So, i've ran into many errors on my phone from sboot.bin and a NAND Write Start fail.....but fixed that somehow but manuvering a pullout battery move more like just a mash start button to flash the PIT file and it worked but now its just switched to just another proble which being ...
Me flashing thru ODIN the official stock tar of PB6 or When done flashing the Rev02 MM tar FW
and i result in success BUT
it immedately restarts and i can tell it's trying to go to the Updates screen with light or baby blue text, but gives me a quick yellow triangle and angle android with X covered on its eyes.
BUt it goe's straight into its stock recovery to just tell me that it (can't mount /efs / data )and anything else,
i then try to wipe it and it just say it can't since it's unmounted, thru stock recovery.
If i just click on reboot system now
it cycles but then heads straight into stock recovery,
to tell me unable to mount /efs (invalid arguement)
So, P86 and PD2 Stock FW , flashes completely, i see the Glaxy S6 Logo but then it goes from that baby blue screen to a
rushed right into stock recovery, yelling at me for failure to mount efs.
I'm not entirely sure what to do, i am able to flash TWRP and format to mount the partitions data,cache, dalvik and it's fine but when trying to boot it just gives me a black screen and blue led cycle.....i even waited a full 2 hours....
is there any fixes or suggestions?
i've tried other cables and computers same issue.
Once in recovery i just hit reboot to system, it gives me a blank screen and endless bluelight cycle led
i've tried the PB6 Customs Rom Renegae ,ti flashses completey except i noticed something for it not completed a boot image or something? so im wondering about that
I've tried the other stock tars which are md5 validated and not damaged a.k.a OJ7, OL1, PB6, PD2
OL1 flashes fine, says erasing and then
the device still could not boot past the Samsung boot logo, kept restarting frequently
and others have me just going straight into recovery.
Your EFS partition needs to be rebuilt. Samsung implemented security called DRK if the /efs is tampered with, it wont boot past the galaxy screen. You need someone with an unlock box to fix it.
Actually my problem is now Fixed Thank you guys So much for the support you could provided with my silly act of trying to get support for more nonsense... MAKE SURE TO DO A NANDROID BACKUP And EFS BACKUP from the apps or forums here, definetly saved me so much from here.
So here's my solution i know that not all have insurance and etc BUT this is what happened today...
So i talked to a Sprint Live Chat about my Phone and they proceeded for me to do a Hard Reset which is mainstream for trying to fix my phone. So i proceeded and it did nothing.
So, today i went to the store And I proceeded with my gimmick of (trying to install an OTA update through the service and it didn't work, then tried with Samsung Kies or something and that didn't work either) The consultant took my phone and number to verify, spoke to a tech that took about an hour and with a final answer said the issue was that ( The device is going straight to the bootloader and even after selecting a reset it is not going passed the bootloader )
so in my case they don't know I used a custom thing to wipe everything and accientlly wipe the efs which is a good thing ~
so i played dumb and they repsonded with me for the information i gave them that i do have warrenty and insurance so I'm covered with the TEP Plan or whatever plan and paid 0.00$ FREE basically ,not even a co-pay....all they said really was if i was interested in switching data plans and etc about their accessories usual consultant talk and that if i didnt have the insurance it would've been a minimum of 75$ to 100$ so since this one time this has happened the next is also free from the 2 that they offer within that 1 year. but aftewards i'd have to pay 100 or 200$ for it.
So, ironically i got this phone when it came out in April of last year and ironically messes up by that same time, so as of the next few days i'm getting a replacement or a new galaxy s6 same version everything and new sim card on Monday and they will establish the new phone as this one is defective... So thank you guys
As another note before you take it in to the Store, make sure ( if you used the phone to wipe it ) With TWRP go to Wipe Data/cache/ then advanced and select everything but OTG and then select format data and from there install the Official 6.0.1 stock tar or mine was the PB6 tar and let it do it's thing, and then power it off and then -proceed with the same story - essentially i got the same responses....dm-verify failed and etc. at the bottom of recovery.
Related
I was updating some apps in the market, as suddenly the phone reboots without any warnings.
OK, **** happens i thought and let it boot. But now the phone starts the ROMs boot animation for about 4-5 seconds and then reboots over and over again.
I pulled the battery and started into recovery. I made a nandroid and wiped cache and dalvik. Reboot with same behavior.
Recovery again: wiped everything and flashed a new AOKP M3 - result: reboot and loop again
Back to recovery: tried to flash the before made nandroid - MD5 checksum error
Flashed an older nandroid and got boot loops again.
So, i think this piece is for the service now...
What is the best way to reset this GN? Using ToolKit to put back stock recovery and lock the bootloader? Or should i try something else?
Update:
Flashed Stock Google Image via ToolKit 5.4 and after that the phone is booting normal?!?
I reflashed the touch recovery and pushed the AOKP build 27 back to the phone and flashed it.
So far so good - I have to start from the bottom now, because flashing the stock rom wiped the whole phone and EVERYTHING on sdcard is gone
Do you think there is a hardware failure? Perhaps some sort of memory malfunktion or something like that?
Same thing just happened to me, thi is the second time
lighthammerhh said:
I was updating some apps in the market, as suddenly the phone reboots without any warnings.
OK, **** happens i thought and let it boot. But now the phone starts the ROMs boot animation for about 4-5 seconds and then reboots over and over again.
I pulled the battery and started into recovery. I made a nandroid and wiped cache and dalvik. Reboot with same behavior.
Recovery again: wiped everything and flashed a new AOKP M3 - result: reboot and loop again
Back to recovery: tried to flash the before made nandroid - MD5 checksum error
Flashed an older nandroid and got boot loops again.
So, i think this piece is for the service now...
What is the best way to reset this GN? Using ToolKit to put back stock recovery and lock the bootloader? Or should i try something else?
Update:
Flashed Stock Google Image via ToolKit 5.4 and after that the phone is booting normal?!?
I reflashed the touch recovery and pushed the AOKP build 27 back to the phone and flashed it.
So far so good - I have to start from the bottom now, because flashing the stock rom wiped the whole phone and EVERYTHING on sdcard is gone
Do you think there is a hardware failure? Perhaps some sort of memory malfunktion or something like that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Firstly when you get bootloops or any other problem do NOT do a nandroid as it backs up EVERYTHING, including the problem.
When you "wiped everything" did you go to mounts and storage and format system, cache and data?
If not then you didn't do a proper full wipe.
This is my own experience, but I want to warn you guys. I had a similar problem with my GNex. The first time it happened, my phone rebooted itself every 5 seconds. I completely restored it using factory image and it ran fine for 3 weeks, then one day, the phone just rebooted itself and got stuck at the boot image. I had to factory reset it again to make it work.
After the second time, I called Samsung and sent it in for repair last week. They are shipping me a replacement unit. It seems the problem was hardware related.
econometrician said:
This is my own experience, but I want to warn you guys. I had a similar problem with my GNex. The first time it happened, my phone rebooted itself every 5 seconds. I completely restored it using factory image and it ran fine for 3 weeks, then one day, the phone just rebooted itself and got stuck at the boot image. I had to factory reset it again to make it work.
After the second time, I called Samsung and sent it in for repair last week. They are shipping me a replacement unit. It seems the problem was hardware related.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For 3 weeks... exactly 3 weeks, 21 days?
I can tell you that my first boot loop brick was 20 days after I bought the phone. The second was later that day. But the third one was... again, 20 days after the last successful restore. Is there something magical about the 3-week mark???
I am currently taking nightly nandroid backups, so when I had my third boot loop brick my backup was just under a day old. If this is ultimately a hardware problem that can be warrantied, I guess I'll have to try that next time. I would have to make sure I return it with the bootloader locked, stock recovery, but without the wipe because it has to still be boot looping to prove there's an issue!
Anyway, things I will point out:
- It's the complete wipe in bootloader that blanks the internal storage.
- If you have CWM installed, you can back up the internal storage over USB via adb pull /sdcard/ ./sdcard/ (correct me if I got the syntax wrong)
- When the boot loop brick has happened, CWM is not capable of properly reformatting or restoring to the data partition. I have not found a way to repair it without blanking /sdcard (which on the GN is actually in /data/media), so if you don't want to lose those files the only way to keep them is to pipe them out, blank the phone, and then pipe them back in afterwards.
- After a complete wipe in bootloader (either by flashing userdata.img or by relocking/unlocking bootloader), you must boot the phone once into the OS in order to complete the reformatting of /data. If you try booting straight into recovery after a wipe in the bootloader, CWM cannot read or write from that partition.
Can't say for sure whether it's exactly 21 days but it's definitely around 3 weeks. Why don't u give Samsung a call? The phone is not supposed to behave this way. Plenty of people don't have this problem. My wild guess is that the internal flash memory is faulty.
econometrician said:
Can't say for sure whether it's exactly 21 days but it's definitely around 3 weeks. Why don't u give Samsung a call? The phone is not supposed to behave this way. Plenty of people don't have this problem. My wild guess is that the internal flash memory is faulty.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll warranty it through my carrier next time as they do exchanges on site. The trouble is, once I've recovered the phone, there's no evidence of the problem anymore. The best way to prove it is to show it fritzing out.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk
I think this is a known problem. You shouldn't have to prove it to them. They should be aware of it.
It bricked again today so I warrantied it in-store at my carrier. They gave me a brand new one after being unable to find a solution when fiddling with it. As a bonus, all the little hairline scratches on my screen are gone too
The store guy said he's never seen this issue, and it's one of only two warranty locations for my carrier in the Vancouver area. So I can only hope this was a rare hardware problem and not something that pervades every GN they're going to sell.
I can tell this one is from a different batch because it came preloaded with 4.0.2.
Good for you. hopefully my new phone will behave
HOW IT STARTED
Yesterday I noticed that my phone was off. I connected the charger and found that it was still half full. I turned the phone on and it worked normally. After an hour I noticed that my phone was off again. I tried turning it on but it only reached the SAMSUNG animation and animated it indefinitely.
A month ago or so I received a notification in the notification bar about refreshment of security policies. Since my phone was rooted, I did not want to apply them because I was afraid that it would kick Knox back in. Then a couple of weeks ago I received a new notification about a new software update from Samsung. At first, I did not want to install that one either. But a couple of days ago I thought what the heck, let's try it and agreed to install it. I left it to install in the background and forgot about it.
WHAT I DID
First I rebooted into recovery (TWRP) and did all wipes. While doing them, TWRP complained that some of them could not me completed. I rebooted and saw that this wiping did not have any effect on the issue.
Then I rebooted back into recovery and did wiping again. This time I noticed that when I ordered a reboot from TWRP, it confirmed me if I was sure because there was no OS installed. I found that weird but had no choice but to reboot and naturally nothing had changed: it still animated SAMSUNG indefinitely.
What else is particular is that the samsung theme melody is cut of in the middle of the animation. When I hear it being cut of I already know: that boot attempt will never end.
Then I downloaded and flashed the latest stock firmware from Sammobile with ODIN. All was well in ODIN but when the phone rebooted, I once again had the opportunity to watch the word SAMSUNG indefinitely.
Then I tried downloading and installing the latest Kies 2 into fresh Windows 8.1 virtual machine and tried the Firmware Upgrade and Initialisation option. It asked for model and serial number and then downloaded something but then said that "This device's version cannot be updated". I then tried Kies 3 but that said that I had the wrong Kies.
WHERE I AM NOW
I tried flashing downloaded n7100_odin_efs.tar with ODIN, knowing that it would erase/overwrite my /efs partition which contains nv_data file with my IMEI code but since /efs could not be mounted anyway, there was nothing to lose. After flashing this file I successfully booted into fresh TouchWiz and saw the information in the attached screenshot.
I checked the IMEI by dialing *#06# and it was "004999010640000 / 01". I don't have a backup of nv_data and I have broken the warranty by flashing custom roms on it. How would I get my nv_data file regenerated with the correct IMEI (without purchasing special hardware or paying some guy with such a box)?
I tried a program called WRITEIMEI which should allow me to write back the correct IMEI but when I tried to read or write with this program, it only displayed "Verifying" indefinitely.
Current problems:
- Unable to fix IMEI from generic to back to what it's supposed to be (to get mobile network access back)
- Unable to get rid of this technical information banner (see the attached screenshot)
- Wifi is always off after reboot
hennot said:
HOW IT STARTED
Yesterday I noticed that my phone was off. I connected the charger and found that it was still half full. I turned the phone on and it worked normally. After an hour I noticed that my phone was off again. I tried turning it on but it only reached the SAMSUNG animation and animated it indefinitely.
A month ago or so I received a notification in the notification bar about refreshment of security policies. Since my phone was rooted, I did not want to apply them because I was afraid that it would kick Knox back in. Then a couple of weeks ago I received a new notification about a new software update from Samsung. At first, I did not want to install that one either. But a couple of days ago I thought what the heck, let's try it and agreed to install it. I left it to install in the background and forgot about it.
WHAT I DID
First I rebooted into recovery (TWRP) and did all wipes. While doing them, TWRP complained that some of them could not me completed. I rebooted and saw that this wiping did not have any effect on the issue.
Then I rebooted back into recovery and did wiping again. This time I noticed that when I ordered a reboot from TWRP, it confirmed me if I was sure because there was no OS installed. I found that weird but had no choice but to reboot and naturally nothing had changed: it still animated SAMSUNG indefinitely.
What else is particular is that the samsung theme melody is cut of in the middle of the animation. When I hear it being cut of I already know: that boot attempt will never end.
Then I downloaded and flashed the latest stock firmware from Sammobile with ODIN. All was well in ODIN but when the phone rebooted, I once again had the opportunity to watch the word SAMSUNG indefinitely.
Then I tried downloading and installing the latest Kies 2 into fresh Windows 8.1 virtual machine and tried the Firmware Upgrade and Initialisation option. It asked for model and serial number and then downloaded something but then said that "This device's version cannot be updated". I then tried Kies 3 but that said that I had the wrong Kies.
WHERE I AM NOW
I tried flashing downloaded n7100_odin_efs.tar with ODIN, knowing that it would erase/overwrite my /efs partition which contains nv_data file with my IMEI code but since /efs could not be mounted anyway, there was nothing to lose. After flashing this file I successfully booted into fresh TouchWiz and saw the information in the attached screenshot.
I checked the IMEI by dialing *#06# and it was "004999010640000 / 01". I don't have a backup of nv_data and I have broken the warranty by flashing custom roms on it. How would I get my nv_data file regenerated with the correct IMEI (without purchasing special hardware or paying some guy with such a box)?
I tried a program called WRITEIMEI which should allow me to write back the correct IMEI but when I tried to read or write with this program, it only displayed "Verifying" indefinitely.
Current problems:
- Unable to fix IMEI from generic to back to what it's supposed to be (to get mobile network access back)
- Unable to get rid of this technical information banner (see the attached screenshot)
- Wifi is always off after reboot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To be honest, if I were you I'll just flash a .pit file to erase everything off the phone (and to erase any errors). After doing so, flash a stock ROM (before 4.3) or a custom ROM, preferably a AOSP ROM. This (might) solve your IMEI issue. (It did for me anyways) (The information banner looks like something from factory mode or something like that, not exactly sure.)
N7105 rocking AOSB with AGNi kernel,
Click "Thanks" if I was of any help!
The issue was resolved by taking the phone to a mobile phone repair service which took €35 and returned the device with a functional IMEI.
Hi,
This morning I woke up to see my phone seemingly booting up but after a few minutes I realised that it was stuck on the boot screen. I can only assume something hardware or software related messed up while I was sleeping and now after reading a few threads I am very scared that my phone could possibly be bricked.
First up, I updated to 4.3 from 4.1.2 about 3 weeks and it has been running fine albeit a few annoyances at the new firmware Samsung deployed. To get root I had to install philz_touch_5.11.2 recovery through ODIN and then go into my new recovery to install root through Dr Ketan's Multi Tool which seemed to work well with no problems, it was quite flawless through the whole update. But now I guess something has happened to my phone and that has changed. When I saw it was stuck, I thought that it would be possible to just reflash to stock firmware and that would fix it. It was working up until the point ODIN got "cache.img" which failed the install. Now, I exited ODIN since it didn't work and restarted my phone and tried to flash the stock 4.3 ROM again. This time, immediately I got a screen telling me that there was "no PIT partition"
(Look at the attachment for the screen, I am new so no outside links)
and now I am getting the message on my phone after restarting "Firmware upgrade encountered an issue. Please select recovery mode in Kies & try again." I am now downloading Kies to try this but does anyone have any suggestions or solutions?
GoonReb0rn said:
Hi,
This morning I woke up to see my phone seemingly booting up but after a few minutes I realised that it was stuck on the boot screen. I can only assume something hardware or software related messed up while I was sleeping and now after reading a few threads I am very scared that my phone could possibly be bricked.
First up, I updated to 4.3 from 4.1.2 about 3 weeks and it has been running fine albeit a few annoyances at the new firmware Samsung deployed. To get root I had to install philz_touch_5.11.2 recovery through ODIN and then go into my new recovery to install root through Dr Ketan's Multi Tool which seemed to work well with no problems, it was quite flawless through the whole update. But now I guess something has happened to my phone and that has changed. When I saw it was stuck, I thought that it would be possible to just reflash to stock firmware and that would fix it. It was working up until the point ODIN got "cache.img" which failed the install. Now, I exited ODIN since it didn't work and restarted my phone and tried to flash the stock 4.3 ROM again. This time, immediately I got a screen telling me that there was "no PIT partition"
(Look at the attachment for the screen, I am new so no outside links)
and now I am getting the message on my phone after restarting "Firmware upgrade encountered an issue. Please select recovery mode in Kies & try again." I am now downloading Kies to try this but does anyone have any suggestions or solutions?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Update: I spent the past two days trying to solve this and I'm at a standstill in progress. It seems that my phone was one that suffered SDS with a corrupt eMMC chip so I've lost both my firmware and recovery but I can still get into Download mode. It also seems like I have lost my PIT table and I am just completely unable to flash the PIT file back to the phone for some reason. Does anyone have any ideas on how I could just factory reset my phone or reinstall my partition table so that i can get a simple recovery installed? Please help
Exact same issue!
I know exactly what you are going through!
My phone did the exact same thing back in June. It downloaded the firmware update over wifi, then when it went to install, it restarted to the boot logo, and went no further. I had left it for a number of hours, so time doesn't seem to make any difference.
I've been working on it since the end of July, and haven't been able to find a solution yet.
dkinniburgh said:
I know exactly what you are going through!
My phone did the exact same thing back in June. It downloaded the firmware update over wifi, then when it went to install, it restarted to the boot logo, and went no further. I had left it for a number of hours, so time doesn't seem to make any difference.
I've been working on it since the end of July, and haven't been able to find a solution yet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, it doesn't seem like time would fix it, so frustrating. Right now I am getting the glass of my Note replaced (it has a slight crack) which apparently voids my warranty when I went into my carrier to organise a replacement. After it's repaired I will take it to another store and try to get it sent off to Samsung, hopefully they are understanding about it and will honour their warranty end as I do believe it was SDS so it would be their fault for using faulty eMMC chips. The only thing I wish I could do it just start over, flash the PIT file so I can just install CWM to see if any of my files are still there. I just want some peace of mind and it seems impossible at this point. I guess it is impossible to flash a PIT when the storage chip is corrupt, sucks to lose all my messages and data, just wish I had a backup in place but it is a good learning experience for the next time I have a functioning phone.
GoonReb0rn said:
Yeah, it doesn't seem like time would fix it, so frustrating. Right now I am getting the glass of my Note replaced (it has a slight crack) which apparently voids my warranty when I went into my carrier to organise a replacement. After it's repaired I will take it to another store and try to get it sent off to Samsung, hopefully they are understanding about it and will honour their warranty end as I do believe it was SDS so it would be their fault for using faulty eMMC chips. The only thing I wish I could do it just start over, flash the PIT file so I can just install CWM to see if any of my files are still there. I just want some peace of mind and it seems impossible at this point. I guess it is impossible to flash a PIT when the storage chip is corrupt, sucks to lose all my messages and data, just wish I had a backup in place but it is a good learning experience for the next time I have a functioning phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was lucky having most of my info already backed up. I also had just upgraded another line, so I had a new phone to work with. It just sucks having to switch everything over to a new phone, reloading all the apps etc.
So my issue is pretty similar, see what you guys think. i been trying everything i can think of.
i updated from xtrestolite 2.1 to 2.2 with out wiping. everything worked fine except when i would make calls, the other people could not hear me. so i updated the bootloader and modem again (i had done it before) and the problem persisted. i flashed back to stock and was getting stuck at the s6 edge screen. the only way to get around this was and get my phone to boot was to flash aou kernel. i was still having a similar issue with calling so I download a modem from a diffrent server and all of a sudden, it was working again on stock firmware... AWESOME!
now that i had all that done and my phone working as it should, i reset my phone for the first time and i got the FRP lock, wont boot phone because custom kernel. GREAT
I then flashed stock of6 again, the tar ball, and the 4 piece version. no dice
i then found of8, tried to flash that still no dice.
id love to flash twrp and load a rom on, but FRP is a alsjdflajs.
the phone will flash successfully, but upon reboot, it will go into recovery, run its course, reboot, and get stuck that the galaxy s6 edge screen.
i use the vol and power click during recovery to see what its doing and everything seems to go fine. it will then say failed to mount /data. im hoping flashing this with the pit file will work, but i cannot download the pit file from my work computer (hahah its blocks on 4shard and mega).
anyone have any other advice? i will update if i figure it out.
Regards team,
-Mad
p.s. none of this is xtrestolite's fault, that rom has been nothing but good to me.. my phone has been picky though. after 5.1.1 i had to flash a custom kernel in order for the digitizer to function properly.... any help is appriciated guys.
SO UPDATE!
nothing good, i tried the pit with of6 and of8, no dice. still stuck.
anyone got a s6 edge w a broken screen? you can claim it lost for all i care.
no one?
i guess if anything past flash stock firmware people dont know? was hoping for alittle more insight.
im sure if i could flash a kernel i could get it to turn on, but FRP has be at bay...
no help for you bro...Samsung just needs to release there software fixing for this comunity...I'm looking a for a dev to answer my question in this section about just flashing zip files in twrp instead of using odin or whatever other methods that can avoid all these problems that are all similar...hopefully in next few months it will be addressed
Hey mate, try this...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=61531848
Sent from my SM-G925T using Tapatalk 2
holy... fu34%# /S45it.... IT BOOT?!
after flashing every firmware 100000 times...
THANK YOU!
I initially used odin to flash OI1 update, after a rom I was using caused problems and I got bootloop. It changed bootloader value to b:3 and I'm unable to downgrade now so I used smart switch which didn't recognize device so used emergency recovery and still bootloop. I have factory reset and wipe cache multiple times along with adb side load and individual flashes of bootloader, modem, kernel, flashed custom kernel and twrp to access fix permissions and to mount partitions with advanced wipe etc and still wont boot past logo. Also during one fix attempt phone said can't mount system.. Idk I'm not understanding where the problem is .everything says successful but I'm still in bootloop. Please help. I've spent hours everyday for the past week searching & trying different things that seem might help so open to any suggestions.
Hi guys, bit of a saga here so bear with me...and also it should be mentioned I have little experience/understanding of tech stuff, so that isn't helpful either lol
I've had a Nexus 5x running 7.1.2 for not quite a week; it came with an unlocked bootloader (strangely). Tried to do the usual install twrp & root as I've done with previous phones (all pre-nougat) but all attempts failed. Couldn't boot into stock recovery from the bootloader at all, it would just boot into the system. OK, next thought was that an OTA upgrade to Oreo might work to restore a recovery - but got the BLOD (naturally lol). I found a fix in a modded 4-core Twrp 3.2.1 -0 fbe img + workaround injector zip from osm0sis & XCnathan32 which by some miracle worked.
So far, so good. Ffwd a few days and google play store keeps crashing on opening; I had the feeling that some glitch happened while it was updating, so I tried all the usual fixes like app cache/data wipes and uninstall updates/renistall google play, delete google account etc which failed. Next I tried a cache & data device wipe through twrp - also unsuccessful. Finally, I thought the only thing left to try would be to restore a backup I made on twrp - this led to the current issue of not booting, stuck on the google logo screen. I even thought what the hell! and attempted a factory reset with twrp - same result, where I am now. Google logo screen, however I still have an unlocked bootloader.
Would anyone be able to suggest where I might go from here? I'm pretty sure the version is N2G48C, if that helps.
Any suggestions very much appreciated...wouldn't mind getting to the 1 week mark with a functioning phone lol
Saga #2
Still no idea what's going on. I realised that I'd backed up and recovered the system and vendor .img files, which according to this thread would be a cause of the issue https://forum.xda-developers.com/nexus-6p/help/stuck-google-logo-twrp-backup-restore-t3320840/page3
So I made another backup without those images, did a full wipe and restored it - still does not boot, still only sitting on the google logo. Tried next to open a cmd terminal to see if I could reflash a stock image, but adb could not connect (maybe because the phone would have been on charging and not file transfer mode?)
Last resort as I saw it was to try the NRT, and see if it would flash stock via the bootloop/softbrick option. Process seemed to be OK, judging by the log - but it did not reboot to the system. Now there is a looping bootloop between the google logo and the unlocked bootloader warning.
Following wugfresh's instructions to factory reset from the recovery (the phone won't turn off via the power button so I just booted straight into the bootloader) Looked for the recovery option, selected....and nothing!!
So there isn't a stock recovery??? How does that work?
And what hope is there for this phone now? (I can't think of anything else )
Anyone have an idea? I've never heard of this before tbh!
Well, my problem has been sorted. In the absence of knowing what the hell I should do lol I managed to get a refund for the phone even though it was a refurb to begin with (something to be said for an honest seller who provides a 3 month warranty!) and I picked up a brand new N5x, which was unboxed on Tuesday. Not even 6 hours into setting it up, the phone started to get progressively hotter and then went into bootloop. Got into the bootloader and tried a factory reset - all seemed OK but halfway through the setup process it bootlooped again. Fortunately it was still within the 2 year warranty, and LG didn't argue about authorising a repair for a phone which didn't get even half a day's use on it lol
Authorised Wednesday, walked into the service centre Thursday and a 1 hour wait later had phone in hand with the PCB/motherboard replaced. Has been working fine (and cool!) ever since. Definitely feel lucky to have hopefully dodged a bullet on this one.
Bonus that they upgraded from 6.0 to 7.2.1 while they were at it; apparently LG considers nougat the "latest" stable version for the 5x.