Develop Bugs

soft bricked my phone

Merry Christmas everyone. I tried to resolve this issue my self but was unable to. I had stock 4.3 rooted and flashed MOAR. MD5 matched. Everything seemed ok but when I flashed, it was stuck on "updating apps" for over 20 min. I did a battery pull. My phone started and I was able to go to TWRP recovery. I did a cache wipe and factory reset with plans of reflashing but everything was gone, including my nandroid. I tried to flash stock firmware from http://samsung-updates.com/ it said "failed". I cannot get back into TWRP. Is there any way I can restore to 4.1.2? Or 4.3? I just want to get the phone working again. Ideally I would like to get root back but my main priority is obviously just to get the phone working. Thank you.

jeppuda said:
Merry Christmas everyone. I tried to resolve this issue my self but was unable to. I had stock 4.3 rooted and flashed MOAR. MD5 matched. Everything seemed ok but when I flashed, it was stuck on "updating apps" for over 20 min. I did a battery pull. My phone started and I was able to go to TWRP recovery. I did a cache wipe and factory reset with plans of reflashing but everything was gone, including my nandroid. I tried to flash stock firmwa.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had a similar bad expreience with updating my rooted S3,
to recover your phone try to get md5 recovery room and install it using odin, try to get the one that called recovery (runs stock 4.0.4) then you can update by Kies to 4.3.

If stock means the Samsung update you need to flash the 4.3 firmware. If stock means the de-Knoxed version from here, I would start by flashing a new recovery image then reinstalling the de-Knoxed one.
Can you not get into any recovery at all?

mjkubba said:
I had a similar bad expreience with updating my rooted S3,
to recover your phone try to get md5 recovery room and install it using odin, try to get the one that called recovery (runs stock 4.0.4) then you can update by Kies to 4.3.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MD5 recovery room (or rom I googled both)? I could not find it. I'm sorry i have never done this before...could you post the link for it?

Kevets said:
If stock means the Samsung update you need to flash the 4.3 firmware. If stock means the de-Knoxed version from here, I would start by flashing a new recovery image then reinstalling the de-Knoxed one.
Can you not get into any recovery at all?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I press the volume up, home and power button it says "firmware upgrade encountered an issue. Please select recovery mode in kies and try again."
I installed the de-knoxed version..I would like to go back to the de-knoxed version if possible. Is there a way to flash new recovery image through ODIN...again, I'm not very confident in my abilities right now and don't want to flash anything to make it worse. Would it be possible to send me a link with what to flash. Thank you

Sorry I meant rom not room, but youv still can get it from the dev "room" forums. I got it from there.
sorry I cant post links here yet, i dont have the enough posts, but google "unroot sprint galaxy s3" it's one of he first links and once you get the md5 file you can use it with Odin, it's a simple process.

fixed it
Fixed it, got to keep root also. Flashed a new recovery image through ODIN (link for recovery in case anyone else needs it: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=38079994). Then flashed ROM. Thanks for your help guys.

[Q] Soft Bricked my i747- HELP!

So I was able to root phone on w/o issue. I installed CWM via play store then proceeded to attempted to load Cyanogen mod via zip..and oh yeah I didn't wipe phone prior so....Now I have infinite loop issue at boot. I've searched the interwebs looking for any way to get back to stock or anything so I'll be able to use the phone again but have come up short every time. I've tried using ODIN to flash stock image but that fails. I've tried various .tar, .tz and anything else that odin will load w/o success. Will anyone take pity on my stupid ass and lens a hand?

exarkun631 said:
So I was able to root phone on w/o issue. I installed CWM via play store then proceeded to attempted to load Cyanogen mod via zip..and oh yeah I didn't wipe phone prior so....Now I have infinite loop issue at boot. I've searched the interwebs looking for any way to get back to stock or anything so I'll be able to use the phone again but have come up short every time. I've tried using ODIN to flash stock image but that fails. I've tried various .tar, .tz and anything else that odin will load w/o success. Will anyone take pity on my stupid ass and lens a hand?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you able to boot in recovery? (volume up + home + power). You could wipe and try flashing again (the first boot does take a while).
As for Odin, make sure you're using the right image (.tar) if recovery doesn't work.
Here's a little Odin guide: [ODIN] Desktop ODIN ver 3.07 for use with Samsung Galaxy S III

yeah I tried that
BWolf56 said:
Are you able to boot in recovery? (volume up + home + power). You could wipe and try flashing again (the first boot does take a while).
As for Odin, make sure you're using the right image (.tar) if recovery doesn't work.
Here's a little Odin guide: [ODIN] Desktop ODIN ver 3.07 for use with Samsung Galaxy S III
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I am able to boot into recovery but it's the stock recovery, not the one I intalled after root.
I've tried flashing stock images, custom images, CWM, TWRP, .TARs all w/o success. In ODIN I've flashed CWM and TWRP and it reports success but upon reboot it goes back to stock recovery and shows now 13 attempts to load custom firmware. I even tried to use Cyanogen,s windows app but even that gets stuck saying it can't communicate w/device. I've tried several driver, hiemdal, (which I can't figure out). What I'd like to do wipe EVERYTHING, like format the phone but I can't seem to remove the Samsung boot loader. Is my phone beyond repair? I'm super bummed, esp since I'm not a total noob when it comes to custom ROMs. I dropped greenpoison on my fist iPhone and had several ROMs on my old Moto Atrix. I think whatever evil Samsiung put on this device is totally screwing me.

exarkun631 said:
So I've tried flashing stock images, custom images, CWM, TWRP, .TARs all w/o success. In ODIN I've flashed CWM and TWRP and it reports success but upon reboot it goes back to stock recovery and shows now 13 attempts to load custom firmware. I even tried to use Cyanogen,s windows app but even that gets stuck saying it can't communicate w/device. I've tried several driver, hiemdal, (which I can't figure out). What I'd like to do wipe EVERYTHING, like format the phone but I can't seem to remove the Samsung boot loader. Is my phone beyond repair? I'm super bummed, esp since I'm not a total noob when it comes to custom ROMs. I dropped greenpoison on my fist iPhone and had several ROMs on my old Moto Atrix. I think whatever evil Samsiung put on this device is totally screwing me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try with a different stock image (debloated if you want a smaller download).
Also, Heimdall installs its own drivers, therefor Odin won't work on the same usb port you've installed Heimdall on.
Even in stock recovery, you should be able to do a factory reset (I think). Chances are that your ROM is corrupted atm though, you can try doing a factory reset and attempt boot. If that doesn't work, go the Odin way.
Bootloaders are not something to play with, it's the only way to hard-brick your phone (and you definitively don't wanna remove those nor stop Odin while it's flashing them, if the .tar contains them).

what about...
BWolf56 said:
Try with a different stock image (debloated if you want a smaller download).
Also, Heimdall installs its own drivers, therefor Odin won't work on the same usb port you've installed Heimdall on.
Even in stock recovery, you should be able to do a factory reset (I think). Chances are that your ROM is corrupted atm though, you can try doing a factory reset and attempt boot. If that doesn't work, go the Odin way.
Bootloaders are not something to play with, it's the only way to hard-brick your phone (and you definitively don't wanna remove those nor stop Odin while it's flashing them, if the .tar contains them).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I updated the phone via ota to latest android (4.3 ?). And I think the stock image I tried using was 4.1.x. Could it be I need to find a stock 4.3.x image from at&t? Any idea where to get this? I don't think AT&T provides ythis as that is where I got the previous stock image.

exarkun631 said:
I updated the phone via ota to latest android (4.3 ?). And I think the stock image I tried using was 4.1.x. Could it be I need to find a stock 4.3.x image from at&t? Any idea where to get this? I don't think AT&T provides ythis as that is where I got the previous stock image.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you check if the image you used had bootloaders? Cause if so, you might have bricked your phone. You can't downgrade bootloaders from 4.3.
The image can be found here or on sammobile.com

Strange
So after flashing my i747 30x via ODIN w/various .tar for boot and recoveries I was briefly able to boot into CWM. Stupidly, I selected the format option and foolishly restarted, intending to boot back into CWM and flash a .zip image. Once I restarted I was locked out of CWM again and can only boot into stock recovery once again. What am I doing wrong? I just can't wrap my head around why every time I flash a custom recovery like CWM or TWRP or Philz's_Touch in OdIn and it reports success, when I restart it just loads Samsung's ****ty stock recovery. I still can't flash a ROM via ODIN but I'm hoping if I can get back into CWM I'll be able to load a new ROM and use my phone again. Anyhelp would be great.
BWolf56 said:
Can you check if the image you used had bootloaders? Cause if so, you might have bricked your phone. You can't downgrade bootloaders from 4.3.
The image can be found here or on sammobile.com
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

lol
exarkun631 said:
So after flashing my i747 30x via ODIN w/various .tar for boot and recoveries I was briefly able to boot into CWM. Stupidly, I selected the format option and foolishly restarted, intending to boot back into CWM and flash a .zip image. Once I restarted I was locked out of CWM again and can only boot into stock recovery once again. What am I doing wrong? I just can't wrap my head around why every time I flash a custom recovery like CWM or TWRP or Philz's_Touch in OdIn and it reports success, when I restart it just loads Samsung's ****ty stock recovery. I still can't flash a ROM via ODIN but I'm hoping if I can get back into CWM I'll be able to load a new ROM and use my phone again. Anyhelp would be great.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I think I figured out what I did wrong. Recovery mode = pwr+home+VolUp...Download mode = Pwr+home+VolDown. What an a$$hole I am, I thought Download mode and Recovery were one in the same and flashing TWRP or CWM would replace download mode. Once I figured out that one it was a simple matter to boot into recovery and wipe the drive then flash my rom (Omni 4.4.2 D2att) IDK if it's the rom or all the screwing around I did but it now takes no less than 10 min to boot into android from rom splash. Tried updating Kernel to latest but found it didn't fix problem.

exarkun631 said:
So I think I figured out what I did wrong. Recovery mode = pwr+home+VolUp...Download mode = Pwr+home+VolDown. What an a$$hole I am, I thought Download mode and Recovery were one in the same and flashing TWRP or CWM would replace download mode. Once I figured out that one it was a simple matter to boot into recovery and wipe the drive then flash my rom (Omni 4.4.2 D2att) IDK if it's the rom or all the screwing around I did but it now takes no less than 10 min to boot into android from rom splash. Tried updating Kernel to latest but found it didn't fix problem.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you do a clean flash? Sounds like you didn't factory reset.
Make sure you backup your apps before doing so if you wanna keep your app data.

[Q] Flashing stock firmware in Odin doesn't change anything

tl:dr I've been trying to flash the stock firmware using Odin but nothing seems to change after I reboot.
SGH-T889
TWRP v2.6.3.1
Devil Kernel
Jedi X Rom (20)
I had this setup for a few months until this morning when my phone had shut off on its own some time while I was sleeping. Turning on the phone would only load up to the Devil Kernel Splash screen. I can get into TWRP but it asks me for a password that I never set. After some searching, I'm assuming that this is because my data partition has possibly been corrupted.
I've tried doing a factory reset in TWRP, it says it's successful but practically there is no change. The console states that it is unable to mount /efs, /cache, and /system.
I tried using 'Format Data', but choosing this options only seems to reset TWRP because I see the TWRP splash screen and then am asked for a password again. From my understanding, shouldn't formatting the data should remove any encryption?
I tried to just reflash the stock firmware to reset everything but every time I finish flashing in Odin, Odin states that everything is fine but there is no change on my phone. I still only see the kernel splash screen on boot.
I've tried doing an Emergency Firmware Recovery through Kies but Kies is unable to do anything after it detects my device version.

kyang321 said:
tl:dr I've been trying to flash the stock firmware using Odin but nothing seems to change after I reboot.
SGH-T889
TWRP v2.6.3.1
Devil Kernel
Jedi X Rom (20)
I had this setup for a few months until this morning when my phone had shut off on its own some time while I was sleeping. Turning on the phone would only load up to the Devil Kernel Splash screen. I can get into TWRP but it asks me for a password that I never set. After some searching, I'm assuming that this is because my data partition has possibly been corrupted.
I've tried doing a factory reset in TWRP, it says it's successful but practically there is no change. The console states that it is unable to mount /efs, /cache, and /system.
I tried using 'Format Data', but choosing this options only seems to reset TWRP because I see the TWRP splash screen and then am asked for a password again. From my understanding, shouldn't formatting the data should remove any encryption?
I tried to just reflash the stock firmware to reset everything but every time I finish flashing in Odin, Odin states that everything is fine but there is no change on my phone. I still only see the kernel splash screen on boot.
I've tried doing an Emergency Firmware Recovery through Kies but Kies is unable to do anything after it detects my device version.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Odin the UVALJ1 ROM (i use the Mr. Robinson rooted version). I have been down that road before. I had to flash 2x before it fixed my devices file system.
Then install the current TWRP recovery as 2.6.3.1 is not the best option. From there you should be able to get started again.

Coug76 said:
Odin the UVALJ1 ROM (i use the Mr. Robinson rooted version). I have been down that road before. I had to flash 2x before it fixed my devices file system.
Then install the current TWRP recovery as 2.6.3.1 is not the best option. From there you should be able to get started again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tracked down the ROM that you're referring to by mrRobinson but after trying another 4 times I'm still getting the same results.
Can you clarify your second line about TWRP recovery? I tried seeing if TWRP was the problem since I could not format data but I cannot flash any new recoveries (stock, CWM, or older versions of TWRP). Does anyone know of any alternate means other than flashing through Odin?
Thanks for the reply though, hearing that other people have had similar problems gives me some hope.

kyang321 said:
I tracked down the ROM that you're referring to by mrRobinson but after trying another 4 times I'm still getting the same results.
Can you clarify your second line about TWRP recovery? I tried seeing if TWRP was the problem since I could not format data but I cannot flash any new recoveries (stock, CWM, or older versions of TWRP). Does anyone know of any alternate means other than flashing through Odin?
Thanks for the reply though, hearing that other people have had similar problems gives me some hope.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try the UVUCMK7 version. That might do it.
Your version of TWRP is old. Try the current version for better results. My first issues with corruption involved 2.6.3.1 though I can't implicate it directly.

Coug76 said:
Try the UVUCMK7 version. That might do it.
Your version of TWRP is old. Try the current version for better results. My first issues with corruption involved 2.6.3.1 though I can't implicate it directly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks again for the response! Flashing recoveries in Odin isn't giving me any results so I'll try getting an external sd card and flashing version 2.7.2.0 from within TWRP.

kyang321 said:
Thanks again for the response! Flashing recoveries in Odin isn't giving me any results so I'll try getting an external sd card and flashing version 2.7.2.0 from within TWRP.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Coug76 said:
Try the UVUCMK7 version. That might do it.
Your version of TWRP is old. Try the current version for better results. My first issues with corruption involved 2.6.3.1 though I can't implicate it directly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I can't seem to change my recovery. Odin will supposedly pass but the version stays the same in my phone. Within TWRP I cannot mount my external sd card so I can't flash from there either.
I tried to see if I could do something with ADB but TWRP won't let me go into ADB side load because it cannot mount /cache.
Any ideas?

Download the ODIN flashable version of TWRP and flash from within ODIN. That will get you at least a new recovery. From there you can restore/etc. I had a similar issue a few weeks back. My partitions got corrupted and doing the standard full ODIN, regardless of which ODINversion/firmware combo I used, resulted in me having a stock recovery with literally nothing else. System, cache, data....nothing would mount. I thought I was permanently soft bricked. Each ODIN flash seemed to go well, but upon booting up, the phone would immediately go into stock recovery with those mounting errors. I used the ATT version of twrp 2.7.2.2...or whatever the latest version was because it had the partition repair option that the TMO version hasn't been updated to yet.
Install the recovery from ODIN.
Boot into recovery.
Click the wipe tab. Then do the advanced wipe...select one partition at a time then click on the 'repair partition' option. I think only cache, system and data can be repaired. The others won't let you repair. Will give an error saying failed or not repairable or something like that.
That's what helped me get out of my dilemma. Fortunately, I had a stock backup on an SD card I was able to restore at that point. If you don't, flash a new ROM, log in, then download Mobile ODIN from the market. You can then flash full firmwares from within the phone itself and get back to 100% stock, minus boot loader. But if you're already on the 4.3 bootloader then there won't be any problems.
I'll check back to see if you had any success. It worked for me, but I offer no guarantees.
Good luck.

carlz28 said:
Download the ODIN flashable version of TWRP and flash from within ODIN. That will get you at least a new recovery. From there you can restore/etc. I had a similar issue a few weeks back. My partitions got corrupted and doing the standard full ODIN, regardless of which ODINversion/firmware combo I used, resulted in me having a stock recovery with literally nothing else. System, cache, data....nothing would mount. I thought I was permanently soft bricked. Each ODIN flash seemed to go well, but upon booting up, the phone would immediately go into stock recovery with those mounting errors. I used the ATT version of twrp 2.7.2.2...or whatever the latest version was because it had the partition repair option that the TMO version hasn't been updated to yet.
Install the recovery from ODIN.
Boot into recovery.
Click the wipe tab. Then do the advanced wipe...select one partition at a time then click on the 'repair partition' option. I think only cache, system and data can be repaired. The others won't let you repair. Will give an error saying failed or not repairable or something like that.
That's what helped me get out of my dilemma. Fortunately, I had a stock backup on an SD card I was able to restore at that point. If you don't, flash a new ROM, log in, then download Mobile ODIN from the market. You can then flash full firmwares from within the phone itself and get back to 100% stock, minus boot loader. But if you're already on the 4.3 bootloader then there won't be any problems.
I'll check back to see if you had any success. It worked for me, but I offer no guarantees.
Good luck.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I already have TWRP 2.6.3.1. In trying to see if that version is a problem, I've tried flashing a different version through Odin but it doesn't have any effect (the version will always stay as 2.6.3.1 regardless of what I flash through Odin).

So it's been a week since my issue started and I haven't gotten any further since I started.
I've tried flashing a new pit file to no avail (stuck on get pit file mapping). I've also tried doing a nand rewrite but I get a nondescript error.
As of this point I've given up and am just going to use an old phone lying around until my contract is up. If you've found this thread because you've had similar issues I wish you better luck than I had.

Help...semibrick or not?

Hi,
All was good in the SM-T705 world rocking 5.0.2 Rooted Stock.
But one day, decided to take the plonge and update to the 5.1.1 Unnoficial CM12.1 to try things out.
Well, all was good, but kinda lost the 4G connectivity (even after flashing the radio file provided on the thread)
So i decided to try again something, and start from Stock again.
Got myself the latest 5.0.2 image from kies and "odin it away".
Everything ok with the flash, but the device remains on the boot screen ....meaning bootloop.
Never seen a bootloop on a stock flash.
When bootlooping, i can only access download mode/recovery. Nothing else works.
Any hints?
Thanks guys.

Bootloader maybe?

rookie12 said:
Bootloader maybe?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Any hint how to fix this?

Idk ask a prof
Maybe flash the whole frimware via odin again

I advice you to download a stock firmware (or at least a TW based one) from here in the forum, instead of Kies.
You can try also first with a manual EXT4 reformat of System, Data and Cache though Recovery. Do NOT touch other partitions.
Then reinstall with Odin, NO tick on repartition.
It must work

Thank you guys for all your replies.
Thing is, i cant seem to be able to flash twrp. I do it through Odin and goea fine, but when it reboots it is overriding to the stock recovery again (since it can't complete the stock flash boot process)
That would be the desired scenario, since I even have a twrp backup that I'm wishing to restore.
Any other ideas?

You need to boot to twrp immediately after flashing or recovery will be overwritten with stock.
Second, once in recovery wipe data and you should be good to go.

ashyx said:
You need to boot to twrp immediately after flashing or recovery will be overwritten with stock.
Second, once in recovery wipe data and you should be good to go.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Got my tab back.
Thank you very much for all your help...that's why xda works most of the time.
Sent from my SM-T705 using XDA Free mobile app

problem when flashing stock ROM

Greetings, all.
Some time ago, I rooted and flashed LineageOS 14.1 to my Note 10.1 2014 (SM-P600). Since then, I've decided to get rid of my tablet, so I decided to flash the stock ROM onto the device. I encrypted and factory reset the device, and then followed the instructions found here to flash the stock ROM. I put the tablet in download mode and opened Odin 3.14. I then connected the tablet to my PC and Odin recognized it (blue square under ID:COM). I added the tar.md5 file in AP, and made sure that Auto Reboot and F. Reset Time were the only boxes checked under Options. I did not make any changes to Pit. After the process completed, a green PASS! box appeared. However, when the tablet boots back up, it requires a pattern to log in. Even if I use the login pattern when using LineageOS, it doesn't work. Plus, the screen doesn't look right (see attached images). Any ideas what I'm doing wrong?
TIA.

download mode image
BTW, see image of the tablet in download mode (I took this photo after trying to flash the stock ROM a couple times). Does this matter?
And is there a way that I can unroot the device once I can get back into the stock ROM?
TIA.

dollsey74 said:
BTW, see image of the tablet in download mode (I took this photo after trying to flash the stock ROM a couple times). Does this matter?
And is there a way that I can unroot the device once I can get back into the stock ROM?
TIA.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I found that using TWRP to clear everything out first then flash with stock. Stock rom will unroot the tablet. Hope this helps.

louvass said:
I found that using TWRP to clear everything out first then flash with stock. Stock rom will unroot the tablet. Hope this helps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! So should I flash TWRP first and wipe and then flash stock? Any place I can find instructions so that I don't screw this up?

dollsey74 said:
Thanks! So should I flash TWRP first and wipe and then flash stock? Any place I can find instructions so that I don't screw this up?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes flash TWRP first make sure to wipe everything off tablet, then flash stock. Just search TWRP install you should find something on it, use odin flash TWRP reboot to TRWP recovery then wipe everything then flash stock.

louvass said:
Yes flash TWRP first make sure to wipe everything off tablet, then flash stock. Just search TWRP install you should find something on it, use odin flash TWRP reboot to TRWP recovery then wipe everything then flash stock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! Much appreciated!