[Q] 2.3.5 boot loop and hosed recovery - Motorola Photon 4G

Current status: BOOT LOOP, NO WORKING RECOVERY
I'm working on a friend's Photon, trying to get it back to stock. It got the 2.3.5 OTA update ages ago and therefore has a locked bootloader.
I have tried many things. Do not tell me to search the forum; I have spent many hours doing exactly that.
The phone starts booting, shows the U.S. Cellular animation from the Electrify due to the performing the first of the six tasks outlined in several places, including here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=30654255&postcount=5
It then reboots before getting to a home screen. The next logical step would be to boot to recovery and do a factory reset. However, starting recovery (hold volume down, down until recovery, up) results in the yellow exclamation point sign and android icon and then it freezes. I suspect, but am not sure, that the phone had CWM on it at some point. I'm not sure if the Electrify sbf also re-installs stock recovery?
I can get into fastboot, but the two recovery images I attempt to flash result in "failed to process command flash:recovery error(0x180002)". I have also flashed 2.3.5_45.4.13ota_unbrick.sbf in an attempted to get a working recovery, but that just goes back to the boot loop at the end of flashing.
I can't continue with the 6-step unbrick process because the phone won't boot up all of the way to allow me to root it and install the bootstrap apk. I can't wipe the phone because recovery doesn't work.
What I need:
a fastboot-able stock recovery image file, to ensure that I have the correct recovery. There were links to this at one time, but they are all either rotted or the OP flounced and nuked his posts containing them.

Apparently the yellow exclamation point sign means that stock recovery is installed. However, it never presents a menu or any text, just the image, so something else is wrong. Of course, there are no useful error messages, either, just the image.
No amount of RSDLite appears to be helping. Is there a way to force a factory reset from fastboot or RSDlite instead?

To answer my own question:
fastboot erase userdata does a factory reset.
If anybody else sees this while trying to do the 6-step 2.3.5 stock reinstall, if you get hosed after step 1, that's how you fix it.

Related

Soft brick boot loop

A lot of ForeverNOOBS like myself are going to come across this issue every so often. I have succeeded in resurrecting my SGS3 and this may help for you too...
If your phone is stuck at the samsung boot animation flashing pretty much forever your in the same boat I was in.
Chances are you select the NAND Delete option in ODIN 3 before you flashed the L710VPALEN rom.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1737859
After the phone has rebooted every reflashing of a rom will give you the same boot loop. It doesn't matter if its flashed in odin or CWM you will most likely get the boot loop. It took 3 hours to figure that out the hard way. At some point I end up flashing the full odex update of LF9 in CWM then the LF9 baseband, and its still bootlooped.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1743923
I dont know which one gave me stock recovery but in stock recovery you will see these warning.
e:failed to mount /file... I don't remember the exact expression but there is 4 of them e:/failed's.
I only had a few options left in the repertoire of the recovery app so I used factory reset. Immediately rebooted back into recovery and noticed my e:failed warnings had disappeared. I rebooted one more time and no more boot loop!!!! my phone is back on.
I hope this helps.
First of all, this is definitely the wrong section.
Second, for anyone reading this, the TL;DR version is: Flash the stock recovery and do a factory reset.
Sent from my SPH-L710 using xda premium

[Q] TWRP Recovery - Black screen then boots system

I have a slight problem with my phone right now. I got the great idea to try and build a rom just for myself in kitchen based off the Telus 1.15.661.11 base. Everything appeared to work correctly, I got my rom flashed and working fine, haven't had any problems with it besides a FC issue with the HTC Sense input but i just uninstalled it as i use swiftkey anyways.
The problem is I can no longer access TWRP, I can get into the bootloader fine just when i select recovery it shows the TWRP logo then goes to a black screen and then proceeds to boot into the system. I have no idea how to fix it and but here's what I've tried so fair:
-Reflashing the recovery via fastboot
-Flashing a rom via fastboot (Can't be done gives me some remote denied error, i assumed because its still s-on?)
-Reflashing boot.img via fastboot (Figured it was worth a attempt?)
-Trying to reboot into recovery (Same thing happened, went from black screen to boot. Also i should note I could not get the phone to reboot via adb but could via the cwm rom manager (I just used it to reboot nothing else))
-Factory Reset from bootloader (didn't appear to do anything)
The one thing I have not tried is an RUU, however this was because first off i had difficultly locating one (I had the link somewhere but lost it) and second I don't think there is one for Telus (Although i would assume an ATT one would work?). Also ill try to locate the rom that i flashed, and maybe someone would be able to look at it and see what went wrong. Any help/ideas would be greatly appreciated to try and help restore my recovery.
EDIT: So i ran the ATT RUU and it failed towards the end of the process and I went through the recovery process. Then i re locked and unlocked my bootloader and after that i went to reboot into recovery and it works again. So im not sure what happened but if anyone has some insight it would be nice to know for the future.

XT910/GSM bricked? Tried RSD Lite

I decided to flash a factory image since the GPS was not working anymore with whatever ROM I tried, plus random problems. The phone was previously set up with CM10.1 and BMM.
Installed RSD Lite, Moto drivers, downloaded several stock ROMs.
From the factory recovery mode I cannot flash any of those zip files so I proceed with RSD lite. I flashed "9.8.2O-124_SPUEM-14_S7_USASPDRICS01O2UKE1007.0R_USASPDRJBO2GB_P013_A012_p2b_S1FF_fb.xml.zip" which is a retail UK JB image. The phone shows the very first boot screen (red logo) and then the screen goes blank. The computer still sees an MTP device, though only in device manager.
I've tried installing other images but they are an older type (ICS I guess, 01.6.7.2-180&01.6.5.1-167) and RSD shows an error while trying to flash the first file from the archive.
Oh, I still have the "Customer error: contact dealer" on the first boot screen, I think this was from a ICS to JB upgrade with CID deletion(?).
I've already flashed twice using RSD, deleted cache+data, rebooted and left the phone to start up for ten of minutes, don't know what to do. RSD lite reports that flashing was ok.
been there
brainwash123 said:
I decided to flash a factory image since the GPS was not working anymore with whatever ROM I tried, plus random problems. The phone was previously set up with CM10.1 and BMM.
Installed RSD Lite, Moto drivers, downloaded several stock ROMs.
From the factory recovery mode I cannot flash any of those zip files so I proceed with RSD lite. I flashed "9.8.2O-124_SPUEM-14_S7_USASPDRICS01O2UKE1007.0R_USASPDRJBO2GB_P013_A012_p2b_S1FF_fb.xml.zip" which is a retail UK JB image. The phone shows the very first boot screen (red logo) and then the screen goes blank. The computer still sees an MTP device, though only in device manager.
I've tried installing other images but they are an older type (ICS I guess, 01.6.7.2-180&01.6.5.1-167) and RSD shows an error while trying to flash the first file from the archive.
Oh, I still have the "Customer error: contact dealer" on the first boot screen, I think this was from a ICS to JB upgrade with CID deletion(?).
I've already flashed twice using RSD, deleted cache+data, rebooted and left the phone to start up for ten of minutes, don't know what to do. RSD lite reports that flashing was ok.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you erase CID?
if you did yo need to boot in a different way
U did a factory reset in stock recovery? U cannot flash a ics image after flashing jb via rsd. Try again jb EU image than go to stock recovery and perform the wipes
Tapped from my RazR
Got it "fixed", finally. I had to go back into the stock boot/recovery menu and choose "BP Tools", last option from the menu and then it booted normally.
I still have to do this after each reboot because it boots to the black screen: hold the three buttons together until it flashes (which means a hard reboot), let go of the power button, press power button again while the other two are still pressed.
On the plus side the GPS started working again after factory reflash which it was kind of expected since the same chip is providing also WiFi and bluetooth which were running fine.
I have a root question: the device was rooted with the virtual machine procedure but after a factory reset the root was lost. I had saved it using Voodoo RootKeeper and the app shows: superuser installed, device rooted, /system supports root protection, protected su available. The "root permission granted" checkbox is disabled though and no application is able to retrieve the root. The su binary is in both /bin and /xbin so I don't understand how it can not function.
Edit: ok, got it, the su binary has -rwsr-sr-x and the owner is root so random users cannot execute it. I also cannot change the permissions so I probably have to root again and figure out a way to keep the root after a factory reset. It makes sense to install BMM since it can take care of permissions.

[Q] i777 Dead?

Hello, first post here and I am hoping you guys will be able to help me.
I have here a SII that will only access download mode. I have tried re-flashing it several times with various Odin flashable files all of which returned a "Pass" but still would not allow me to pass the first "Samsung" screen. The files I have flashed include Clockworkmod, TWRP, and the stock UMCD8 firmware with and without pit file.
Is there any other option left short of replacing the motherboard?
You should be able to boot the phone after performing a wipe data/factory reset from within recovery. To enter recovery, hold all three buttons (vol+ vol- & pwr) continuously until the boot screen appears the second time, then release all three. You can perform a wipe data/factory reset from stock 3e recovery, or from a custom recovery, depending on which you have, it doesn't matter. That being said, you success will depend perhaps on what you flashed. I am assuming by ClockworkMod and TWRP you mean I-777 kernels containing those recoveries, as the I-777 does not have a separate recovery because the recovery is built into the kernel. If the kernel version does not match the system version (UCMD8 is Jelly Bean) then the phone would not boot even after a reset. But you could flash the full I777UCMD8 again, and then it should boot. If you have additional questions or issues, let us know.
creepyncrawly said:
You should be able to boot the phone after performing a wipe data/factory reset from within recovery. To enter recovery, hold all three buttons (vol+ vol- & pwr) continuously until the boot screen appears the second time, then release all three. You can perform a wipe data/factory reset from stock 3e recovery, or from a custom recovery, depending on which you have, it doesn't matter. That being said, you success will depend perhaps on what you flashed. I am assuming by ClockworkMod and TWRP you mean I-777 kernels containing those recoveries, as the I-777 does not have a separate recovery because the recovery is built into the kernel. If the kernel version does not match the system version (UCMD8 is Jelly Bean) then the phone would not boot even after a reset. But you could flash the full I777UCMD8 again, and then it should boot. If you have additional questions or issues, let us know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Retried flashing the I77UCMD8 using odin 1.83 but it still wont boot. I also realized that when I try to access recovery it doesn't actually shut down, but gives me a black screen from which it will reboot if left for approximately five minutes. Is there anyway to get access to adb, like perhaps flashing a. insecure bootloader or something?
Berthfield said:
Retried flashing the I77UCMD8 using odin 1.83 but it still wont boot. I also realized that when I try to access recovery it doesn't actually shut down, but gives me a black screen from which it will reboot if left for approximately five minutes. Is there anyway to get access to adb, like perhaps flashing a. insecure bootloader or something?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Since you get a pass in Odin when you flash the full UCMD8 distribution, you should be able to get into recovery. Pull the battery for at least 30 seconds, then put the battery back into the phone and hold all three buttons continuously until you see the Samsung logo appear, the screen to go black, the Samsung logo appear a second time, and the screen to go black a second time, then release all three buttons.
If this does not boot the phone into recovery mode, then please describe in detail in your next post exactly what happens when you follow this procedure.
And, if the phone will not boot into recovery, then I will need additional information in order to troubleshoot the issue further. You have not given much information about the phone. What is the history of the phone before the problem manifested? Has this been your phone since new, or did you get it from another user? What was it running before the problem. Exactly what happened when the phone stopped working. Are you an individual trying to get his personal phone going, or a business trying to fix a phone to sell? Give me as much information as you can possibly think of.
creepyncrawly said:
...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
On a side note, very honored to have issued your 3,001 'thanks'. I swear you should have triple that amount, due to the quality and depth of help you've given to the community - and continue to do so.
creepyncrawly said:
Since you get a pass in Odin when you flash the full UCMD8 distribution, you should be able to get into recovery. Pull the battery for at least 30 seconds, then put the battery back into the phone and hold all three buttons continuously until you see the Samsung logo appear, the screen to go black, the Samsung logo appear a second time, and the screen to go black a second time, then release all three buttons.
If this does not boot the phone into recovery mode, then please describe in detail in your next post exactly what happens when you follow this procedure.
And, if the phone will not boot into recovery, then I will need additional information in order to troubleshoot the issue further. You have not given much information about the phone. What is the history of the phone before the problem manifested? Has this been your phone since new, or did you get it from another user? What was it running before the problem. Exactly what happened when the phone stopped working. Are you an individual trying to get his personal phone going, or a business trying to fix a phone to sell? Give me as much information as you can possibly think of.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay. I am a student who repairs phones part-time, I am not new to the android platform or to the galaxy line however this is the first I am experiencing this particular problem.
This phone is a unlocked and refurbished device that was purchased recently by my cousin. He claims he was just installing an app when it shut down and refused to boot back up. I initially took it with the intentions of wiping the data and returning it, however I was unable to access the recovery menu.
As I had no idea what rom was on it before, other than the fact that it was a samsung original, I proceeded to trying to flash various recoveries hoping that one would load from which I could install a custom rom. Failing that I then went on to flashing the I777UCKH7 firmware which also failed to boot and/or access recovery. Unsure what to do next I then attempted to flash the I777UCMD8 firmware which also did not boot. I then made a second attempt at flashing the I777UCKH7 firmware and .pit file from your download repository which also failed to boot.
All were loaded using Odin versions 1.82, 1.83 or 1.85 (Mostly 1.85). They all returned a "Pass" status but would be stuck on the "Samsung" screen when they rebooted. It was at this point having run out of ideas that I made the O.P.
I have also tried leaving the battery out and then following your instructions for recovery, when I do so I get a black screen. If i leave it in that screen for some time (approximately 5 mins) it will reboot and again be stuck on the "Samsung" screen.
We appreciate that you aren't new to the android platform or to the galaxy-line. Regarding the i777, you are in good company, and if we know NOTHING about any other device, we know the i777 very well. We're here to help.
You mentioned that you flashed several recoveries to the device. For future reference, the recovery for the i777 is packaged with the kernel, and is not installed separately. Even the often-troublesome temporary flash-recoveries that can be found, are actually a kernel/recovery combination. The s959g (straight talk's s2) has the same partition layout as the i9100 and i777 (and several other s2's), and DOES use a separate partition for recovery.
The fact that desktop ODIN indicates PASS when the flash is complete tells us that all of the factory nand images flashed successfully (including boot). It is very common that the device needs to have the factory data reset even after the factory images have been installed via desktop ODIN, but of course that requires access to recovery. If after a successful factory flash, the vol+ & vol- & power button held-concurrently-until-recovery (<--while NOT plugged into a USB port) truly doesn't get you to recovery, then that would be a new one for me as well; all other signs (as you have stated them) point to a correctly functioning device.
I'm hesitant to point you to flash a custom kernel;
there's some unnamed part of the procedure affecting the process, and flashing another boot image won't be helpful
-or-
there's a hardware failure, and flashing another boot image won't be helpful
-or-
you're using an incorrect method to get to recovery, and flashing another boot image won't be helpful
If you want to try it anyway, custom_kernel_twrp_v2.7.1.0.tar file via desktop odin might be worth a try.
^^this will trip the flash counter
^^this will install any custom firmware, but will not boot anything below android 4.4.x
I apologize for the hijack @creepyncrawly
Berthfield said:
Okay. I am a student who repairs phones part-time, I am not new to the android platform or to the galaxy line however this is the first I am experiencing this particular problem.
This phone is a unlocked and refurbished device that was purchased recently by my cousin. He claims he was just installing an app when it shut down and refused to boot back up. I initially took it with the intentions of wiping the data and returning it, however I was unable to access the recovery menu.
As I had no idea what rom was on it before, other than the fact that it was a samsung original, I proceeded to trying to flash various recoveries hoping that one would load from which I could install a custom rom. Failing that I then went on to flashing the I777UCKH7 firmware which also failed to boot and/or access recovery. Unsure what to do next I then attempted to flash the I777UCMD8 firmware which also did not boot. I then made a second attempt at flashing the I777UCKH7 firmware and .pit file from your download repository which also failed to boot.
All were loaded using Odin versions 1.82, 1.83 or 1.85 (Mostly 1.85). They all returned a "Pass" status but would be stuck on the "Samsung" screen when they rebooted. It was at this point having run out of ideas that I made the O.P.
I have also tried leaving the battery out and then following your instructions for recovery, when I do so I get a black screen. If i leave it in that screen for some time (approximately 5 mins) it will reboot and again be stuck on the "Samsung" screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
cyril279 said:
I apologize for the hijack creepyncrawly
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
On the contrary, your input is valuable and desired.
@Berthfield,
If there was actual nand damage in any partition that was flashed, you would not get a pass in Odin, as far as I know. Since you are unable to boot into any recovery, this indicates a problem with the nand memory, possibly a corruption issue. Please try the following (you might try accessing recovery after each step, and if you get to it, perform a wipe data/factory reset):
Instructions to clear nand read/write corruption. Instructions are specific; do them in order, and don't skip.
Odin3 v1.85 is recommended.
1) Download the Tar version of Siyah 2.6.14 Kernel. Flash it in PDA. Without ticking Re-Partitioning
2) Flash the Tar.md5 of the full stock Gingerbread distribution from the Download Repository, I777UCKH7 including the bootloaders and everything, in the PDA slot.
3) If that is successful you are done. If it is not, then:
4) Download the SBL Bootloader from the Download Repository. Flash it as PDA in ODIN, without ticking Re-Partitioning. (Please observe normal bootloader flashing caution.)
5) Flash the Kernel, as in step 1.
6) Flash the full stock Gingerbread distribution, as in step 2.
I was away from home for a bit and so was unable to work with the phone. I have followed the instructions given above but I am still unable to boot.
I was using the "I777UCKH7-REV02-home-low-CL503881.tar.md5" file downloaded from the download repository, is this the right file or is there another Gingerbread flash that wold be better to use?
I am really puzzled at what exactly is happening with this phone.
Yes, that is correct. That is the original stock gingerbread from when the phone was first released.
I agree that it is a puzzle. Just to be sure, you followed the directions exactly? I'm not sure why, but the sequence will clear nand read/write corruption. You might try once again with the SBL -> Siyah Kernel -> Full Gingerbread, just to make sure.
1) Flash the SBL by itself and pull the battery.
2) Flash the Siyah kernel by itself and pull the battery.
3) Flash the full Gingerbread stock and pull the battery.
4) Enter recovery and perform a wipe data/factory reset.
5) Reboot.
creepyncrawly said:
Yes, that is correct. That is the original stock gingerbread from when the phone was first released.
I agree that it is a puzzle. Just to be sure, you followed the directions exactly? I'm not sure why, but the sequence will clear nand read/write corruption. You might try once again with the SBL -> Siyah Kernel -> Full Gingerbread, just to make sure.
1) Flash the SBL by itself and pull the battery.
2) Flash the Siyah kernel by itself and pull the battery.
3) Flash the full Gingerbread stock and pull the battery.
4) Enter recovery and perform a wipe data/factory reset.
5) Reboot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did the above and it is still a no go.
I have come to realize that the phone seems to think it is in recovery mode when I attempt to enter it as if it is plugged in while on the black screen it doesn't display the charging animation. This occurs regardless of the kernel/recovery combo that is on the phone and while in that state it is also not detected by the computer. To rule out possible problems I have also attempted the flash on a different computer with a different cable and it is still the same.
I remember reading about the ICS hard-brick bug and that it was possible to brick the phone is a large enough file was written to memory. Is it possible that this could be my problem or would Odin return a error if the chip was damaged? Also I am not sure if this matters but I find it odd that after flashing the Siyah kernel and CWM the phone still hasn't tripped its custom binary counter.
Berthfield said:
Did the above and it is still a no go.
I have come to realize that the phone seems to think it is in recovery mode when I attempt to enter it as if it is plugged in while on the black screen it doesn't display the charging animation. This occurs regardless of the kernel/recovery combo that is on the phone and while in that state it is also not detected by the computer. To rule out possible problems I have also attempted the flash on a different computer with a different cable and it is still the same.
I remember reading about the ICS hard-brick bug and that it was possible to brick the phone is a large enough file was written to memory. Is it possible that this could be my problem or would Odin return a error if the chip was damaged? Also I am not sure if this matters but I find it odd that after flashing the Siyah kernel and CWM the phone still hasn't tripped its custom binary counter.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Evidently, this situation is beyond my experience.
My understanding is that if emmc memory is damaged within a given partition, then Odin will not be able to successfully flash that partition. While I don't know exactly how Odin functions, I believe there are checks within the flashing sequence for each partition. So as stated before, it is assumed that if you get a pass in Odin, there is not emmc damage, at least not within the various partitions that Odin flashes.
There was one case I remember with the emmc super brick bug where the phone would boot, but would not function correctly. Evidently in that case, a small portion of the emmc memory was damaged. The usual symptom of that bug was a hard brick.
The charging issue could be hardware or it could be a failing or failed battery. Have you tried another battery?
Flashing the Siyah kernel and not tripping the flash counter is more than a little odd. The code that governs that behavior is in the secondary boot loader as far as I know, and you have reflashed that. Please bear in mind that anything I say is speculation, but this issue give me a lot of reasons to think it is a failed hardware issue.

Help restoring device to Stock

Hello all,
I want to give my friend my Galaxy Note. Due to this, I attempted to do a factory reset from the settings menu, but it would reboot to TWRP instead and get locked in a boot screen. I tried flashing a third-party ROM (CM), but stupidly forgot to wipe the device since I thought I had done it before, resulting in it hanging at the boot animation. Could someone point me to the right direction on how to restore the device to Stock using a tool like Odin? Thanks.
P.S. Does anyone know how to get into TWRP? I can't seem to find a key combination, I have to do it from the TWRP application (yet I can't access the application).
UPDATE: I have managed to get into TWRP, however restoring fails, as it goes back to the TWRP logo. Wipe also does not work.
Solved, what I did was flash a recovery via Odin, which resulted in an error. Kies detected it since it had an error, so it was able to be restored.

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