Hey guys, I seem to have soft-bricked my AT&T S3.
I was running Paranoidkangdroid 2.32 (based on CM10.1, 4.2.2), but started having some stability issues. Thinking it was time to start fresh with a new ROM, I downloaded SlimKat 4.1 and tried to install it following these instructions.
Upon rebooting, my phone hit the SlimKat loading screen and never finished booting. I rebooted to recovery, and saw errors saying it was unable to mount /cache, /data, and /system. I still have access to recovery and download, and have tried flashing and reflashing a variety of different ROMs, both custom and stock, but haven't been able to get past those errors.
When flashing from recovery, I get errors saying the partitions aren't able to be mounted. I can flash ROMs from Odin, and they do seem to be installing (no errors in Odin, and the Current Binary setting does change depending on whether it is a stock or custom ROM).
Best I can tell, my partitions are screwed up. Any advice on what I did wrong and the best way to proceed? If the partitions are screwed up, is there a way I can rebuild the partitions through the shell?
ericmerl said:
Hey guys, I seem to have soft-bricked my AT&T S3.
I was running Paranoidkangdroid 2.32 (based on CM10.1, 4.2.2), but started having some stability issues. Thinking it was time to start fresh with a new ROM, I downloaded SlimKat 4.1 and tried to install it following these instructions.
Upon rebooting, my phone hit the SlimKat loading screen and never finished booting. I rebooted to recovery, and saw errors saying it was unable to mount /cache, /data, and /system. I still have access to recovery and download, and have tried flashing and reflashing a variety of different ROMs, both custom and stock, but haven't been able to get past those errors.
When flashing from recovery, I get errors saying the partitions aren't able to be mounted. I can flash ROMs from Odin, and they do seem to be installing (no errors in Odin, and the Current Binary setting does change depending on whether it is a stock or custom ROM).
Best I can tell, my partitions are screwed up. Any advice on what I did wrong and the best way to proceed? If the partitions are screwed up, is there a way I can rebuild the partitions through the shell?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What stock ROM did you try to flash via Odin and did you get the <PASS> message? If you did, then it would seem the flash was successful. Can you try booting into recovery and doing a hard wipe/reset? Unless your phone has hardware issues, flashing a complete stock image should update all partitions.
Finally, if you were already on Android 4.3, you may try doing a stock restore using the instructions in the following thread ...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2658486
Stock ROMs
Larry2999 said:
What stock ROM did you try to flash via Odin and did you get the <PASS> message? If you did, then it would seem the flash was successful. Can you try booting into recovery and doing a hard wipe/reset? Unless your phone has hardware issues, flashing a complete stock image should update all partitions.
Finally, if you were already on Android 4.3, you may try doing a stock restore using the instructions in the following thread ...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2658486
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The ROM I had previously installed was based on 4.2.2, so I'm not sure the instructions in that thread will apply...
I have tried installing the UCDLK3 ROM, as well as a couple of custom ROMs. I'm about to try another stock ROM (UCALEM), and will report back with the results in a few minutes.
ericmerl said:
The ROM I had previously installed was based on 4.2.2, so I'm not sure the instructions in that thread will apply...
I have tried installing the UCDLK3 ROM, as well as a couple of custom ROMs. I'm about to try another stock ROM (UCALEM), and will report back with the results in a few minutes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sad times.
I just tried installing the UCALEM stock ROM with Odin. Everything seemed to go well, and it finished with no errors and a "PASS!" result.
When my phone rebooted, a screen briefly popped up with red text. It didn't stay up long, but the errors I saw were similar to what I had seen before (unable to mount, etc.). The background was the red exclamation with the android robot lying down. The phone quickly rebooted, and sat with a black screen. When I pulled the battery out and powered it back on, it tried to enter recovery mode on its own, but only flashed the Samsung Galaxy S3 screen and remained on a black screen.
I can still access download mode, and the Current Binary now reads "Samsung Official." My phone did this same thing earlier when I flashed another stock ROM, and I was able to get back to recovery mode by flashing a fresh instance of CWM.
ericmerl said:
Sad times.
I just tried installing the UCALEM stock ROM with Odin. Everything seemed to go well, and it finished with no errors and a "PASS!" result.
When my phone rebooted, a screen briefly popped up with red text. It didn't stay up long, but the errors I saw were similar to what I had seen before (unable to mount, etc.). The background was the red exclamation with the android robot lying down. The phone quickly rebooted, and sat with a black screen. When I pulled the battery out and powered it back on, it tried to enter recovery mode on its own, but only flashed the Samsung Galaxy S3 screen and remained on a black screen.
I can still access download mode, and the Current Binary now reads "Samsung Official." My phone did this same thing earlier when I flashed another stock ROM, and I was able to get back to recovery mode by flashing a fresh instance of CWM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To follow up again, I was able to re-flash TWRP using Odin. Once that was done, the phone no longer tried to boot straight to recovery. I was able to three finger into TWRP, though it took a super long time for it to boot.
Here's the console log taken from TWRP once it boots:
Code:
E:Could not mount /data and unable to find crypto folder.
E:Unable to mount '/data'
E:Unable to recreate /data/media folder.
Updating partition details...
E:Unable to mount '/system'
E:Unable to mount '/data'
E:Unable to mount '/cache'
E:Unable to mount internal storage.
E:Unable to mount /data/media during GUI startup.
E:Unable to mount '/cache'
Full SELinux support is present.
E:Unable to mount '/cache'
Running boot script...
Finished running boot script.
E:Unable to mount '/cache'
E:Unable to mount /data/media/TWRP/.twrps when trying to read settings file
E:Unable to mount '/data'
Related
Back story: OTA update to 4.3 killed USB on this phone, so there is no USB access to it - at all. I don't have a Windows computer, so I never downloaded ODIN to root the phone. It is completely stock, other than the unlock code obtained from T-Mobile.
I just switched from T-Mobile to AT&T, and for some reason had no data connection on the phone, even with the correct APN settings. I decided to try a factory reset. I went through the system settings menu and found the "Reset to factory settings" menu item, selected it, acknowledged the warning, input my PIN and let it go to work.
A few minutes later, it had rebooted into recovery. Sicne it was there, I took the opportunity to use the boot-loader's reset function and wiped the cache while I was at it. That was a mistake.
Now, the phone won't boot past the pulsing Samsung logo. I can get back to the recovery, and it pops up these errors - first, the droid on his back with the red triangle over him flashes "No command", and then it dumps me to the recovery menu with this scrolled at the bottom of the screen:
Code:
# MANUAL MODE #
-- Appling Multi-CSC...
Applied the CSC-code : TMB
Successfully applied multi-CSC
E:failed to mount /data (Invalid argument)
can't mount '/data' (Invalid argument)
E:failed to mount /data (Invalid argument)
E:Can't mount /data/log/recovery_log.txt
It's obviously soft bricked. I can't use ODIN to flash anything. But, since I'm at the recovery screen, it is giving me the option of loading an update from external storage - what should I put on the SD card to load in order to fix it? Can I fix it without ODIN?
edit to add:
I've already tried the stock UVUEMJC firmware from DocHoliday77's thread, but it threw a bunch of errors across the screen that I didn't catch in time and rebooted to the same point.
Try @saranhai's StockMod Rom. Put it on the External SD and flash it. If that fails, please post the error log.
On another note. can you try in Recovery and manually mount /Data Partition ?
Perseus71 said:
Try @saranhai's StockMod Rom. Put it on the External SD and flash it. If that fails, please post the error log.
On another note. can you try in Recovery and manually mount /Data Partition ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Stuck @ work today, and I didn't bring it with me. I'll give that a shot when I get home tonight. I don't recall seeing a "mount" option in recovery - it's the stock Samsung recovery, I'm not sure I made that clear in the OP.
My Nexus 5 arrived last night, so this is becoming a project for me. I just want to know if I can make it work, but without USB access to it, that is probably a non-starter.
If you have Stock Rom, there isn't anything you could flash that way. At the most you could flash a Stock firmware via KIES.
Hello all
I was updating my gf phone from rooted UVALJ4 or UVALH2 (Cant remember now, but it was an old Firmware) to root66 T999_UVUENC2 via Odin 3.09 on my Win 7 pc but after the odin install (which passed) I rebooted the phone and I got stuck on the Samsung logo on the start up screen. After about 10 mins I pulled the battery and tried to enter the Recovery mode, but nothing appears. Just a black screen.
So i Odin flashed the TWRP 2.6.3.1 to try to get to a recovery, but that didnt work. Still no Recovery.
I then used odin to flash the stock tmobile UVUENC2 4.3 firmware and it still gets stuck on the Samsung screen.
Next I tried to unbrick it via http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2439367 using "SGH-T999 4.3 only Debrick Image" and reflashed the stock 4.3 rom, but that didnt work. :crying:
What can I try next? WHat should I do? I can still access download mode, thats about it.
Please help if you can.
Thx
I dont know how but I got the stock recovery to finally appear and now I get these errors (see Pic) what do these mean?
The recovery errors read: E:failed to mount /data ( Invalid argument) can't mount "/data" (invalid argument)
E: Can't mount /data/log/recovery_log.txt
again thx
synplex said:
I dont know how but I got the stock recovery to finally appear and now I get these errors (see Pic) what do these mean?
The recovery errors read: E:failed to mount /data ( Invalid argument) can't mount "/data" (invalid argument)
E: Can't mount /data/log/recovery_log.txt
again thx
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Never Mind Used Unified Android Toolkit to fix recovery and flash stock rom.
Thank god for that toolkit.
...time to donate
:victory:
Mod Please delete Thread.
Thx
In the future, try a factory reset, almost all boot hangs are solved with this. Happens because of incompatible data between versions, which would make sense condidering the jump you made. Kind of makes sense with the error message too, but I'm not 100% certain there.
Be careful with the toolkit. There is no support for it and it has bricked phones in the past.
Ok here is the story about a year ago I rooted my AT&T GS3 installing CWM and Cyanogenmod. I hadn't had an issue until mid-september. For some reason one of the updates caused certain phone functions to quit working, specifically my mobile data. I searched around on the internet and found out that it had probably affected my modem files, and was told to flash back to stock and that that should solve it. I found a stock firmware file and flashed it with odin. When my phone rebooted it boots to the point of the samsung emblem with the oscillating blue background and just sits there. I tried flashing different versions of the firmware to the same result. I later learned I probably flashed just the modem which I found while trying to solve the problem. When I boot into stock recovery i receive the following message:
E:failed to mount/data (Invalid argument)
can't mount '/data' (Invalid argument)
# MANUAL MODE #
-- Appling Multi-CSC...
Applied the CSC-code : ATT
Successfully applied multi-CSC
E:failed to mount/data (Invalid argument)
can't mount '/data' (Invalid argument)
E:failed to mount/data (Invalid argument)
Anything will help because I am currently without a phone so.... thanks
Edit 1: The Firmware I attempted to flash came from samsung-updates.com though I am not sure of what build and can't check since it won't boot all the way
What firmware build are you on?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk
I cannot tell what build, I got it from samsung-updates.com in a zip titled ATT-I747UCDLK3-201211116120549
I would download it again in case it was somehow corrupted. The build is in the filename, LK3, which appears to be 4.1.1. I would say to try 4.1.2 instead, but it appears that wasn't released by AT&T either.
Or if you want you can try flashing the root66 firmware instead. It's LK3 too, only pre-rooted. It's in this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1739426
Either way, redownload and try flashing again. Then boot recovery and factory reset. (Will wipe internal sd)
If it still won't mount /data, try flashing Twrp recovery and factory reset. (Will not wipe internal sd unless you choose advanced > Format /data.)
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk
Thank you so much! I ended up having to flash twrp but when I did what you said it booted just fine. Now the only question remaining is do I try to go back to cyanogenmod?
Since you have TWRP working, copy CM11 to your phone, boot to twrp, and flash CM11. If CM11 does't boot, try wiping data, cache, and dalvik.
Just remember, anytime you go between different based roms, such as TW and CM, you have to factory reset or it'll hang during boot.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk
This happened a few days ago. So first of all what happened was before I went to sleep my phone rebooted by itself for no reason which I thought that maybe my phone died,But the next morning i woke up to a samsung logo on my phone (not blinking) which I thought was rebooting again, but it wasnt booting into the OS. Im running dirty unicorn 4.4.4 (final ver) and the unicorn booting animation wasnt showing up. Before I try to boot/go into recovery/bootloader there is a red blink ( not too sure if that was always there) and I am able to access my recovery and bootloader. I checked my recovery log and it says the following:
E:unable to find partition size for '/boot' '/recovery' '/modem'
E:unable to mount '/efs' '/cache' '/system' '/data' storage /data/media during GUI startup
E:Failed to get default contexts and file mode for storage files
So seeing this I tried going into my bootloader which I was successfully able to go. Therefore I tried flashing stock through odin and resulted in failing or just freezing. *Had notes about being unable to write
I had this phone for 2 years without any problems and I'm with Rogers. Has anyone else gone through this or know a solution?
A similar thing happened to me recently. The battery was part of the problem I believe (for 2 of my Note 2s), as it wasn't holding a charge properly (this was causing problems from charging, to regular freezes, reboots). Finally, the last time the phone just got stuck on the samsung boot logo. By then, I had my new battery, so I swapped that in - but that didn't fix the problem. I booted into Philz recovery and saw the same error messages as you. I wiped dalvik cache 3 times, factory reset, and reset for installation of new rom (which still gave me the same error messages and something about unable to format E. Despite the error message, I proceeded to reinstall the custom Rom (Ditto Note 3) again from an external SD card. Everything loaded up like normal. SMS, chat records, contacts were all in tact (like a dirty flash). That said my wifi was having issues - so I ended up redoing the aforementioned process (clear cache, factory reset, reset for installation of new rom). This time no messages about the E: location. Installation was fresh and all content was wiped clean. The wifi issue was still occurring - but it turned out I just needed to install the AGNI kernal again.
Good luck
Note2Hunter said:
This happened a few days ago. So first of all what happened was before I went to sleep my phone rebooted by itself for no reason which I thought that maybe my phone died,But the next morning i woke up to a samsung logo on my phone (not blinking) which I thought was rebooting again, but it wasnt booting into the OS. Im running dirty unicorn 4.4.4 (final ver) and the unicorn booting animation wasnt showing up. Before I try to boot/go into recovery/bootloader there is a red blink ( not too sure if that was always there) and I am able to access my recovery and bootloader. I checked my recovery log and it says the following:
E:unable to find partition size for '/boot' '/recovery' '/modem'
E:unable to mount '/efs' '/cache' '/system' '/data' storage /data/media during GUI startup
E:Failed to get default contexts and file mode for storage files
So seeing this I tried going into my bootloader which I was successfully able to go. Therefore I tried flashing stock through odin and resulted in failing or just freezing. *Had notes about being unable to write
I had this phone for 2 years without any problems and I'm with Rogers. Has anyone else gone through this or know a solution?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
jun3280 said:
A similar thing happened to me recently. The battery was part of the problem I believe (for 2 of my Note 2s), as it wasn't holding a charge properly (this was causing problems from charging, to regular freezes, reboots). Finally, the last time the phone just got stuck on the samsung boot logo. By then, I had my new battery, so I swapped that in - but that didn't fix the problem. I booted into Philz recovery and saw the same error messages as you. I wiped dalvik cache 3 times, factory reset, and reset for installation of new rom (which still gave me the same error messages and something about unable to format E. Despite the error message, I proceeded to reinstall the custom Rom (Ditto Note 3) again from an external SD card. Everything loaded up like normal. SMS, chat records, contacts were all in tact (like a dirty flash). That said my wifi was having issues - so I ended up redoing the aforementioned process (clear cache, factory reset, reset for installation of new rom). This time no messages about the E: location. Installation was fresh and all content was wiped clean. The wifi issue was still occurring - but it turned out I just needed to install the AGNI kernal again.
Good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So did you install it using an external sdcard?
Hi there, so I'm having a bit of a problem. I tried to revive my old M9. I remember flashing it with a custom ROM (Android HD Revolution) and everything was fine. I left it since I got a new phone and today wanted to play around with my M9 again.
However, it would be stuck with the HTC Logo while loading, and my TWRP was gone, could no longer boot into it and my download mode was also screwed, as it gave me the error (failed to boot to download mode).
Anyway so I tried restoring to one of my TWRP backups, by mounting a TWRP img file first using my PC. It went fine, after that I booted into system and the HTC logo would be on white background and preventing me from using the screen, although funnily enough the system was functionally normally i.e. the volume keys worked and I could see it change on screen but, it was just as if I had a some kind of overlay and couldn't use the screen itself by touching.
I then tried to flash with the same custom ROM, but after installing it and rebooting the phone it was stuck in a boot loop, where it would shutdown and try to boot again.
So I turned it off using power up and home button, and tried to wipe the partition to install another ROM, using the same TWRP method I did above.
Only this time, I can't do anything: wipe, install, format etc. I get the error "Failed to mount '/data' (Invalid Argument)" "Failed to mount '/cache' (Invalid Argument)" whenever I try doing anything within TWRP. I can't even mount cache, system or Data. It is if they're not there.
And now my phone is back to where it started, i.e. infinite boot screen with HTC Logo and "This build is for etc..." text.
Note: Trying to change file system from ext4 to ext2/3 and back to ext4 does not fix the problem ,as the same errors pop up when trying to change file system.
90% chance the nand is goosed. 10% chance of recovering by flashing a stock firmware in download mode (same version as currently installed, external sd card method).
Twrp has a known issue for bricking devices at random.