Bootloop at green HTC Boot Animation after trying to restore TWRP - HTC 10 Questions & Answers

Hello,
sorry if this has been mentioned anywhere before, but I wasn't able to find something similar.
So I know why way around with my old Nexus 5 in things backing up the phone with Titanium or TWRP, but since it's wifi module died on me I switchted to the HTC 10, which is kinda intimidating to me when it comes to updating to new OS or backing up. With the NExus 5 it was a walk in the park for me.
First, I don't really understand the concept of S-On and S-Off. Don't know if this is related to my problem, just wanted to mention it.
My HTC 10 is rooted, bootloader unlocked, S-On and runs on 7.0 2.41.401.41.
TWRP is the latest available version.
Before I rooted the phone I made a backup of the stock system image etc like explained in one of those "how to root the htc 10" tutorials (no writing allowed).
To root I had to allow writing onto the system partition of course.
Now, I made an TWRP backup. I backed up everything that was available in TWRP. Userdata, cache, system etc.
Few weeks ago I ran into some problems (I though I did, turned out Google App is just weird) and wanted to restore my TWRP backup.
So I did. Went to TWRP and restored the backup from my SD card.
Got no error messages during the process, but when I wanted to boot up the phone the green HTC boot animation did its thing and then froze at the HTC logo, which would result in a bootloop after ~10 minutes of waiting.
Could force the phone to go into bootloader and from there into TWRP, but that's the best I could do.
Also removed SD and SIM card trays, but that didnt do anything.
Had to factory reset and then do a backup via Titanium backup, which is better than nothing but still a pain in the a** because some things just have to be set up manually, which took me quite a while. I honestly don't want do that again anytime soon
Does anyone have an idea what could went wrong or what I did wrong during the backing up and restoring process?
Except for that, I tried to understand how to update to an upcoming version of the OS when the phone is rooted with S-On and how I could keep my userdata? On the Nexus 5 I just manually installed everything via adb except userdata.img and only had to re-root the phone afterwards. I am afraid this isn't possible with the HTC 10, am I right?

The HTC 10 forces encryption and that has broken TWRP restore for me if I try to switch between ROMs. If I switch ROMs then I have to do a full wipe / format. The one time I tried to go back to my original OS I had a similar issue and I ended up flashing the full RUU to get back to stock.
The only time I am able to restore in TWRP is if I'm returning to the same ROM that I am currently running. Even then I usually just restore the data.

Related

[Solved] Issues activating SGS3 SPH-L710 on Sprint with Custom ROM + lots of problems

Hello all!
This is my first foray into the world of custom Android systems, and I'm having a hell of a time with it... if somebody would be able to help me out, I would greatly appreciate it.
First off, the situation:
I am on Sprint, and I recently bought a Samsung Galaxy S3 (SPH-L710) from Sprint to use as a backup phone, I used it for a while on Stock, then deactivated it so I could give it to my wife. First though, I wanted to put a custom ROM on it, and experiment/play around a bit and see what this world of options could do for me. Long story short, I ended up flashing an AICP ROM, and everything seemed to go smoothly, but when I went to activate the phone on my account again and it would not work no matter what I tried (details below). I figured maybe I could activate on the stock setup then just restore my custom setup, so I tried to revert to my stock ROM backup and I couldn't do anything because I was constantly getting messages that various programs had closed... Then I tried to wipe and restore my custom ROM backup and I get stuck in a boot loop... so I tried to flash a stock recovery and I get stuck in a boot loop... I'm out of ideas here, and now I'm stuck with a phone I can't use or do anything with, and I can't activate.
Details:
The initial rooting/install process seemed to work ok, and was fairly straightforward. I followed various guides on http://galaxys3root.com/ to get my phone rooted and backed up (Don't recall which ones now, but I've read through so much by now I don't know if it matters...).
My phone:
Samsung Galaxy S3 (Sprint) SPH-L710
Modem: L710SPRDNJ2
My Desktop:
Debian Linux
Here's the steps I performed:
Rebooted phone in Odin mode
Downloaded CWM S3 Sprint Recovery from the http://galaxys3root.com/ website (can't find the link any more)
Flashed the CWM recovery using Heimdall then rebooted phone into CWM
Installed SuperSU through CWM, then rebooted
Checked that the phone was rooted successfully (it was), then ran Titanium Backup on the whole device to my SD card, then copied the backup files to my desktop computer
Rebooted into CWM, and performed a backup through CWM, then rebooted and copied the CWM backup to my desktop.
Downloaded AICP Rom for my phone from here: http://downloadandroidrom.com/file/GalaxyS3Sprint/roms/AICP/aicp_d2spr_lp-10.0-RELEASE-20150707.zip, put it on my SD card, then installed it through CWM and rebooted
At this point, I was happy with how everything was working, so I did some minor theme customizations then made another backup through CWM, and copied it to my computer, but I did NOT run Titanium this time...
After all of this, I tried to go ahead and activate it through the Sprint web service. This process failed continuously with an unhelpful error message of "Sorry, this device can't be activated right now". I then got on Chat to see if they could activate it manually, and then the problems began. They did their thing activating the phone, but when I booted up I got no data connectivity, and couldn't make calls, and the SIM was not changing over to the new number. I was on the chat with them for over an hour trying to get the situation resolved, but that finally ended when they started asking me to punch in ## codes, because I discovered that none of them worked on my custom ROM. Some quick research told me that this was non-trivial to get around so I had them switch everything back and I started researching the issue.
I found this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1626638&highlight=sph-l710 that looked like it would let me do what I needed from the custom ROM, but I couldn't tell if it would fix my problem for sure, so I figured "I'll just restore my stock setup from that backup I took, activate it and update, then start over". This is when things got really frustrating...
First I rebooted into CWM, went to 'backup/restore', and restored my stock backup
Rebooted, and as soon as I got past the lock screen, I get inundated with messages of various apps being closed unexpectedly.
I researched a bit, discovered the issue may be caused by stale dalvik cache, so I rebooted into CWM, cleared the dalvik cache, formatted the /cache partition, then tried to restore the stock backup again, but this time I get stuck in a boot loop.
I then rebooted into CWM, tried to restore the backup of my AICP ROM, only to be stuck in a boot loop as well.
Trying to get into any usable system, I rebooted to CWM, cleared dalvik cache, then formatted /cache, /data, and /system just to be sure, and re-flashed the base AICP ROM I started with. This worked fine, and before long I had stock AICP back
Since I still couldn't get the phone to activate in the custom ROM, and my backups are apparently completely useless, I rebooted into CWM, wiped dalvik, /cache, /data, and /system again and tried to install a different stock ROM I found in the XDA forums (here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-s3-sprint/development/stock-rom-4-4-2-t3010642) only to be greeted by another bootloop
At this point I've spent well over 24 man-hours trying to get this to work, reading, researching, flashing, etc all to no avail. Nothing I do seems to work, and it seems like every article, tutorial, or forum thread I read either has nothing to do with my device, is too old, or doesn't describe my problem.
I'm at wits end, and am so frustrated I'm ready to just give up and smash this device and buy a new one... My questions to the community are as follows:
I know I screwed up on a couple of things, but in my initial research of doing this there was no indication that these were even things I needed to watch out for... Is there any more organized sources of information for doing this sort of thing?
Does anybody else out there use Sprint on a custom ROM, and if so how you you pull this off
Where else have I screwed up, and how can I fix this situation? (My end goal is still to get the S3 onto Sprint with a custom ROM)
What can I do differently next time? I would like to figure this out and do it to other phones and devices I have, but if it's this much trouble every time, I just don't have the time to mess with it.
Thank you in advance, and I appreciate any information that the community can provide.
This sounds like a CWM problem to me. If I were you, I'd boot the phone into Odin Mode and flash TWRP ( www.twrp.me ) then try flashing the latest aicp nightly downloaded from the official site ( www.aicp-rom.com ). Check the md5sums on everything! Then maybe try flashing a touchwiz ROM and activating your phone. Remember that you need to wipe the internal storage when you go between KitKat and lollipop.
I'm fairly certain you have to do activation with the stock Touchwiz roms -- once the phone is activated you can flash a custom.
You should go into recovery and wipe everything (System/data/etc) EXCEPT for the External SD Card
Power off - pull the battery for a few - power on directly into download mode
Odin NJ2 back onto the phone and reboot and activate it (skip through most of the setup since you'll flash a custom after)
Once you know it's activated and working under the stock Touchwiz, then again power off and Odin TWRP recovery
Then you can go back into recovery, wipe everything except External SD, and flash the custom rom back on.
Looks like swapping CWM for TWRP did the trick.
Flashed TWRP no problems, and put CleanBean on there to get the phone activated. Still wouldn't work automatically over the Sprint website, but I got on chat with them and they fixed me right up. Downloading a fresh copy of AICP now...
Is it worth it to keep the CWM backups I made earlier, or should I just go ahead and flush them? I figured just get rid of them since restoring them wasn't working anyway, but I figured I would ask.
Now to move all the data over to the new phone. Thanks so much for your help guys!
afarris01 said:
Looks like swapping CWM for TWRP did the trick.
Flashed TWRP no problems, and put CleanBean on there to get the phone activated. Still wouldn't work automatically over the Sprint website, but I got on chat with them and they fixed me right up. Downloading a fresh copy of AICP now...
Is it worth it to keep the CWM backups I made earlier, or should I just go ahead and flush them? I figured just get rid of them since restoring them wasn't working anyway, but I figured I would ask.
Now to move all the data over to the new phone. Thanks so much for your help guys!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Get rid of them. TWRP can't restore CWM even if the backup is good

phone says its full?

Hey guys Im running stock rooted and for some reason my phone SD is saying im full. I have literally nothing on it. Any ideas?
I tried once to install a ROM but it borked so I went back to a backup I had and it was fine.
Via windows it says my SD only has around 8 gigs used but android is saying 24?!?!?!?
WTF MATE?
Try wiping userdata in twrp.
Illogi.xbone said:
Try wiping userdata in twrp.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks, I was about to try and just redo the device with a ROM. Clear cahces and such.
I was actually wrong, every time I go into the phone in windows its giving me different storage use #'s. One time its 8 then 17 then 23 then 9. its weird. I think when I tried dirty flashing it just screwed it all up. I have nothing on the SD I care about really so maybe Ill just back up what I want (TWRP backup and titanium apps) and start from scratch if I Cant solve this.
That might be the best. Try backing up to an OTG then completely wiping and installing a fresh ROM. After backing up apps and such.
ugh IM having trouble using any roms on my 5x. No matter the way I install the phone always boots to "internal problem with device"
Ive tried installing different roms (I only like stock style ones) and the vendor.zip and it just doesnt work for me. Ive gone back to my backup for the moment until I figure this out. Never had these issues with my nexus 5
this is odd now my pattern no longer work since my restore back to my TWRP backup! GOD DAKNIT!
let me do the start patttern fine for android then when unlocing the phone it tells me "pattern needed to start device"
what the hell man!
tevil said:
this is odd now my pattern no longer work since my restore back to my TWRP backup! GOD DAKNIT!
let me do the start patttern fine for android then when unlocing the phone it tells me "pattern needed to start device"
what the hell man!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try 1st: Completely wipe device, System, data etc. Including Internal Storage and flash a new rom. If that does not fix the issue try flashing stock firmware and start from scratch. Use THIS guide to flash the stock images.
Flash vendor.img that matches your rom base. MMB29Q is the February OTA base. February AOSP roms are based on MMB29U master code but MMB29Q vendor file works fine.
For password issues after TWRP restore, do this: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=3245070
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk
SERIOUS ISSUE!
Bricked the phone!
CRAP, this whole thing went downhill. Can get into TWRP, and get the android crash logo (triangle) was trying to restore back to stock to start fresh and it bombed completely!
Any tips!!!
Been a while since I used ADB or fast etc, but man if I have to relearn I will

Tinkering with Redmi Note 5, flashing TWRP, trying to enable Camera2, bootloop...

Hello there,
I've recently received my Redmi Note 5 back from warranty service. As much as I like the phone, one thing I always found really disappointing about it is that for whatever reason, it is, as far as I know, the only phone from the Redmi Note series that has Camera2 disabled by default, preventing me from installing GCam. Fortunately, I have found multiple tutorials on how to activate it. Since I've wiped my data before sending it, now was the best time to do some tinkering.
I've used my friend's laptop to unlock its bootloader and install TWRP (it refused to work on my desktop for some reason). the official TWRP web page warned me that the phone uses dm-verity, which is something none of the tutorials mentioned. After some further digging, I found out that should I mess with it, the phone would simply revert any changes, and to prevent this, I needed to flash a dm-verity disabler, such as LazyFlasher
Thinking nothing would go wrong, I decided to try flashing TWRP and deal with the system replacing it with the stock recovery later. All went as planned, and the phone booted into the custom recovery with no issues. It asked me for a password to decrypt the internal storage, which I don't know, so I skipped this step. The first thing I did was creating a backup.
I then tried rebooting, just to see if it would really revert the changes. It did, but it didn't go as smoothly as I had hoped. The system became laggy to the point where it was basically unusable, often freezing for more than 30 seconds after just opening an app. Not knowing what to do, I flashed TWRP back, this time with the dm-verity disabler. A tutorial on how to do this that I found recommended I wipe the cache after flashing the tool. I tried doing that, but the process failed immediately. I rebooted the phone, and the next thing you know, I'm in a bootloop. I've let it sit for a while, but even after some time, the system wouldn't start. Fortunately, I was still able to get back into TWRP.
I restored the backup I created earlier. This, for the most part, solved my issues, the system works fine-ish again (aside from an occasional lag, but it's not nearly as bad as it was) and isn't trying to replace TWRP with the stock recovery anymore, but I'm kinda afraid to tinker with it again. I'd really hate having to buy a new phone just because I bricked the one I have (and I didn't even get to flash the tool that was meant to enable Camera2).
What did I do wrong? Should I've formated the internal storage to gain access to it first? Did flashing TWRP without dm-verity disabled somehow mess up the system? Would flashing a custom ROM bypass having to disable it? I'm confused...

Bootloops everywhere

I've been trying to install one of the android 10 lineages on my wife's phone.
It keeps on bootlooping and by now I have tried so many combinations of twrp and restores, wipes, different roms and restoring the backup of an android 9 lineage.
The phone keeps bootlooping, sometimes in the "your bootloader is unlocked" message and sometimes in the lineage startup movie.
It even seems to bootloop in the twrp startup screen, but maybe it is just slow and my impatience is getting too high.
I've tried two different twrp versions as one gave an error in restoring a backup (I think the newest one gave the error).
Could it be that a backup made in the older twrp cannot be restored with the newer twrp?
I'm running out of options and may need to go back to stock, which is not the easiest path to take.
Oh, the phone was rooted when I made the backup, if that makes a difference...
Any thoughts?
If you backed up all partitions, then restore all of them and follow the steps to install...
Note: Before you restore the partition, make sure to wipe it, it ensures that nothing goes wrong...

A/B partitions out of whack

So, I tried some custom roms out there it has caused some really odd issues on this device. The first one I tried was CalyxOs, then lineage, and Proton. All are good roms, but not what I am looking for. But somewhere along the way things got wonky to say the least. Now, I am not blamming any rom or dev for "breaking" my device. I flashed these roms knowing there is a risk, and the roms listed above work for others. I'm pretty confident, there is something I did along the way that screwed things up. Some of the issues I have ran in to:
Before I flash anything, I learned a long time ago, make a backup and transfer all data on sdcard to your pc.
I generally use TTBU. But recently, when I tried to manually drag/drop my sdcard backup to my device, not all files gets transferred over. Basically all the .apk.gz files. Which happens to be the core of the the backup for the apps.
I started using another backup program, oandbackup, which transfers fine. But my apps/data only gets properly restored about 20% of the time. I say 20% because out of 10 flash back to stock and restores, only 2 will successfully work.
When flashing the rom I have been working on, I use lingeage recovery. But what worked yesterday, fails tomorrow. My method has been, flash lineage recovery, flash rom, boot, test rom, flash back to stock, restore. However, it doesn't always work out that way. Sometimes, it will flash fine, I reboot back to recovery and flash gapps, boot system and the loops begin. Flashing a different kernel fixes the bootloop. Oddly though, the stock kernel booted fine on the last flash (mind you, no changes in kernel or rom code). There is a slew of roadblocks and walls I have slammed in to, but this is just to give you an idea as to what I've been trying to work with.
Now, after flashing a custom rom and then flashing back to stock, I always wipe data. But the most recent issue I have encountered, I flashed back to stock. I was on "b" partition. After the initial flash, it boots to fastbootd. Oddly, I was stuck in stock recovery with the little android guy laying on his back. I hit power then vol up and got in to recovery where I selected fastboot and the fashing process continued. After my phone booted, I rebooted back to bootloader, switched to "a" partition, rebooted bootloader, and ran the stock flash script. This way, in my hopes, I would get a fresh and clean flash all the way around. Again, the whole recovery thing happened again, and I resolved it the same way. But when the rom rebooted, bootloops which eventually kicked me back to bootloader. I switched to slot "b" and the rom booted, went thru setup and restored my data, but most apps failed. Luckily, the 1 game I cared about restored this time.
So, yesterday, I wanted to check out stock recovery a little closer, and see if I could use adb. When I tried adb pull <random file on sdcard>, adb did not connect. So, I tried to reboot. Unfortunately, I got stuck at the google boot splash. To recover the device, I had to flash my boot.img.
This morning, I set out on a mission to try and get things fixed back up. I know slot "a" is not bootable, so I figured I would start there. I went to stock images and instead of downloading, I used the online flash tool. nSince I was on slot "b", it flashed to "b" even though I choose to wipe data and force flash all partitions. I tried booting slot "a" but it failed. So, I manually switched to slot "a" and ran the online flasher again. Now slot "a' and "b" both boot successfully. Then I started restoring my sdcard. It is 4.2gb of data. Honestly, not a lot IMO. But it took an extremely long time to restore it. After restoring my sdcard, I ran oandbackup, but I only restored data for 4 apps, which was successful. Everything seems to be running smoothly, and I was able to flash a custom kernel, root, etc with no issues. I guess, when I flash the final beta of my rom, I will see if I got things fixed up or not.
As I write this, I can't help but wonder, what is the root cause of all these issues? One thing I thought of was my cable. I was using one of the usb cables for my oneplus 6t. I switched to the stock cable to test things. I wiped all my data from the sdcard and then restored it with the stock cable. Things went A LOT quicker 928 minutes with op6t cable/2 minutes on stock cable). Since I have things to do today, I have to put this aside for now. But I wanted to get everyone's thoughts and input on this. Have I done something terribly wrong along the way that has caused these issues? Could the cable I was using be the root of all evil in this case? Is this just that wonky of a device, that it has happened to others and a great deal of patience is needed when trying to work on the pixel 4a 5g?

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