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Hello all!
In an effort to try and help Boost Mobile users out, I have put together a stock restore guide for the Moto E 2015. There are other versions of a stock firmware guide, but those are for GSM and others not using CDMA. Here you will find steps to restore your Boost Mobile Moto E!
First off, I am NOT responsible for damaging your phone or any user error. USE THIS GUIDE AT YOUR OWN RISK!
If you are here reading this guide, you have either bricked your device or just want to go back to the stock firmware. If you are using a custom recovery such as TWRP, any saved nandroid backups will be lost if saved on internal storage. This will factory load 5.0.2 Lollipop fresh out of the box the day you got your phone!
Firstly, you will need ABD and Fastboot and Motorola Device Manager. You can download Motorola Device Manager directly from here.
I have attached ABD and Fastboot to this post for download.
To use ABD and Fastboot, you will need to make a new folder and extract the zip to the new folder and name it fastboot. From there, you will need to launch a command window from that folder. The easiest way to do this is to to have that folder selected and Shift/right click and "Open command window here". From there, if you have done this right, you will have a command prompt window ready to go!
After you have setup your new folder with ABD and Fastboot, you are ready to load the stock firmware to your Moto E! Download link is here
After you have downloaded your stock firmware, double check to make sure you have XT1526_Updated_SURNIA_BOOST_5.0.2_LXI22.50-14.6_cid9_subsidy-DEFAULT_CFC.xml.zip
Extract the contents of the file you downloaded to the folder where you put your ABD and Fastboot in.
Once you have everything ready to go, power down your phone and put it in bootloader mode. Hold power and volume down for a few seconds and you are there. Attach your USB cable from your PC to the phone and be ready to load several lines of code. Flash these codes in order. Copy and paste if you like in to your command prompt, one line at a time!
Code:
fastboot oem fb_mode_set
fastboot flash partition gpt.bin
fastboot flash bootloader bootloader.img
fastboot flash logo logo.bin
fastboot flash boot boot.img
fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.0
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.1
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.2
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.3
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.4
fastboot flash system system.img_sparsechunk.5
fastboot flash modem NON-HLOS.bin
fastboot erase modemst1
fastboot erase modemst2
fastboot flash fsg fsg.mbn
fastboot erase cache
fastboot erase userdata
fastboot oem config carrier
fastboot oem fb_mode_clear
Once you have done this, restart your phone and wait a few minutes for the boot sequence to start. If you have done this right, your phone will be factory fresh with the stock firmware on it!
If I was able to help out, hit thanks! :good:
This is my first guide and I had to look everywhere to find out how to do this for Boost variants, and hopefully it is ok for everyone to use!
EDIT: I updated the download link. Sorry about that.
Will this relock bootloader?
crazynapkinman said:
Will this relock bootloader?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No. There are certain steps to relock the bootloader, but it does no good now. You can still OTA with an unlocked bootloader, but as far as factory warranty goes, its void as soon as you unlock it. The only reason you would ever want to relock it is if you were giving the phone to someone who didn't know anything about rooting our phones.... it just doesn't do any good.
Thanks. I may try this, but not until after I flash cyanogen 12. That won't be until they get LTE working on CDMA Boost Mobile variant.
Also, why do you need to have Motorola Device Manager?
crazynapkinman said:
Thanks. I may try this, but not until after I flash cyanogen 12. That won't be until they get LTE working on CDMA Boost Mobile variant.
Also, why do you need to have Motorola Device Manager?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Motorola Device Manager installs all the drivers you need for the phone.
Thank you
imprint89 said:
Motorola Device Manager installs all the drivers you need for the phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you I finally got my Moto e back to stock with twrp and root with SuperSu which Borks my cameras. LOL. The only thing I had to do different I had to use MFastboot and there is a 1 click installer to do it with.
I really appreciate you looking out.
Joe
joex55 said:
Thank you I finally got my Moto e back to stock with twrp and root with SuperSu which Borks my cameras. LOL. The only thing I had to do different I had to use MFastboot and there is a 1 click installer to do it with.
I really appreciate you looking out.
Joe
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad I could help out!
Hey, this forum looks really helpful, but unfortunately the stock firmware zip link isn't working for me. Is there any other place that you might suggest getting it from? I do have two of the same phone if it's possible to retrieve the firmware from another one, but I wiped my first one which is why I'm here in the first place. Thanks!
*EDIT: Hey, no worries, I found another file of the same type, but I can't post the link yet. (Follow the Moto E 2015 thread to general to "| Read Before You Flash | Unlock | Restore | Stock Firmware |," follow the link there, and find the other, newer, XT1526 file.) I just installed the drivers, got the minimal adb/fastboot zip, and followed the commands given above. Thanks for your help, everything is fixed now, even my service is back!
Will you provide the link when you can?
I could use a link as well :|
Sitting ducks until i can flash stock back on.
---------- Post added at 08:25 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:17 PM ----------
NateAC said:
Hey, this forum looks really helpful, but unfortunately the stock firmware zip link isn't working for me. Is there any other place that you might suggest getting it from? I do have two of the same phone if it's possible to retrieve the firmware from another one, but I wiped my first one which is why I'm here in the first place. Thanks!
*EDIT: Hey, no worries, I found another file of the same type, but I can't post the link yet. (Follow the Moto E 2015 thread to general to "| Read Before You Flash | Unlock | Restore | Stock Firmware |," follow the link there, and find the other, newer, XT1526 file.) I just installed the drivers, got the minimal adb/fastboot zip, and followed the commands given above. Thanks for your help, everything is fixed now, even my service is back!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
is there any way you could pm me a link to a working xt1526 rom?
Download link is updated.
Does this remove account information and installed apps? Do you have to activate phone with Boost again or no?
Nevermind. I just went for it and the answer is Yes, it removes accounts and installed apps.
And No, you do not have to re-register with Boost Mobile. Full system restore.
Confirm working for Boost Mobile XT1526 CDMA LTE.
Thanks so much for this thread. You're going to save SO many devices!
After flashing this my stock recovery gives me a dead android (on it's back with red triangle) How can I get stock recovery back? Can I flash stick recovery via adb?
Edit: So after further Googling, my understanding is that the red triangle android is supposed to be there... but I've tried all the suggested button presses to get the actual menu to appear. I'm trying to get the menu on the Moto E 2015 CDMA LTE Boost Mobile.
Can someone tell me the actual button combination to get the stock recovery menu to appear?
Edit: OMFG! People are so stupid... I'm going to make my own youtube video and post it for our phones.... All of the guides were wrong!
To enter recovery menu (after android with red triangle is displayed) press and hold power for 3 seconds, then tap the volume up once.
I will post a video on how to do this for moto e 2015 CDMA XT1526. Hope this helps anyone else who was confused/concerned about their stock recovery partition not working after flashing back to pure stock.
Edit: Here's the video of how to access the contextual menu of Recovery on the Moto E 2015 4G LTE CDMA Boost Mobile variant (XT1526)
http://youtu.be/gffx5CN9wF4
Help with Fastboot Errors
There are errors when running some of these commands on my phone the rest of the commands seem to run fine. Hope to resolve or confirm they are simply to be ignored. I would like to confirm all partitions are re-written factory for troubleshooting purposes. Thanks.. These are the only errors...
Windows 8.1
Fastboot download from this post.
Driver Motorola ADB interface v2.0.2.0 - If in question please confirm this or post directly to drivers that I can manually install to know I'm running. The MOTO software install hides everything so I'm just not sure what it's doing exactly.
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.016s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\cache
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\cache'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\cache
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot oem config D:\ADB\XT1526\carrier
...
(bootloader) Not allowed command
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.016s
Hmmm. I followed this exact guide and it worked flawlessly
deansouth8 said:
There are errors when running some of these commands on my phone the rest of the commands seem to run fine. Hope to resolve or confirm they are simply to be ignored. I would like to confirm all partitions are re-written factory for troubleshooting purposes. Thanks.. These are the only errors...
Windows 8.1
Fastboot download from this post.
Driver Motorola ADB interface v2.0.2.0 - If in question please confirm this or post directly to drivers that I can manually install to know I'm running. The MOTO software install hides everything so I'm just not sure what it's doing exactly.
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.016s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst2
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\cache
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\cache'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\cache
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata
erasing 'D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata'...
(bootloader) Invalid partition name D:\ADB\XT1526\userdata
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.000s
D:\ADB>fastboot oem config D:\ADB\XT1526\carrier
...
(bootloader) Not allowed command
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.016s
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're entering the commands incorrectly. For example, the first command in your example should be "fastboot erase modemst1", not "fastboot erase D:\ADB\XT1526\modemst1". Enter the commands as shown in the first post of this thread.
Brainfart bigtime. Thanks for the catch. I'm going to get the tire pump for a refill.
If you do this after updating to 5.1 ota will the phone still work correctly?
Meaning you will be back to stock recovery, stock system, stock firmware, and Android 5.1 OS?
Question?
imprint89 said:
No. There are certain steps to relock the bootloader, but it does no good now. You can still OTA with an unlocked bootloader, but as far as factory warranty goes, its void as soon as you unlock it. The only reason you would ever want to relock it is if you were giving the phone to someone who didn't know anything about rooting our phones.... it just doesn't do any good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can i just put the lock bootloader command first,then put the rest of the commands or is this not digitally signed
Help: XT1511 bricked
Hello, my XT1511 has been bricked, had installed CM12.1 and TWRP but the error information to be going to an external hard drive via a laptop with ubuntu mate is present. My terminal only presents the logo of the brand and enter fastboot, have tried to follow the steps but I get errors that you can not write to the device, the debug options and OEM you were disabled so the OEM unlock does not work how I can get my device?
Regards.
Long story short, I tried to flash new rom on my Mt2-L02 mate2 and failed and its bootlooping (at Huawei Ascend screen and keep rebooting) now. using the SDcard udload to load new rom don't work either. I cannot go into recovery, or boot into system.
My phone is bootloader unlocked, so I tried to flash (extract from a rom) boot.img, recovery.img and is ok but when flashing system.img, it stucked in writing 'system'... for long time.... so I tried fastboot erase system -w and get FAILED (remote: Command not allowed)... why is it so? my phone is already unlocked. I tried unlock again and flash the system.img, same problem.
So... I'm screwed?
You're not screwed. Impatient maybe. Try on a different computer if you have one. If not, update drivers and try a different port on the existing computer. Are you flashing an MT2-L02 ROM?
kimtyson said:
You're not screwed. Impatient maybe. Try on a different computer if you have one. If not, update drivers and try a different port on the existing computer. Are you flashing an MT2-L02 ROM?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Only have 1 pc, yes, I'm flashing MT2-L02 ROM, tried alot of version but discovered only these version rom (b408, b603, b606, b607) able to write the system.img, original out of box android version for my phone is 4.4.2. but still bootlooping after flashing boot.img, recovery.img and system.img. I think only custom recovery can save now, but there is none for this model... or maybe there is no hope for my phone? Maybe my phone got some system modified lock so that I'm not able to erase using flashboot?
C:\adb>fastboot erase cache
erasing 'cache'...
FAILED (remote: Command not allowed)
finished. total time: 0.001s
C:\adb>fastboot erase data
erasing 'data'...
FAILED (remote: Command not allowed)
finished. total time: 0.002s
C:\adb>fastboot erase system
erasing 'system'...
FAILED (remote: Command not allowed)
finished. total time: 0.001s
If I'm able to erase those, I'm might solved the bootlooping problem..
Try using this thread as reference, http://forum.xda-developers.com/asc...to-fix-soft-bricked-phone-using-twrp-t2886630. It's for a different model so just use your stock ROM in place of the L03 ROM. I'm not sure how to help beyond that. There has to be a way to return to stock on the L02.
Maybe this message is late, pls try following
http://pan.baidu.com/s/1dDpc4eP
http://www.huaweirom.com/rom/mate2/2619.html
usb flash instructions:
http://www.huaweirom.com/guide/2621.html
You may need to use google translate since all the info is in Chinese
Basically they are saying you should use B117 if B4xx not working.
I am not a developer, but would like to consider myself an advanced user.
After unlocking the bootloader, I have installed custom ROMs on three different devices at different times. I have also installed the stock ROM. But have never locked the bootloader back.
However, on the current device (that was looping through the bootloader), I installed the stock ROM (RETAILDSDSALL_XT1022_4.4.4_KXC21.5-40_cid7_CFC.xml) and locked the bootloader. Successfully updated it to the official OTA Lollipop 5.1.
After that, I just tried my luck to install Ubuntu Touch (ported actually for Moto G [falcon] by h2o64, based on this thread). I unlocked the bootloader again for this. The install was 'successful' (there were no errors surprisingly), but the device obviously did not boot.
Now, I wanted to reinstall the stock firmware on the device. This time however, it fails at this command:
sudo fastboot flash partition gpt.bin
Here's the result >
target reported max download size of 299892736 bytes
sending 'partition' (32 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.087s]
writing 'partition'...
(bootloader) Preflash validation failed
FAILED (remote failure)
finished. total time: 0.667s
I have used fastboot in Linux all the other times I said I installed custom and stock ROMs.
However, I tested with mfastboot on Windows 10 as well, with no luck.
I am also able to successfully install TWRP recovery on the device and erase "system", "cache" and "userdata" using fastboot. However, cache and dalvik cache removal fails on TWRP.
Finally, although the partition flash command (which I personally understand as creating the partition table - correct me here please) and the motoboot.img flash command failed, I ran the rest of the commands and successfully installed the stock ROM mentioned above. However, this time, the "fastboot oem lock" command fails.
Any suggestions would be of great help... (it's not my phone)
So I bought a son new phone.
As he told he installed magisk first, flashing "magisk_patched.img" through windows shell, everything was fine. Then He flashed twrp and magisk, everything was almost fine, he noticed that he cant play audio. He was trying to fix it first through installing magisk audio mods like viper and sauron. It didn't fixed anything, he unistalled it, everything was still in the same state, so he decided to flash stock frimware. He flashed through mi flashing tool, unfortunetaly It was image for "global xiaomi version" I mean "PFQMIXM" when as far as I know It should be "PFQEUXM". It didn't work and he was stuck in a bootloop. He found "MiUi 11 " image and for still unknown to me reason thought that it is going to fix everything. He flashed It again through mi flashing tool. It didn't work. He did that second time but at last he just closed the flashing tool while it was doing its thing.
At last he found eu firmware but now after all of that when i try to flash it or single files like crc list i get this:
flash crclist "E:\ModCR\adb\images\crclist.txt"
Sending 'crclist' (0 KB) FAILED (Write to device failed (Unknown error))
fastboot: error: Command failed
Device only boots to fastboot (no recovery/twrp either).
I tried erasing cache:
./fastboot erase cache
Erasing 'cache' FAILED (Write to device failed (Unknown error))
fastboot: error: Command failed
I tried to check slots:
./fastboot getvar active-slot
getvar:active-slot FAILED (Write to device failed (Unknown error))
Finished. Total time: 5.003s
I tried to change slot:
./fastboot set_active b
fastboot: error: Device does not support slots
When i typed "fastboot devices" It appeared as "??????"
./fastboot devices
???????????? fastboot
I don't know how to fix it, If anyone knows or has any kind of even small idea please write it down. I would be very greatfull.
Install custom recovery twrp
Install custom rom
Reboot
Download firmware EU
Install a firmware witch miflash
Restore Factory
Walaaaaa
xt610 said:
Install custom recovery twrp
Install custom rom
Reboot
Download firmware EU
Install a firmware witch miflash
Restore Factory
Walaaaaa
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What i understand from op post is that fastboot commands are not working. So how will he flash twrp?
The firmware version doesn't matter at all you can flash EU on global and vice versa it doesn't matter.
What I think happened was your son never switched to slot 'a' before using mi flash.
Xiaomi's install script for miflash requires you to be on slot 'a' before flashing.
The only way to recover from this is edl mode which requires a xiaomi verified account to fix.
MOD EDIT: Part removed
Please do not advertise/recommend remote unlock services on XDA. Please read the FORUM RULES especially those:
Help! Installed CallX, which has very good reviews, but instantly I could no longer hear anyone who called nor who I call. If I turn on the speaker we can converse but not clearly in a noisy environment.
I immediately deinstalled CallX... but, the problem remained.
In desperation I completely installed new firmware on the phone (Havoc 4.12, previously Havoc 4.8) and lost all my config which takes me a day to rebuild, and guess what? NO CHANGE. I can't hear anyone as a normal phone.
The developer of CallX is unresponsive. Isn't that dynamite? I think he must have been packing the reviews.
Does anyone know where the problem could be? I can't believe installing new firmware did not fix it.
Quantumstate said:
Help! Installed CallX, which has very good reviews, but instantly I could no longer hear anyone who called nor who I call. If I turn on the speaker we can converse but not clearly in a noisy environment.
I immediately deinstalled CallX... but, the problem remained.
In desperation I completely installed new firmware on the phone (Havoc 4.12, previously Havoc 4.8) and lost all my config which takes me a day to rebuild, and guess what? NO CHANGE. I can't hear anyone as a normal phone.
The developer of CallX is unresponsive. Isn't that dynamite? I think he must have been packing the reviews.
Does anyone know where the problem could be? I can't believe installing new firmware did not fix it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sounds like you need to flash stock Motorola firmware.
I never thought an app could do such damage to a phone even after reinstalling firmware.
I've now also lost all of my Signal SMS history (Havoc 4.12) because in Permissions the only ones available for Signal are Media Only or None. It needs Files permission to restore the backups, but it is just not an option.
It's worse now. I installed Stock using my instructions over here, but I installed Android 11, not having seen Beetle's post below. In TWRP I got all kinds of permission denied errors on /data/. So I then downloaded Android 10 from here, and
# fastboot flash partition gpt.bin
...which went fine. But then
# fastboot flash bootloader bootloader.img
Sending 'bootloader' (14204 KB) OKAY [ 0.414s]
Writing 'bootloader' (bootloader) Validating 'bootloader.default.xml'
(bootloader) Preflash validation failed
(bootloader) Preflash validation failed
(bootloader) Cancelling 'bootloader.default.xml'
FAILED (remote: '')
fastboot: error: Command failed
No idea what is wrong. The partitions should have been written. My phone's down hard now. Booting into fastboot I do not get the normal way it looks, but a mostly blank screen with Start in the center, and text at bottom acknowleging it's connected. And it does answer up to # fastboot devices. I've downloaded the stock image twice and same issue.
I can't find an older Android 10, in the hope that it will fix this. I believe that Android 10 is required for all versions of Havoc, but I can't even get to Stock at this point. Feel like drinking but won't,
# fastboot flash bootloader bootloader.img
Sending 'bootloader' (14204 KB) OKAY [ 0.385s]
Writing 'bootloader' (bootloader) Validating 'bootloader.default.xml'
(bootloader) Preflash validation failed
(bootloader) Preflash validation failed
(bootloader) Cancelling 'bootloader.default.xml'
FAILED (remote: '')
fastboot: error: Command failed
In TWRP I get "failed to mount /metadata" "invalid argument". There is no way to recover from this. I suspect this happened because I tried to roll back from stock Android 11 to 10. I've tried going back to 11 and every which way.
Looks like this phone is ruined. I've tried everything I can think of. out of ideas.
Yep, did a complete fastboot flash reinstall of Stock 11, and still the earpiece does not work. Phone is the default calling app.
This phone is unusable except in speakerphone. I've ordered another Moto G Power 2020 as it's so good otherwise, even without call recording. But AVOID CallX!
Beetle84 once said to not install Stock 11 then Havoc, that it must be Stock 10, but it is unclear whether that applies to the current Havoc 4.12 which is based on Android 11?
What I know for sure is that when you install Stock Android 11, you can NOT go back to Android 10 as G**gle has thoughtfully put in anti-rollback measures. And Android 12 makes things much more difficult for us modders.
Quantumstate said:
What I know for sure is that when you install Stock Android 11, you can NOT go back to Android 10 as G**gle has thoughtfully put in anti-rollback measures. And Android 12 makes things much more difficult for us modders.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's not good. May I suggest supporting the efforts of the Pine64 folks?
Quantumstate said:
In TWRP I get "failed to mount /metadata" "invalid argument". There is no way to recover from this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you try wiping metadata entirely?
I had the same problem with the bootloader refusing to allow downgrading the bootloader after installing Motorola's Android 11 firmware. Even so LineageOS is running fine on the device's Slot A right now. Read my post over here.
I did something like: (Exact steps weren't noted. Sorry, no desire to retest on a now working device used by a family member.)
Booted into the bootloader and flashed Motorola's Android 11 stock firmware from XT2041-4_SOFIA_RETUS_11_RPMS31.Q1-54-13-7_subsidy-DEFAULT_regulatory-DEFAULT_CFC.xml.zip on Slot A, minus vbmeta and super
fastboot set_active a
fastboot oem fb_mode_set
fastboot flash partition gpt.bin
fastboot flash bootloader bootloader.img
fastboot flash radio radio.img
fastboot flash bluetooth BTFM.bin
fastboot flash dsp dspso.bin
fastboot flash logo logo.bin
fastboot flash boot boot.img
fastboot flash dtbo dtbo.img
fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
fastboot oem fb_mode_clear
Rebooted into fastbootd (fastboot reboot fastboot) and flashed LineageOS fastbootd images from lineage-18.1-20211219-UNOFFICIAL-FASTBOOTD-sofiar.zip
fastboot flash boot boot.img
fastboot flash system system.img
fastboot flash vbmeta vbmeta.img
fastboot flash product product.img
Returned to the bootloader (fastboot reboot bootloader) and wiped data
fastboot erase carrier
fastboot erase userdata
fastboot erase metadata
fastboot erase ddr
Rebooted (fastboot reboot) into LineageOS, it booted successfully and runs fine. Rooting wasn't tested. Before trying LineageOS fastbootd images I installed crDroid through TWRP and booted it with success. It had some weird bugs unfortunately, most importantly being unable to serve as a working phone. My family member was very happy with an older version of crDroid from around June on the Android 10 firmware.
I fixed the /medadata error by (in TWRP)
- Unmount /metadata
- Disable MBR
- Format /metadata.
Problem is metadata was encrypted and 11 couldn't tell from 10.
Now all the /loop's on inactive slot b are inaccessible. I could keep jacking with it but ran out of time. And running Stock in slot a I find I still have the earphone problem so gave up and ordered another phone. It should never be possible for an app to do this kind of damage.
Yes I've noticed the Pine64 project, although one thing I require is a water-resistant phone. There will come a point, in view of the awful changes in Android 12, where I may move to a Pine phone. As it is, for years I've run no gapps, do not use the Play store, nor anything else G**gle except the OS. And I choke the OS off with AFWall+ in F-Droid.