Develop Bugs

Weird error message on TWRP?

I fastboot'ed the latest TWRP on my OP3 today after the recovery reverted back to Oxygen recovery when i flashed the latest update from oneplus. After getting TWRP on my phone, I went ahead and made a backup before i did anything. But during the back up i got a red line of text that says: "Unable to locate "/aboot partition for backup calculations." (Word for word). I'm too scared to do anything else on my phone as of right now since I need to be using it for an important meeting in the next two days so my question is, what is this error message and how can i fix it? Thanks for your time.

Reboot to RECOVERY 3, 4 times. See if you still got the message. Sometimes after flashing recovery it gives some message. Like:
No OS instaled. Could not mount cache partition. etc.
Or reflash recorevy. I use blu spark 3.1.1.39 by eng stk.

null0seven said:
Reboot to RECOVERY 3, 4 times. See if you still got the message. Sometimes after flashing recovery it gives some message. Like:
No OS instaled. Could not mount cache partition. etc.
Or reflash recorevy. I use blu spark 3.1.1.39 by eng stk.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How would I go about testing to see if the red message appears? I don't wanna make a backup everytime to test for the red error message

Bamfist said:
I fastboot'ed the latest TWRP on my OP3 today after the recovery reverted back to Oxygen recovery when i flashed the latest update from oneplus. After getting TWRP on my phone, I went ahead and made a backup before i did anything. But during the back up i got a red line of text that says: "Unable to locate "/aboot partition for backup calculations." (Word for word). I'm too scared to do anything else on my phone as of right now since I need to be using it for an important meeting in the next two days so my question is, what is this error message and how can i fix it? Thanks for your time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have not stated which version of TWRP you are having, given that there are so many.
I am running the official 3.1.1-2 and I get /modem partition instead of /aboot partition. But the backup runs and finishes. There doesn't seem to be any other issues. So I have concluded that it is TWRP that is having issues and not my phone because the error message talks about "calculations" and not actual backing up.

tnsmani said:
You have not stated which version of TWRP you are having, given that there are so many.
I am running the official 3.1.1-2 and I get /modem partition instead of /aboot partition. But the backup runs and finishes. There doesn't seem to be any other issues. So I have concluded that it is TWRP that is having issues and not my phone because the error message talks about "calculations" and not actual backing up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm on the same version of twrp so i assume it must be twrp itself too. Guess I'll try flashing the rom i wanted to try.

Would this procedure work? (install magisk and twrp on 10.0.3.0)

First, let me say I have been using rooted phones with twrp for several years and never had the slightest problem with them, so I generally know what I am doing, but the Mi A2 Lite is just a disaster area for me, not with Magisk, that works fine, but twrp seems impossible for me to install on 10.0.3.0 without soft bricking ( I had twrp installed on 10.0.2.0 and 10.0.1.0 so I am not unfamiliar with the method, but on 10.0.3.0 - no way). I have done so many factory resets now I have my own parking space at the factory! (That is humour btw).
So I wondered if a different approach to the problem might work. I am not a coder or phone guru, so what I propose might be nonsense, if it is I am sure somebody will tell me.
We are all used to the concept of the 'patched_boot.img' created by Magisk and if you don't want to produce your own version the forum usually has a link to it. Magisk though is not the problem, twrp is, so what I am proposing is that somebody provides a link to a 'double_patched_boot.img' ie a flashable boot image that contains both twrp and magisk and that can directly replace the stock boot via fastboot.
Apparently there are some folks that have managed to install both twrp and magisk on 10.0.3.0, so if one of them could extract the 'double_patched_boot.img' from their phone it might help out a lot. How do you achieve that? Well there is probably more than one way, but the way that I would choose (if I could manage to install them both in the first place) is to boot into twrp, connect to pc, take a miflash backup of the phone and then unzip it with the following command (this is a linux command I am sure someone can provide a windows equivalent):
Code:
tar -xzf ********.tgz
where ********.tgz is the name of your miflash backup.
Then extract the boot.img from the resulting folder, rename it to something like 'double_patched_boot_10.0.3.0.img' and provide a link to it on the forum. Then some brave soul could try it out (probably not me as I am sick of doing factory resets and don't have any backups because I don't have any recovery to make them from).
OTOH this might just not be practical, I don't know enough to be sure.

i was having similar issues. replaced my mi a2 lite and followed the guide for the aosp 109 gsi here in the forum replacing the fstab and one other file i forgot they name but it's instructed. i have twrp zero the fixed one, magisk, and I'm running the RR PIE ROM with zero issues and I've been back and forth in and out of recovery no problem. I'm pretty sure it will work for you too.

12:121390 said:
i was having similar issues. replaced my mi a2 lite and followed the guide for the aosp 109 gsi here in the forum replacing the fstab and one other file i forgot they name but it's instructed. i have twrp zero the fixed one, magisk, and I'm running the RR PIE ROM with zero issues and I've been back and forth in and out of recovery no problem. I'm pretty sure it will work for you too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interesting. I have certainly thought of jumping ship to a custom rom, but I would like to wait a little before I do so, ideally until someone fires up a Lineage rom for the A2 Lite. But if things continue as badly as they have done so far with stock roms then I might well join you on RR.

viking777 said:
Interesting. I have certainly thought of jumping ship to a custom rom, but I would like to wait a little before I do so, ideally until someone fires up a Lineage rom for the A2 Lite. But if things continue as badly as they have done so far with stock roms then I might well join you on RR.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
also because of the new ARB thing, custom is much safer, i think i bricked my last device rolling back from ota 9.0 software to ota 8.1. that's a non-issue with custom. just something to be wary of. the current RR pie gsi is near flawless for he so far. hope that helps a little

12:121390 said:
also because of the new ARB thing, custom is much safer, i think i bricked my last device rolling back from ota 9.0 software to ota 8.1. that's a non-issue with custom. just something to be wary of. the current RR pie gsi is near flawless for he so far. hope that helps a little
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Anti roll back is disabled and not an issue if bootloader is unlocked

Nice thread. Tried it as well but no chance 10.0.3.00 + twrp + magisk. And you are right the problem is twrp.
Sent from my Phh-Treble vanilla using Tapatalk

12:121390 said:
i was having similar issues. replaced my mi a2 lite and followed the guide for the aosp 109 gsi here in the forum replacing the fstab and one other file i forgot they name but it's instructed. i have twrp zero the fixed one, magisk, and I'm running the RR PIE ROM with zero issues and I've been back and forth in and out of recovery no problem. I'm pretty sure it will work for you too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does RR Pie have any issues on Mi A2 Lite? Whichever GSI I'd tried, I had lags :/

12:121390 said:
i was having similar issues. replaced my mi a2 lite and followed the guide for the aosp 109 gsi here in the forum replacing the fstab and one other file i forgot they name but it's instructed. i have twrp zero the fixed one, magisk, and I'm running the RR PIE ROM with zero issues and I've been back and forth in and out of recovery no problem. I'm pretty sure it will work for you too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
brother i also want to install RR PIE Rom can you please give me the guide link?

hossman said:
Anti roll back is disabled and not an issue if bootloader is unlocked
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
correct it is not. what happened was.. lol. i thought i was crafty and did some file swapping and made miflash setups that would flash so the stock files as usual , but with gsi's like RR and/or bootleggers for the system image. and it works, up until i flashed from RR to bootleggers with those setups described previously . there is where my genius was flawed. lol. lesson learned
---------- Post added at 06:43 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:38 AM ----------
marstonpear said:
Does RR Pie have any issues on Mi A2 Lite? Whichever GSI I'd tried, I had lags :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
for me, i have not come across anything caused by the GSI. any issues I've faced are purely self inflicted.

I don´t get your problems... Just boot twrp, and install it as described in original thread.
After that flash back aboot from 9.6.11.0 and the message "your system got destroyed" will disappear!

Voodoojonny said:
I don´t get your problems... Just boot twrp, and install it as described in original thread.
After that flash back aboot from 9.6.11.0 and the message "your system got destroyed" will disappear!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You might not get my problem, but likewise I don't get your solution. Firstly aboot has never been touched during the attempted twrp install so why flash it at all, it has not been changed, and secondly you suggest I flash it with something that is how many versions old 4?, 5?, I'm not sure, when just about every post you ever read stresses that you should not mix old and new partitions at the same time.
I hope you forgive my scepticism, but can you actually suggest the slightest reason why this might work?
Or is it all just voodoo johnny (sorry, couldn't resist that).

viking777 said:
You might not get my problem, but likewise I don't get your solution. Firstly aboot has never been touched during the attempted twrp install so why flash it at all, it has not been changed, and secondly you suggest I flash it with something that is how many versions old 4?, 5?, I'm not sure, when just about every post you ever read stresses that you should not mix old and new partitions at the same time.
I hope you forgive my scepticism, but can you actually suggest the slightest reason why this might work?
Or is it all just voodoo johnny (sorry, couldn't resist that).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Aboot is the bootloader. Since Pie the aboot was modified to check wheather there are modification on your boot.img. So everytime you modify something (like installing twrp), you get the message "your system got destroyed".
9.6.11.0 is the last version of Oreo. Here the bootloader didn´t check boot.img.
That´s why you need to flash 9.6.11.0 - maybe the older verstions will work too. Didn´t check. But I guess only 9.6.11.0 will work becouse it was the latest oreo version and it had to have a bootloader which can boot up pie (to have ota working).
Here you can find the aboot.img I use... and which works without any problem on pie - right now I´m running 10.0.3.0...
Just flash it via fastboot.

Voodoojonny said:
Aboot is the bootloader. Since Pie the aboot was modified to check wheather there are modification on your boot.img. So everytime you modify something (like installing twrp), you get the message "your system got destroyed".
9.6.11.0 is the last version of Oreo. Here the bootloader didn´t check boot.img.
That´s why you need to flash 9.6.11.0 - maybe the older verstions will work too. Didn´t check. But I guess only 9.6.11.0 will work becouse it was the latest oreo version and it had to have a bootloader which can boot up pie (to have ota working).
Here you can find the aboot.img I use... and which works without any problem on pie - right now I´m running 10.0.3.0...
Just flash it via fastboot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK that makes sense now - thank you for the explanation. I will probably give that a try sometime, but not right now as I have a stable working phone for the first time in ages and I don't want to jeopardise that.
Just one question though. When I had twrp installed on 10.0.2.0, it was fine at doing backups, but on the two occasions I tried to restore with them they failed, by which I don't mean that the restore didn't repair the phone, but that it was impossible to even carry out the restore, it started but did not complete - just ended with 'Restore Failed' message.
Have you tried any restores with twrp installed in the manner you suggest and if so did they work? No point in installing it otherwise.

viking777 said:
OK that makes sense now - thank you for the explanation. I will probably give that a try sometime, but not right now as I have a stable working phone for the first time in ages and I don't want to jeopardise that.
Just one question though. When I had twrp installed on 10.0.2.0, it was fine at doing backups, but on the two occasions I tried to restore with them they failed, by which I don't mean that the restore didn't repair the phone, but that it was impossible to even carry out the restore, it started but did not complete - just ended with 'Restore Failed' message.
Have you tried any restores with twrp installed in the manner you suggest and if so did they work? No point in installing it otherwise.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There seems to be some bugs restoring system and vendor... Some users talked about... I usually only save and restore the data and boot partition and I never had any problems with that. For all other partitions you can use miflash or fastboot...

Yeah all my twrp full backups don't work after a fresh stock installment either, that's very annoying.
The twrp version for daisy is bugged. Backups are not working, the wifi with GSI Roms on pie stock is not working anymore as soon as twrp is installed as well.
Sent from my Phh-Treble vanilla using Tapatalk

Thanks for the replies above. @voodoojohnny
In my case it was the data partition that caused the restore to fail, vendor and system and boot all seemed to go through normally. @cd492
Based on what you say along with my own experiences and those of voovoojohnny, it looks like twrp is more trouble than it is worth at the moment. I think I will make do without it for now and hope for a better version in the future.

viking777 said:
First, let me say I have been using rooted phones with twrp for several years and never had the slightest problem with them, so I generally know what I am doing, but the Mi A2 Lite is just a disaster area for me, not with Magisk, that works fine, but twrp seems impossible for me to install on 10.0.3.0 without soft bricking ( I had twrp installed on 10.0.2.0 and 10.0.1.0 so I am not unfamiliar with the method, but on 10.0.3.0 - no way). I have done so many factory resets now I have my own parking space at the factory! (That is humour btw).
So I wondered if a different approach to the problem might work. I am not a coder or phone guru, so what I propose might be nonsense, if it is I am sure somebody will tell me.
We are all used to the concept of the 'patched_boot.img' created by Magisk and if you don't want to produce your own version the forum usually has a link to it. Magisk though is not the problem, twrp is, so what I am proposing is that somebody provides a link to a 'double_patched_boot.img' ie a flashable boot image that contains both twrp and magisk and that can directly replace the stock boot via fastboot.
Apparently there are some folks that have managed to install both twrp and magisk on 10.0.3.0, so if one of them could extract the 'double_patched_boot.img' from their phone it might help out a lot. How do you achieve that? Well there is probably more than one way, but the way that I would choose (if I could manage to install them both in the first place) is to boot into twrp, connect to pc, take a miflash backup of the phone and then unzip it with the following command (this is a linux command I am sure someone can provide a windows equivalent):
where ********.tgz is the name of your miflash backup.
Then extract the boot.img from the resulting folder, rename it to something like 'double_patched_boot_10.0.3.0.img' and provide a link to it on the forum. Then some brave soul could try it out (probably not me as I am sick of doing factory resets and don't have any backups because I don't have any recovery to make them from).
OTOH this might just not be practical, I don't know enough to be sure.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
THIS HAS NOT BEEN TESTED ON GSI'S YET
I'm currently in the process of RR with TWRP but having extreme Encryption errors
Grab these two files (Big Thanks to Zerovoid, Seryioo, and mac12m99)
Fixed SDCard Support TWRP Image File (Put this on your SDCard and Computer)-
https://forum.xda-developers.com/mi...unofficial-twrp-daisy-mount-sd-fixed-t3889390
Fixed SDCard Support TWRP Installer Zip (Put this on your SDCard)-
https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=11410963190603893418
But I got TWRP on 10.0.3.0 with magisk, and Justic Kernel.
THIS WILL WIPE YOUR DEVICE I'M DEFINITELY NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR LOST DATA
Start with the phone being on with USB Debugging enabled correctly
Type adb reboot bootloader
So flash the 10.0.3.0 ROM through MiFlash using the flash_all.bat, this process has to be done so backup your data before erasing.
After it is done flashing it restarts, go ahead and hold power and volume down right back to the Bootloader
Type: fastboot boot twrp-3.2.3-0-daisy_zero.img
It would boot into TWRP, if you see something about decryption hit cancel this may mean you haven't followed directions so far
Tap install and find your SD Card, find the fixed-twrp-installer-daisy.zip where ever you put it on your SD Card and install it, this process takes a few minutes when finished DO NOT HIT REBOOT SYSTEM!
Hit the home button back to TWRP home screen and tap reboot >>> bootloader
Download this to your computer - https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=11410963190603884024
Type: fastboot flash aboot aboot_9.6.4.img
Then type: fastboot reboot
Afterwards your phone shall boot up to Android if it does hold power and volume up and release power and keep hold volume up when the screen turns back on to go-to recovery, if TWRP boots up you have successfully completed the task.
Now flash Magisk zip (optional)
Hopefully this helped kind of my first tutorial, this was my process.

InfinityXDA said:
THIS HAS NOT BEEN TESTED ON GSI'S YET
I'm currently in the process of RR with TWRP but having extreme Encryption errors
Grab these two files (Big Thanks to Zerovoid, Seryioo, and mac12m99)
Fixed SDCard Support TWRP Image File (Put this on your SDCard and Computer)-
https://forum.xda-developers.com/mi...unofficial-twrp-daisy-mount-sd-fixed-t3889390
Fixed SDCard Support TWRP Installer Zip (Put this on your SDCard)-
https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=11410963190603893418
But I got TWRP on 10.0.3.0 with magisk, and Justic Kernel.
THIS WILL WIPE YOUR DEVICE I'M DEFINITELY NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR LOST DATA
Start with the phone being on with USB Debugging enabled correctly
Type adb reboot bootloader
So flash the 10.0.3.0 ROM through MiFlash using the flash_all.bat, this process has to be done so backup your data before erasing.
After it is done flashing it restarts, go ahead and hold power and volume down right back to the Bootloader
Type: fastboot boot twrp-3.2.3-0-daisy_zero.img
It would boot into TWRP, if you see something about decryption hit cancel this may mean you haven't followed directions so far
Tap install and find your SD Card, find the fixed-twrp-installer-daisy.zip where ever you put it on your SD Card and install it, this process takes a few minutes when finished DO NOT HIT REBOOT SYSTEM!
Hit the home button back to TWRP home screen and tap reboot >>> bootloader
Download this to your computer - https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=11410963190603884024
Type: fastboot flash aboot aboot_9.6.4.img
Then type: fastboot reboot
Afterwards your phone shall boot up to Android if it does hold power and volume up and release power and keep hold volume up when the screen turns back on to go-to recovery, if TWRP boots up you have successfully completed the task.
Now flash Magisk zip (optional)
Hopefully this helped kind of my first tutorial, this was my process.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you very much for posting this process in such detail, unfortunately I think you must have missed my last post where I said:
it looks like twrp is more trouble than it is worth at the moment. I think I will make do without it for now and hope for a better version in the future.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I meant it, at least for now, but maybe your post will help somebody else.

viking777 said:
Thank you very much for posting this process in such detail, unfortunately I think you must have missed my last post where I said:
I meant it, at least for now, but maybe your post will help somebody else.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes I didn't see that post but understand I didn't give you links to the official TWRP, I gave you the unofficial fixed TWRP which actually features SD Card Support and trust me it works completely fine I haven't had a problem yet. This took me hours upon hours to figure out what I was doing wrong.
The only specific reason you are not successfully getting TWRP is because you didn't flash the aboot.img after installing the zip.
I hope this helps you in the future!

thanks InfinityXDA for the tutorial, you should create a post just for it~

Issue on reinstalling any kind of OS - brick?

Hello,
It all began that i just wanted to restart my Oneplus3 unlocked with lineage 15.
But then back in Lineage15 i wasnt able to use my pin anymore + it restarted after few seconds...
Afterwards i ended up in a lineage bootloop.
Ok, then i thought then i do a fresh flash with new lineage 16.
I tried to flash but it said i need to install new modem firmware for Lineage16.
I downdloaded the new 9.0.5 modem + firmware and flashed it from here : https://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-3/how-to/op3-flashable-firmware-modem-zips-t3816066
Then i tried to flash LOS16 again but it failed due to some errors on unable to mount some partitions (cache , system, etc).
So i thought i need to wipe or reformat them, as some people suggested to switch from ext4 to fat and back to reinit the partition.
I did this for at least system and internal storage. ( i learned that it was a dumb idea )
Afterwards i was not able to push anything anymore through MTP in TWRP, but i was still able to sideload or push images via adb.
Afterwards i tried to flash LOS16 or LOS15 via TWRP again but it always ends up to a "unable to mount /system (invalid argument" error at some point of the installation.
I thought: Okey maybe i go back to stock as i messed up the internal file system somehow, and go back to LOS afterwards.
So i flashed the stock recovery for nougat which i got from here: https://www.****************/2017/0...th-latest-oxygen-os-firmware-complete-unroot/
Then i tried to flash various stock Oxygen roms with the stock recovery, by using wipe + system reset + adb sideload:
4.02, 4.51, 5.08, 9.0.5
4.02 and 9.0.5 didnt run until the end.
Flashing 5.08 works but ends up in a black screen when starting it.
Flashing 4.51 works but when i start it i run into a bootloop ( 2 Dots circuling forever )
I also tried to use the 4.51 version to flash LOS again but it did not work out
I just tried again to flash 4.51 but it also didnt work out anymore. :\
So, what do you think i could do to get a working OS on my system again?
Did i do something on the installation of LOS or Oxygen ?
Can i use a backup from a friends Oneplus3_T to get a working system partition / full OS again?
Should i unbrick the phone by using one of various guides to go back to fully stock? I am kind of afraid of this, as some people describe some final brick in the threads which may be caused by modem firmware problems (Sahara issue). https://forums.oneplus.com/threads/guide-oneplus-3-3t-unbrick.531047/ or https://forums.oneplus.com/threads/guide-mega-unbrick-guide-for-a-hard-bricked-oneplus-3.452634/
Thank you so much, i kind of getting mad about it

@julledd
Backup from 3T seems like a bad idea.
You may have a hardware issue.
Your best bet is to use one of the tools available in the various unbrick guides. If one doesn't work, try another.
Best of luck!

Hi thx for your help!
i tried different unbrick tools (9.0.5 / 3.1.2 / 4.0.5) and after several attempts i get it flashed to the phone. But in the end it still ends up in a bootloop, either at the android logo or the circuling dots. Via Sideload i am also not able to flash a new OS. It always breaks somewhen >50%.
In very rare cases i am then able to go to the OS, but when i go to "About Phone" to unlock it for TWRP, it freezes before showing anything. I guess there is internally something broken which forbids it to show the internal state of the phone. Every boot is different, and i cannot see any system in this failure of my phone.
Do you have any more hint?
I am already at a point where i want to exchange the main PCB.. Is this possible for the Oneplus3? Can i also exchange it with a Oneplus3T PCB?

Flashing and Imei Problem with XA2 H3113

Hi at all,
i've a big problem with my XA2:
- I unlocked the bootloader for flashing TWRP and LinageOs 18.1 - which worked
- After flashing the LinageOS, my Imei was "deleted" - meaning if I doing *#06# the phone shows: MEID 0000000
- If I go in the system settings, the Imei is correct.
- The phone not able to connect to the mobile network.
I can't flash the Stock-Rom with "Emma" or Flashtool, cause the bootloader is open.
I tried to relock the bootloader with Flashtool, but it eds up with a error: "Cannot invoke "String.split(String)" because the return value of "java.util.Properties.getProperty(String)" is null."
I really need any help what I can get.
thanks
knofi

Did you get it fixed?

Not yet :-(

With my XA2 H3123, I went from stock 9, to LOS 18.1 and all seemed great. To experiment further, I used Emma to go to stock 8. After a week or two I went to LOS 18.1 again but now video problems. I was told my firmware was too old from stock 8 and to upgrade to stock 9 to get newer video drivers, and then return to LOS 18.1. When I returned to Emma, Sony had removed stock 9 for the H3123. The only successful way I found was by using Xperifirm to get CustomUS version 50.2.A.3.77 for H3123 and then had to flash it with NewFlasher thanks to advice from @LuK1337. I failed on first couple attempts because I answered the questions from NewFlasher incorrectly upon launch. I got the quesitons right and it worked. I think I was saying yes to a dump for recovery or something and should have said no, and I may have at first answered wrong on whether to use Gordon Gate. I don't recall which way I went on Gordon Gate. So finally phone seems to work great. The problem remains, through the whole procedure of changing ROMs I kept noticing my phone Settings always said my phone remained encrypted. So the wipes and erase from fastboot weren't doing it right, as the instructions from LOS say wipes should obviously remove encryption. During these changes, I also tried TWRP wipe and erase, and Factory Data Reset through LOS Settings. Now I'm trying to find time to learn how to get "Parted" or "Busybox with Fdisk" to use on phone and cleanly overwrite my partitions on phone with 1s or 0s and really start over with clean phone. Lacking time.
The reason I posted all that is it amazed me my phone could stay encrypted through all that, telling me the phone is not a clean install. So figure maybe your phone is not a clean install also, and maybe a clean overwrite will get your IMEI reported correctly again. Somwhere I was reading about changing a phone's IMEI so maybe those articles will tell you which partition hold the IMEI data, other than your SIM card. Or maybe if you use TWRP rather than LOS Recovery img, you can wipe or erase and install LOS again and you're good.
By the way, my understanding is once bootloader is unlocked you won't be able to use Sony Companion to flash phone, so you have to use Emma. I use Emma with unlocked bootloader, so not sure about that statement in your opener.

Problems restoring nandroid backup to new phone

Hi all,
I believe the original motherboard for my RN5 whyred went bad (spontaneous reboots) and so I found a replacement for it - but it is a RN5Pro whyred board. Since they are both whyred, I figured it would be ok to replace the RN5 with the RN5Pro board. The boards look identical and they're both whyred, so why not? Right?
I made a nandroid backup with OrangeFox (9.2.3 I think?), swapped the boards, everything booted great with the new board. I unlocked the bootloader, installed a slightly newer version of OrangeFox (10.0.3) and then restored the nandroid backup. It restored without any errors, but when I tried to boot it - then the problems started. Since there was no logo or anything to see on the screen, I thought I hard bricked it, but MiFlash saw it and I was able to reinstall a stock MIUI 11.0.3 image. Now it boots, but I have a few questions/issues:
1. It doesn't recognize the SIM any more. It did recognize it when I first booted the new board, so I know it's not an issue of the board not recognizing the SIM by nature. Maybe the nandroid restore bonked it? Not sure what I can do at this point besides asking for a replacement SIM. Any ideas?
2. Is it not possible to restore a nandroid backup from the RN5 to the RN5Pro? Or do you have to use the exact same version of recovery to restore that you used to backup? I would really like to not have to reinstall and reconfigure all my programs, which includes 2FA apps that will be a pain to refresh.
Any help is appreciated,

eisenbergw said:
1. It doesn't recognize the SIM any more. It did recognize it when I first booted the new board, so I know it's not an issue of the board not recognizing the SIM by nature. Maybe the nandroid restore bonked it? Not sure what I can do at this point besides asking for a replacement SIM. Any ideas?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK, so I put the SIM in another phone and it works fine. So the problem is somewhere else. Can anyone point me in the right direction? The new board definitely recognized the SIM before I restored the nandroid backup and now after a stock ROM reflash, it doesn't recognize it. Driver?

eisenbergw said:
OK, so I put the SIM in another phone and it works fine. So the problem is somewhere else. Can anyone point me in the right direction? The new board definitely recognized the SIM before I restored the nandroid backup and now after a stock ROM reflash, it doesn't recognize it. Driver?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Persist partition and 1 more are corrupted... Search it on xda

drnightshadow said:
Persist partition and 1 more are corrupted... Search it on xda
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply. I found some resources for flashing the persist partition. Which is the other partition you suspect of being corrupted, or how can I discover that? Is it the modem partition/non-HLOS.bin? I've already done the regular stock ROM flash through fastboot, so the 'normal' partitions have already been rewritten. What other 'special' partitions are there besides persist?

eisenbergw said:
Thanks for the reply. I found some resources for flashing the persist partition. Which is the other partition you suspect of being corrupted, or how can I discover that? Is it the modem partition/non-HLOS.bin? I've already done the regular stock ROM flash through fastboot, so the 'normal' partitions have already been rewritten. What other 'special' partitions are there besides persist?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ha, you have them CCA 28 partitions. You need to find out by your self. Start with persist, vendor,... Most common ones than less common. Maybe you should try flashing under EDL mode. I would advise you to check which partitions did restored and start there.

drnightshadow said:
Ha, you have them CCA 28 partitions. You need to find out by your self. Start with persist, vendor,... Most common ones than less common. Maybe you should try flashing under EDL mode. I would advise you to check which partitions did restored and start there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, no idea there were that many. I haven't been this deep into the phone before.
I see there is a file called partition.xml in the fastboot images directory, I assume that is the full list of partitions on the phone (but there are 64 entries there)? Do you actually check them all for corruption, or just try to reflash them all until it starts working? Some of them do not have a filename listed. Not sure what to do with those.
<partition label="apdp" size_in_kb="256" type="E6E98DA2-E22A-4D12-AB33-169E7DEAA507" bootable="false" readonly="false" filename=""/>
The 'flash_all.bat' file (that did the flash that got it working again) looks like it flashes 24 images by default, so I guess there aren't too many others to try.
Any links you can refer me to, to understand how to start poking at this? Thanks!

eisenbergw said:
Wow, no idea there were that many. I haven't been this deep into the phone before.
I see there is a file called partition.xml in the fastboot images directory, I assume that is the full list of partitions on the phone (but there are 64 entries there)? Do you actually check them all for corruption, or just try to reflash them all until it starts working? Some of them do not have a filename listed. Not sure what to do with those.
<partition label="apdp" size_in_kb="256" type="E6E98DA2-E22A-4D12-AB33-169E7DEAA507" bootable="false" readonly="false" filename=""/>
The 'flash_all.bat' file (that did the flash that got it working again) looks like it flashes 24 images by default, so I guess there aren't too many others to try.
Any links you can refer me to, to understand how to start poking at this? Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Start with EDL MODE and flash all.... Check and search 1st how EDL MODE works and how to get into it... Read a lot before you'll mess with your phone... for persist you need to patch file (like notepad++), very simple and for the rest like I said read a loooooot..
But if you use OrangeFox recovery than you should only look at those partitions + persist.. For everything else you need research by yourself, sorry no easy way out.
BE CAREFUL DON'T LOCK YOUR BOOTLOADER OR YOU'LL GET EVEN MORE TROUBLES !!!!!
Good luck.

You should be fine flashing 2 files, persist partition and modem file.
Extract the files from the fastboot rom installed in your device.
Please read and document yourself how to flash those files.
Modem file is called "NON-HLOS.bin" and is fastboot flashable.
Persist partition is recovery flashable by OrangeFox.
The best part is that you managed to hardware repair your device! The software part is easy.
Take care and good luck!
Follow @drnightshadow advice also.

MadK9 said:
You should be fine flashing 2 files, persist partition and modem file.
Extract the files from the fastboot rom installed in your device.
Please read and document yourself how to flash those files.
Modem file is called "NON-HLOS.bin" and is fastboot flashable.
Persist partition is recovery flashable by OrangeFox.
The best part is that you managed to hardware repair your device! The software part is easy.
Take care and good luck!
Follow @drnightshadow advice also.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the info. I tried both items, flashing modem from fastboot and persist from OF, but it didn't change anything.
So I tried an EDL flash, but it won't flash persist.img. It recognizes that it is sparse, but still gives me a 'ERROR_BAD_FORMAT' error and that is the end of that. Reflashed persist.img from OF, no results. Tried a regular stock fastboot-based flash with no tweaks and now it won't flash the modem with the error:
error:FAILED (status read failed (Too many links))
There's really not much left in the images directory that isn't already flashed -
* ddi.elf
* misc.img
* lksecapp.mbn
* uefi.elf (but that looks like a bootsector kind of thing)
My Google-fu is not strong enough to find any mentions of the first three images or what they are used for.
I do note that rawprogram0.xml mentions a lot of partitions that have no files associated with them. I'm a bit wary of just dropping those images into there without a good reason to do so. But again, Google is not helping here.
Any ideas before I toss the phone and go buy a new one?

Oh, man... I'm no expert at all and really cannot help anymore... There are more android experts here then anywhere else on this web and still your issue found no fix. In my opinion you should try to flash the factory image, the rom which your device came. I did encounter the issue when flashing went wrong a few years ago. No other image was flashable! Had errors with more recent ones but when I went and flash the factory image, my RN5 came to life.

MadK9 said:
Oh, man... I'm no expert at all and really cannot help anymore... There are more android experts here then anywhere else on this web and still your issue found no fix. In my opinion you should try to flash the factory image, the rom which your device came. I did encounter the issue when flashing went wrong a few years ago. No other image was flashable! Had errors with more recent ones but when I went and flash the factory image, my RN5 came to life.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did that and it did come back to life... except for not recognizing the SIM.
There is a lot of help here on xda, but I guess even that has its limits sometimes. If you or @drnightshadow don't have any other ideas, then I guess it's time to get a new phone. A shame really, this one lasted me about 3 years and I've had no reason to replace it until now.

No, you tried and accomplished a lot! You should not give up just because of us. We're no experts. Just try to look and search for similar issues but on other brands! Try this approach. And even if you buy a new phone, continue to look for solutions in order to have a RN5 functional again! I remember I even lost imei and all mac addresses for bth and wireless... Not quite like your issue but similar. Only flashing persisit partition brought my device back.
SIM not recognized after flashing at DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo. Privacy, Simplified.
duckduckgo.com
L.E.
You could also try to flash persist partition from other rom version, older or newer from stock images... an idea, something else to try...

MadK9 said:
No, you tried and accomplished a lot! You should not give up just because of us. We're no experts. Just try to look and search for similar issues but on other brands! Try this approach. And even if you buy a new phone, continue to look for solutions in order to have a RN5 functional again! I remember I even lost imei and all mac addresses for bth and wireless... Not quite like your issue but similar. Only flashing persisit partition brought my device back.
SIM not recognized after flashing at DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo. Privacy, Simplified.
duckduckgo.com
L.E.
You could also try to flash persist partition from other rom version, older or newer from stock images... an idea, something else to try...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm thinking - I got into this problem because I tried to restore a nandroid backup from the first board to the new board. I'm wondering if there is something like an IMEI or other 'burned in' identifier that got written in and now the phone has a mismatch so the OS won't recognize the SIM as being installed.
Fortunately, before I started doing anything with the new board I did a nandroid backup of what came shipped with it (I unlocked it and put OF on it first, obviously). A bunch of reading I did today made me think about the efs partition - I had restored persist and modem, but not that one. So I did a full nandroid restore of the clean backup, including efs. Rebooted and it went straight to fastboot, would not boot. No problem, used MiFlash to put MIUI 11.0.3 cleanly on it (no tweaks). When it booted after that - the SIM is back! Woo-hoo!
I'm guessing the EFS partition has something to do with it, but I'd have to do more reading to understand it more fully.
In any case, I have a usable board again. *finally*.
For the record (and for anyone else that might have this problem in the future):
* restore original clean nandroid backup (but probably only needed the *efs* partition)
* forced to do a stock rom install via fastboot (used MIUI 11.0.3)
** got use of the SIM again!
* flashed twrp in fastboot to be able to flash OrangeFox from inside twrp
* updated firmware to latest stable v12.0.2
* flash Lineage 18.1
* flash Magisk
* wipe caches and dalvik
* install gapps
* wipe caches and dalvik
* reboot to usable phone
Thanks for being part of the journey!

Sweet, that's nice to hear... Resurrection of whyred wuuuhuuu ..
good job... See, you just don't give up and success is here.. Remember that I told you persist and 1 more partition are corrupted... You find it, EFS
If it isn't hardware problem, whyred can be always unbricked.

Really, really happy for you man!!!
Well done!!!
Yesterday was about to do more research in order to find a way out for your issue but had something else at my job, only downloaded a fastboot rom and was trying to find that troubled partition, even to tell you about efs... And now, the good news from you is that you were busy and had success!!!
Enjoy your zombi phone! I mean resurrected!