to say.
Sent from my SGH-T989 using xda premium

jordanishere said:
Get a jig?
Sent from my SGH-T989 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried to flash a kernel and a rom for the i9100 on mine using cwm. Flash went through just fine, went to reboot.... Nuthin. Not even a jig brought it back. Just be sure of what you're flashing and you'll be good. I've been flashing roms since the razr v3, and this is my first brick.
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk

zak rabbit said:
I tried to flash a kernel and a rom for the i9100 on mine using cwm. Flash went through just fine, went to reboot.... Nuthin. Not even a jig brought it back. Just be sure of what you're flashing and you'll be good. I've been flashing roms since the razr v3, and this is my first brick.
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its tough with all the diff varients. doesnt help that they all have the exact same name too.
Props for not being one of the whiners who blames their brick on xda. hope you get a new t989.
Sent from my SGH-T989 using XDA App

Just to throw this in there - if your phone does ANYTHING when you try to turn it on (soft keys light up/some sort of response from the screen), or plug it in, it is a soft brick in which you should be able to recover the phone. Many times it takes multiple tries (due to picky button combos) but it will come back. Coming from the Vibrant 3g, I can tell you from experience that you know when you have a hard brick because the phone does not respond AT ALL. It doesn't do anything when it's plugged in or when buttons are pressed. The ONLY time I've legitimately bricked a sgs was when I flashed a rom on a low battery not knowing that the phone does not charge in recovery. The battery died during reboot and the phone would not respond to anything. This is a true hard brick.

Also i'm not sure if this has been said but I would never flash anything without art least 50% battery life

The galaxy is pretty cool because of how easy it is to unbrick. All you have to do it load the stock kernel from Odin and plug up the USB, mount the sd, and place the ROM onto the sd and unmount then flash it. In the case that you install a bad ROM, if it's just the kernel then just load the stock kernel with Odin then use the one you want.
Sent from my SGH-T989 using xda premium

iwasblown said:
The galaxy is pretty cool because of how easy it is to unbrick. All you have to do it load the stock kernel from Odin and plug up the USB, mount the sd, and place the ROM onto the sd and unmount then flash it. In the case that you install a bad ROM, if it's just the kernel then just load the stock kernel with Odin then use the one you want.
Sent from my SGH-T989 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that was very confusing, but I'm not sure if you really know what a true hard brick is, which is really hard to unbrick and need to do the jtag stuff.
what you addressed is a softbrick (i don't even consider this a brick because the phone turns on), which is flashing an incomplete rom or kernel that is for our device, however if it was another device's than it might lead to a hardbrick.

Teo032 said:
that was very confusing, but I'm not sure if you really know what a true hard brick is, which is really hard to unbrick and need to do the jtag stuff.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A true hard brick cannot be unbricked. With a true hard brick the phone won't turn on and therefore, you cannot use Odin. Jtag also won't work if the phone does not turn on/the hardware buttons don't work.

[Q] things that can brick your phone

can flashing a cwm recovery brick my phone?
how about TITANIUM kernel?
ps: every thing is stock on my one v

Hi
Actually those things cannot "brick" your phone.
In the worst case you can always apply the RUU to get it back to stock.
Only really "stupid" things can do this
e.g. Power Failure during RUU or pulling the USB plug during flashing
Regards
max

alifa said:
can flashing a cwm recovery brick my phone?
how about TITANIUM kernel?
ps: every thing is stock on my one v
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it takes a special kind of person to brick with kernel and or recovery so your fine.

maxwen said:
Hi
Actually those things cannot "brick" your phone.
In the worst case you can always apply the RUU to get it back to stock.
Only really "stupid" things can do this
e.g. Power Failure during RUU or pulling the USB plug during flashing
Regards
max
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is RUU?
I Know it is a really silly question.

alifa said:
What is RUU?
I Know it is a really silly question.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
RUU = Rom Update Utility
which is HTC's way of distributing updates via the pc, also you will find a list of most of the RUU's available for this rom in the development forum (it's a sticky) which will help you revert to stock.
read this thread, might answer some future Questions

I added TITANIUM kernel to my phone, how can i use its features ?

Hi
alifa said:
I added TITANIUM kernel to my phone, how can i use its features ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Install a set cpu frequency app - you will find links to some in the titanium kernel thread
Set what you like - apply on boot - ready
regards
max

Ok so for someone like you who is new to kernels let me put it this way, Titanium kernel enables your phone's processor to perform faster or slower than in your stock, to customize the speed you have to use an external app.
i use this...
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.antutu.CpuMasterFree&hl=en
P.S: Overclocking too much is harmful for your phone so do not set it too high.

Repeatedly press power button when you fail to enter fastboot mode. If you do this, you are most likely to get a blank screen and QHSUSB_DLOAD error when you plug it into pc. if you get this error,your phone is hard brick and the only solution is phone replacement. To avoid this, you can install fast reboot or similar app as soon as your phone get rooted if you want to enter fastboot mode/recovery.
Better late than never, but never late is better.
-Drake

JalmiNyondong1933 said:
Repeatedly press power button when you fail to enter fastboot mode. If you do this, you are most likely to get a blank screen and QHSUSB_DLOAD error when you plug it into pc. if you get this error,your phone is hard brick and the only solution is phone replacement. To avoid this, you can install fast reboot or similar app as soon as your phone get rooted if you want to enter fastboot mode/recovery.
Better late than never, but never late is better.
-Drake
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i use the tool kit, i never go to boot loader Manually.
i didn't understand the last part.

Are you unsure about rooting?

I was too, until yesterday.
Why was I unsure?
Because I was afraid of loosing warranty of such an awsome and expensive phone.
What was the reason that I rooted it anyways?
I wanted to flash the latest stock ROM from Germany to my Austrian phone via Odin and so I had to make a full wipe.
Then I thought that I wouldn't root it if I didn't do it now, because i hate to backup and restore everything.
If you stay at stock ROM and keep the stock recovery, I think you won't loose your warranty if anything happens to the phone.
If you flash a custom kernel, you have to set Triange Away to reset the flash counter on each boot (only if your kernel supports it).
I read a lot about it and decided to root it with CF Auto Root (Step 1 in that post), because it keeps the stock recovery.
AFAIK the kernel of the CWM recovery isn't SDS proove. And Nandroid Backups are not that important for me, because I don't plan to change the ROM often.
I also have read a lot about custom kernels. They unleash the full power of android!
So after reading the latest change log entries and lots of posts in the Perseus Kernel Thread, I decided to flash this kernel using Odin.
After wiping dalvik cache with Andromizer (since I don't have CWM) and wiping battery stats using Battery Calibration Free (since I don't have CWM), I felt like Alice in Wonderland!
MY PHONE WAS FAST AS HELL!
Then I found a new app called STweaks and I couldn't stop to grin.
All I thought was: Why didn't I do this earlier????
So if you are unsure about rooting your phone, I hope this article helped you and you begin rooting your phone now.

muena90 said:
If you stay at stock ROM, keep the stock recovery and set Triange Away to reset the flash counter on each boot I think you won't loose your warranty if anything happens to the phone. (Please correct me if I am wrong)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you are having stock recovery and kernel, no need to set reset countr at every boot, you need it just once then you can uninstall Triangle away.
You need to reset counter on every boot only if you have custom recovery/Kernel.
Again you need to have support in your custom kernel to use this option(reset counter at every boot)

dr.ketan said:
If you are having stock recovery and kernel, no need to set reset countr at every boot, you need it just once then you can uninstall Triangle away.
You need to reset counter on every boot only if you have custom recovery/Kernel.
Again you need to have support in your custom kernel to use this option(reset counter at every boot)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, I just updated my post.

As a techie who knows he's unlikely to end up bricking it (and accepts that if I do it's probably my fault for doing something stupid) I'll not be intimidated by Samsung not to root, just like I wasn't intimidated by HTC, and I'm sure it's probably not me (but rather, non-techies) who they're trying to intimidate.
Besides, from what I was reading you just have to put it back to stock to get your warranty back. But even if a fault developed that bricked it (and not of my own doing, but I'd never overclock or anything anyway and am unlikely to do anything stupid), as I'm in the UK and we have a lot of consumer rights, I'd just keep parroting the Sale of Goods Act at them and possibly threatening a small claims court until they got the message
It's like rooting any other Android phone: naturally they won't help you with it, and I can see where they're coming from in that they won't do warranty returns if a non-technical person tries it and screws it up and then claims that it's faulty. That's what they mean - not genuine hardware faults, but being asked to cover a bad flash. So basically: only do it if you're confident, and it's at your own risk if you don't have a clue what you're doing. But it's quite difficult (if not impossible?) to permanently brick to the point where you can't even get to ODIN download mode, it's just that a lot of people think "won't boot into a working OS" means "bricked" and throw the towel in. (Personally I think it's difficult to even "brick" the OS as long as you take your time and read the instructions properly). That's where you can get unstuck as there's nothing actually wrong with the phone's hardware you just don't know what you're doing and that's where they're within their rights to say "no" to helping you out with a free unbricking or replacement. Even within consumer laws.
There's less reason to be put off than with a HTC phone, as the bootloader isn't locked so you don't have to go through the tedium of a full wipe and having to download all your apps again.
I do find that people who develop tools and tutorials tend to overcomplicate it with paragraphs of instructions and complex UIs full of a billion functions and tabs. Here's how I do it in Arch Linux:
Install Heimdall.https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/heimdall/
Get CWM Recovery: http://www.clockworkmod.com/rommanager
Download the touch version for Samsung Galaxy Note 2 (HSPA+)
Get CWM-SuperSU: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1538053
Copy it to the SD storage.
To copy to SD storage if MTP isn't working in Arch:
Code:
sudo pacman -S libmtp
mtp-detect
mtp-connect
mtp-sendfile UPDATE-SuperSU-vx.xx.zip UPDATE-SuperSU-vx.xx.zip
Plug phone into PC
Turn it off
Hold down Volume DOWN, home and power until download mode screen appears. Press volume up to accept flash mode warning.
sudo heimdall flash --no-reboot --recovery recovery-clockwork-touch-x.x.x.x-n7100.bin
This should work, if not try a different USB port, try re-entering download mode etc.
While still at the download mode screen (if you reboot completely it'll re-flash recovery to stock) hold Volume UP, home and power until the Samsung logo repeats itself then let go, eventually CWM Recovery will appear.
Install zip from SD card
Select the CWM SuperSU zip
Reboot
That's it!
Nothing more complicated than that. In Windows you just basically use ODIN to do the same thing, but this is one of those occasions where things are actually easier to do in Linux than Windows.
Edit: Obviously you follow the above at your own risk and should learn how everything works - I'm just sharing my own notes to show how easy it can be.

Cloudane said:
As a techie who knows he's unlikely to end up bricking it (and accepts that if I do it's probably my fault for doing something stupid) I'll not be intimidated by Samsung not to root, just like I wasn't intimidated by HTC, and I'm sure it's probably not me (but rather, non-techies) who they're trying to intimidate.
Besides, from what I was reading you just have to put it back to stock to get your warranty back. But even if a fault developed that bricked it (and not of my own doing, but I'd never overclock or anything anyway and am unlikely to do anything stupid), as I'm in the UK and we have a lot of consumer rights, I'd just keep parroting the Sale of Goods Act at them and possibly threatening a small claims court until they got the message
It's like rooting any other Android phone: naturally they won't help you with it, and I can see where they're coming from in that they won't do warranty returns if a non-technical person tries it and screws it up and then claims that it's faulty. That's what they mean - not genuine hardware faults, but being asked to cover a bad flash. So basically: only do it if you're confident, and it's at your own risk if you don't have a clue what you're doing. But it's quite difficult (if not impossible?) to permanently brick to the point where you can't even get to ODIN download mode, it's just that a lot of people think "won't boot into a working OS" means "bricked" and throw the towel in. (Personally I think it's difficult to even "brick" the OS as long as you take your time and read the instructions properly). That's where you can get unstuck as there's nothing actually wrong with the phone's hardware you just don't know what you're doing and that's where they're within their rights to say "no" to helping you out with a free unbricking or replacement. Even within consumer laws.
There's less reason to be put off than with a HTC phone, as the bootloader isn't locked so you don't have to go through the tedium of a full wipe and having to download all your apps again.
I do find that people who develop tools and tutorials tend to overcomplicate it with paragraphs of instructions and complex UIs full of a billion functions and tabs. Here's how I do it in Arch Linux:
Install Heimdall.https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/heimdall/
Get CWM Recovery: http://www.clockworkmod.com/rommanager
Download the touch version for Samsung Galaxy Note 2 (HSPA+)
Get CWM-SuperSU: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1538053
Copy it to the SD storage.
To copy to SD storage if MTP isn't working in Arch:
Code:
sudo pacman -S libmtp
mtp-detect
mtp-connect
mtp-sendfile UPDATE-SuperSU-vx.xx.zip UPDATE-SuperSU-vx.xx.zip
Plug phone into PC
Turn it off
Hold down Volume DOWN, home and power until download mode screen appears. Press volume up to accept flash mode warning.
sudo heimdall flash --no-reboot --recovery recovery-clockwork-touch-x.x.x.x-n7100.bin
This should work, if not try a different USB port, try re-entering download mode etc.
While still at the download mode screen (if you reboot completely it'll re-flash recovery to stock) hold Volume UP, home and power until the Samsung logo repeats itself then let go, eventually CWM Recovery will appear.
Install zip from SD card
Select the CWM SuperSU zip
Reboot
That's it!
Nothing more complicated than that. In Windows you just basically use ODIN to do the same thing, but this is one of those occasions where things are actually easier to do in Linux than Windows.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fully confirm!
It's more likely that your phone dies because it decides to take a round in the washing machine (like my last one) than you brick it.
I first thought about providing a fool-proove step by step manual how to root your Note 2 and flash a custom kernel.
But then I thought that if anyone wants to root his phone, he should read into it himself, so he knows what he's doing.

Rooting is easy when you understand ehat you are doing. When my brother bought his Kindle Fire I discover the wonderful world of Android so I came up with an idea, root my brother's Kindle, my brother let me do it because as we live in South America the Kindle not longer have guarantee, so I plug the tablet to my PC and began the process. I was so nervous that I committed a lot of mistakes that result in the Kindle bricking twice. At the third try I made it and we began installing ROMs and Kernels, the I bought the little Galaxy Y. That phone was the most modified think I ever see. I installed like 20 custom ROMs, Kernels Scripts and anything I found in XDA. Then my father see my affection to Android and borrow me the Galaxy Note II so in a big step I remember how great was rooting benefits and thats why I rooted the phone, now my other brother is buying a Nexus 4 and we just can't stop talking about root benefits.
Thats a long story
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