Has anyone come across one of these devices in the title. It runs 5.0.2, and the full software version is AK81510A. Granted this is a tablet from a regional cell carrier (Bluegrass Cellular) but I haven't been able to find much in the way of useful information for this device. I've tried numerous methods of rooting including several one-clicks, apks, and even pulling the image and rooting the image myself in ubuntu, but couldn't get anything to work. This is my first android device that I've ever attempted to root so I suppose it's possible that I just jacked something up. Any help/advice is much appreciated!
Hi! For what it's worth, I haven't noticed anyone mention this variant/model before. Have you tried KingRoot? It's awful because it really embeds in your system deeper than people notice most of the time but if you're desperate enough. I've only used KingRoot on the VS985 G3 on 35B (5.1.1) long enough to downgrade some partitions manually in order to be able to flash any old KDZ using LG Flash Tool 2014. Besides all the privacy concerns about what KingRoot might phone home about you or your device, at least on that stock release it required re-rooting using KingRoot every time you reboot, and it needed internet to root.
Edit: At least that model appears on this website but doesn't seem to be any KDZs to restore to 100% stock in case you screw things up enough trying to root. http://devtester.ro/projects/lg-firmwares/country.php?country=United+States Type AK815 in the Search field.
Kingroot was one of the first things I tried, and it fails every time. Even attempted using Kingroot desktop program to root with no results, but then again my chinese is rusty. I was able to pull the system image, but being that I'm by no means an expert or even partially fluent in the rooting ways, have no real idea of what to do with it. Gonna keep digging. Maybe I'll make progress.
Related
Does anyone have a proven way to root this device? Can't find to much info on the net.
VK815 model Verizon
I don't have that model, but just throwing it out there. Have you tried Kingroot? The latest updates to it seem to root the latest official LG ROMs for the VS985 and VK810 - don't recall if I've seen people comment the same for the VK815. If it does work you can always use SuperSUMe to replace it with SuperSU if you'd rather.
It doesn't work with x8.5 (vk815 model). Its amazing that there is such limited information on this tablet. Probably cause it's Verizon exclusive
Working root for VK815
Just used the method in this thread about 3 weeks ago, and it worked. It's a bit painful, especially if you're not familiar with Linux (I am not), but I made it work after several hours of tinkering. You will need a computer running Linux, or a virtual machine running Linux, unless you just want to use the stock rooted 11A OTA that the OP uploaded to the thread. Personally, I didn't want to lose all of my settings and such from my pre-root days, so I copied my system.img from my device and ran the root inject program.
I've been on this forum for roughly a week looking through articles and I'm seriously confused at this.
I have a Samsung Verizon note 4 on Lollipop
Baseband N910VVRU2BOG5
I'm trying to either downgrade it, root it, etc. Everything I've tried just sends me in circles. I get theres no perma-root method, but can I do anything at this point?
DikStarrbuck said:
I've been on this forum for roughly a week looking through articles and I'm seriously confused at this.
I have a Samsung Verizon note 4 on Lollipop
Baseband N910VVRU2BOG5
I'm trying to either downgrade it, root it, etc. Everything I've tried just sends me in circles. I get theres no perma-root method, but can I do anything at this point?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It depends on what you want to do, as there are ways around doing certain things that usually require a rooted device. For instance, if you want to back up your apps and their data, there's an app called Helium that works on non-rooted devices.
will4958 said:
It depends on what you want to do, as there are ways around doing certain things that usually require a rooted device. For instance, if you want to back up your apps and their data, there's an app called Helium that works on non-rooted devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Right now, what I really want to do is 'block' mock locations check. But I cannot figure out how to downgrade my phone, if its even possible. And I cant root my phone. I have tried Kingroot, but it said my phone wasnt rootable yet. But I read somewhere I can downgrade my phone to a rootable OS, but that didnt work either, so I dunno what I can do.
DikStarrbuck said:
Right now, what I really want to do is 'block' mock locations check. But I cannot figure out how to downgrade my phone, if its even possible. And I cant root my phone. I have tried Kingroot, but it said my phone wasnt rootable yet. But I read somewhere I can downgrade my phone to a rootable OS, but that didnt work either, so I dunno what I can do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, unless you updated to a version of Lollipop using one of the safe update options mentioned in one of the threads, you can't downgrade to a previous version. There is a program called Debloater, I believe, that will block any app you want on your phone, but you still can't uninstall said app. All the program does is essentially disable the blocked app from running. For instance, when I didn't want my phone automatically checking for system updates, I would use Debloater to block the two apps on the phone that are required for it to perform those automatic checks. All you do is start Debloater on your computer, plug your phone into a USB port, set the phone to 'Media Device', and wait for the program to recognize the device. Once it does, just select the app(s) you want to block. Just out of curiosity, though, what version of Lollipop are you currently running? If you're on 5.0.1, I can understand why you don't want to stay there. I was on it for a little while, but only as a pit stop on my way to 5.1.1. I can say with assurance that after running my phone on 5.1.1 for at least a couple weeks or more, it runs very smoothly, even better than it did on 4.4.4, which was supposed to be better than 5.0.1 as far as performance goes. My battery lasts about as long as it did on Kit Kat, and I haven't experienced any crazy overheating issues.
I had 5.1.1 installed. Couldn't get KingRoot to give temp root (lots of people say you can only do it on 4.4.4, lots of other people say they got it to work on 5.1.1 if you read around).
So I tried downgrading to 4.4.4. Odin failed every time.
So I tried downgrading to 5.0.1. That worked. But kingroot still was unable to get root.
I then found King O Root. Tried that once, no luck. Tried it a 2nd time, and success. I then ran the samsund_fix file. And it changed my CID.
But then you have to restart the phone and run the fix file again.
I have run king o root (and tried kingroot) each at least 30 times now. And I can't get either to give me root access again. I've even tried the desktop version of king o root. Nothing.
I'm SOOO close I feel. But I can't get that last step. Its killing me.
Can anyone help with where to go next?
I figure either 1) I have to find a way to get temporary root one more time. OR 2) find a way to get down to kitkat 4.4.4 to get temporary root.
One other quick question, is the reason I can't get to 4.4.4 because I upgraded all the way to 5.1.1? EVERYTHING I read says 'yeah you can downgrade' but mine won't downgrade. Odin fails with an error So how do I get to 4.4.4? Am I just screwed?
NAND Write Start!
boot.img
FAIL! (Auth)
Are you sure you have to push the file again?
Sometimes it doesn't take and you need to push it again. The last couple of times I unlocked it went on the first try. Go into download mode and see if it says "developer mode."
I was able to unlock on 5.1.1. Kingroot and Kingoroot are extremely unstable besides being Chinese software with all of the risks that entails. There is supposedly a PC version of one of them (shudder) that is allegedly a bit more stable.
Where are you getting the firmware you're trying to use to downgrade?
douger1957 said:
Are you sure you have to push the file again?
Sometimes it doesn't take and you need to push it again. The last couple of times I unlocked it went on the first try. Go into download mode and see if it says "developer mode."
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I'm not 100% sure I have to push the file again. I know when I ran the fix file in adb shell the first time, it said I have to run the fix script again. And then when I boot into download mode, I see nothing that says "developer mode".
But, on the other hand. When I check with the eMMC Brickbug checker thing. That says the CID did change according to what the samsung_fix script said it changed it to.
So I *think* the CID changed? But I don't have developer mode. So I think I need to run the fix script again to finish the job.
douger1957 said:
I was able to unlock on 5.1.1. Kingroot and Kingoroot are extremely unstable besides being Chinese software with all of the risks that entails. There is supposedly a PC version of one of them (shudder) that is allegedly a bit more stable.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I actually tried a PC version of kingoroot. It also failed numerous times.
douger1957 said:
Where are you getting the firmware you're trying to use to downgrade?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm getting it from androidfilehost.
https://www.androidfilehost.com/?w=search&s=n910v
That's where I got the 5.0.1 version that worked when I went from 5.1.1 to 5.0.1. But I guess I could try finding a 4.4.4 version from somewhere else. I don't know where though.
It passes md5 check in odin. Though I'm not sure that means much.
nertskull said:
So I'm not 100% sure I have to push the file again. I know when I ran the fix file in adb shell the first time, it said I have to run the fix script again. And then when I boot into download mode, I see nothing that says "developer mode".
But, on the other hand. When I check with the eMMC Brickbug checker thing. That says the CID did change according to what the samsung_fix script said it changed it to.
So I *think* the CID changed? But I don't have developer mode. So I think I need to run the fix script again to finish the job.
I actually tried a PC version of kingoroot. It also failed numerous times.
I'm getting it from androidfilehost.
https://www.androidfilehost.com/?w=search&s=n910v
That's where I got the 5.0.1 version that worked when I went from 5.1.1 to 5.0.1. But I guess I could try finding a 4.4.4 version from somewhere else. I don't know where though.
It passes md5 check in odin. Though I'm not sure that means much.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This may be your problem. I don't think you can flash a rooted ROM with a locked bootloader with success. Try this one. (Thanks, @hsbadr!) It's the OEM firmware. This will mean that you'll need to start from scratch. I should note that another poster has had trouble flashing this firmware although other posters including myself have used it successfully.
@hsbadr has a repository of firmwares. What you're looking for is the full firmware. Sammobile is another source of firmware, but they're terribly slow to download from.
douger1957 said:
This may be your problem. I don't think you can flash a rooted ROM with a locked bootloader with success. Try this one. (Thanks, @hsbadr!) It's the OEM firmware. This will mean that you'll need to start from scratch. I should note that another poster has had trouble flashing this firmware although other posters including myself have used it successfully.
@hsbadr has a repository of firmwares. What you're looking for is the full firmware. Sammobile is another source of firmware, but they're terribly slow to download from.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried that firmware you linked to. That took me back to 5.1.1. I tried kingroot and kingoroot, and still no luck. After 8 or 9 tries each, I still can't get temproot.
I thought it would be better to go back to 4.4.4, and looked through hsbadr's list of roms you linked me to. I tried both of the 4.4.4 full firmwares (NJ5 and NI1) and both fail on odin.
It would seem to me I'm never getting back to 4.4.4/kitkat am I?
Should I just keep running kingroot/kingoroot until I can get temp root? I ran kingoroot at least 30 times last night on 5.0.1 and never got root again. I really don't understand why I could get it once but never again.
Should I try running it a million times on 5.1.1 where I now am again? Or should I go back to 5.0.1? Is there any other way to get temporary root?
nertskull said:
I tried that firmware you linked to. That took me back to 5.1.1. I tried kingroot and kingoroot, and still no luck. After 8 or 9 tries each, I still can't get temproot.
I thought it would be better to go back to 4.4.4, and looked through hsbadr's list of roms you linked me to. I tried both of the 4.4.4 full firmwares (NJ5 and NI1) and both fail on odin.
It would seem to me I'm never getting back to 4.4.4/kitkat am I?
Should I just keep running kingroot/kingoroot until I can get temp root? I ran kingoroot at least 30 times last night on 5.0.1 and never got root again. I really don't understand why I could get it once but never again.
Should I try running it a million times on 5.1.1 where I now am again? Or should I go back to 5.0.1? Is there any other way to get temporary root?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was able to unlock my bootloader twice on 5.1.1. I used Kingroot to unlock Lollipop and Kingoroot to unlock Marshmallow. See if you can find an older version of either root methods. I think I remember reading somewhere that the newer version is flakier than the older stuff. I'm fairly convinced that the rooted ROM you flashed is part of the problem.
As I said, Kingroot and Kingoroot are highly unstable. You may need to spend quite a bit of time in multiple attempts. It comes down to how badly do you want root?
douger1957 said:
I was able to unlock my bootloader twice on 5.1.1. I used Kingroot to unlock Lollipop and Kingoroot to unlock Marshmallow. See if you can find an older version of either root methods. I think I remember reading somewhere that the newer version is flakier than the older stuff. I'm fairly convinced that the rooted ROM you flashed is part of the problem.
As I said, Kingroot and Kingoroot are highly unstable. You may need to spend quite a bit of time in multiple attempts. It comes down to how badly do you want root?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Holy success. I have no idea why. But after rebooting the phone for the umpteenth time and running kingoroot another 20 times. It finally gave me another successful temp root, this time while on 5.1.1.
I ran the script again, and now when I got into download mode, I have Mode: Developer showing. Hooray.
BUT....then bootloops. I couldn't get it started.
I then accidentally wiped everything, completely wiped. No operating system according to twrp.
So I looked around, and it appears JasmineRom and CM13 by hsbadr are mentioned as good custom ROMs. So I grabbed CM13, used twrp to install it. And success. I have a working phone. At least, for the past couple minutes.
So a tremendous thank you for giving me some guidance.
I have two more questions for the moment though.
1) How easy/hard would it be to lose developer mode? Do I need to be careful about what roms I flash? Could I lose that? Or now that it is in developer mode, should I be pretty safe in that sticking around?
2) Can I try any Rom on it right now. There don't appear to be a lot of verizon note 4 specific roms around for this phone, because it hasn't had root for long. Will any of the other note 4 roms work? Or should I make sure to stick to only 'proven verizon' roms.
Thanks again for the help.
....
Oh, and how bad do I want root? Badly. Super badly. If I had the money I would have ditched this phone forever ago. I will never buy another phone again on the hope/promise that it will get root soon.
nertskull said:
Holy success. I have no idea why. But after rebooting the phone for the umpteenth time and running kingoroot another 20 times. It finally gave me another successful temp root, this time while on 5.1.1.
I ran the script again, and now when I got into download mode, I have Mode: Developer showing. Hooray.
BUT....then bootloops. I couldn't get it started.
I then accidentally wiped everything, completely wiped. No operating system according to twrp.
So I looked around, and it appears JasmineRom and CM13 by hsbadr are mentioned as good custom ROMs. So I grabbed CM13, used twrp to install it. And success. I have a working phone. At least, for the past couple minutes.
So a tremendous thank you for giving me some guidance.
I have two more questions for the moment though.
1) How easy/hard would it be to lose developer mode? Do I need to be careful about what roms I flash? Could I lose that? Or now that it is in developer mode, should I be pretty safe in that sticking around?
2) Can I try any Rom on it right now. There don't appear to be a lot of verizon note 4 specific roms around for this phone, because it hasn't had root for long. Will any of the other note 4 roms work? Or should I make sure to stick to only 'proven verizon' roms.
Thanks again for the help.
....
Oh, and how bad do I want root? Badly. Super badly. If I had the money I would have ditched this phone forever ago. I will never buy another phone again on the hope/promise that it will get root soon.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The only way I know to lock your bootloader is to flash an OEM firmware, take an OTA or mess with flashing bootloader without knowing what you're doing..
What you can flash depends upon which bootloader you have unlocked. Lollipop? You can flash a ROM based on a Lollipop bootloader. Jasmine 4.3 and CM 13 before 6/20 are Marshmallow ROMs based on Lollipop bootloaders. You can also run ROMs made for the N910F/G (also based on Lollipop bootloaders) if you use the proper data fix.
If you want to run a pure Marshmallow ROM, you need to do the unlock dance again. If you're interested in wifi calling, you'll need to stick with a fairly stock OEM ROM like Jasmine 6.0 or 7.0 (both versions are buried pretty deep in the thread) or PaulPizz which I haven't tried but hear good things about.
douger1957 said:
The only way I know to lock your bootloader is to flash an OEM firmware, take an OTA or mess with flashing bootloader without knowing what you're doing..
What you can flash depends upon which bootloader you have unlocked. Lollipop? You can flash a ROM based on a Lollipop bootloader. Jasmine 4.3 and CM 13 before 6/20 are Marshmallow ROMs based on Lollipop bootloaders. You can also run ROMs made for the N910F/G (also based on Lollipop bootloaders) if you use the proper data fix.
If you want to run a pure Marshmallow ROM, you need to do the unlock dance again. If you're interested in wifi calling, you'll need to stick with a fairly stock OEM ROM like Jasmine 6.0 or 7.0 (both versions are buried pretty deep in the thread) or PaulPizz which I haven't tried but hear good things about.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome. I downloaded CM13 from before the 20th and it seems to work great. I had to flash the CM13 rom and open GApps at the same time, otherwise the GApps kept crashing. But flashing them at the same time before turning on CM13 for the first time seemed to work.
Thanks for the help. Don't follow things closely enough to have known that I needed a pre 20th build.
Perhaps one more question.
Would you recommend taking the time to unlock the marshmallow bootloader? I don't need wifi calling. And I seem to be getting most of the benefits of 6.0.1 now even though using a lollipop bootloader.
I'm hesitant to try to unlock the marshmallow bootloader, because according to the instructions, it looks like I have to deal with kingroot/kingoroot again to do it. And I had such a hard time getting those to work this first time (easily 80+ tries running kingoroot) before I got temproot, that I'm not sure I want to take the risk of doing it again.
In your opinion, is it worth the risk to unlock the marshmallow bootloader? Or is running marshmallow on the lollipop bootloader reasonable enough?
Thanks
nertskull said:
Awesome. I downloaded CM13 from before the 20th and it seems to work great. I had to flash the CM13 rom and open GApps at the same time, otherwise the GApps kept crashing. But flashing them at the same time before turning on CM13 for the first time seemed to work.
Thanks for the help. Don't follow things closely enough to have known that I needed a pre 20th build.
Perhaps one more question.
Would you recommend taking the time to unlock the marshmallow bootloader? I don't need wifi calling. And I seem to be getting most of the benefits of 6.0.1 now even though using a lollipop bootloader.
I'm hesitant to try to unlock the marshmallow bootloader, because according to the instructions, it looks like I have to deal with kingroot/kingoroot again to do it. And I had such a hard time getting those to work this first time (easily 80+ tries running kingoroot) before I got temproot, that I'm not sure I want to take the risk of doing it again.
In your opinion, is it worth the risk to unlock the marshmallow bootloader? Or is running marshmallow on the lollipop bootloader reasonable enough?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a difficult question to answer and for me would boil down to whether I wanted features available in Marshmallow based ROMs or not.
Wifi calling is a nice to have feature for me but it's not really a dealbreaker. There's a bit more security baked into Marshmallow which is always nice to have.
The development atmosphere is more active over at the generic Note 4 forum. You can now get one of the super ROMs (Note/S7 combo ports) in either flavor. You'll want to stick with ROMs developed for the N910F or G models. They're international phones with fewer integration headaches for our N910V phones. To use those ROMs on our phone, you'll need a data fix most kindly provided by @louforgiveno.
My suggestion in picking a ROM is to zero in on one that seems to have the features you'd like to have and read the entire thread. Look for threads in either the General or Q&A subforums that are dedicated to answering questions about the ROM and read those, too. Some of those threads are upwards to 1,000 posts or more, you say? You'll discover what problems people have had with the ROM and the solutions or workarounds needed to overcome them. You'll also discover just how lazy many posters are either not reading thoroughly or failing to use the search function.
Final suggestions? Do a full nandroid backup before you flash anything. In TWRP, check off all of the boxes. In many of today's ROMs, you'll have a 8 to 10 gig backup file. If you can't keep that on the phone, move it to your PC. There will be far fewer tears if something goes wrong. When you flash a ROM, do a full wipe. I check off Dalvik/ART cache, system, data, and cache. For your first ROM, I would move anything that you have on internal storage off the phone and wipe internal storage too. If you have any Kingroot/Kingoroot cooties, that should clear them off the phone. When you're done flashing a ROM there's an option to wipe the cache. Do it. If you've installed a bunch or apps or deleted them, wipe the Dalvik and cache. It'll help bring the Android stars into alignment as that forces the system to optimize.
Good luck and happy flashing.
You need to go to 5.1.1 use kingOroot and then do it again. Cid will remain that's what I did. Its different for everyone these root methods are pulled from the internet and it will usually take a few time and it will try dufrrent methods of rooting
nertskull said:
I had 5.1.1 installed. Couldn't get KingRoot to give temp root (lots of people say you can only do it on 4.4.4, lots of other people say they got it to work on 5.1.1 if you read around).
So I tried downgrading to 4.4.4. Odin failed every time.
So I tried downgrading to 5.0.1. That worked. But kingroot still was unable to get root.
I then found King O Root. Tried that once, no luck. Tried it a 2nd time, and success. I then ran the samsund_fix file. And it changed my CID.
But then you have to restart the phone and run the fix file again.
I have run king o root (and tried kingroot) each at least 30 times now. And I can't get either to give me root access again. I've even tried the desktop version of king o root. Nothing.
I'm SOOO close I feel. But I can't get that last step. Its killing me.
Can anyone help with where to go next?
I figure either 1) I have to find a way to get temporary root one more time. OR 2) find a way to get down to kitkat 4.4.4 to get temporary root.
One other quick question, is the reason I can't get to 4.4.4 because I upgraded all the way to 5.1.1? EVERYTHING I read says 'yeah you can downgrade' but mine won't downgrade. Odin fails with an error So how do I get to 4.4.4? Am I just screwed?
NAND Write Start!
boot.img
FAIL! (Auth)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For me, I had to run Kingoroot from my laptop, and Kingroot never worked.
I rooted my AT&T LG G Pad 8.0 V495 right as it came in. I used Kingroot to root it and I didn't like the Kingroot manager so I switched the root access over to SuperSU and after rebooting I ended up stuck at the AT&T loading screen. I was now stuck in a boot loop and found no way out of it since I didn't have a custom recovery. I appreciate all the help that's given to me. P.S. I am fairly new to this so please mind me asking questions about something your statement has explained so I may get a better understanding of it.
chopsticks n' eggrolls said:
I rooted my AT&T LG G Pad 8.0 V495 right as it came in. I used Kingroot to root it and I didn't like the Kingroot manager so I switched the root access over to SuperSU and after rebooting I ended up stuck at the AT&T loading screen. I was now stuck in a boot loop and found no way out of it since I didn't have a custom recovery. I appreciate all the help that's given to me. P.S. I am fairly new to this so please mind me asking questions about something your statement has explained so I may get a better understanding of it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your best bet might be LG warranty service.
If you were on Lollipop before your tablet bricked, I have a thread in the General section where 1-2 people with a bricked V495 were able to flash the UK495 KDZ and everything worked except for mobile data.
But another user found that when he tried that after having bricked on the Marshmallow ROM, the display was messed up and wasn't usable.
I don't have the V495, I was just trying to help because there's been lots of people who did the same thing as you did.
So no matter whether you were on Lollipop or Marshmallow, I'm not responsible if flashing the UK495 KDZ doesn't unbrick it satisfactorily or bricks it worse. If the information helps, please thank the users I mention in my thread who did the actual work and were kind enough to report their results.
FYI, on any device its a crapshoot of you'll be successful switching from Kingroot to SuperSU. Kingroot changes often, works in a suspicious manner, and is very invasive putting stuff in the system partition that's not necessary for root.
On any device, one person can have success and the next person with the same device and setup might not.
Other Options?
roirraW "edor" ehT said:
Your best bet might be LG warranty service.
If you were on Lollipop before your tablet bricked, I have a thread in the General section where 1-2 people with a bricked V495 were able to flash the UK495 KDZ and everything worked except for mobile data.
But another user found that when he tried that after having bricked on the Marshmallow ROM, the display was messed up and wasn't usable.
I don't have the V495, I was just trying to help because there's been lots of people who did the same thing as you did.
So no matter whether you were on Lollipop or Marshmallow, I'm not responsible if flashing the UK495 KDZ doesn't unbrick it satisfactorily or bricks it worse. If the information helps, please thank the users I mention in my thread who did the actual work and were kind enough to report their results.
FYI, on any device its a crapshoot of you'll be successful switching from Kingroot to SuperSU. Kingroot changes often, works in a suspicious manner, and is very invasive putting stuff in the system partition that's not necessary for root.
On any device, one person can have success and the next person with the same device and setup might not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the info., however I would like to use the LG warranty service as a last resort. I looked online for any stock firmware(KDZ/TOT) I could flash but I ended finding nothing. I assumed that I couldn't find anything because AT&T doesn't release their firmware or it's just difficult to get a hold of. I would just want to know if there was any other options I could take before contacting LG or any KDZ/TOT files anybody has for my device they could share with me on this thread. Thanks for any help and info.
For the future
I guess once I get my device back up and running i'll just use Kingroot as a temp root since everytime I restart my device it removes the root. I'll just flash SuperSU next time and not attempt to switch root users to increase my chances of a soft brick.
This is an open discussion about the Straight Talk Galaxy S6. Here I want to discuss about possible root access along with a possibility to downgrade. Looking for any volunteers to help me with this phone.
I own a red magic 3, a G6, and an old S6 with straight talk firmware. I usually use my G6 and S6 to play around with for development purposes.
So awhile back, I managed to root my galaxy S6 straight talk with a third-party rootkit. Not long after that I wanted to upgrade this thing to marshmallow. I managed to succeed in doing it, only to be left with a useless phone.
Upon my research, you can flash an SM-S907VL firmware which appears to be a TracFone firmware for the S6. However, the 907VL appears to not support straight talk users. I attempted to downgrade back to the S906L but the strict SBoot prevents me from going back.
A half year later, I'm still messing with this phone. I want to see about finding a way to gain root access or look for any loop holes (possible exploits) that we could do with this phone. I managed to find a way to root the SM-S907VL. Here's how:
I first did some deep digging on the internet and found combination firmwares for this particular model. Combination ROMs are (what I believe are test ROMs for phones). I managed to flash a combination firmware to it. After that I rooted it with kingroot, uninstalled kingroot SU and switched to SuperSU. Then I installed Flashfire and I tried to flash the SM-S906L but no luck.
However, upon even FURTHER searching, I managed to flash the SM-S906L by ONLY flashing the system.img by extracting it from the md5 and adding it to a tar archive.
Well here is where things get complicated, since I only flashed the system, the kernel is running on a later kernel security patch. Which means rooting it with Kingroot fails. Also, the CVC and modem is still running on the SM-S907VL so even if you put a straight talk sim card into it, it won't work. Bummer
I'm wanting to see how far we can go into this phone and hopefully find a way to somehow get it unlocked somehow.
I'm all ears for y'all!
EDIT: Crap, posted in the wrong category. I should have posted in the general forum.