I've had the great misfortune of bricking my phone within the first few hours of owning it. I should have known something was up, it wouldn't reboot when I changed the language to English, and I'd have to hard reset it (delete everything) and then let it load in Chinese again. Well, in an attempt to fix what I thought was a rom issue, I went through the song and dance of trying to root my phone.
I'm still not fully clear on how to do it, as it seems there's more to it than just what the tutorials say.
Anyway, like the title of this thread says, there's a pretty good way to figure out if your phone is really bricked, no need to ask or wonder anymore.
If your phone only boots to the htc magic screen (and then stops), and is unable to load bootloader, fastboot, usb connections, or anything else, it's bricked. 100%. You have to take it back. Don't bother searching the forums for the answer, I've wasted hours going through every related thread and trying every possible solution. Without the ability to access the fastboot screen, you're out of possibilities. Untill someone comes out with an unbricker which goes deeper than fastboot, there is absolutely no way to fix it.
A semi brick is much better on the other hand. There are plenty of ways to fix your phone, provided you're only semi bricked. I would define semi bricked as being able to enter fastboot, but being unable to boot the phone as normal. This can happen with a bad flash, or a mis step during a tutorial. I'm not exactly sure how easy it is to change a semi brick to a full brick, but my full bricking happened after semi bricking it while loading a new rom on it.
So. to summarize, if your phone WON'T go into the boot menu by pressing vol-down+power, you're in need of a new phone.
If you can still get into the boot menu, and access your phone through usb, you're ok, just get help (via a tutorial) before going any further, unless you're completely certain of what to do next.
Tis a shame to send a device, which is physically undamaged, to the digital graveyard. But such is life.
Caid.
444.
EDIT
on a side note, before my phone reset itself into it's endless loop of unloading, I noticed the screen flash an image of a box with what looked like a red arrow coming out of it. It was right in the center of the screen. This was in the recovery-RAv1.0H.img menu. What's that all about?
Did you try other key combinations such as Home+Power, or Back+Power?
I'm sorry but I think you're misunderstanding it all a little bit...
Caid444 said:
I've had the great misfortune of bricking my phone within the first few hours of owning it. I should have known something was up, it wouldn't reboot when I changed the language to English, and I'd have to hard reset it (delete everything) and then let it load in Chinese again. Well, in an attempt to fix what I thought was a rom issue, I went through the song and dance of trying to root my phone.
I'm still not fully clear on how to do it, as it seems there's more to it than just what the tutorials say.
Anyway, like the title of this thread says, there's a pretty good way to figure out if your phone is really bricked, no need to ask or wonder anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's easy if you follow the guides... I did it in two different phones with no problem at all in any of them... Anyway, let's stay on topìc
Caid444 said:
If your phone only boots to the htc magic screen (and then stops), and is unable to load bootloader, fastboot, usb connections, or anything else, it's bricked. 100%. You have to take it back. Don't bother searching the forums for the answer, I've wasted hours going through every related thread and trying every possible solution. Without the ability to access the fastboot screen, you're out of possibilities. Untill someone comes out with an unbricker which goes deeper than fastboot, there is absolutely no way to fix it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wrong. If your phone boots to the HTC Magic screen, the bootloader is doing it's job. The bootloader just takes you there. The linux kernel and ramdisk takes you to the boot animation, and there is where android really starts.
If your phone shows the first htc logo, or the Vodafone branded screen, you can start in bootloader mode. To make that you just have to remove the battery, put it back, and press and hold BACK + END KEY. From that, you can fastboot.
Also, and unless you destroyed the recovery partition, you can also boot in recovery mode, by pressing END KEY while holding HOME (no need to keep them both hold, just home button)
Caid444 said:
A semi brick is much better on the other hand. There are plenty of ways to fix your phone, provided you're only semi bricked. I would define semi bricked as being able to enter fastboot, but being unable to boot the phone as normal. This can happen with a bad flash, or a mis step during a tutorial. I'm not exactly sure how easy it is to change a semi brick to a full brick, but my full bricking happened after semi bricking it while loading a new rom on it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would call a semi brick this:
Your phone goes into an endless loop while booting.
Your phone gets stucked on the first boot logo.
You can't get access to the recovery partition.
Your phone boots all the way but then gets stucked.
Your phone gone bad during a software update.
That, all, can be solved by reflashing the affected region. There are tutorials for everything but if you need I can write some hints on each case (I suffered them all ).
Caid444 said:
So. to summarize, if your phone WON'T go into the boot menu by pressing vol-down+power, you're in need of a new phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually, VOLDOWN+POWER starts in Hboot mode. From there you can go back to fastboot mode, but hboot is used to make a software upgrade using complete images or running htc diagnostic images (SAPPDIAG.IMG, SAPP*.IMG /NBH).
Caid444 said:
If you can still get into the boot menu, and access your phone through usb, you're ok, just get help (via a tutorial) before going any further, unless you're completely certain of what to do next.
Tis a shame to send a device, which is physically undamaged, to the digital graveyard. But such is life.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you can't get USB working on fastboot mode, or on recovery mode, your phone has probably a hardware fault. It happened with some of the first revisions of the Vodafone branded magic, don't know about htc branded ones though..
NOTE: Not talking about missing drivers, if you don't have drivers, that's another problem, but the computer should at least detect the device. Also, if your phone is off, and you connect the charger (or usb) and the orange led lights up, the bootloader should be ok.
Caid444 said:
on a side note, before my phone reset itself into it's endless loop of unloading, I noticed the screen flash an image of a box with what looked like a red arrow coming out of it. It was right in the center of the screen. This was in the recovery-RAv1.0H.img menu. What's that all about?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's the recovery mode. With that you can unbrick your phone
Also, as another hint, if you're new to linux OSes, you might want to take a look at some manual on terminal commands. If your main software is bricked, it's possible that your SDCard doesn't get mounted on recovery mode, depending on wich recovery image you're running. Provided you have an update.zip on the sdcard you need to run, you might have to mount it manually.
To do that, you have to start the phone in recovery mode, and run an "adb shell" on the PC.
When you have a shell opened, you'll have to mount the sdcard manually:
mount /dev/block/mmcblk0p1 /sdcard
Then, on the phone you can use the option to run sdcard update.zip to restart the software upgrade procedure.
Regards!
Before I reply, I'd just like to say thank you very much for your extremely in depth reply.
biktor_gj said:
I'm sorry but I think you're misunderstanding it all a little bit...
It's easy if you follow the guides... I did it in two different phones with no problem at all in any of them... Anyway, let's stay on topìc
Wrong. If your phone boots to the HTC Magic screen, the bootloader is doing it's job. The bootloader just takes you there. The linux kernel and ramdisk takes you to the boot animation, and there is where android really starts.
If your phone shows the first htc logo, or the Vodafone branded screen, you can start in bootloader mode. To make that you just have to remove the battery, put it back, and press and hold BACK + END KEY. From that, you can fastboot.
Also, and unless you destroyed the recovery partition, you can also boot in recovery mode, by pressing END KEY while holding HOME (no need to keep them both hold, just home button)
I would call a semi brick this:
Your phone goes into an endless loop while booting.
Your phone gets stucked on the first boot logo.
You can't get access to the recovery partition.
Your phone boots all the way but then gets stucked.
Your phone gone bad during a software update.
That, all, can be solved by reflashing the affected region. There are tutorials for everything but if you need I can write some hints on each case (I suffered them all ).
Actually, VOLDOWN+POWER starts in Hboot mode. From there you can go back to fastboot mode, but hboot is used to make a software upgrade using complete images or running htc diagnostic images (SAPPDIAG.IMG, SAPP*.IMG /NBH).
If you can't get USB working on fastboot mode, or on recovery mode, your phone has probably a hardware fault. It happened with some of the first revisions of the Vodafone branded magic, don't know about htc branded ones though..
NOTE: Not talking about missing drivers, if you don't have drivers, that's another problem, but the computer should at least detect the device. Also, if your phone is off, and you connect the charger (or usb) and the orange led lights up, the bootloader should be ok.
That's the recovery mode. With that you can unbrick your phone
Also, as another hint, if you're new to linux OSes, you might want to take a look at some manual on terminal commands. If your main software is bricked, it's possible that your SDCard doesn't get mounted on recovery mode, depending on wich recovery image you're running. Provided you have an update.zip on the sdcard you need to run, you might have to mount it manually.
To do that, you have to start the phone in recovery mode, and run an "adb shell" on the PC.
When you have a shell opened, you'll have to mount the sdcard manually:
mount /dev/block/mmcblk0p1 /sdcard
Then, on the phone you can use the option to run sdcard update.zip to restart the software upgrade procedure.
Regards!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To the first answer.
It's not THAT easy, the guides are kinda (you should already know what you're doing at this point) in nature. It's confusing for newcomers, as we've no idea what to expect, that and there are a multitude of variations. More specification as to which guide works with which model, and which updates would be nice.
As for the second part, I could not get the phone working with any button variation pressed. I'm sorry I was not more clear in my description, to begin with. I could press (and hold) any button (or buttons) + power (end key) and the phone would just vibrate (briefly) and then display the original screen "htc magic"(endlessly). The orange light does come on when plugged into the usb or computer, but only while it is off, as soon as the device turns on, the light turns off.
Another thing of note is that, after bricking it, I had to remove the battery to turn it off (every time if it was on), and if I put the battery back in while it's plugged into the usb port of the computer, the phone would turn back on without pressing any buttons. It's also completely unresponsive or detectable by my computer after bricking it. The only other thing I can get it to do is make the orange light blue by holding the action button and turning on the device. That way the light on top of the device is blue when it turns on. Still unresponsive at that point.
This is my first android device, but not my first htc device (I've had MANY MANY different ones.) so I'm a bit familiar with trying different combinations to get a response.
I am not the first person who's had this happen, unfortunately. There have been a couple others, who've described the exact same encounter. Perhaps it's a mistake that I made, and perhaps they also made it themselves. I would like to figure out how it's happening, though, and perhaps write a tutorial for people like us unlucky few.
Again, a really big thanks. I've sent my phone back and am getting a new one soon. I much appreciate your reply, however, as it's probably the most understanding and considerate reply I've seen on these forums.
Cheers.
Caid.
444
One more quick question out of curiosity, when you press and hold back and press end to turn on the device (it still goes to the htc magic screen) SHOULD it go to a different screen, other than the "htc magic" screen? Or is that a process that runs without some sort of visual notification on the device itself?
The usb was completely unresponsive after this happened, but in the event that bootloader may have been running, (only possible if it runs without any visual notification on the device itself), I'll go pick up the device and see if my usb drivers on my computer just became unresponsive after being accessed too many times. Sometimes windows does that, right? Perhaps a reboot would have allowed fastboot and the drivers to connect again, if the device was trying to talk to the computer, but I just didn't know on account of not having any notification.
So, again, should pressing back and power bring me to a different screen? or would it also look like it was hanging on htc magic screen?
Caid.
444
p.s. Sorry for the confusing wording, I'm tired and trying very hard to be as specific as possible.
back+end/power should lead you to the fastboot screen right after it shows the HTC Magic screen or whatever splash screen you have installed.
Home+end/power should lead you to the recovery screen.
ok, it was bricked. Thanks for the answer.
Caid.
444
Caid444 said:
Before I reply, I'd just like to say thank you very much for your extremely in depth reply.
To the first answer.
It's not THAT easy, the guides are kinda (you should already know what you're doing at this point) in nature. It's confusing for newcomers, as we've no idea what to expect, that and there are a multitude of variations. More specification as to which guide works with which model, and which updates would be nice.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problem, we all should be here to learn, and to help (except for the trolls)
This is the guide I followed for both Vodafone branded Magics: http://android-dls.com/wiki/index.php?title=Magic_Rooting
Maybe not for now, but for the next magic you get it may come handy
Caid444 said:
As for the second part, I could not get the phone working with any button variation pressed. I'm sorry I was not more clear in my description, to begin with. I could press (and hold) any button (or buttons) + power (end key) and the phone would just vibrate (briefly) and then display the original screen "htc magic"(endlessly). The orange light does come on when plugged into the usb or computer, but only while it is off, as soon as the device turns on, the light turns off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When the phone is off with the charger connected and you press the power button, the light goes off, as for the others, you really should be able to enter the SPL if it could the magic bootlogo and vibrated upon boot...
Maybe you didn't try enough or maybe your bootloader behaved differently than mine... I should be more clear anyway, to get to the bootloader, the best way to make it go to the bootloader is press and hold back key, then while holding it, hold the power button too. It should take about a second or two before showing the three skater droids.
Caid444 said:
Another thing of note is that, after bricking it, I had to remove the battery to turn it off (every time if it was on), and if I put the battery back in while it's plugged into the usb port of the computer, the phone would turn back on without pressing any buttons. It's also completely unresponsive or detectable by my computer after bricking it. The only other thing I can get it to do is make the orange light blue by holding the action button and turning on the device. That way the light on top of the device is blue when it turns on. Still unresponsive at that point.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When you put the battery while USB or charger is connected, the phone boots up, that's the normal behaviour. About the blue led, that's the Radio bootloader. That's quite dangerous to play with, but it gives a lot of other functions. Another sign that your phone wasn't completely dead Even if you wipe the SPL (the three skater droids), you may be able to boot into the Radio bootloader and write or boot another one to fix it. But that's waaaay harder
Caid444 said:
This is my first android device, but not my first htc device (I've had MANY MANY different ones.) so I'm a bit familiar with trying different combinations to get a response.
I am not the first person who's had this happen, unfortunately. There have been a couple others, who've described the exact same encounter. Perhaps it's a mistake that I made, and perhaps they also made it themselves. I would like to figure out how it's happening, though, and perhaps write a tutorial for people like us unlucky few.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess the first advice when you start tricking with a phone is be careful with what you're doing. That's the good thing of fastboot.
When booting on fastboot mode, you can pick, for example a recovery image, and boot it without overwriting the original rom:
Code:
fastboot boot [recovery_image]
Then, when you see it's working, you can flash it:
Code:
fastboot flash recovery [recovery_image]
fastboot flash boot [boot_image]
fastboot flash system [system_image]
fastboot flash data [data_image]
You can't do that with the system.img since it's too big, but you can do it also with a boot.img
About the key combinations on the phone, it goes like this:
Code:
BACK + END KEY -> Fastboot mode (you shouldn't see the boot logo)
VOLDOWN + END KEY -> Hboot mode (you shouldn't see the boot logo)
ACTION (trackball center) + END KEY -> Radio Bootloader (you shouldn't see the boot logo)
HOME + END KEY -> Recovery mode (you should see the boot logo, then get the recovery menu)
SEND + MENU + END -> Reboot the phone (while the phone is on)
Maybe there are more (android has kind of 'safe mode' but I don't know it it goes there automatically if there's a problem or if it has to be called manually)
Anyway, I hope these things will be useful for the next phone, and for anybody who's a bit lost on this
Regards!
Let us know where you live , so maybe one can help you , I live in Sweden and will be glad to help you if you are near ;-)
Hey! Thanks again for all the help, and the offer to come help. Unfortunately, I'm in China. Coming here from Sweden (although it's a single large landmass) would take quite a bit of time
I appreciate all the support, though. Very cool community we're building here for the magic.
Caid.
444
htc semi-brick?
Hi to all. I'm in the same condition described in this tread; after installing SPL i get the htc block in Vodafone brand red screen.
None keys combination bring me to the boot menù. Only Action(trackball) + power have effect, but with a black screen...
Any suggest?
What do you do if you can boot into fastboot but can't flash anything because absolutely everything gives the error "FAILED (remote: signature verify fail)"?
I have a card reader and have tried just about every sappimg.zip, every boot.img, every recovery.img i could find. I can't even boot a recovery img because the screen just hangs at the HTC Magic logo.
I don't know what kind of warranty i have on this thing, but i might take it in tomorrow and see if i can get it replaced. I've only had it for just under two weeks.
Newbie need help
ok so i can still go to recovery mode but everytime i reboot my phone the mytouch 3g logo never goes away im new to Android but not htc can somebody plz help me out.
gruppler said:
What do you do if you can boot into fastboot but can't flash anything because absolutely everything gives the error "FAILED (remote: signature verify fail)"?
I have a card reader and have tried just about every sappimg.zip, every boot.img, every recovery.img i could find. I can't even boot a recovery img because the screen just hangs at the HTC Magic logo.
I don't know what kind of warranty i have on this thing, but i might take it in tomorrow and see if i can get it replaced. I've only had it for just under two weeks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Instead of flashing something, you boot a recovery image, and then, from there, you flash whatever you need (using adb & flash_image for example)
PS: Be a little patient, if fastboot is letting you boot a recovery image, the recovery needs to boot, and that takes a little while, and while it's booting, you see the bootlogo until the menu appears. Also, you can try running adb shell after boot process started to try to get an error message (or at least to know if the thing is booting in some way)
I couldn't boot any recovery images. I had tried a few different Hero ROMs but decided i wanted to use Cupcake again because i have a 32B board and it just doesn't have enough RAM, though Swapper makes it usable at least. I don't know what exactly i did, but i've learned a lot from my mistakes. Everything i tried failed the signature check because the hboot version didn't match. If i could just flash the 1.33.2005 hboot again, i would have been in business, but no matter which recovery image i tried, it just sat there doing nothing. And believe me, i waited.
Fortunately, T-Mobile gave me a new device after i took it in and played dumb. And I just rooted it =]
Caid444 said:
ok, it was bricked. Thanks for the answer.
Caid.
444
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why not flashing it with an RUU from HTC. Not sure that would work but it is worth trying.
Hi there, people!
First of all, thanks because while I was reading ur posts I realized that my phone had been bricked, 100 %
I tried official ROM upgrade to Android 1.6 using the folowing steps
1. Copied radio zip to my sd card by renaming it in update.zip
2. Recovery screen was started by pressing HOME+END key
3.Applied update.zip, process was going on: Opening package, verifing package, installing radio...and message about success was shown and phone restarted
4. Phone stucked on HTC Magic logo screen...15 minutes
5. I removed a battery, put it back and tried to reach recovery or boot mode again
6.Unsuccessfully! Phone vibrates and turns on...but always stucks on the HTC Magic screen
7. USB does not recognize my phone is connected (I tried any adb and fastboot commands)
8. So, I just pray to give me a new phone if my warranty will be accepted
iivanovic said:
Hi there, people!
First of all, thanks because while I was reading ur posts I realized that my phone had been bricked, 100 %
I tried official ROM upgrade to Android 1.6 using the folowing steps
1. Copied radio zip to my sd card by renaming it in update.zip
2. Recovery screen was started by pressing HOME+END key
3.Applied update.zip, process was going on: Opening package, verifing package, installing radio...and message about success was shown and phone restarted
4. Phone stucked on HTC Magic logo screen...15 minutes
5. I removed a battery, put it back and tried to reach recovery or boot mode again
6.Unsuccessfully! Phone vibrates and turns on...but always stucks on the HTC Magic screen
7. USB does not recognize my phone is connected (I tried any adb and fastboot commands)
8. So, I just pray to give me a new phone if my warranty will be accepted
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same problem. I get up hboot and fast boot menus can not get it in recovery. try to add in sappimg but no luck
I'm having the exact same problem...
Any solution yet?
Hello! I can assure you that your phone is not fully bricked! Awhile ago I flashed a new radio only to discover that I hadn't done my research and was a complete and total idiot. I flashed the 1.76.xxxx on a 32B. It didn't like it. I got a quick HTC logo that disappeared then the phone never responded again. When I say never responded it was dead. no combination of buttons would get any response. If you can get into fastboot you have options. All that's necessary is to make sure you have the appropriate sappimg file. Try the Unlockr's gold card method file. He has a .zip file that may work for you. Just make sure that you find an image that is compatible with your board (32A or 32B). Hope this helps!
Hello, first time posted, long time browser...
So, I have a bricked (or almost totally bricked) LG G2X. Here is what I did:
I had flashed the Hellfire Sandwich 1.9 rom and was just fine...until my phone started turning off randomly. After reading somewhere here that I should nullify my phone and the re-flash the rom in order to fix my issue.
So, I backed up my data and downloaded the Aroma Nullifier from Volk (thanks for all you do). I booted to recovery and ran the Nullifier. Once the Nullifier had stopped, still while in Recovery, I tried to access my sdcard to re-flash my Rom...well, I couldn't access my SD card. Furthermore, I couldn't unmount the SD or mount the USB Storage.
Here comes the big mistake:
So, as I was doing some research about how to proceed, my USB cord wiggled out of the phone and my phone lost power. Now, since I had read from Volk not to let that happen, I knew I was in trouble.
At this point, I can only load into the LG Boot Screen and my computer loads drivers for "Asus Android Device" (I have the Asus Transformer Prime Tablet) and under that title "Asus Android Bootloader Interface". No APX, No USB Controller....no other communication.
Last little note, I took the phone to the Tmobile store on a hunch one of the guys who works there had some experience (which he did), and while he was trying to boot into recovery from battery power (something I have been unable to do) he got the USB communication interface...something like "S/W Do not disconnect".... Since then, I have not been able to reproduce that interface.
I am at the end of my abilities...I haven't seen anything that addresses this particular problem though I have tried a bunch of solutions without success. I have looked all through XDA forums, but if there is one I missed, please let me know.
Any thoughts would be very helpful.
Kickingcans
If you haven't already, I recommend looking into nvflash. I'm almost certain you'll be able to fix this. nvflash works at a very low level, requiring that you connect your phone without a battery using a special startup sequence. You will need the APX driver (for Windows) to make it recognize your phone in this recovery mode. At that point, you should be able to flash CWM using nvflash and go from there. If you can't get into recovery, I seem to recall flashing the stock ROM itself with nvflash.
This thread should help you: forum.gsmhosting.com/vbb/archive/t-1503546.html (I can't link yet)
Specifically, the link in the "I solved it" post.
Good luck, and let us know when you get it working :good:
Thanks much...but...
therealnexion said:
If you haven't already, I recommend looking into nvflash. I'm almost certain you'll be able to fix this. nvflash works at a very low level, requiring that you connect your phone without a battery using a special startup sequence. You will need the APX driver (for Windows) to make it recognize your phone in this recovery mode. At that point, you should be able to flash CWM using nvflash and go from there. If you can't get into recovery, I seem to recall flashing the stock ROM itself with nvflash.
This thread should help you: forum.gsmhosting.com/vbb/archive/t-1503546.html (I can't link yet)
Specifically, the link in the "I solved it" post.
Good luck, and let us know when you get it working :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the thoughts. I will try that all again, but I have tried nvflash and tried updating APX drivers. My computer only recognizes the phone as an "Android Bootloader Interface". When I try to manually update/change the drivers for the "Android Device", there is a problem with 64-Bit operating System (Windows 7 Home Premium). I was going to try to boot the computer in Safe Mode, but I don't know if that will help.
I haven't been able to communicate with the phone, and only saw the S/W Upgrade screen once and that was in the Tmobile store without access to my computer.
I am going to try those suggested steps again. Thanks again.
Leigh
Got it going....
THANKS SO MUCH. I knew I was missing something stupid. I kept reading the nvflash instructions and pressing the Power and Volume Down button instead of Volume Up and Down.
Things are going again. Thanks so much.
Kickingcans
Hi.
I own a TF700T and seems to have bricked it. Last status was: I had the latest stock ROM with root running and wanted to get a CM11 based 4.4.2 image from here. I downloaded it and used rom manager to get it installed. But the install script failed at some point and I thought the recovery might be outdated. So I used ROM Manager to update recovery... I tried CWM and TWRP option. Finally I booted up into recovery trying again to install those damn rom - I used the option to wipe all data / settings from the main menu and tried again to install the ROM which again failed (I do not remember the error message clearly). I gave up. I used the "reboot" option.
Now:
- Powering up gets me into the screen with the ASUS logo (left upper corner says "the device is unlocked"). Here it is stuck forever.
- Power + Vol-Down is same as just Power - I do not get into flashboot with those 3 small icons... I just get the ASUS logo and nothing else happens. Reset hole does not change situation. The device is pretty much "always on" now (till battery is exhausted) as long-press Power turns off and immediately on again
- Only thing that seems to work: Power + Vol-Up ends up in APX mode - my computer recognizes the device via USB at this point
Unfortunately I never did any set up to nvflash.
Do I have any chance to get this thing alive again?
Thanks a lot in advance,
q2.
Quentin2 said:
Hi.
I own a TF700T and seems to have bricked it. Last status was: I had the latest stock ROM with root running and wanted to get a CM11 based 4.4.2 image from here. I downloaded it and used rom manager to get it installed. But the install script failed at some point and I thought the recovery might be outdated. So I used ROM Manager to update recovery... I tried CWM and TWRP option. Finally I booted up into recovery trying again to install those damn rom - I used the option to wipe all data / settings from the main menu and tried again to install the ROM which again failed (I do not remember the error message clearly). I gave up. I used the "reboot" option.
Now:
- Powering up gets me into the screen with the ASUS logo (left upper corner says "the device is unlocked"). Here it is stuck forever.
- Power + Vol-Down is same as just Power - I do not get into flashboot with those 3 small icons... I just get the ASUS logo and nothing else happens. Reset hole does not change situation. The device is pretty much "always on" now (till battery is exhausted) as long-press Power turns off and immediately on again
- Only thing that seems to work: Power + Vol-Up ends up in APX mode - my computer recognizes the device via USB at this point
Unfortunately I never did any set up to nvflash.
Do I have any chance to get this thing alive again?
Thanks a lot in advance,
q2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately ROM Manager does not work with the TF700 and you are not the first one to find out the hard way...
If you cannot find a way to boot into the bootloader to have fastboot, there's nothing you can do anymore without the NVflash blobs.
Did you try holding Vol - and then pressing the reset button in that little pinhole on the side of the tablet?
If you have ADB drivers installed on your PC you could try if you can establish an ADB connection at any point. If you did, you could issue the command: "adb reboot bootloader", which would enable you to flash a recovery and/or bootloader. This probably won't work since you need to be in the recovery or have Android booted for ADB to work, but worth a try anyway...
Admittedly these are very thin straws - but what have you got to loose?
Also: Just a few days ago a user here was stuck on a bootloop to recovery and couldn't get out of it. He left it alone overnight and all the sudden the bootloop sorted itself out... I have no explanation for it and it is unlikely to happen in your case, but you never know...
Good luck!
Thanks for replying.
Yes, I did keep Vol-Down (means Vol-Left) pressed while pinching the reset button. It did not help.
I will experiment a bit more. It's not really a boot "loop" - it gets stuck at the ASUS logo and this does not change anymore. Not overnight.
So far I could only see it being recognized as USB device in APX mode. Can you give me a bit background here? I have nvflash here. The blobs are not available anywhere on the net? Or why is that all a big fuzz? I used to have a Notion Ink Adam and APX saved my life several times, but the blobs were available to everybody. Nobody has the blobs here? Or are they device-specific?
I cannot believe that a today's device with a non-bricked bootloader and working APX is totally lost and even the manufacturer will only offer a costly RMA to replace the whole mainboard!?
Best regards,
q2.
Quentin2 said:
Thanks for replying.
Yes, I did keep Vol-Down (means Vol-Left) pressed while pinching the reset button. It did not help.
I will experiment a bit more. It's not really a boot "loop" - it gets stuck at the ASUS logo and this does not change anymore. Not overnight.
So far I could only see it being recognized as USB device in APX mode. Can you give me a bit background here? I have nvflash here. The blobs are not available anywhere on the net? Or why is that all a big fuzz? I used to have a Notion Ink Adam and APX saved my life several times, but the blobs were available to everybody. Nobody has the blobs here? Or are they device-specific?
I cannot believe that a today's device with a non-bricked bootloader and working APX is totally lost and even the manufacturer will only offer a costly RMA to replace the whole mainboard!?
Best regards,
q2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For the TF700 the nvflash blobs are device specific - sorry.
Damn. That was the only answer I didn't want to read
Thanks a lot. So chances are gone, only RMA could help... I will ask friendly at Asus what costs they will charge...
q2.
Update:
Reply is here.
They only want to exchange mainboard. They of course know (and it seems that this is the only thing they know) that my bootloader was unlocked, therefore this is no case of guarantee for them. I know, I wrote to them that I just want to know how much they wanna charge me to fix this issue.
But: they don't want to tell me how much. They say they do not even know which revision and what hardware is inside my tablet, not even from my serial number. And I must first send them my tablet and they will charge me 95 Euro to check what's going on. And then they will tell me how much it will cost (and according to other threads I saw prices of over 400 Euro for a mainboard change - the TF701 successor model cost 450 Euro new in store)...
I somehow feel the need to reply that if they would've put only half the energy the put into logging who has unlocked the bootloader into the fact of making APX usable as a emergency recovery (as obviously not even Asus is able to generate a working blob for my device), they would have higher customer satisfactory statistics. I still just cannot believe a today's device lacks of all recovery options after a bootloader fails for some reason - as well as I cannot understand why Koush did not display a warning in ROM manager if problems are known to the community with this specific device (I mean the problem did not arise last week and ROM manager had tenths of updates since then).
I know that in the end all was my fault. And all flashing is done on our own risk. I will have to deal with it.
Phew...
Unlucky. It should be be stickied here somewhere that ROM Manager bricks the TF700 but then there is no guarantee it would be read. It is well known on this forum but that doesn't help people that don't visit frequently.
You can replace the mainboard yourself fairly easily. Watch the you tube vids on how to do it,. That is what I would do if I was in your position.
berndblb said:
For the TF700 the nvflash blobs are device specific - sorry.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is there a way to backup my blobs before I leave all stock then?
Thanx! Zeddock
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
zeddock said:
Is there a way to backup my blobs before I leave all stock then?
Thanx! Zeddock
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2455925&highlight=nvflash
Any Solution?
Quentin2 said:
Hi.
I own a TF700T and seems to have bricked it. Last status was: I had the latest stock ROM with root running and wanted to get a CM11 based 4.4.2 image from here. I downloaded it and used rom manager to get it installed. But the install script failed at some point and I thought the recovery might be outdated. So I used ROM Manager to update recovery... I tried CWM and TWRP option. Finally I booted up into recovery trying again to install those damn rom - I used the option to wipe all data / settings from the main menu and tried again to install the ROM which again failed (I do not remember the error message clearly). I gave up. I used the "reboot" option.
Now:
- Powering up gets me into the screen with the ASUS logo (left upper corner says "the device is unlocked"). Here it is stuck forever.
- Power + Vol-Down is same as just Power - I do not get into flashboot with those 3 small icons... I just get the ASUS logo and nothing else happens. Reset hole does not change situation. The device is pretty much "always on" now (till battery is exhausted) as long-press Power turns off and immediately on again
- Only thing that seems to work: Power + Vol-Up ends up in APX mode - my computer recognizes the device via USB at this point
Unfortunately I never did any set up to nvflash.
Do I have any chance to get this thing alive again?
Thanks a lot in advance,
q2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately I'm stuck in same boat I tried to wipe out settings completely and clockwork mode was stuck and I was able to wipe recovery with TWRP or so I thought tried to reboot into recovery got stalled and now stuck on asus screen. I'm not opposed to buying a new motherboard but I find it very hard to believe that no one has come up with a solution to flashing the mainboard with the original firmware. I'm tempted to ask asus but I know the bill will be more then the tablet. Did you find an easier solution or do I just have to swap out the mainboard?
sbdags said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2455925&highlight=nvflash
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanx, but it seems like to backup blobs I have to do the very thing that will risk me needing backup of my blobs? ... install a custom bootloader before I have a backup?
Is this right?
Is this a safer method?
zeddock
zeddock said:
Thanx, but it seems like to backup blobs I have to do the very thing that will risk me needing backup of my blobs? ... install a custom bootloader before I have a backup?
Is this right?
Is this a safer method?
zeddock
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's correct. You have to flash a modified bootloader and recovery. Done correctly this is not risky at all. But if there is a single line in the instructions you are not sure you understand, you are not quite ready.
There are quite a few tutorials on flashing in fastboot on this forum. Read them.
But generating your nvflash blobs you have to do without a safety net. It's worth it though! I have become much more adventurous with my tablet since I have the blobs squared away...
berndblb said:
Done correctly this is not risky at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you define risk?
Flashing a bootloader (without having nvflash access) is always risky by my definition, it *can* permabrick your tablet if something goes wrong at the wrong moment. But it's the best we have.
I got a Venstar2050 off of ebay (Chinese made tablet) I had it a couple of days, and it was sluggish. So I preformed a factory reset on it, I did it through the android OS, within the system settings. It worked, booted fine, until a reset. I now get a "no command" dead android logo. There are no combination of buttons that seems to pull it into a recovery mode. I've read that there is no recovery mode on some Chinese made tablets. If anyone is curious, there are vol+, vol-, a back button, and a power button, on the device. I did some searching for a couple of days and I could not find much info on this tablet (I had a feeling I wouldn't find much), or any way of adding a recovery to a tablet that may not have one. Any help would be great. Thanks in advance.
Hi there!
I searched XDA and found nothing in your device. I will ask a moderator to move your question to our general Q&A section, found here...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/general/help
Otherwise, you could try contacting the manufacturer about flashing original firmware and for the files.
Good luck! ?
Thanks for the reply! I've attempted to find the manufacturer for the device, but the only "venstar" I found in Google, with a legitimate website, didn't appear to be the correct manufacturer.
From my understanding of these Chinese devices, they are mostly all built off of the same motherboard.
I'd also like to add that my device is a 10.1 inch screen. That might make a difference between the motherboards.
if someone has got into recovery mode on a newer Chinese tablet that has the same button layout as mine, I could try the same combination of buttons, or whatever used to do this.
Also, is there a way to force a factory reset through usb to pc using software, like adb?
Has anyone found a way to get into recovery mode on this tablet?
Or any other information on how to fix my issue, maybe some simple things I could try?
I should also mention, I have found a little "reset" button on the tablet. But all it seems to do is just do a basic reset of the tablet. Not a factory reset. I've also tried using that, in a combination of other buttons along with the power button to get into a recovery mode, but nothing seems to work.
HELP !
dropcorn said:
Has anyone found a way to get into recovery mode on this tablet?
Or any other information on how to fix my issue, maybe some simple things I could try?
I should also mention, I have found a little "reset" button on the tablet. But all it seems to do is just do a basic reset of the tablet. Not a factory reset. I've also tried using that, in a combination of other buttons along with the power button to get into a recovery mode, but nothing seems to work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If someone can help me please ! i got the same problem with my Venstar 2050 . it stops after logo ANDROID and i can't to go in recovery mode for to flash another rom ...