How I bricked my Desire S - information on avoiding brick and an indictment of the dubious nature of HTC's S-on policy
The Desire S is a great phone so why did I want to root it?
The main reasons for rooting and s-off for me were:
Titanium backup (android built in backup is weak)
Being able to remove bloatware that takes up unnecessary spaces and unnecessarily reduces battery performance.
To try different ROMs from the community
Video screen capture
And of course I bought the phone so isn't it mine to use as I please.
Having waited a long time for a good s-off tool to come out I was getting more and more anxious to s-off.
Alpharev got together with Unrevoked to create Revolutionary.
I had previously used the Unrevoked tool to root my first generation Desire. The tool worked easily and flawlessly even on my Mac.
I later used the Alpharev bootable CD to s-off and root a later generation Desire. Again it worked smoothly and flawlessly.
Having had this positive experience I felt confident in the new tool, Revolutionary.
I read everything I could find about how the tool worked and how others were finding results. All seemed straight forward and uncomplicated so I proceeded to download and run the tool from my PC because there was no Mac version available.
Temp root and s-off went smoothly. No apparent issuse. Both Hboot and Fastboot had been successfully replaced on the phone, and CWM recovery was working.
So I added su in recovery then ran a nand backup of the whole system at this point.
Then I downloaded a Cyan 7 ported for the Desire S that was getting good reviews and feedback. The rom seemed to flash clean. After running it for a short time it stated crashing, so I decided to try an MIUI ported to Desire S. Again a ROM with good feedback and labeled as stable.
Downloaded the ROM and flashed it after a full wipe in recovery.
This time on reboot the phone hung at the HTC screen on boot for a very long time. So I wanted to do a force shutdown.
Here is where things got ugly.
The Desire S does not have a force shutdown keystroke combo as my old Desire did. So I opted to pull the battery.
Reinserting the battery and booting into recovery nothing worked properly.
CWM wouldn't mount its partitions, wouldn't flash a rom or even do a factory reset.
I tried doing some functions in fastboot mode. But nothing worked. Any command issued in fastboot mode would just lock up the phone and terminal.
At this point I was pretty worried so I got on #revolutionary and chatted with some of the big guns. I got some good feedback to test this and try that but in the end nothing worked. So I got on XDA forum and looked for others with similar issues.
What I found at this point was very troubling.
XDA user opumps had the same issue as me and had done some great research about the problem.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1150917
It becomes clear on reading, that like him, my Desire S had a fried eMMC chip. This is the internal storage device for HBoot. Once cooked your are basically F*ucked. There is no recovering from this by reformatting the eMMC. Pooched.
Doing the tests on the XDA post I found my eMMC to be pooched.
Now the question is, What fried the eMMc? Was it the S=off process or the forced pulling of the battery while the phone was boot locked?
I then took the phone to HTCs warranty center.
They tested the phone and called me back a few hours later. Your eMMC chip is fried they said. Yes, I said, Can you fix it please?
He told me that the eMMc was fried by the s-off tool I had used. Now, maybe he is full of **** and just wants an excuse to void my warranty. And, maybe not.
I told him to go ahead and fix it. He told me it would be a $200 Dollar replacement of the main board. ****. Well, what other choice do I have. Do it, I told him.
Next I got on the phone with the HTC help center. I got friendly with the lady technician on the call. After some nice chat I started probing for information on the Desire S. After a long conversation She told me that the Desire S, Incredible S, Desire HD all have the problem of frying the eMMC chip if the battery is disconnected while power is on. She said she gets calls every day with people who have fried their eMMC chip. Not through S-off but just because the battery came loose and lost contact while the phone was on or charging. The main reasons for the issue are as follows, HTC cheaped out on the eMMC chips in these phones, as the issue is specific to a particular series of eMMc. And because of a design flaw in the way the battery door closes, and because HTC did not include a force shutdown key combination to shut the phone off properly when locked.
So in the end it sounds like a lot of bad design and bad planning and poor foresight on HTC's part led to the fried eMMC on my phone. But they are not willing to stand behind their product and found an excuse to void my warranty and make me pay for the replacement Mainboard.
Now, here is where we get into the debate of should anyone s-off their phone? The main point here is no one should have to s-off. The phones should never be shipped s-on. It's bad policy to lock the bootloader. But having received an s-on phone you may very well want to s-off. If you decide to s-off just remember that you could easily brick your phone by many ways not related to s-off and your warranty will be void.
Another option is to not buy HTC because of the design flaws and their bad locked bootloader policy. To unlock and root a Samsung all you have to do is issue the command fastboot oem unlock. I don't know if Samsung phones also have the eMMc chip issue, so I can't comment there. But I certainly prefer their open policy on bootloaders.
Maybe the whole reason for locked bootloaders from HTC is beacause they are aware that they used sub par eMMc chips and are trying to reduce bricks.
Regardless this experience has made me very dubious of HTC in general.
I hope this is helpful and educational.
Thanks for sharing, I removed my battery a couple of times while stuck in htc logo screen. Don't think I'll try that move again, anyway I read about holding power + vol up + vol down to force shutdown, wondering whether that works...
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
monkey21stc said:
Thanks for sharing, I removed my battery a couple of times while stuck in htc logo screen. Don't think I'll try that move again, anyway I read about holding power + vol up + vol down to force shutdown, wondering whether that works...
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Again, thanks for warning.sorry to hear your struggle, disappointed that htc use this tactic, will certainly reconsider buying an alternate make device next time of this issue persists
The volume up plus volume down plus power button combination does work, it's just but published
Very often, although have yet trio try out when the devices has hung, but certainly reboots my device .
Swyped from HTC Desire S using XDA Premium
just fyi in germay they take 184 € to repair a bricked eMMc :-(
Aye, Thanks for Sharing. I'v hade the same problem as you. I'll never buy an HTC phone again. Cheap bastards!
i need to know that every chip is different...bad for u that u got the bad one but i flash phone daily and its ok..i have same procedure every time i do that..to brick phone can happen to experts too...well if u want to risk to get root and all goodies u can say good bay to warranty..thats for sure
thanks for sharing man.
monkey21stc said:
Thanks for sharing, I removed my battery a couple of times while stuck in htc logo screen. Don't think I'll try that move again, anyway I read about holding power + vol up + vol down to force shutdown, wondering whether that works...
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that works on miui
Buy a htc with simlock.
Mine is t-mobile
When I've started my device for the first time, is was already s-off because if I turn my phone on it will show the t-mobile logo
So u can't brick your phone if you will s-off
But thanks for sharing
Next time I won't buy a htc
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA Premium App
Just remember though flash memory is extremely volatile, and ripping a battery out of a phone generally isn't a good idea to begin with, although I was lucky to read about the vol up/down + power procedure before I rooted my phone.
Very interesting post, interesting to see the bigger picture behind this issue.
so here's the deal - I am 99.9% sure that the bricked eMMC chip is a problem only in devices with a chip that was faulty in the first place. When the phone first came out, there were MANY threads on the hardware faults like "Battery cover not fitting" and "Misaligned screen". This was an issue that could't be identified easily, so it wasn't reported. Now, many people are having this issue and instead of panicking, we should do some research. I think that all the guys who bricked their phone would be living close to each other, in the same country or at least the same continent ie, this is a local issue. Also, i'm sure they had one of the other issues i mentioned above. I've not seen anyone in India or Asia with any such issues, so i think we need to find out why europe is having problems. Contact the BRICKees, i'll try making a new thread.
^^^.. yes this issue you need to find the Source.. I sold my Desire yestreday to get Hold of the Desire S but my only concern is this Dead eMMC chip.. and that is the reason I am not buying it yet... I want to identofy the ones with this issue..
really I dont want to screw up my 40K Rs on a faulty set..
Got the same problem, accidentally bricked a DS with a faulty Samsung eMMC, barely 3 weeks after buying it and 2 weeks after S/OFF'ing and rooting it... (btw, isn't it strange that Samsung chips that you find in Samsung branded phones don't seem to have this problem, but strangely the chips sold to their competitors seem to always be somehow sub-par ? Clever and sneaky way to undermine the competition, if you ask me. But at the same time, I bought a SGS2 as replacement in the meantime. ^^ even though it heats up a bit, it's way better than the DS )...
Haven't RMA'd the DS yet, I'm trying my damnedest to find a way to S-ON again and trash the remainder of the partition table -so the service center won't gimme **** about it.. So far I've been able to revert back from Alpharev SOFF to PVT ENG SOFF (0.98.2000), but even this has been horribly hard to achieve.. The "secret fastboot command" to totally brick a NAND didn't work, of course. Had to do it all by hand, in the dead of night, losing many hours of sleep in the process.. :/
It's really shameful that HTC is using such deviant ways to cover their own ****ups and to shirk the payment of their dues.. So I really got no qualms about trying to con them into replacing the device under warranty either. "tit for tat", or so they say.. And they shouldn't be surprised if I never ever again buy a phone from them either, that's really bad PR if y'ask me...
PS : I just got one of those mischievous ideas that often occur to me during sleepless nights : I've read here and there about how dangerous flashing a radio is, and it should only be done if necessary, yadda-yadda-yadda... (heck, I was at my 4th radio flash -just for the fun of it, didn't even have any reception or battery problems to justify it- when I bricked my DS, and I can tell y'all that it wasn't what ****ed it up :S)
Let's just imagine -that's a hypothesis, of course- that I attempted flashing a new radio, and one of my cats "accidentally" jumped on the desk and ripped the usb cord away from the phone, making it drop down on the floor, dislodging the battery in the process.. Wouldn't this brick it nice and proper, and render the NAND totally unreadable even for a HTC service center ? xD
I guess they got a XTC device at hand, but would that help in such a case ?
Can someone confirm what exactly is meant by pressing Power and Volume + and - at the same time? Press Power and press both ends of the volume rocker switch at once? Is that it?
first press the two volume buttons and then power until it shuts down.
worked for me at least -I just learned about that trick a trifle too late
your story said that it includes desire HD? wow i didn't know that honestly when my old DHD freezed i always pull the battery out and no problems at all it's just that the constant carmode problem irritated me and ended up selling it and bought a Desire S...not yet rooted and S-Off but will do later...so it's not the S-off process it's the battery thingy...it sucks for that to happen
Thanks for guide. I'm really scare of eMMC chip problems. I never tried to S-OFF coz of eMMC chip problems. Don't wanna to make void the warranty
Thanks for sharing! I have removed my battery a few times already to force shutdown. Don't know if I'll ever try it again. Maybe as a last resort, but at least I know the risks now. Thanks again!
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
Cool thanks for Sharring
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
i work my whole life with pc, hardware, software, flashed everything from set-top boxes to mobile phones.
seriously, i can't believe that anybody can fry the eMMC (a ****ing simple NAND-based flash memory) cause he puts SOFTWARE on it - thats what it build for!!!
you can brick your phone if you destroy the bootloader or something without a possibility to fix it, this won't destroy any hardware on your phone - but thats a different story.
the only reason for s-on is to take you the chance to deinstall the bloatware which they pollute their devices.
apairofscissors said:
How I bricked my Desire S - information on avoiding brick and an indictment of the dubious nature of HTC's S-on policy
The Desire S is a great phone so why did I want to root it?
The main reasons for rooting and s-off for me were:
Titanium backup (android built in backup is weak)
Being able to remove bloatware that takes up unnecessary spaces and unnecessarily reduces battery performance.
To try different ROMs from the community
Video screen capture
And of course I bought the phone so isn't it mine to use as I please.
Having waited a long time for a good s-off tool to come out I was getting more and more anxious to s-off.
Alpharev got together with Unrevoked to create Revolutionary.
I had previously used the Unrevoked tool to root my first generation Desire. The tool worked easily and flawlessly even on my Mac.
I later used the Alpharev bootable CD to s-off and root a later generation Desire. Again it worked smoothly and flawlessly.
Having had this positive experience I felt confident in the new tool, Revolutionary.
I read everything I could find about how the tool worked and how others were finding results. All seemed straight forward and uncomplicated so I proceeded to download and run the tool from my PC because there was no Mac version available.
Temp root and s-off went smoothly. No apparent issuse. Both Hboot and Fastboot had been successfully replaced on the phone, and CWM recovery was working.
So I added su in recovery then ran a nand backup of the whole system at this point.
Then I downloaded a Cyan 7 ported for the Desire S that was getting good reviews and feedback. The rom seemed to flash clean. After running it for a short time it stated crashing, so I decided to try an MIUI ported to Desire S. Again a ROM with good feedback and labeled as stable.
Downloaded the ROM and flashed it after a full wipe in recovery.
This time on reboot the phone hung at the HTC screen on boot for a very long time. So I wanted to do a force shutdown.
Here is where things got ugly.
The Desire S does not have a force shutdown keystroke combo as my old Desire did. So I opted to pull the battery.
Reinserting the battery and booting into recovery nothing worked properly.
CWM wouldn't mount its partitions, wouldn't flash a rom or even do a factory reset.
I tried doing some functions in fastboot mode. But nothing worked. Any command issued in fastboot mode would just lock up the phone and terminal.
At this point I was pretty worried so I got on #revolutionary and chatted with some of the big guns. I got some good feedback to test this and try that but in the end nothing worked. So I got on XDA forum and looked for others with similar issues.
What I found at this point was very troubling.
XDA user opumps had the same issue as me and had done some great research about the problem.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1150917
It becomes clear on reading, that like him, my Desire S had a fried eMMC chip. This is the internal storage device for HBoot. Once cooked your are basically F*ucked. There is no recovering from this by reformatting the eMMC. Pooched.
Doing the tests on the XDA post I found my eMMC to be pooched.
Now the question is, What fried the eMMc? Was it the S=off process or the forced pulling of the battery while the phone was boot locked?
I then took the phone to HTCs warranty center.
They tested the phone and called me back a few hours later. Your eMMC chip is fried they said. Yes, I said, Can you fix it please?
He told me that the eMMc was fried by the s-off tool I had used. Now, maybe he is full of **** and just wants an excuse to void my warranty. And, maybe not.
I told him to go ahead and fix it. He told me it would be a $200 Dollar replacement of the main board. ****. Well, what other choice do I have. Do it, I told him.
Next I got on the phone with the HTC help center. I got friendly with the lady technician on the call. After some nice chat I started probing for information on the Desire S. After a long conversation She told me that the Desire S, Incredible S, Desire HD all have the problem of frying the eMMC chip if the battery is disconnected while power is on. She said she gets calls every day with people who have fried their eMMC chip. Not through S-off but just because the battery came loose and lost contact while the phone was on or charging. The main reasons for the issue are as follows, HTC cheaped out on the eMMC chips in these phones, as the issue is specific to a particular series of eMMc. And because of a design flaw in the way the battery door closes, and because HTC did not include a force shutdown key combination to shut the phone off properly when locked.
So in the end it sounds like a lot of bad design and bad planning and poor foresight on HTC's part led to the fried eMMC on my phone. But they are not willing to stand behind their product and found an excuse to void my warranty and make me pay for the replacement Mainboard.
Now, here is where we get into the debate of should anyone s-off their phone? The main point here is no one should have to s-off. The phones should never be shipped s-on. It's bad policy to lock the bootloader. But having received an s-on phone you may very well want to s-off. If you decide to s-off just remember that you could easily brick your phone by many ways not related to s-off and your warranty will be void.
Another option is to not buy HTC because of the design flaws and their bad locked bootloader policy. To unlock and root a Samsung all you have to do is issue the command fastboot oem unlock. I don't know if Samsung phones also have the eMMc chip issue, so I can't comment there. But I certainly prefer their open policy on bootloaders.
Maybe the whole reason for locked bootloaders from HTC is beacause they are aware that they used sub par eMMc chips and are trying to reduce bricks.
Regardless this experience has made me very dubious of HTC in general.
I hope this is helpful and educational.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please change the title of the thread to "how not to brick your desire s". The current one sounds really fun and why any one would want a guide to brick their phone.
Sent from Desire Aj'S using XDA eXtra Premium App!
My Sensation died last thursday, wouldnt turn on at all, sent to htc, got it back in 4 days no probs. well no probs apart from they changed the mainboard and i now have to have it sim unlocked again...
This is why HTC requires people to register their devices with them for unlocking the bootloader in the official way. Otherwise providing unlocked bootloader translates into higher repairing cost for HTC.
If your device doesn't turn on and you send it to HTC, they won't be able to check anything software related on your phone, as they too will not be able to turn it on.
So even if you had -Revolutionary- S-OFF, had flashed a custom ROM, changed the bootscreen, etc, they would not be able to tell. They would just go ahead and change the motherboard, and since all the software stuff ( S-OFF, ROMs, etc) is on the NAND on the motherboard, this will be replaced with stock, and so you are back to S-ON, and stock ROM, etc
tsekh501 said:
This is why HTC requires people to register their devices with them for unlocking the bootloader in the official way. Otherwise providing unlocked bootloader translates into higher repairing cost for HTC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
doesnt matter if i had s-off or not, the phone got so hot solder points broke my point os to make people not be scared to send it back if it does, the phone is flawed. the new board is also getting hot just after booting the stock fw...
and in reply to HTC not being able to see the software if its dead... of course they can the riff box is based on the same method of dumping the phones fw chips as HTC do, jtag is not just a phone process but an electronics standard for repair through direct I/O on a chip without the controller chip programming it..
Okay, so I guess these problems may not seem serious to you, but they really do to me.
I'm on my third Sensation in two weeks. Ridiculous, I know. My local Orange store seems to have received a 'bad batch'.. yeah right, more like their software messes the phone up. Anyway I'm having problems with S-off'ing.
The first two Sensation's I recieved from Orange, had *Bootloader Locked* on the HBOOT, however this one does not have that at all? It doesn't say anything about a locked or unlocked bootloader at the top of HBOOT.
The problems first started when I attempted to S-Off. I have ALL my drivers installed and do not have any interrupting applications. Revoloutionary manages to complete all steps however on the 2/3rd time rebooting the bootloader it suddenly losses connection with my phone. It manages to root and everything, but then it will loose connection at this point and there seems to be not a thing I can do about it.
I have no idea how to fix this situation, I don't want to run a custom rom, I just want to be able to run a stock de-branded phone with S-ON!
Also, I was wondering if I S-Off, install Stock HTC Software, then S-On again will I be able to recieve updates OTA?
Thnaks XDA.
I think I bricked my phone, but wanted to check here first. Needed to send device back for warranty service, but may have just hosed myself. Was running new ICS FW 3.24 and testing ARHD & IC ROMS without issue.
I set my CID back to T-MOB010 as device was originally with ADB. Rebooted into bootloader and verified the updated CID was shown and it was.
Now this is where I think I choked....
I meant to flash RUU to take back to stock, but got my steps mixed up and did the fastboot command to put S-On back onto the device. Now the damn thing won't even boot up....black and no signs of life. My PC can no longer see it either.
Any suggestions or should I give up hope because of hat one mis-step?!?
I know you have probably done all this but heres what I would do. I would take the battery out then put it back in then hold volume down and power on and see if hboot will turn on. If hboot won't turn on your bricked. sorry dude. Also if you would have ran a stock RUU it would have s-on your phone as it would have flashed stock hboot I believe.
Any suggestions or should I give up hope because of hat one mis-step?!?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry i think your only chance is Warranty !!
If your provider is tmobile I have a fun fact for ya. There going to ask you 3 questions after they waste an 30 minutes of your time trying to trouble shoot "it just won't turn on". They ask you, is it in one piece(yes)? Is there any physical damage(no)? Are the water indicators white(yes)? Is the battery damaged(no)? If you answer correctly they'll send you out a new phone right then and there. If you lie and send your old one back and lets say it's been ran over, they'll charge your account full price for the phone. When the new one arrives you send the old one back. They never ask about rooting or anything of that nature, so your not telling them any lies. NICE. Also they're going to ask a bunch about the battery on the phone. They're hoping just your battery is ****ed up. To speed past this step tell them you have a second HTC battery made for the Sensation that doesn't work either.
Yes, it won't even go to HBOOT now, so I'm pretty sure I'm toast. Thanks for the replies!
Hello guys. I've finally created an account and joined your community hoping that i would finally be able to find an answer to problem my phone has, as i haven't really found something similar while i was wasting time searching on google. I have the S4 version of the One S, updated to 4.1.1 stock, no rooting or anything else done.
Okay, now let me describe what happens : Whenever i turn on my Data connection, it works fine for a couple of minutes, then it self-reboots. The screen randomly turns off, then the HTC logo appears and it's back on. If i don't turn data connection off as soon as possible, it won't pass too long until it reboots again. Each time, I receive the notification to send the error report to HTC, but it didn't really help me. This has been happening ever since i bought my phone, 3 months ago.
I even tried contacting HTC support, i chatted with an operator and described him my problem, but his only two solutions were factory reset or warranty. The first one didn't work, unfortunately. That's why i came here, hoping that there may be a software problem or something like that which could be fixed somehow.
PS: Wi-Fi has no problem at all. It's all smooth and fine. Reboots are only caused by data connection.
Wish you a nice day!
I'm no expert, but it seems that you have a retarded phone. Try running an RUU for your CID, take it back down to Ice Cream Sandwich and then do the OTA update again. If that continues to happen, then run the RUU again and stick with ICS. It's better than Jelly Bean, battery life is much much longer, and the sense improvements aren't all that good. Having personalised text message themes is nice, but that's one of the only upsides.
Running RUU doesn't require unlocking, which voids the warranty? If i do that, and it eventually fails, warranty won't be an option anymore, i guess. Am i wrong?
Bogdan9183 said:
Running RUU doesn't require unlocking, which voids the warranty? If i do that, and it eventually fails, warranty won't be an option anymore, i guess. Am i wrong?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Running RUUs requires having a LOCKED bootloader, so you don't have to worry about that. Secondly, it says that is MAY void your warranty. HTC have to prove that unlocking the bootloader made it break.
But, from what I read, as I have very little knowledge of this, I still have to downgrade the hboot from 2.15, my actual version to a lower one. And this requires rooting. Am I right?
I will try tomorrow to use the RUU from 4.1.1, it has the same version and radio like my phone. I suppose that's fine, right? [my Cid is 405]
Sent from my HTC One S using xda app-developers app
If the RUU says HTC__405 and Ville (if you have the 1.5Ghz S4 version) or Ville_C2 (if you have the 1.7Ghz S3 processor) then it will work perfectly.
Sent from my One S using xda premium
Take it to warranty if it was doing that from the first day you bought it... DON't Try to fix it, it sounds as a hardware problem, and to be fair, why do you want to repair it??? TAKE IT TO THE SHOP YOU BOUGHT IT! STOP.
I also had some kind of problem, it wasn't related to Data, but more with WIFI, and it wasn't fixed completely until I flashed A FULL RUU of the latest Jelly Bean Rom Available, probably in the process rewriting every bit of software, radio and such!
I was on the verge of throwing my phone out the window more than one time, but I bought it second hand so I didn't had warranty!
This is the only thing you cand do, flash a RUU for your region or operator, beside that it's hard to diagnose the problem... OTA Updates can do nasty things sometimes, so I don't recommend it...
After the flash, if it still acts up it's a hardware problem!