Develop Bugs

[Q] Root Question: No OTA updates done; Best ROM and method?

Hi--I am a generally technically adept Evo owner who would like to root to a Froyo custom ROM, but I've never had to root anything before. I've read threads meant to act as guides (like those linked in the sticky thread), but there seems like so much I don't understand. I know these are simple questions, but my searching didn't really help. I'd be really grateful if anyone had any helpful answers.
Question 1: Does anyone have any recommendations for the best custom ROM that will have these features?:
Froyo (of course)
SenseUI (I prefer it, but have nothing against stock Android)
Ability to restore my apps (via Titanium Backup, I assume)
Unlocked wifi tethering (via app or Froyo's in-built capability)
Unlocked FPS (I have a Novatec panel)
Same or better camera/video capabilities as stock SenseUI (i.e., nothing broken at least)
My current software: Stock Evo, no OTA updates applied, with Superuser Unrevoked permissions.
(That is, I have not applied any OTA updates since I bought it, June 11th. I'm running 2.1-update1, version 1.32.651.6. I did the Unrevoked 1-click "root" that in fact only gave me Superuser permissions (the Unrevoked that was first released, not the Unrevoked2 or 3 updates). I.e., I can use the wifi tether and Titanium Backup, and I've backed up my apps/settings with it.)
Question 2: Can anyone tell me in a simplest method to safely root and install the custom ROM, considering I have no OTA updates and unrevoked superuser permissions?
Specifically, I've read guides that list 3 steps (gaining root permissions, unlocking NAND, gaining "full" root), but I still have a lot of questions:
What does it mean to "flash a recovery"?
[*]When do I have to manually install radio updates, and how do I know which ones I need?
[*]If I decide I'd rather go back to stock, ever, can I do that?
[*]What is the likelihood of a brick, and can I repair a brick?
[*]Can Titanium Backup really restore all my apps after I do a full wipe and root? (just to calm my anxiety, please...)
The best guide I've seen is the "IDIOT-PROOF" root guide, at thread 701004 (sorry, new user restriction, can't post links), but I don't know if it's still current. That also seems more complex than SimpleRoot (also don't know if it's current).
I think I'm looking for the simplest root method with the least possibility of screwing everything up. (It pains me to say it, but a brainless iPhone-like "slide-to-jailbreak" method would be great.)
Sorry for the newbie questions. If anyone has any advice/answers, I'd be glad to hear them!

Well best bet for you is probably going to be either the one click simpleroot, you can go to simpleroot.com its there for download. Of course it depends on exactly what software version you are on. As far as your rom choice there is no rom that offers all of those things, probably closest will be stock rooted 2.2, then you can either live with the 30fps restriction or flash a custome kernel and live with 3mp camera .... you're choice. the recovery is a program that the phone boots into that has nothing to do with the rom at all, with this you can select several operation to make on the rom. You need recovery because you cant modify the rom when you are booted in the rom. Anyway this is all a very basic explanation. My recommendation would be to follow toasts part 1 then part 2 to root and unlock nand. (unlocking nand allows writing and writing to the system area of the rom while booted into the rom) then you will be all set to flash any rom you like. feel free to pm if you need more info As far as knowing what you need I would recommend starting with netarchy's stock rooted 2.2 odexed version. In his post he will tell you flash rom then radio then wimax, all of these files are included there in the post. Then as you learn you can switch between roms to explore what each one can do for you and decide which you like best. Yes Titanium backuop will work with this.

For me and I have flashed every rom lol. Daily driver would have to be the fastest and stabliest rom which is in my opinion Caulkins v1.02 froyo. Use simple root for 1.32. Then use the flash recovery and pick ra recovery.

ifly4vamerica said:
As far as your rom choice there is no rom that offers all of those things, probably closest will be stock rooted 2.2, then you can either live with the 30fps restriction or flash a custome kernel and live with 3mp camera .... you're choice.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Really? How about a ROM with, say, just 2.2 + SenseUI, with all the standard features, and wifi tether enabled?
Thanks for the advice, by the way, both of you.

ScaryBugThing said:
Hi--I am a generally technically adept Evo owner who would like to root to a Froyo custom ROM, but I've never had to root anything before. I've read threads meant to act as guides (like those linked in the sticky thread), but there seems like so much I don't understand. I know these are simple questions, but my searching didn't really help. I'd be really grateful if anyone had any helpful answers.
Question 1: Does anyone have any recommendations for the best custom ROM that will have these features?:
Froyo (of course)
SenseUI (I prefer it, but have nothing against stock Android)
Ability to restore my apps (via Titanium Backup, I assume)
Unlocked wifi tethering (via app or Froyo's in-built capability)
Unlocked FPS (I have a Novatec panel)
Same or better camera/video capabilities as stock SenseUI (i.e., nothing broken at least)
My current software: Stock Evo, no OTA updates applied, with Superuser Unrevoked permissions.
(That is, I have not applied any OTA updates since I bought it, June 11th. I'm running 2.1-update1, version 1.32.651.6. I did the Unrevoked 1-click "root" that in fact only gave me Superuser permissions (the Unrevoked that was first released, not the Unrevoked2 or 3 updates). I.e., I can use the wifi tether and Titanium Backup, and I've backed up my apps/settings with it.)
Question 2: Can anyone tell me in a simplest method to safely root and install the custom ROM, considering I have no OTA updates and unrevoked superuser permissions?
Specifically, I've read guides that list 3 steps (gaining root permissions, unlocking NAND, gaining "full" root), but I still have a lot of questions:
What does it mean to "flash a recovery"?
[*]When do I have to manually install radio updates, and how do I know which ones I need?
[*]If I decide I'd rather go back to stock, ever, can I do that?
[*]What is the likelihood of a brick, and can I repair a brick?
[*]Can Titanium Backup really restore all my apps after I do a full wipe and root? (just to calm my anxiety, please...)
The best guide I've seen is the "IDIOT-PROOF" root guide, at thread 701004 (sorry, new user restriction, can't post links), but I don't know if it's still current. That also seems more complex than SimpleRoot (also don't know if it's current).
I think I'm looking for the simplest root method with the least possibility of screwing everything up. (It pains me to say it, but a brainless iPhone-like "slide-to-jailbreak" method would be great.)
Sorry for the newbie questions. If anyone has any advice/answers, I'd be glad to hear them!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'd like to suggest something before you actually move forward. I usually back up with MyBackup and with Titanium backup. I am completely rooted and nand unlocked but something i've seen Titanium for some reason after i grant it superuser tell me my phone isn't rooted on different roms, also i have seen Mybackup crash the sense and try to reboot it over and over in a loop. Luckily I did a Nandroid restore to a more stable setup. Some of the other forum members here are more likely than not less new to the process than myself, but I thought i had covered everything and when i did simple root, I was on 1.47, with the factory reset and everything lost my data... luckily it wasn't a lot or important. I just thought i'd let you know that it is not a bad thing to have a zipped backup of all of your apks+data, and your contacts with both programs before you go ahead. Hope that possibly can steer you out of trouble if one of them fails to perform as it should. Best of luck.

Exohart said:
I'd like to suggest something before you actually move forward. I usually back up with MyBackup and with Titanium backup. ... Hope that possibly can steer you out of trouble if one of them fails to perform as it should. Best of luck.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Cool, thanks for the tip.

You can get a rooted stock 2.2 ROM, odexed or deodexed. Then you can install a wifi tether app. Personally, I use Fresh 3.1.0.1, I don't notice any differences in general to stock, but you should probably just try different ROMs out and see which one you like. It's easy to switch around.
See this for ROMs.
As for rooting, You can use Simple Root, but I highly suggest doing it yourself using toast's or TheBiles' guides. You learn a lot and it's the same thing as using Simple Root, but you can deal with problems better (although I didn't have any issues when I did mine).
See here for guides.
There is a lot of info on how to get around any issues you have, so be sure to search if you do run into trouble.
And if you need the files for rooting, check here.

Awesome response, SilverZero, thanks! I'm starting to feel comfortable with the rooting procedure.
I think the difficulty I have in choosing a ROM is that many ROM threads don't list conclusively whether a feature works or not. So, for instance, I presume that the Fresh ROM has a fully working camera (8MP/720P with all settings), but I've read other ROM threads that talk about downgraded camera bugs, so I am not sure if I should assume things work fine. Conversely, I think wifi tethering doesn't work, since it *seems* to suggest it isn't working, but doesn't flat-out say so...
I don't suppose some source exists somewhere that lists/compares all of these ROMs' features in a table format, listing whether they work or not, or are downgraded? Having something like that in a central, often-updated location would be incredibly useful...

I used toast's method for rooting, and havent had any problems whatsoever. All I had to do after that, was install the new RA recovery image ( was more current ).
Is this the simplest way? probably not. But, i perfer doing the method with the most manual work. Automated processes tend to scare me, 'oh, our mod does steps 1 through 19 all at once'... well, thats fine, but what happens when it fails half way through? Toast's method, while a bit involved, is pretty simple, and if something happens, you can go "hey, when i do this command <whatever>, it does this, helps?!".
as for your 'questions 2s'
1: Are you sure you dont mean, flash from recovery? recovery is where you do all of your flashing, do your nandroid backups, and wiping. theres 3 ways to get there ( once your rooted/nand unlocked ).. volume -, and power while the phone is off, hold it til you get the menu. use quickboot ( a feature of damagecontrol mod ), or use adb using a command prompt on windows ( adb reboot recovery ).
2: Most people install radio updates when they go to change to new roms. The reason being, 2.2 'code' is based around having a certain radio version, and for things like 4g, and good 3g signal, you need to match.
personally, every time i go to install a new rom, i verify what the most recent radio version is out there, and install it ( same with wimax )
3: Once you are fully rooted, there are walktrhoughs for 'starting over / going back to stock'.. but I would just use one of the rooted stock images, as it gives you the ability to change your mind. for instance, right now 2.2 isnt rootable, so if you changed your mind after switching back to it, your kind of screwed. I'm not sure if the engineering image you install for root would go away if you reverted to stock/root though, as have never tried.
4: as long as you have the phone rooted, any 'bricking' that i have caused ( boot loops, power turning off on boot, etc ), were easily recoverable by just booting into recovery and reflashing. the only way I could see bricking in a totally bad way, would be if you somehow messed up the rooting process and corrupted the bootloader in such a way it couldnt recover. Otherwise, i have yet to see a rom that will flash / change your bootloader or recovery image, so it shouldnt be an issue.
5: It can, but i've seen issues where backing up stuff from a 2.1 rom, and installing a 2.2, causes weird issues. its safer to just redownload them if you are using a 2.2 rom. Another benefit of 2.2, is now google backs up your app selection you had installed, so when you wipe / flash a new rom, it auto-reinstalls all your apps you had from before ( it doesnt backup your settings though, just the applications themselves ).

ScaryBugThing said:
Awesome response, SilverZero, thanks! I'm starting to feel comfortable with the rooting procedure.
I think the difficulty I have in choosing a ROM is that many ROM threads don't list conclusively whether a feature works or not. So, for instance, I presume that the Fresh ROM has a fully working camera (8MP/720P with all settings), but I've read other ROM threads that talk about downgraded camera bugs, so I am not sure if I should assume things work fine. Conversely, I think wifi tethering doesn't work, since it *seems* to suggest it isn't working, but doesn't flat-out say so...
I don't suppose some source exists somewhere that lists/compares all of these ROMs' features in a table format, listing whether they work or not, or are downgraded? Having something like that in a central, often-updated location would be incredibly useful...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here's a project that one user is putting together comparing different ROMs.
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Aguc0npJCrWxdEFyU2NRNG1jNnRkY2trdXBsYlJLdWc&hl=en#gid=0

imiddlet said:
I used toast's method for rooting, ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, thank you for taking the time--you really answered all of my questions.
SilverZero said:
Here's a project that one user is putting together comparing different ROMs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Greeeeat. Exactly what I was looking for.
You guys are awesome--I think I know what I need to know now, and in the next few days I will probably try rooting and installing Fresh Evo or BakedSnack. I'll update once I know how it went!

Urg...Well, I did the manual root method. Everything went fine through the initial root (using the classic method by toastcfh), and through the manual recovery mode where I made a nandroid backup.
Then, in recovery mode, I attempted to flash the latest Fresh Evo 3.1.0.1. It gave me no error messages, and I rebooted.
Now, it is stuck on an infinite reboot at the Fresh Evo ("FRESH!!!") bootup animation. It just keeps running that animation, never loading up. I've let that animation run about 15 times before I had to pull the battery to make it stop. Any time I try to boot the phone, I am stuck at that infinite reboot/load sequence.
The only thing I could do was hold Vol- while powering up to get into the bootloader and redo my stock root. I redid the Fresh Evo install, and it still just keeps rebooting for 10 minutes, before I pull the battery. I'll try Baked Snack next, but I don't want to press my luck with too many flashes... Any ideas anyone?

ScaryBugThing said:
Urg...Well, I did the manual root method. Everything went fine through the initial root (using the classic method by toastcfh), and through the manual recovery mode where I made a nandroid backup.
Then, in recovery mode, I attempted to flash the latest Fresh Evo 3.1.0.1. It gave me no error messages, and I rebooted.
Now, it is stuck on an infinite reboot at the Fresh Evo ("FRESH!!!") bootup animation. It just keeps running that animation, never loading up. I've let that animation run about 15 times before I had to pull the battery to make it stop. Any time I try to boot the phone, I am stuck at that infinite reboot/load sequence.
Anyone have any advice? Am I screwed?
The only thing I think I can do is hold Vol- while powering up to get into the bootloader and have it check PC36IMG, after which it gives me the same normal root Step 1 option to "Start Update" (Vol+ for yes, Vol- for no). Will this just restore to "stock" root? I'd like to get FreshEvo working somehow...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try doing a full wipe, Data, Dalvik Cache, everything except the SD card. Then try reflashing the ROM. That was how I had to fix mine when it did the same thing.
Also don't forget to update your Radio, WiMax and Recovery if you havent already.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=715485
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=6877247&postcount=98
As far as the best ROM is concerned I've been using SteelH's deodexed stock ROM with the netarchy-toastmod kernel and it's been running great. FPS are unlocked, its quick as hell and my battery life is excellent.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=743781
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=719763

xHausx said:
Try doing a full wipe, Data, Dalvik Cache, everything except the SD card. Then try reflashing the ROM. That was how I had to fix mine when it did the same thing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestions. Unfortunately, I did a double-wipe (cache, dalvik cache, and data/factory reset x2) before each of the 3 times I tried to install Fresh Evo. Same infinite reboot loop always.
Then I installed Baked Snack just now. I was able to actually boot (54 fps looks great!) but ROM Manager was giving me an error message about flashing the Recovery replacement, Wifi Tether force closed every time I opened it, and every time I plugged in the USB cable, it would disconnect about 2 seconds later, rendering the phone essentially useless since it wouldn't recharge or accept files in that two seconds.
So now I'm flashing back the stock root image, PC36IMG.zip.
I guess this isn't going very well. If anyone has any advice about these problems I'm having, I'm still in the depths of rooting hell. I appreciate the SteelH suggestions. Maybe I'll try that next. But it's definitely worrying me that every ROM I try has some major problems.

ScaryBugThing said:
Thanks for the suggestions. Unfortunately, I did a double-wipe (cache, dalvik cache, and data/factory reset x2) before each of the 3 times I tried to install Fresh Evo. Same infinite reboot loop always.
Then I installed Baked Snack just now. I was able to actually boot (54 fps looks great!) but ROM Manager was giving me an error message about flashing the Recovery replacement, Wifi Tether forced close every time I opened it, and every time I plugged in the USB cable, it would disconnect about 2 seconds later, rendering the phone essentially useless since it wouldn't recharge or accept files in that two seconds.
So now I'm flashing back the stock root image, PC36IMG.zip.
I guess this isn't going very well. If anyone has any advice about these problems I'm having, I'm still in the depths of rooting hell. I appreciate the SteelH suggestions. Maybe I'll try that next. But it's definitely worrying me that every ROM I try has some major problems.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if you're using clockwork try switching to Amon-RA. That may be whats doing it

xHausx said:
if you're using clockwork try switching to Amon-RA. That may be whats doing it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestion and the very fast responses. I'll give Amon-RA a shot, if I can install it. (note: I didn't use Rom Manager to install any actual ROMs here--it was just what I was about to begin using.)
Sorry if I have so many questions, but: What is the best method to flash Amon-RA recovery? Rom Manager seemed easy because you could simply download the program, run it, and choose an option in the settings menu to replace the stock Recovery.
For Amon-RA, there are two options--fastboot, and adb. I only have a vague idea of what these are and how to make them work.
As an UPDATE: I installed SteelH's ROM, and it booted, but it definitely didn't have 54 fps on mine (clearly 30 fps, Novatec panel FWIW), and I had the same problem with the USB cable disconnecting 2 seconds after plugging it in. I of course wiped everything before installing.
So I'm trying to figure out if I did something wrong in my original root--though it seemed to work fine. Could a locked NAND be causing these problems?

ScaryBugThing said:
Thanks for the suggestion and the very fast responses. I'll give Amon-RA a shot, if I can install it. (note: I didn't use Rom Manager to install any actual ROMs here--it was just what I was about to begin using.)
Sorry if I have so many questions, but: What is the best method to flash Amon-RA recovery? Rom Manager seemed easy because you could simply download the program, run it, and choose an option in the settings menu to replace the stock Recovery.
For Amon-RA, there are two options--fastboot, and adb. I only have a vague idea of what these are and how to make them work.
As an UPDATE: I installed SteelH's ROM, and it booted, but it definitely didn't have 54 fps on mine (clearly 30 fps, Novatec panel FWIW), and I had the same problem with the USB cable disconnecting 2 seconds after plugging it in. I of course wiped everything before installing.
So I'm trying to figure out if I did something wrong in my original root--though it seemed to work fine. Could a locked NAND be causing these problems?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used the fastboot method earlier and it was a piece of cake. Just move the recovery to the Tools folder for the SDK, put your phone in fastboot mode and copy paste the two lines in a cmd prompt to install it. I was bored reading through the recovery thread I linked to earlier and apparently clockwork is not wiping properly, others were also having problems with Fresh because of it.
For the FPS fix that is done in the kernel so you would need to flash a custom one.

xHausx said:
I used the fastboot method earlier and it was a piece of cake. Just move the recovery to the Tools folder for the SDK, put your phone in fastboot mode and copy paste the two lines in a cmd prompt to install it. I was bored reading through the recovery thread I linked to earlier and apparently clockwork is not wiping properly, others were also having problems with Fresh because of it.
For the FPS fix that is done in the kernel so you would need to flash a custom one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried to do as instructed. I rebooted into Fastboot mode on my phone, verified the device was seen by fastboot on my PC, then entered:
C:\android-sdk-windows\tools>fastboot flash recovery recovery-RA-evo-v1.7.0.1.img
sending 'recovery' (5032 KB)... OKAY [ 1.406s]
writing 'recovery'... INFOsignature checking...
FAILED (remote: signature verify fail)
finished. total time: 2.094s
I tried to redownload the file, but the same result occurred.
EDIT: I was able to flash the Amon-RA recovery, going back to toast's instructions. I don't know why it wasn't flashed before...
I'm also not sure that my wiping the data is the problem--I wiped factory settings/cache/dalvik cache each time using only the stock recovery. I think my mentioning Rom Manager might have suggested I used that program to wipe my data, but I haven't done so...
Anyway, I appreciate the help. This is tough for me--I can't seem to get anything to work.
EDIT2: Problems solved! Indeed, I had not properly unlocked NAND. I redid the toast NAND unlock steps, and Fresh Evo installed on the first try!
My only remaining question: how do I flash a kernel? I simply flash a ROM and then the kernel? I think Fresh Evo is great, but fps2d is still showing me locked at 30 fps.
EDIT3: I think I found the answer. Flash it like any other ROM from zip. (Doing it with Netarchy's Kernel 4.0.3: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=719763 )
(Probably looks silly reading me answer my own questions, but I thought it was better to look stupid if it might help a future beginner like me.)

Just my oppinion simpleroot never really worked for me and ive read bad things about unrevoked so just follow toasts method to rooting it is very simple and straight forward, as for rom i prefer baked snack themed version it is by far the most sexy rom i have seen it uses manups theme and u can enhance it even more, its very stable and has no fps cap on it, as well as both cameras work and video recording works, im not sure if blue tooth has been fixed yet and am not sure if 4g works because i dont have it where i live try it out and tell me what u think.

So...Everything works! A couple of final notes in case it ever helps anyone in the future:
Note 1: The call part of the phone was not working well at all. I could send and receive calls, and hear the other party, but the audio was very noisy and the other party didn't hear my voice when I talk.
I tried to update PRL and Profile, but I got an error code 1012: "The profile update could not be completed. Please try again later. If the problem persists, you may need to contact customer service. Error code:1012"
I thought the problem might be me overwriting some system files with Titanium Backup (though I was careful). But when I tried wiping factory settings/cache/dalvik cache, and rebooted, still the same problems. Ultimately, it turned out simply that Sprint's servers were down, so I couldn't update my profile/PRL. I finally was able to update the Profile and PRL (now 60669) when they came back up, and everything seems to be working.
Note 2: I realized too late that I lost all of my visual voicemails. I don't think there's a way to restore them, and I don't know if there's any way to back them up. But something to think about if you've racked up a fair amount of downloaded visual voicemails.
Thanks everyone for your help.

[Q] Wifi not turning on! Please Help.

Hello, Im new to all of this so please understand. Okay, I have a Sprint GS3, I rooted it using the toolbox thing it worked but I decided that I didnt want the root anymore. I loaded stock software and booted it up normal. The only problem now is my wifi isnt turning on. Ive searched page after page on google, ask and bing. I dont know what to do anymore. Im just about to just say screw it and give up. Any help will be much appreciated.

You Odin'd back to Stock, and now your WiFi is not working correctly ? Are you certain your connecting to your Router ? Did you check the Router to make sure it's working correctly ? Did you try to connect to the Router with another Device ?

If you still have a custom recovery installed, I'd say to just flash another rom. The toolbox kills your WiFi fir sine reason, which can only be fixed by flashing another kernel, and roms have the kernels built in so, you might as well kill two birds with one stone
You could just flash stock rooted though, no need to go full out custom

Wifi not turning on
What I mean is my phone's wifi wont turn on at all. How do I get everything back to normal like before I rooted it?

Brblank44 said:
What I mean is my phone's wifi wont turn on at all. How do I get everything back to normal like before I rooted it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, this method should work and do exactly what you wanted, but you'll still have root access.
Below, I have quoted a post I made a while back when trying to help someone out.
Down below I link to Freeza's stock Rom, which is what you want if you want the stock phone with root. The one you want to download is the DeOdex MD4 one:
DeOdex:
Sprint Touchwiz Jelly Bean 4.1.2 L710VPBMD4 | Mirror
MD5: 77262D9D6CF1A6AF30A8981A95A75D57
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In step #4, the wipe system is very important. It's most likely that something in your /system folder is messing up your wifi. Just flashing a new Rom over might not fix it. I'd also wipe /data, 'cause a fresh wipe is much less likely to have issues.
Ok, let's start at the very beginning (it's a very good place to start).
Before we get started, I'm going to make the following assumptions:
You successfully rooted your phone through Odin.
You currently have a custom recovery (either TWRP or CWM).
You have a Rom you'd like to flash on either your internal storage or your SDcard (I'd recommend the SDcard, but that's your prerogative).
If either of the first two is not true, I'd recommend going back to the rooting guide and check out the videos on how to use Odin to gain root and a custom recovery.
If number 3 above is not true, download a ROM (nor someone new to flashing/custom Roms, I'd recommend Freeza's stock rooted Rom, as it's identical to stock TW, but just with Root). Once you download a Rom, check it's md5sum to verify that it's a good download. Copy the file to your SD card and get ready to flash (make sure you have decent battery life left, I try to keep at least 50% or more when flashing Roms, although it shouldn't take too long.
I'll give directions on how to flash a Rom below. The instructions will be for TWRP, but CWM has similar options/settings
Turn your phone completely off (hold down power for 3-5 seconds)
Boot your phone into recovery. Hold Up, Menu, and Power for a few seconds (until SAMSUNG appears on your screen and the phone vibrates)
Make a Nandroid backup. I can't emphasize this enough. In flashing, it's almost a certainty that one time, something will mess up. When that happens, you want to be able to restore a backup. In TWRP, just go into Backup Menu and choose where you want it (internal vs. External storage). It takes my phone a few (5-10) minutes to completely backup my data.
In TWRP, click the wipe button, then system. This will completely wipe the Rom from your phone. Doing this will allow you to get a "clean" install, without any settings or leftover files from your old Rom getting in the way. Instead, you could only wipe data (factory reset), which is good enough for most Roms. I'd still recommend a system wipe, though.
Also while in the Wipe menu, wipe Cache and Dalvik Cache.
Go back to the TWRP main menu.
Click Install, then find your Rom zip file (may have to switch from internal to external storage).
Let TWRP do it's thing.
If you're installing a TW-based Rom, chances are it had gapps already installed. If not, you should now flash the correct gapps package from goo.im. Make sure you're flashing the correct one, as if you don't, your google apps will force close upon use.
Reboot into system and give it time to boot (first boot sometimes takes a couple of minutes).
Set up your phone the way you like.
These should be the directions to follow whenever you flash a new Rom. Some Roms have the Aroma installer, so you'll have more options once you choose to flash the Rom zip, but those are typically easy to follow (and vary from Rom to Rom, so I won't be able to give you a good guide on that).
Hope this helps!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Brblank44 said:
What I mean is my phone's wifi wont turn on at all. How do I get everything back to normal like before I rooted it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes. The toolbox kills your WiFi completely and you have to flash another rom to fix it. Flash stock rooted from freezas thread and you should be good to go.

CNexus said:
If you still have a custom recovery installed, I'd say to just flash another rom. The toolbox kills your WiFi fir sine reason, which can only be fixed by flashing another kernel, and roms have the kernels built in so, you might as well kill two birds with one stone
You could just flash stock rooted though, no need to go full out custom
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Why do people use a toolbox on a phone that's so easy to root without it?

flastnoles11 said:
Why do people use a toolbox on a phone that's so easy to root without it?
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When I first rooted my phone (back pre LJ7 days), I used it because I came from the EVO 4G, which was notoriously difficult to root (and which needed a toolkit). So when I came to the GS3, I figured it'd be the same way. Fortunately, the toolkit worked better back then and I didn't have an issue. Now that I've helped others use Odin (and have used it myself a number of times), I don't point to the toolkit anymore.
But my point is, sometimes people assume it's difficult, see a toolkit that is meant to make it easier and decide that's the way to go.

topherk said:
Ok, this method should work and do exactly what you wanted, but you'll still have root access.
Below, I have quoted a post I made a while back when trying to help someone out.
Down below I link to Freeza's stock Rom, which is what you want if you want the stock phone with root. The one you want to download is the DeOdex MD4 one:
In step #4, the wipe system is very important. It's most likely that something in your /system folder is messing up your wifi. Just flashing a new Rom over might not fix it. I'd also wipe /data, 'cause a fresh wipe is much less likely to have issues.
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Thank you very much. I will try this as soon as I can.

topherk said:
When I first rooted my phone (back pre LJ7 days), I used it because I came from the EVO 4G, which was notoriously difficult to root (and which needed a toolkit). So when I came to the GS3, I figured it'd be the same way. Fortunately, the toolkit worked better back then and I didn't have an issue. Now that I've helped others use Odin (and have used it myself a number of times), I don't point to the toolkit anymore.
But my point is, sometimes people assume it's difficult, see a toolkit that is meant to make it easier and decide that's the way to go.
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I get that, but just a tiny bit of reading around well show you the toolkit is actually the harder way to root this phone in my opinion... Just saying

flastnoles11 said:
I get that, but just a tiny bit of reading around well show you the toolkit is actually the harder way to root this phone in my opinion... Just saying
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I totally agree that the toolkit is much more complicated and a bit of a "black box." Hence why I don't recommend it anymore.
But back then, even though I read a whole lot, I decided to go with the toolkit because it felt safer. Heck, I eevn donated so I could get the "pro" features! And for people who aren't that comfortable "hacking" things, it's tempting to use something that'll do the "hard work" for you, even if the normal way of doing it is relatively simple.
That's why I always try to spell things out very clearly for people (I do like numbered lists, don't I?). If someone responds to a thread with "just wipe data and flash a new rom," most "noobs" will hesitate because while they may know those terms, they don't know the procedure and will be afraid of messing it up. With the numbered list of instructions, they typically feel much more comfortable with doing it themselves.
Just my two cents.

Yeah, very true (@topherk). The first time I rooted my firdt phone, I saw all the guides and stuff, but settled on a toolkit sort of program to do it for me...subsequent phones I've always rooted by hand. For me it kinda sucks that there's no way to root the S3 manually (as in like, push this to.the phone, reboot, run this command then flash recovery)
Having come from 2 HTC devices (evo and evo shift), I kinda feel like ODIN is a "cheating" way to root lol. But that's just me.

Whats a md5? It says no md5 file and gives me an error.

Brblank44 said:
Whats a md5? It says no md5 file and gives me an error.
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Thats normal,.the great majority of flashable zips do not include an md5 file.
What that is referring to is a hashing function, called the md5sum, that can be used to verify the integrity of a file. Most devs will provide this (in number format) so that you can check the md5sum of your local copy/download against what they provide. If anything goes wrong in a download or file transfer, the md5sum of your copy will not match the expected value, confirming that it was a bad download or that something went wrong along the way.
For your case, TWRP always checks to see if the flashable zip includes an md5sum check file that it can check your file against as an added precaution that you're not flashing something corrupted.

Brblank44 said:
Whats a md5? It says no md5 file and gives me an error.
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Don't do the md5 verification in the Recovery. That typically fails, even if the md5 is correct.
I typically do it in Windows (I use this program, works great). If it's a really large file or I don't feel confident about the cable I'm using, I'll also check the md5sum in ES Explorer on the phone after I transfer it.

Okay I flashed it and I have the same problem. Wifi not turning on. The detox whatever its called didn't work. So I took it to sprint today after having flashed it and everything and they did a hard reset. I lost everything. Sprint couldn't swap the phone out for a new one. I am thinking about sending it back to samsung. So they can fix it. Any other ideas guys? Also thank you for your understanding and helping me.

Brblank44 said:
Okay I flashed it and I have the same problem. Wifi not turning on. The detox whatever its called didn't work. So I took it to sprint today after having flashed it and everything and they did a hard reset. I lost everything. Sprint couldn't swap the phone out for a new one. I am thinking about sending it back to samsung. So they can fix it. Any other ideas guys? Also thank you for your understanding and helping me.
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Brblank,
Try this easy method to return to stock everything including recovery, flash count reset and device status normal. It worked perfectly for me.
Before flashing wipe Cache and Dalvik and factory reset.Then flash the file. Make sure you choose the correct file (16gb or 32gb version).
Even if it doesn't fix your WiFi issue it will put your phone in the proper state to send to Samsung.
You can place the file on your internal or external card.
Return to Stock Link
With much thanks to billard412
Hope this helps you.

A N00b's First Foray Into Modding Their Phone [Root, DN4]

I've always been interested in installing ROMs, rooting, and all the cool stuff that comes with it, since my first android phone. Unfortunately, my first two android phones ended up having a lot of issues with just working stock, so when I finally ended up getting a Samsung Galaxy Note II (I317M - Rogers/Canadian) and it worked... I held off on the modding. Well, my cell contract is up, the warranty has expired, sounds like the perfect time to start.
Of course, this is post KNOX, so after reading around and watching some videos, it was unclear as to whether I could actually install ROMs at all. I wasn't worried about the warranty, just if I could do it, and it would work. So I decided to just jump in anyway.
First task is to root. I tried flashing a CWM+Root with Odin 1.85. No go. Just wouldn't work. So I ended up using chainfire's CF-Auto-root. It would give me the root I wanted, and the stock recovery. The package came with Odin 3.07, and everything worked. It flashed, I downloaded Titanium Backup and launched it, and SuperSU did prompt for root access, and everything went fine. Excellent! Two years after getting the phone and 3 years since I've wanted to do this, everything is going well.
Next task is a custom recovery. I picked TWRP, mostly because I wanted to try the Ditto Note ROM, and they suggested using that. Flashed the recovery in Odin 3.07 and reboot into Recovery with the three finger salute of volume up, home, and power. TWRP launches. Excellent. First order of business is to click the backup button and check all the boxes. Takes 1400-1500 seconds to backup the 6.5GB.
Time to get the ROM and jump in. Downloaded Ditto Note 4 v 2.2 from the team Electron site, and transfer it to my phone. So far things are looking good. Still don't know for SURE if my bootloader is locked or if KNOX will not let me do things, but I have a couple of backups, so I'm going to take the plunge. I reboot into TWRP, wipe the dalvik cache, cache, data, and system, then I install the ROM. Didn't take long at all. Time to see if it works.
At this point I should mention that the reboot function on TWRP(v2.8.6.0) seems to just loop me back into TWRP, no matter which option I choose. So I hold the power button to actually reboot... and...
TA DA! Ditto Note 4 is going through it's first start. I come across a black and white gradient fill background with some sort of animated tesseract sphere in the middle. I'm cool with that, but that also means I can add in my own animation at some point which is even more cool. Go through the start up prompts and...
The first problem. Wifi won't turn on. The other Canadians here will know the pain of not having wifi for your cell with our data prices up here. This is something that needs to be solved. Back on to the forums to see if anyone else has had the same issue, and someone did, the solution? Flash the latest AGNi kernel. Hey, I'm down, now do I flash a kernal with odin or TWRP? After spending way too much time on google, I went to the actual AGNi thread and after a few pages found out that people were installing it with CWM. TWRP it is then. I tried installing it through TWRP, all seemed to go well, though I did note that in the terminal window I did say that it failed to set permissions. That can't be good, but it did say that it installed successfully. Let's give it a go.
The phone started... but nothing had changed. I noticed the OTA Updater app, so I tried using that. Once it was done downloading I clicked the install/flash button. That wasn't a good idea. I flashed it, but ended up in a loop that would only show me TWRP. Even after removing the battery it would only go to TWRP.
What else could I do? I restored the backup in TWRP. Let's start over.
Rooted with the same method, Installed TWRP again, installed DN4 again, tried to run the AGNi settings app and found out that root wasn't working. So after some searching I came across the 2.14 SuperSU update and installed it with TWRP. Root is back. Awesome. Time to get my wifi back, installed the 4.4.5 AGNi kernel, and this time, no permission sets failed. This too, is a great sign. Got the OTA Updater download and this time, decided not to have the program reboot to install it, and just rebooted into TWRP myself to do it manually. Installed fine, rebooted and... my wifi is working.
Mission accomplished. I haven't fully tested everything yet, but I did check to make sure that the s-pen was working, the camera, and after messing with the APN settings a bit, had LTE as well.
All things considered, for a first time, not too bad. So glad I had made that backup before hand. Glad I had remembered to do that, and also to write down the APN stuff before hand. It was mostly correct to what I had, but there were 2 fields that were different, changed them and had full LTE.
So far things seem great! More testing is needed, but I can call and recieve calls, wifi/cellular data works, camera and s-pen works.
Still a noob in this department, but due to the xda-devs making good products, nothing killed the phone, and things are working great.
Thanks to Chainfire, Team Win, Team Electron, psndna88, and anyone else that has worked on any of these projects. So far things work well, and those of us with older phones really appreciate your effort and work on breathing new life into these devices. Cheers mates!

Nice first post for your first one my friend excellent ?! If you need any help with Dn4 you can post in the q&a section since your so new to Xda.
And welcome to the world of Android and Xda enjoy your stay here.. Ttys
Bajan

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
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Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Frankenscript said:
Good luck and let us know how it goes!
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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?
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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.

Help, plz? (nandroid stuff)

working on a sprint note 2 (of course). Rooted, flashed twrp with Odin, clean flashed CM 13 nightly (2016.12.18). Worked well, but no LTE. Tried flashing the newest radio, lost APN access. Flashed a Sprint APN fix, no change.
So, after all that failed, I did a full wipe and format /data and /data/storage or whatev, and went to restore the nandroid backup of the stock JB. Restore went fine, no errors, but upon booting the phone, I'm hit with a never ending barrage of "this thing stopped, that thing stopped"; seemingly every process on the phone just crashed over and over and over.
As i'm typing, i'm wondering: is it the radio flash, being as the latest available was for KK, and now i'm back trying to run JB? I wouldn't think that would cause the ui to implode, logic seems to me that only the cellular service would be affected by that, but it's just now the one thing i realized that is definitely different.
Right now i'm about to push the cm 12.1 (2015.11.17) and see what happens, but I know pretty much everyone here knows volumes more about this kinda stuff than I, so I'm making a post to see what kinda options someone else could come up with for me to try.
It's not really a big deal to have the stock rom or a custom one (of course i'd prefer something newer, this device should be plenty able to handle anything I can throw at it, but...), Just need that LTE coverage. So, any and all recommendations or solutions welcome!