Develop Bugs

HELP! I rooted my phone and not touchwiz is gone

Hello,
Last night I rooted my device using this (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1265429) method and file from zedomax and everything worked great except when I booted my device there was a yellow triangle with a black “!” in it. I figured that just indicated the device was rooted or running a 3rd party kernel so I didn’t worry about it.
Today I launched my camera app and it failed to load the interface but showed the image from the camera momentary then crashed back to the home screen. I restarted my device and when the device restarted it was very slow and unresponsive and after unlocking it my live wallpaper was gone replaced with the last background I used before selecting a live background a couple weeks back. No icons or widgets loaded and I am unable to open the settings tray. The only things I am able to do with the phone is pull down the notification bar, respond to text messages, adjust the volume and hold power to restart the phone. All of which are very slow and delayed.
When I connect the device to my computer windows is no longer able to load the drivers and Kies is unable to connect with the device. I am not sure what caused this or how to resolve this issue so any advice or known fixes would be fantastic! I am unable to get to clockwork mod to restore my backup and I am unable to get to Kies or the phone settings to do a factory reset so I really don’t know what to do they were supposed to be a last resort and now I don’t even think I can do them. I am an experienced techie but I am new to android and this is the first device I have rooted so any advice would be great no matter how basic it may be.
UPDATE: I just connected the phone via USB to my laptop at work and it was able to discover and install everything it needed to connect with the phone. I am installing Kies now so at least there is hope of a factory restore, although I really hope it doesn't come to that!

Boot into download mode and flash the stock eg30 tar file from crawrj.
Sent From My Evo Killer!!!

Thanks Already started doing that waiting for it to download now

Still no touchwiz... great!

Try flashing a stock rom via clockworkmod.

efarley said:
Still no touchwiz... great!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can root again and restore your backup, or go to this website www.lostandtired.com (midnight roms blog) click on android development and download and flash the sprint bloat and TW restore zip. Hope that helps.

I flashed the stock rom which didn't change anything so then I used clockworkMod to do a factory reset which ended up trapping me into a boot loop. I could use Odin to flash new roms but the device would never go past the 4G logo
I ended up taking the device back to Best Buy and since the loading screen showed the stock rom and they couldn't get past the 4G logo I just had to say it wasn't rooted and they gave me a new one.
I would love to know if anyone has any idea of what went wrong here so that I can feel comfortable rooting again. Also if anyone has some basic articles handy that teach basics of rooting that would be great, I didn't even know about clockwork mod until after I had this problem so knowing things like that earlier would have helped a lot I think. I'll be spending the weekend looking up everything I can find on the subject so any reading you guys can suggest would be fantastic.

efarley said:
I flashed the stock rom which didn't change anything so then I used clockworkMod to do a factory reset which ended up trapping me into a boot loop. I could use Odin to flash new roms but the device would never go past the 4G logo
I ended up taking the device back to Best Buy and since the loading screen showed the stock rom and they couldn't get past the 4G logo I just had to say it wasn't rooted and they gave me a new one.
I would love to know if anyone has any idea of what went wrong here so that I can feel comfortable rooting again. Also if anyone has some basic articles handy that teach basics of rooting that would be great, I didn't even know about clockwork mod until after I had this problem so knowing things like that earlier would have helped a lot I think. I'll be spending the weekend looking up everything I can find on the subject so any reading you guys can suggest would be fantastic.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you a clockwork and "stock rom" you were still rooted...Doing a factory reset will send you into bootloop when rooted. Trying to flash other roms on a bootloop is not going to work. You need to have grabbed a backup such as Zedo has on his post and put the backup in clockwork folder on your phone. Then flash that in CWM. Would of brought you out of bootloop to a stock rom with his kernal. Now you can flash Roms and kernals or could of flashed crawf or anyone else FULL stock rom and been back to stock kernel and rom and not rooted.

dallastx said:
If you a clockwork and "stock rom" you were still rooted...Doing a factory reset will send you into bootloop when rooted. Trying to flash other roms on a bootloop is not going to work. You need to have grabbed a backup such as Zedo has on his post and put the backup in clockwork folder on your phone. Then flash that in CWM. Would of brought you out of bootloop to a stock rom with his kernal. Now you can flash Roms and kernals or could of flashed crawf or anyone else FULL stock rom and been back to stock kernel and rom and not rooted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ohhhh that's what happened! Awesome thanks. I will be much better prepared with backups out the wazoo this time haha.
Now if only I could figure out why Touchwiz died in the first place hmmm....

I hope you can figure it out, just postin here to say that when I saw this thread, it reminded me of the thread over in the EVO forums about the guy who claimed that sprint removed his Sense from his phone.

Khilbron said:
I hope you can figure it out, just postin here to say that when I saw this thread, it reminded me of the thread over in the EVO forums about the guy who claimed that sprint removed his Sense from his phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
haha SPRINT removed it?! So that person thinks sprint monitors every device and has a team of techies on staff to hack your phone and brick it if you break their rules?... yeah that totally makes more sense than a file got corrupted when you were messing with the kernel.. some people maybe shouldn't be rooting their devices in the first place haha

Bad Flash Stories

Hi everybody!
I figure we should have a thread dedicated to telling horror stories about flashes gone wrong. Whether it's because of power failures, bad USB cables, poorly labeled packages, or pure user error, we've all had that moment of worry: "Did I just turn my device into a paperweight?"
It's my hope that, by sharing these stories, we can help each other realize that we're all human, we all make mistakes, and most mistakes can be recovered from. Don't be afraid to share your stories; we can't learn from each other's mistakes if nobody talks about them!
_____________________________________________
My first story is from my Telus SGS3 (I747M, you'll see why that matters in a moment) and is definitely a user-error kind of story.
I've been playing around with CM10 and its derivatives for the past month or two (got my SGS3 on release day and it wasn't running Samsung software 3 hours later) and I'm not new to Android, having run XDAndroid on my HTC Diamond, and bouncing between CM7 and CM9 on my Milestone. The first thing I did when I got my SGS3 was a full block device backup using DD from the command line, which is the only reason I don't have a paperweight today.
I decided to try out Paranoid Android over a week ago and I've been loving it, so I haven't been flashing much lately. But, when I got back from vacation and saw that CM10 had gone into nightly builds, I couldn't resist the temptation to try a clean install. I've got folders on my SD card for ROMs, GApps, kernels, recoveries, and anything else flashable just to make my life easier. Apparently at some point I downloaded an AT&T (I747, no M) modem, stuck it in a "/modems/" folder with the rest of my flashables, but realized that it wouldn't work on my device, so I never used it. I then promptly forgot that I had put it on the SD card, and it had a fairly cryptic filename. Away I went, flashing CM10, GApps, a nice bootscreen, and... the modem.
Dammit. :crying:
At this point, I was running the newest CM10 build, but with a borked modem. I thought I had fallen victim to the IMEI bug that's been going around, but then I remembered something about that modem file not being usable on a Telus device... And had no idea how to get back to a working state. I already knew that none of my nandroid backups would have the modem in them, and the only "stock" flashables I could find were rooted kernels and a nearly-700MB "stock" package that wouldn't download any faster than 10 kb/s. I couldn't wait 20 hours for a download, I wanted my phone now! I tried using Odin with a few of the TAR packages I found, but that only made my situation worse to the point of failing to boot entirely, even restoring a nandroid wasn't helping anymore.
I started digging through the forums in the hope that someone had ripped the Telus modem into a CWM flashable zip, but had no luck. I tried both the Rogers and Bell modems with the same results. That's when I remembered that I had done a block backup, but I had no idea which block device was the modem, and my phone wouldn't even boot up to let me MTP the files over. I was left with CWM recovery as my only option, and had to ADB push 2.5 GB of .img files to the SD card, and DD them one at a time through the ADB shell.
Somehow, it all worked out, and I was back to running Stock Touchwiz with root, and was then able to restore a nandroid from yesterday and amazingly enough Paranoid Android booted up, happy as ever, and in came my emails and text messages. I know I'm lucky that my IMEI didn't get lost in that mess, but it just goes to show that there's no such thing as a backup being "too extensive". You never know when "mmcblk0p99" needs to be replaced with a known working copy.

I do believe im going to flash a stock/rooted ROM and then do a dd backup.
What options do you set for your backups?
Sent from my SGH-I747M using xda premium

I did as follows:
Code:
cd /dev/block/
ls
(get the list of mmcblk devices from here)
dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1 of=/sdcard/dd/blk0p1 bs=4096
...
dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p99 of=/sdcard/dd/blk0p99 bs=4096
Obviously you shouldn't have 99 partitions... but you get the idea. I ran each line manually.
Then just move the /dd/ folder off your /sdcard/ and onto some safe storage.

I bought my device off someone from Craigslist 2 nights ago. Went home with device working great. Decided to update from ICS to JB, downloaded everything on the ol gaming machine, go to update using Kies, then BAM! Hung update, bricks phone immediately. Woo....great experience after dropping $400 on phone lol. Contacted Samsung support who told me my update wouldn't work until I registered? I told him it bricked my phone and it wasn't being picked up by computer anymore and I wanted to go back to ICS, he apparently thought waiting 24 hours would fix driver issues. Found JB official rom and learned about Odin. Worked at it until 2-ish am, never worked, woke up, did ICS instead same method, worked immediately, then update worked.
Moral of story? Don't trust Samsung apparently, go with 3rd party everything....

Can we share from other devices? Because I've had a serious one with my nitro HD lol.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda premium

After having my phone on stock rooted touch wiz since day one I was tempted to go jellybean... So months later I'd say Octoberish I finally said f**k it I'm going aokp... So I ran the task and k toonsen romantic for a while until they started porting the t mobile jelly bean stock tw rom... It made me miss tw and it's awesome camera app... So I flashed it after a week or so upon its release... First thing I noticed was the phone would get txts and phone calls rarely (keep in mind I'm in an lte area) and it became un bare able after about an hour. So I reverted back to my aokp nandroid and just figured I'd call it a day... But when I restored my nandroid my service was still messed up.. So after a bit of gooogling I checked my phone status to find my imei to be 0!!! I was beyond upset... So I tried re flashing stock in Odin and everything else I could find (unfortunately the imei restorer wasn't existent yet) and it came to the point where I left it stock and went to the att repair center down the road... The guy didn't know what was wrong with it and I just played dumb... After about 30 mins he came to the conclusion that my sim card slot was broken and I got a new phone...
After getting this one back home I instantly rooted it again
I've been staying away from those ported tmobile roms ever since
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747

[/COLOR]
rani9990 said:
Can we share from other devices? Because I've had a serious one with my nitro HD lol.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I dont see why not. All stories are interesting lol
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium

No bad flashes .... Yet?
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app

Alright then,
It was my first day with the LG Nitro HD. My first smartphone (don't comment xD) and I was prepared to root and flash the living crap out of it. Done with rooting, now to install CWM. Simple enough, right? WRONG. This was the one time where google was not my friend. I followed a horribly misleading guide, and ended up with a paperweight. Turns out I flashed the recovery image to the secondary bootloader partition, thereby bricking my phone completely and utterly, irreparably. Had to ship it off to LG, and they fixed it, no questions asked. Thank God for that...

I had an HTC Touch Pro on Sprint. You had to flash a stock ROM before flashing a new custom ROM or the phone would stop working properly after almost exactly an hour. The file system would become completely messed up but the OS would keep running from RAM. It would fail to reboot after that. It was such a pain that I updated my phone every ~3-4 months.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app

This one actually just happened this weekend.
So I finally got bored of having stock ICS on my i747 (Rogers), and since I loved cm 7/9 on my SGS2, I figured I'd go with the latest (15 dec) CM10 nightly.
downloaded to phone, rebooted in recovery, wiped data and cache, and installed the new firmware.
booted up and I've got no (or inconsistant) cell service. Figure it's a bug that hasn't been fixed, so no biggie, I backed up a week ago, so I decided to revert back to stock for the time being.
go through the process, and discover I still only have EDGE data.... WTF?
So I do some reading *AFTER the fact, hur dur...* and discover the IMEI wipe issue, and surprise surprise, I didn't do an NV backup, since I didn't know it'd get wiped.
Spent a couple hours keeping the phone / computer away from the 13 month old while I replace the IMEI NV data.... Still stuck on EDGE.... at least my IMEI is showing up though.
Nick

Odin back to stock worked for me when that happened to me.... YMMV.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda premium

The night I got my phone, I rooted via odin and when it booted, I'd get a framework FC every 90 seconds or so. It took me almost two hours to get cwm recovery on my phone to flash AOKP. Not a brick, but since I hadn't even activated it, yet....not happy.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app

Each Phone an Adventure
I can completely relate to all of you. Though I'm new as a member (thought I already had an account but apparently I didn't), I've been using the forum for a long time. I have rooted four phones to date, each with its' own disaster story and happy ending. My latest was the AT&T S3. While not a disaster entirely, the no flash counter guide ended up not working out for me. So I paved my own trail so to speak and I found all the root dependencies (Recovery, ROM, the works) by myself. The entire process took me about a day. I also used TriangleAway which threatened explosions if anything went wrong and thankfully nothing did. I'm glad I never had to send a phone back, I've always been very cautious about any type of flashing and always read the forum before doing it.

When I was on the captivate, I really wanted JB so I thought I could grab the Nexus S JB ROM cause the devices were so close to each other. Flashed it via Odin. Good God was that a mistake. I couldn't get back to download mode using the button combo since the button mapping was all switched up. I had this one cable that would give me bad connection, so I jiggled that around in the port for 35 minutes trying to get download mode. Finally, I got it and flashed the stock package. Learned my lesson, will never flash something from a different phone or anything that won't work 100%.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2

goobs408 said:
When I was on the captivate, I really wanted JB so I thought I could grab the Nexus S JB ROM cause the devices were so close to each other. Flashed it via Odin. Good God was that a mistake. I couldn't get back to download mode using the button combo since the button mapping was all switched up. I had this one cable that would give me bad connection, so I jiggled that around in the port for 35 minutes trying to get download mode. Finally, I got it and flashed the stock package. Learned my lesson, will never flash something from a different phone or anything that won't work 100%.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The thing about the Captivate was, no matter what ROM you flashed, the jig ALWAYS worked. It saved my ass quite a few times, until that is, the memory in the phone decided to die. I could flash through Odin as much as I wanted and it would pass everytime, but never go past the boot animation.

Dave the Knave said:
The thing about the Captivate was, no matter what ROM you flashed, the jig ALWAYS worked. It saved my ass quite a few times, until that is, the memory in the phone decided to die. I could flash through Odin as much as I wanted and it would pass everytime, but never go past the boot animation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flash stock GB with forgot name of kernel baked in. After that in cwm recovery partition external SD card.. then reflash in Odin then install whatever ROM u want
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda premium

Trying to use Kies to flash anything. That's always a bad story for me
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2

Don't attempt to explain to a friend of little flashing knowledge how to root their phone. He hard bricked my phone. Odin is easy if you read but he turned it into rocket science and yeah.. Had to wait for another phone
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app

Well let me begin by saying I have a Galaxy Nexus and have been flashing roms, etc like it's going outta style. It's very simple to me and I am no newb. So with this logic in mind, I got a brand new GS3 the other day and proceeded to do the same. First, it took my a while to realize there are so many variants of our phone, then when I did a search I saw that there was a i9305 that is LTE....you already know where this is going. I figured that was the correct variant, spent like an hour trying to install a recovery because of the auto wipe feature and thus increasing the flash counter to 10+ (wtf!). Finally I download a rom, flash it. Freezes half way through (knew that wasn't good) and when I pull the battery, BAM, bricked phone.
After some more reading, not only did I find out the correct way of flashing to not increase the counter but also that the Canadian versions are the i747! Luckily it happened a day after I got it and I switched it out for a new one. Moral of the story: If you are flash happy and think all phones are like the Nexus, that's your biggest mistake! lol

[Q]Guides For Installing Roms?

Coming from an EVO 4G I thought I had a pretty good grip on installing roms. A week after getting and rooting my S3 I'm still gun shy. I want to install Jelly Bomb but I keep seeing posts about flash counters and dirty flash. I've never heard this mentioned before. Are these Samsung exclusive terms? I wanted to go easy and find a Rom as close to Stock as possible with the ability to remove apps to get my feet wet but haven't found one. This phone seems easier to brick than the EVO. Am I right? Also, I see things referencing Touchwiz and fishing it. Very confused. Samsung's version of Sense I guess?

ruckstande said:
Coming from an EVO 4G I thought I had a pretty good grip on installing roms. A week after getting and rooting my S3 I'm still gun shy. I want to install Jelly Bomb but I keep seeing posts about flash counters and dirty flash. I've never heard this mentioned before. Are these Samsung exclusive terms? I wanted to go easy and find a Rom as close to Stock as possible with the ability to remove apps to get my feet wet but haven't found one. This phone seems easier to brick than the EVO. Am I right? Also, I see things referencing Touchwiz and fishing it. Very confused. Samsung's version of Sense I guess?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flash counters can be reset pretty easy these days. all roms labeled as having TW or touchwiz are pretty much stock with things like battery saving mods or battery hogging apps removed that are usually not needed"debloated".
this post sent from my Jellybombed GalaxySIII

joeyhdownsouth said:
Flash counters can be reset pretty easy these days. all roms labeled as having TW or touchwiz are pretty much stock with things like battery saving mods or battery hogging apps removed that are usually not needed"debloated".
this post sent from my Jellybombed GalaxySIII
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I see you are on Jelly Bomb right now. What's your overall opinion of it? Any problems? Anything I should know not mentioned in the Dev's post?

ruckstande said:
Thanks. I see you are on Jelly Bomb right now. What's your overall opinion of it? Any problems? Anything I should know not mentioned in the Dev's post?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here's what you do...former evo'er here as well...
Grab the one click Odin LJ7 that you will find in sg3/android dev. Titled (root)odin one clicks by billard. Read the post so you understand how to use it. Save it to your CPU. That will save you if you ever brick your shiny new phone.
Go on you tube and search qbking77....you'll find every video you want regarding rooting and installing cmw
After that its the exact same way to flash ROMs as your evo. I promise.
Good luck

jwitt418 said:
Here's what you do...former evo'er here as well...
Grab the one click Odin LJ7 that you will find in sg3/android dev. Titled (root)odin one clicks by billard. Read the post so you understand how to use it. Save it to your CPU. That will save you if you ever brick your shiny new phone.
Go on you tube and search qbking77....you'll find every video you want regarding rooting and installing cmw
After that its the exact same way to flash ROMs as your evo. I promise.
Good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I should be flashing through Odin the same way I rooted? I, did root btw using qbking77 very easy video guide. Took me all of ten minutes to root.

ruckstande said:
Thanks. I see you are on Jelly Bomb right now. What's your overall opinion of it? Any problems? Anything I should know not mentioned in the Dev's post?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I luv this rom, super themed though, not everyone likes all the blue. For me everything works. Just the statusbar after a reboot, you have to pull down notification bar once to get it to show up. Other than that no problems, kernal in 10.2 allows overclocking also.
this post sent from my Jellybombed GalaxySIII

Your fine then...just install cmw and your good to go.
The galaxy 3 is different than the evo in the sense that its very easy to root and unroot using Odin. The evo is a pain to unroot.
Make sure your grab that one click Odin and save tho because it will bail you out of trouble if something gets screwed up. You could run that and it will return you to stock or stock rooted (your choice depending on what file you download).
Anyways. Install cmw. Download ROM to your SD or internal SD. Hold volume up, home, power to cmw. Wipe/factory reset x3, wipe cache, advanced/wipe dalvik, install ROM, reboot
By the way. If you want what you posted in op keep stock but rooted. If you want a better kernel flash team sonics or jelly bomb with kt747....but if I were you I'd go SlimBean...enjoy

One other thing. What's this business about downloading a modem?

The roms are not modem dependant. And chances are if you're on stock you already have the latest modem. If you want to confirm go in the about section of settings and look at your baseband. should end in LJ7. Like I said though its not really important

If the modem isn't that important, why can't I connect to Sprint's network at all? I was working on installing the Goodness ROM which said I had to install a particular modem. I downloaded all files to the computer as suggested, transferred them to the phone then used TWRP as my backup and installed the ROM and the modem as stated. When I went to reboot it told me that there was no ROM installed. So I went back to my recovery installed it and now I can not connect to the network at all. Can someone please help? I need my phone as I am a Paramedic and I talk to the hospitals with it when I am bringing them a pt.

PolynesianMedic said:
If the modem isn't that important, why can't I connect to Sprint's network at all? I was working on installing the Goodness ROM which said I had to install a particular modem. I downloaded all files to the computer as suggested, transferred them to the phone then used TWRP as my backup and installed the ROM and the modem as stated. When I went to reboot it told me that there was no ROM installed. So I went back to my recovery installed it and now I can not connect to the network at all. Can someone please help? I need my phone as I am a Paramedic and I talk to the hospitals with it when I am bringing them a pt.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not trying to sound harsh here but if that's the case just stay stock rooted. You need the phone brother...peoples lives are depending on it...lol
On a lighter side, I do t have experience with that ROM. But sounds like a bad flash. Wipe/factory reset...cache....dalvik...and I even format the internal SD...haven't had any problems

Open the dialer and hit ##72786# Should set ya straight

Oh well that didn't work. I watched the QBKing77 video and followed those instructions. Install took way less than I expected. Maybe two minutes? I pressed reboot and it rebooted back into recovery. That didn't go so well.

[Q] Is the dead Android normal when booting stock recovery?

I bought two new SG3's yesterday for my sons, and immediately commenced to root one of them via the "Easy Root" method in a how-to here (ODIN recovery, flash root.zip, rooted). I encountered all kinds of issues where no recovery (CWM, TWRP, or even a stock recovery image) would mount anything. I finally read here on XDA where the stock root that comes with the Toolkit works, so I tried that and now I'm back to stock recovery but, of course, an non-rooted phone. I didn't try to do any of this on the second phone after encountering so many issues. I assumed that something may have changed with this latest update and that this root method may not work anymore.
Anyway....
When I boot the phone that I attempted to root to stock recovery, the little Android is dead on his back with an exclamation point in a triangle. Everything seems to work though -- I can wipe cache, browse around the SD card and cache, etc. I assumed it was because of my dinking around with root and that the phone was now cranky because the flash count was at like 5 or 6 by now. However, I then booted the phone that I didn't dink around with to stock recovery and noticed that the Android was dead for it, too! I've done nothing to this second phone that a 75-year-old first-time smartphone user wouldn't do.
So my question: Is this normal? Is this something that happens when you force it into stock recovery or is there something wrong with these two phones, above and beyond the apparent inability to be rooted (at least at the moment)?

internetpilot said:
I bought two new SG3's yesterday for my sons, and immediately commenced to root one of them via the "Easy Root" method in a how-to here (ODIN recovery, flash root.zip, rooted). I encountered all kinds of issues where no recovery (CWM, TWRP, or even a stock recovery image) would mount anything. I finally read here on XDA where the stock root that comes with the Toolkit works, so I tried that and now I'm back to stock recovery but, of course, an non-rooted phone. I didn't try to do any of this on the second phone after encountering so many issues. I assumed that something may have changed with this latest update and that this root method may not work anymore.
Anyway....
When I boot the phone that I attempted to root to stock recovery, the little Android is dead on his back with an exclamation point in a triangle. Everything seems to work though -- I can wipe cache, browse around the SD card and cache, etc. I assumed it was because of my dinking around with root and that the phone was now cranky because the flash count was at like 5 or 6 by now. However, I then booted the phone that I didn't dink around with to stock recovery and noticed that the Android was dead for it, too! I've done nothing to this second phone that a 75-year-old first-time smartphone user wouldn't do.
So my question: Is this normal? Is this something that happens when you force it into stock recovery or is there something wrong with these two phones, above and beyond the apparent inability to be rooted (at least at the moment)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's been a long time since I've dealt with custom recoveries, but I believe that's just the normal background for it. It's like you're tinkering with the inner working of an Android (wiping cache, etc), so you've opened up the green robot.
That's what I recall from when I still had stock about 9 months ago...

If it shows up like that, that means you have the stock recovery...use GooManager or Rom Manager to install a custom recovery while booted up.
Sent from my buttered S3

Hmmm...any other time I've been in a stock recovery, I remember the Android being standing with that spinning wireframe in front of him. that's what displays when I successfully wipe the cache. Maybe I'm just remembering wrong and I'm being paranoid since I'm still deep in issues with being able to install a working custom recovery.
Hey, I'd love to install a custom recovery via GooManager or ROM Manager, but none of the custom recoveries are working on my SG3's. Nothing will mount so I'm stuck with stock recovery until someone more knowledgeable than me figures outwhat Sprint and/or Samsung did with the latest SG3's.

internetpilot said:
Hmmm...any other time I've been in a stock recovery, I remember the Android being standing with that spinning wireframe in front of him. that's what displays when I successfully wipe the cache. Maybe I'm just remembering wrong and I'm being paranoid since I'm still deep in issues with being able to install a working custom recovery.
Hey, I'd love to install a custom recovery via GooManager or ROM Manager, but none of the custom recoveries are working on my SG3's. Nothing will mount so I'm stuck with stock recovery until someone more knowledgeable than me figures outwhat Sprint and/or Samsung did with the latest SG3's.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know why you're having these problems but the newest update (md4) roots exactly like any other software on the s3... I and many have done it plenty of times, it roots exactly the same way... Not sure why your recovery won't mount anything but somebody else also had this problem just today... You could always try to Odin in an earlier build (lj7 maybe) and try to root from there
“It is said that power corrupts, but actually it's more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power."” ― David Brin

flastnoles11 said:
I don't know why you're having these problems but the newest update (md4) roots exactly like any other software on the s3... I and many have done it plenty of times, it roots exactly the same way... Not sure why your recovery won't mount anything but somebody else also had this problem just today... You could always try to Odin in an earlier build (lj7 maybe) and try to root from there.
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I think something changed on the newest batch of S3's. I'm sure the OTA S3's are still rootable with this method but for some reason the brand new ones aren't. I've found at least a dozen other people complaining about the same thing only with brand new S3's.
Unfortunately I had a limited window of time to root these two phones and get them set up before going on vacation, so the phones are in use now and there's no way to backup and restore the existing configuration, data, etc.without like a day of downtime and basically starting over. And even then it's not a sure thing that reverting to an older stock ROM will work. I'll just wait for someone to figure it out and then root the phones later.
But there's definitely something new going on here. Its happening to too many people now. At least my sanity is confirmed!

internetpilot said:
I think something changed on the newest batch of S3's. I'm sure the OTA S3's are still rootable with this method but for some reason the brand new ones aren't. I've found at least a dozen other people complaining about the same thing only with brand new S3's.
Unfortunately I had a limited window of time to root these two phones and get them set up before going on vacation, so the phones are in use now and there's no way to backup and restore the existing configuration, data, etc.without like a day of downtime and basically starting over. And even then it's not a sure thing that reverting to an older stock ROM will work. I'll just wait for someone to figure it out and then root the phones later.
But there's definitely something new going on here. Its happening to too many people now. At least my sanity is confirmed!
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Click to collapse
When you decide to root again here is a prerooted Odin build for mc3, after successfully flashing via Odin you will be rooted and can flash up to md4 from there... There is a prerooted that wipes everything and one that wipes and restores, make sure you read carefully and flash the one you need http://www.sxtpdevelopers.com/showthread.php?t=207
“It is said that power corrupts, but actually it's more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power."” ― David Brin

flastnoles11 said:
When you decide to root again here is a prerooted Odin build for mc3, after successfully flashing via Odin you will be rooted and can flash up to md4 from there... There is a prerooted that wipes everything and one that wipes and restores, make sure you read carefully and flash the one you need http://www.sxtpdevelopers.com/showthread.php?t=207
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Thanks for this. I'm not going to attempt root again until I can get a working custom recovery going.

internetpilot said:
Thanks for this. I'm not going to attempt root again until I can get a working custom recovery going.
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That build will do it all.. It is prerooted, includes the custom recovery... Just like flashing a custom rom with recovery except you do it with Odin

flastnoles11 said:
That build will do it all.. It is prerooted, includes the custom recovery... Just like flashing a custom rom with recovery except you do it with Odin
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Hmmm...but I wonder if that will end up with a working recovery or if I'll be in the same boat I am now, but with an older stock ROM?
I'm just really hesitant to try anything until someone figures out what Sprint/Samsung did with this latest batch of S3's. It's probably something relatively simple to overcome, but I'm not mobile tech enough to even guess what that is. I can't really end up with sons' new phones bricked (even soft bricked).

internetpilot said:
Hmmm...but I wonder if that will end up with a working recovery or if I'll be in the same boat I am now, but with an older stock ROM?
I'm just really hesitant to try anything until someone figures out what Sprint/Samsung did with this latest batch of S3's. It's probably something relatively simple to overcome, but I'm not mobile tech enough to even guess what that is. I can't really end up with sons' new phones bricked (even soft bricked).
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You may be waiting a long time then since most devs either already have the phone or have already moved to other phones... Unless a Dev happens to pick one up with the same problems you're probably S.o.l... And I'm 95%sure they didn't change anything, some phones just have issues on certain builds, there have been plenty of people the last month and even the last week reporting successfully rooting with the same method you used...
You really have nothing to lose, if it doesnt work you can just Odin full stock and be in the exact same place you are now

flastnoles11 said:
You may be waiting a long time then since most devs either already have the phone or have already moved to other phones... Unless a Dev happens to pick one up with the same problems you're probably S.o.l... And I'm 95%sure they didn't change anything, some phones just have issues on certain builds, there have been plenty of people the last month and even the last week reporting successfully rooting with the same method you used...
You really have nothing to lose, if it doesnt work you can just Odin full stock and be in the exact same place you are now
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Click to collapse
True. I always forget the Odin option for when recovery fails. But I'd be without the data and current configuration (basically starting from scratch).
In the last two days I've seen posts from over a dozen people now who are encountering this issue with brand new Sprint S3's. I'm kinda hoping more and more people encounter this problem increasing the chances of it being resolved... Haha

It doesn't matter once your rooted and booted all you do us download either rom Manager or goo manager and install the custom recovery of your choice from the running phone. Doesn't get any easier.
Sent from the future via Tapatalk 4

Until the custom recovery can't mount anything, which is the problem I'm having now. I've tried numerous versions of CWM and TWRP and none of them can mount anything on these phones so they're useless. I'm not sure how reverting back to an older stock ROM will change that...?

internetpilot said:
Until the custom recovery can't mount anything, which is the problem I'm having now. I've tried numerous versions of CWM and TWRP and none of them can mount anything on these phones so they're useless. I'm not sure how reverting back to an older stock ROM will change that...?
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Because you yourself feel the bootloader is the issue. If you Odin the stock tar of a previous version then that loads a previous bootloader. Pretty simple huh? I rooted 2 S3 last week brand new and did not have a single issue both where on the latest md4 right out of the box. I don't understand how you and that other person both ran into the same issue on the same day. It's really weird and like everyone else said and I just experienced just a week ago thousands of people have rooted on the latest version on brand new devices. Unless you guys are getting refurbs which by accident the bootloader has been locked.
Sent from the future via Tapatalk 4

edfunkycold said:
Because you yourself feel the bootloader is the issue. If you Odin the stock tar of a previous version then that loads a previous bootloader. Pretty simple huh? I rooted 2 S3 last week brand new and did not have a single issue both where on the latest md4 right out of the box. I don't understand how you and that other person both ran into the same issue on the same day. It's really weird and like everyone else said and I just experienced just a week ago thousands of people have rooted on the latest version on brand new devices. Unless you guys are getting refurbs which by accident the bootloader has been locked.
Sent from the future via Tapatalk 4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flashing back to an older stock rom doesn't work either. I flashed to a 4.1.1 stock rom and followed the method for CF-Root and The Easiest Way to Root and neither of them allowed a custom recovery to mount anything.

deutscher3891 said:
Flashing back to an older stock rom doesn't work either. I flashed to a 4.1.1 stock rom and followed the method for CF-Root and The Easiest Way to Root and neither of them allowed a custom recovery to mount anything.
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Thank you for trying that as I couldn't because I'm on vacation with the two phones in use. Well that sucks that it didn't work. I'm a retired career network engineer, so I'm not a non-tech, but I'm also not the most tech person with regard to mobile phones. Even so, I can't figure this one out so it's probably not something obvious. Also, on XDA and other forums I'm up to about 18 different people who have now encountered this on very new Sprint S3's.

internetpilot said:
Thank you for trying that as I couldn't because I'm on vacation with the two phones in use. Well that sucks that it didn't work. I'm a retired career network engineer, so I'm not a non-tech, but I'm also not the most tech person with regard to mobile phones. Even so, I can't figure this one out so it's probably not something obvious. Also, on XDA and other forums I'm up to about 18 different people who have now encountered this on very new Sprint S3's.
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Click to collapse
Did you purchase your phones from Sprint directly? I purchased mine through Wirefly. Thinking I may send it back for exchange and pray like heck I get one that works. I am definitely a Vanilla Android person. Touchwiz is not my cup o tea.
Enjoy your vacation, as much as you can. Us tech nerds can never get it off the mind when something isn't working. Lol
Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

I purchased two s3 phones from Amazon about a month ago and haven't had any issues. Both are rooted too. The root process is pretty simple. Have you tried the unified toolkit also? Another easy method.

deutscher3891 said:
Did you purchase your phones from Sprint directly? I purchased mine through Wirefly. Thinking I may send it back for exchange and pray like heck I get one that works. I am definitely a Vanilla Android person. Touchwiz is not my cup o tea.
Enjoy your vacation, as much as you can. Us tech nerds can never get it off the mind when something isn't working. Lol
Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 4 Beta
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Click to collapse
Both directly from Sprint.
lvpre said:
I purchased two s3 phones from Amazon about a month ago and haven't had any issues. Both are rooted too. The root process is pretty simple. Have you tried the unified toolkit also? Another easy method.
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Click to collapse
The problem isn't really root. Depending on the method, we can get root. It's the custom recovery that's the problem -- it can't mount anything so you can't flash anything, backup, wipe, etc via recovery.

Need S4 Rom advice!

Hello! Pretty new in XDA forum and I have a couple of questions and concerns. I was browsing through some threads and I was wondering if I could get some opinion/help from other members.
I have a second phone that I want to mod and I need some help.
Device: Samsung Galaxy S4 (ROOTED)
Model#: SGH-M919
Android Version: 4.4.4
Baseband: M919UVUFNK2
It's an old phone and lately, it's been running really slow and if possible, I'd like to make it run as if it was brand new or at least somewhat close. So the question is, are there any recommended stable roms/mods I could use and if there are/is, will I be able to use it with my rooted phone or do I have to completely factory reset it before I apply the mods/roms?
Thank you!

Hi @Mr.LinK,
Just yesterday I finally got sick of my M919 slow/battery drain/old stuff and decided it was time for a reset. I was running SlimKat from over a year ago and while it was a great ROM, I had accumulated so much crap that it was getting really bogged down. This just happens over time no matter what OS, no fault to Slim. But I was also looking to move to Lollipop. Here's what I did:
1. Backed up using several methodologies (full backup with TWRP just in case, then from Android I backed stuff up with Helium, and used Backup My Mobile for SMS/MMS etc., an EFS backup just in case, etc..)
2. From within Android, did a factory reset. This sent the phone into recovery, and it formatted the data partition.
3. Rebooted to recovery again, and used TWRP to manually format the media section, just in case something was left there. Then wiped everything except the external SD.
4. Used ODIN to flash the OH3 firmware onto my MDL M919, without letting reboot after (unchecked the reboot checkbox). Pulled battery, rebooted back into download mode again, and flashed OH3 a second time... this gets around some instance people have reported about incomplete upgrades of firmware and all sorts of issues... better safe than sorry.
5. Let phone boot into now 100 % stock OH3 Android 4.4.4. YEEEUKKK. Some part of me thought I would just root the thing and get rid of Samsung crapware, but just the sheer annoyance of the T-Mobile boot animation was enough to remind me why I left stock long ago. Anyway, I let it boot, and set it up minimally with just 1 Google account, not restoring from backup. To my surprise it found the ATT network (I'm an ATT user, not T-Mobile... I just prefer T-Mo phones because they have unlocked bootloaders) and APN no problem no effort from me. Usually I have to enter an APN.
6. I tested the phone out to make sure all systems were working. GPS, WIFI, Bluetooth, etc.. To my surprise, first time I ran the camera app, it applied a firmware patch. Sweet. I'm glad I went through this step. Coming from ancient MDL, I figured there might be some kinks like this. I let it sit on stock for a few hours while I did stuff with my kids.
7. Back home, I did a factory reset from within Android. Then I flashed the latest TWRP tar file (2.8.7.0) using ODIN, and in TWRP did a full wipe of everything again.
8. At this point I flashed Danvdh's GPE edition of Lollipop from here.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2539361
Installation went smoothly. It's a very basic set of apps that it comes with (Google play is there, but you have to download email/messaging apps from the store such as Gmail and Messaging, Maps, etc). I like this approach!
I've been gradually setting things back up, and am very happy with things so far. Haven't run into any problems yet. The nice pure GPE android experience is refreshing.

@Frankenscript Thanks for the information. I was reading the linked thread and it looks really good so I'll give it a try

Mr.LinK said:
@Frankenscript Thanks for the information. I was reading the linked thread and it looks really good so I'll give it a try
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Frankenscript said:
Good luck and let us know how it goes!
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Click to collapse
I just completely flashed my phone with the ROM and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. No bloatware feels so nice. I've been tinkering with it for a while now and I haven't encountered any problems so far but I did notice that model number changed to GT-I9505G. I'm assuming that's normal since the rom is based off of another variant which makes sense, correct me if I'm wrong. Will this complicate future updates or other rom installation? If so, are there any ways of reverting back to the original model number?

Mr.LinK said:
I just completely flashed my phone with the ROM and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. No bloatware feels so nice. I've been tinkering with it for a while now and I haven't encountered any problems so far but I did notice that model number changed to GT-I9505G. I'm assuming that's normal since the rom is based off of another variant which makes sense, correct me if I'm wrong. Will this complicate future updates or other rom installation? If so, are there any ways of reverting back to the original model number?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm pretty sure we can change the reported model number by modifying the build.prop file. I just haven't poked around with it yet... I did ask the question in the thread and am waiting for a reply. I haven't had to do this kind of thing for over a year, and I forget the build.prop key that does it. But I had some concern that it might bork something else down the road so I decided to wait a bit. IT's just a cosmetic thing and I'm SOOO enjoying the experience right now.
Two little things I'm still fishing around for answers to:
-In the drop down quick access menu, I wish there was a sound/vibrate/mute toggle. I can make one with PowerToggles but maybe there's a way to adjust what's in the native one.
-Really silly, but the power off button when pressed just seems to ... power off the phone!? No option for restart / recovery. Maybe there's an option to set this somewhere; haven't checked.
Still, these are all minor things to sort out. Really, I think I'm very sold on GPE editions now thanks to Danvdh's work.
Marc

Just an update, my phone just rebooted twice in the last 5 mins or so. Was watching on my netflix and it randomly rebooted. Any idea what's causing it and how to prevent it from happening?

Mr.LinK said:
Just an update, my phone just rebooted twice in the last 5 mins or so. Was watching on my netflix and it randomly rebooted. Any idea what's causing it and how to prevent it from happening?
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Haven't seen random reboots. I think I got maybe one reboot since installing the ROM. Then again, I haven't put NF on the phone. I do know that Netflix app had some issues on my Shield tablet, and the manufacturer (Nvidia) came out with a patch... maybe it's something general in Lollipop?

Frankenscript said:
Two little things I'm still fishing around for answers to:
-In the drop down quick access menu, I wish there was a sound/vibrate/mute toggle. I can make one with PowerToggles but maybe there's a way to adjust what's in the native one.
-Really silly, but the power off button when pressed just seems to ... power off the phone!? No option for restart / recovery. Maybe there's an option to set this somewhere; haven't checked.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Both if those can be fixed with Xposed modules.
Sent from my SGH-M919 using XDA Free mobile app

Will look into doing this in a week or so. Thanks
Sent back in time via Android 9.0 TimeText feature.