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Problem unlocking bootloader

Hey so I am having a problem unlocking the bootloader.
This is my friends phone and he messed it up bad. What he told me is that he was trying to install a custom ROM on his phone which was already rooted and unlocked. When he went to install it he told me that the ROM locked his bootloader and earased everything on the phone.
When I got the phone it would only boot into fastboot and nothing else. The screen would just be blank.
I have run that color installed and now I get the opo screen when i turn it on and I can also boot into fastboot. I cannot boot into recovery because it is gone I think.
When I try and install the recovery through fastboot I cannot because the bootloader is still locked.
I also tried loading up the custom recovery with the command fastboot boot recovery recovery.img
This doesn't work because I am getting the error "cannot load 'recovery' : Permission denied
I am out of ideas and any help will be greatly appreciated.

smertz said:
Hey so I am having a problem unlocking the bootloader.
This is my friends phone and he messed it up bad. What he told me is that he was trying to install a custom ROM on his phone which was already rooted and unlocked. When he went to install it he told me that the ROM locked his bootloader and earased everything on the phone.
When I got the phone it would only boot into fastboot and nothing else. The screen would just be blank.
I have run that color installed and now I get the opo screen when i turn it on and I can also boot into fastboot. I cannot boot into recovery because it is gone I think.
When I try and install the recovery through fastboot I cannot because the bootloader is still locked.
I also tried loading up the custom recovery with the command fastboot boot recovery recovery.img
This doesn't work because I am getting the error "cannot load 'recovery' : Permission denied
I am out of ideas and any help will be greatly appreciated.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think your friend is giving you dodgy information, flashing a ROM doesn't lock the bootloader. So can you get into recovery at all by using the recovery button combo? Hold power to turn the phone off. Hold volume down, then hold power (so you're holding them together), when you see the OnePlus boot logo let go of power but keep holding volume down until you reach recovery.

Heisenberg said:
I think your friend is giving you dodgy information, flashing a ROM doesn't lock the bootloader. So can you get into recovery at all by using the recovery button combo? Hold power to turn the phone off. Hold volume down, then hold power (so you're holding them together), when you see the OnePlus boot logo let go of power but keep holding volume down until you reach recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am sure there is something he isn't telling me.
I have tried booting into recovery and I will hold down the button for several minutes but it never boots into recovery.
The phone will only boot into fastboot.

smertz said:
I am sure there is something he isn't telling me.
I have tried booting into recovery and I will hold down the button for several minutes but it never boots into recovery.
The phone will only boot into fastboot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There isn't much you can do then, without recovery and without being able to unlock the bootloader you're pretty much stuck.

Heisenberg said:
There isn't much you can do then, without recovery and without being able to unlock the bootloader you're pretty much stuck.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Darn. I was hoping there was some other way of unlocking the booloader. I know I can install a recovery if it was only unlocked.

smertz said:
Darn. I was hoping there was some other way of unlocking the booloader. I know I can install a recovery if it was only unlocked.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's right, recovery install requires an unlocked bootloader. It doesn't really fit your situation but this might be worth looking into.

Heisenberg said:
That's right, recovery install requires an unlocked bootloader. It doesn't really fit your situation but this might be worth looking into.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! But I have already tried it. The second half of it requires that you have an unlocked bootloader to use fastboot.

smertz said:
Thanks! But I have already tried it. The second half of it requires that you have an unlocked bootloader to use fastboot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh yeah, I forgot you mentioned that in the OP. Well there's really nothing you can do unfortunately.

Heisenberg said:
Oh yeah, I forgot you mentioned that in the OP. Well there's really nothing you can do unfortunately.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ugh darn I was hoping there was something I could do. Thanks for the help!

[Q] Bricked already? Stuck in bootloader

EDIT
Turns out I was two versions of adb/fastboot behind instead of one. Ignore me!
Hey all,
Yesterday I went to flash the factory image on my Pixel 2 that was running unlocked and rooted with Magisk and Snoke kernel, but it failed while trying to erase the cache partition. I found out that I wasn't using the latest fastboot because the Pixel doesn't use a cache partition so I updated and tried again, and the flash-all script seemed to work fine. But when it finished an rebooted the phone, I was back at the bootloader. I tried the start, recovery, and download mode buttons but they all sent me back to the bootloader. If I turn the phone off and plug it into a charger, the charging icon will come up on the screen for a second and then send me to the bootloader.
I tried flashing the files manually, but the process was hit or miss and would either hang forever or return a generic error (either a generic load error or check device console).
I can't boot the alpha TWRP because it returns a generic load/authentication error and quits.
At this point the flash-all will go through the motions and seem to work every time now, but when it reboots I'm back at square one. I can lock and unlock the bootloader and confirm it on the phone screen, I can flash the bootloader, boot, and system images, I can erase those images, I seem to be able to do everything I can usually do in there, but it's almost like my computer says it's working, but the phone isn't actually doing anything. Short of an RMA I'm not entirely sure what to do. Does anyone have any insight?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I'm new to pixels phones but i read about the slot a and slot b maybe you have to change the boot to other slot?
There is a tool in development section maybe it can help u some how.

gm007 said:
I'm new to pixels phones but i read about the slot a and slot b maybe you have to change the boot to other slot?
There is a tool in development section maybe it can help u some how.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I set the active slot to b and rebooted and I got the warning message that the bootloader was unlocked and to continue, which brought me to the boot logo for a little bit, and then back to the bootloader.

virgilante said:
I set the active slot to b and rebooted and I got the warning message that the bootloader was unlocked and to continue, which brought me to the boot logo for a little bit, and then back to the bootloader.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe you need to flash the stock image again in the second slot?

I have faced the same issue and reflash the factory image do not work, is there anyone resolve this?
# updated
https://forum.xda-developers.com/pixel-2/help/fastboot-update-resulted-bricked-device-t3694761
as this thread， just flash every img manually resolved this issue.

[Help] Bootloop after re-locking Bootloader!

After reading the news that a new method had been found for Verizon/EE-UK Google Pixel (Sailfish) Phones to unlock the Bootloader - I decided to do so and then proceed to flash Magisk for root and other benefits however as there was recently a new update which was showing as 'Failed to Install'.
Of cause I wanted to update the device so I attempted to re-lock the Bootloader using 'fastboot flashing lock' and proceeding to select Yes from the prompt. Which seemed to be acceptable and worked to lock the Bootloader.
Now my phone is stuck in a crazy boot-loop where by the phone will turn on - flash the Google logo on the white background for a split second then shut itself down and repeat.
Does anybody have any tips for me to recover the phone from this awful state?

Mr Ian said:
After reading the news that a new method had been found for Verizon/EE-UK Google Pixel (Sailfish) Phones to unlock the Bootloader - I decided to do so and then proceed to flash Magisk for root and other benefits however as there was recently a new update which was showing as 'Failed to Install'.
Of cause I wanted to update the device so I attempted to re-lock the Bootloader using 'fastboot flashing lock' and proceeding to select Yes from the prompt. Which seemed to be acceptable and worked to lock the Bootloader.
Now my phone is stuck in a crazy boot-loop where by the phone will turn on - flash the Google logo on the white background for a split second then shut itself down and repeat.
Does anybody have any tips for me to recover the phone from this awful state?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Man, when you lock the bootloader you need to make sure you're 100% back on stock without any modifications flashed. Seems to me you tried locking while having magisk flashed.
Try to see if you're able to get into recovery. Get into bootloader menu by pressing power button+volume down and the press volume upp until you get to recovery and then press power button. If you're able to get into recovery then download the full ota image for Google pixel sailfish from here https://developers.google.com/android/ota and then while you're in there should be an option to update using adb. You need to adb sideload the update from your computer to your phone. I know this should work on a non Verizon phone but I hope and assume that is what's needed this time. If you're not able to get into recovery and your bootloader is still locked then you pretty much have a bricked device.

Arju said:
Man, when you lock the bootloader you need to make sure you're 100% back on stock without any modifications flashed. Seems to me you tried locking while having magisk flashed.
Try to see if you're able to get into recovery. Get into bootloader menu by pressing power button+volume down and the press volume upp until you get to recovery and then press power button. If you're able to get into recovery then download the full ota image for Google pixel sailfish from here removed-link and then while you're in there should be an option to update using adb. You need to adb sideload the update from your computer to your phone. I know this should work on a non Verizon phone but I hope and assume that is what's needed this time. If you're not able to get into recovery and your bootloader is still locked then you pretty much have a bricked device.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
At the minute I've taken it to a Phone shop hoping they will be able to figure a way to get to the recovery menu - baring in mind I had TWRP flashed.
Yeah, It will go to the Bootloader menu but when trying to go into recovery it will just repeat the same process as before where by it will flash the Google splash-screen then restart. Any notes on how to go about hard flashing the image?

have you tried fastboot boot twrp.img? does it bootloop aswell? if so, you might have hard bricked your pixel... last solution is to try flash stock image and then try again with stock recovery / twrp img.

Mr Ian said:
At the minute I've taken it to a Phone shop hoping they will be able to figure a way to get to the recovery menu - baring in mind I had TWRP flashed.
Yeah, It will go to the Bootloader menu but when trying to go into recovery it will just repeat the same process as before where by it will flash the Google splash-screen then restart. Any notes on how to go about hard flashing the image?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you can't access stock recovery and your bootloader is locked then your device is pretty much hard bricked unfortunately. Don't think the phone shop would figure it out, they might change the motherboard as a solution if they don't have the right tools to reflash on a deeper level. Hope they figure it out. Please let us know if they managed to fix it. If not then someone else might have some suggestions. I'll try to think of something else.
Try either of these commands to see if you can unlock the bootloader again:
fastboot oem unlock
or
Code:
fastboot flashing unlock
And then try what the post above me suggests.

Hey, did you ever figure out a solution to this? I did the same thing to myself today...

any solution??
---------- Post added at 03:49 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:48 PM ----------
Mr Ian said:
After reading the news that a new method had been found for Verizon/EE-UK Google Pixel (Sailfish) Phones to unlock the Bootloader - I decided to do so and then proceed to flash Magisk for root and other benefits however as there was recently a new update which was showing as 'Failed to Install'.
Of cause I wanted to update the device so I attempted to re-lock the Bootloader using 'fastboot flashing lock' and proceeding to select Yes from the prompt. Which seemed to be acceptable and worked to lock the Bootloader.
Now my phone is stuck in a crazy boot-loop where by the phone will turn on - flash the Google logo on the white background for a split second then shut itself down and repeat.
Does anybody have any tips for me to recover the phone from this awful state?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you managed to unlock it???

You can unlock the bootloader with htc-fastboot if you have a bricked android 7-8.
They patched it on Android 9.
On android 9 your only chance is to reflash it in edl mode. Anyone here who can help me to enter edl mode with my pixel?

leagoo t5 wont boot after unlocking bootloader

Had a bad idea this morning and decided to try to root the phone, leagoo t5. The last time Im going to go messing with a phone that wasnt broken! after spending 10hrs trying to sort it! I downloaded adb tools and and twrp. I unlocked the bootloader with fastboot and installed twrp. However when I rebooted the phone it just booted straight into twrp. I cant get it to boot normally. I reinstalled the firmware but it will still not boot. I can get into recovery and factory modes but thats it. what can I do? Thanks

pcfreeze said:
Had a bad idea this morning and decided to try to root the phone, leagoo t5. The last time Im going to go messing with a phone that wasnt broken! after spending 10hrs trying to sort it! I downloaded adb tools and and twrp. I unlocked the bootloader with fastboot and installed twrp. However when I rebooted the phone it just booted straight into twrp. I cant get it to boot normally. I reinstalled the firmware but it will still not boot. I can get into recovery and factory modes but thats it. what can I do? Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried factory resetting in recovery?

ktmom said:
Have you tried factory resetting in recovery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes I did. No Joy. When I power on I just get the leagoo logo coming on and off repeatedly. Pressing the power button then will not turn the phone off again. I can switch it off by pressing vol- and pwr together though.
Is the problem caused by unlocking the bootloader with fastboot or that the firmware I installed is not suiting? Rebooting the phone after unlocking the bootloader before reflashing the firmware caused the leagoo logo to come on and off repeatedly accompanied by this message in very small text "Orange State - Your device has been unlocked and can't be trusted, Your device will boot in 5 seconds". After flashing the firmware with Sp Flash Tool this message is not being shown. Does reflashing firmware undo the action of unlocking the bootloader?

What your are describing is a bootloop. It sounds like the device can not find the system kernel to boot to. Did you boot the device after unlocking but before doing anything else?
Where did you get the TWRP recovery from?
Isn't this a mediatek chipset? If so, I think you need to use SP Flash Tool*to install.
I would look for a stock ROM for this device to revert to.
I'm not experienced on mediatek devices, but maybe @SubwayChamp could help.

pcfreeze said:
Yes I did. No Joy. When I power on I just get the leagoo logo coming on and off repeatedly. Pressing the power button then will not turn the phone off again. I can switch it off by pressing vol- and pwr together though.
Is the problem caused by unlocking the bootloader with fastboot or that the firmware I installed is not suiting? Rebooting the phone after unlocking the bootloader before reflashing the firmware caused the leagoo logo to come on and off repeatedly accompanied by this message in very small text "Orange State - Your device has been unlocked and can't be trusted, Your device will boot in 5 seconds". After flashing the firmware with Sp Flash Tool this message is not being shown. Does reflashing firmware undo the action of unlocking the bootloader?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then to unlock bootloader is not normal that Android refuses to boot normally but when you flash a custom recovery or modify other partition this usually could happen so either or both you have to do a factory resetting/format data as @ktmom said or/and flash a kind of DM-verity for your device, this last avoids that bootloader checks the integrity of the partitions and can boot normally to system.
The warning message is normal then to unlock bootloader and reflashing the stock rom doesn´t relock it, you have to relock it at similar way that you unlocked it via fastboot command, most commom is "fastboot oem relock" but there are other variants and keep in mind that you have to return completely to stock before to apply it.

SubwayChamp said:
Then to unlock bootloader is not normal that Android refuses to boot normally but when you flash a custom recovery or modify other partition this usually could happen so either or both you have to do a factory resetting/format data as @ktmom said or/and flash a kind of DM-verity for your device, this last avoids that bootloader checks the integrity of the partitions and can boot normally to system.
The warning message is normal then to unlock bootloader and reflashing the stock rom doesn´t relock it, you have to relock it at similar way that you unlocked it via fastboot command, most commom is "fastboot oem relock" but there are other variants and keep in mind that you have to return completely to stock before to apply it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I relocked the boot loader with the command "fastboot flashing lock". small white text dialogue on phone screen stated bootloader was locked successfully. rebooted phone then and it was still stuck in the boot loop. For a few seconds in between the leagoo logo a strange circular graphic was displayed on the phone with word "erasing" under it. What does this mean?
Can you tell me more about how to flash DM-verity?

pcfreeze said:
I relocked the boot loader with the command "fastboot flashing lock". small white text dialogue on phone screen stated bootloader was locked successfully. rebooted phone then and it was still stuck in the boot loop. For a few seconds in between the leagoo logo a strange circular graphic was displayed on the phone with word "erasing" under it. What does this mean?
Can you tell me more about how to flash DM-verity?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, then to relock bootloader I guess that you did successfully boot to system again, right?
When you unlocked bootloader first then device is formatted to avoid a new user can access to the user´s data and when you relock it again the same happens.
As for DM-verity, newer devices strictly since nougat can´t boot to system after any partition was modified like happened when you flashed a custom recovery on it, here is when DM-verity can be useful, is used to avoid bootloader checks the integrity and allow a modified device can perform a reboot and more custom actions not officially permitted. You had to flash it through a custom recovery, sometimes flashing only Magisk is enough but not always.

You *might* be able to use this universal dm-verify script. It can be flashed only in a custom recovery and I'm not certain that is available to you.

ktmom said:
You *might* be able to use this universal dm-verify script. It can be flashed only in a custom recovery and I'm not certain that is available to you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good news and bad news! I got the phone to boot! I reinstalled twrp and the "magisk","no verity opt encrypt" and "disable dm verity" zips from the ext sdcard with fastboot. Twrp stated the zips installed ok but there were also some red line failure lines in the dialogue as they were being installed. I rebooted the phone via fastboot but this just resulted in it booting direct to twrp as before. I tried normal boot from twrp but it still booted straight back to twrp. I then tried selecting normal boot from the fastboot, normal, recovery option menu accessed on the Leagoo T5 by powering off the phone and then pressing the pwr and vol+ buttons together but this still resulted in it booting straight to twrp. I then decided to uninstall twrp by flashing the stock firmware recovery image to try to boot from stock recovery. I did same and rebooted from fastboot and it booted to system.
The bad news is there is an imei failure message and the sim is not connecting to the network.I googled imei failure and saw that its can happen when firmware is changed. I installed the "mobileuncle" app but according to a youtube video I watched, when I tap "Engineer Mode" there should be 2 further options available, one being MTK Mode. I am only getting one option "Engineering Mode (Android) which when I select just results in being returned to the previous menu. please say this is not a major problem!

@pcfreeze you quoted me, but as I said earlier, I'm not experienced with mediatek devices. You'd be better off quoting @SubwayChamp

pcfreeze said:
Good news and bad news! I got the phone to boot! I reinstalled twrp and the "magisk","no verity opt encrypt" and "disable dm verity" zips from the ext sdcard with fastboot. Twrp stated the zips installed ok but there were also some red line failure lines in the dialogue as they were being installed. I rebooted the phone via fastboot but this just resulted in it booting direct to twrp as before. I tried normal boot from twrp but it still booted straight back to twrp. I then tried selecting normal boot from the fastboot, normal, recovery option menu accessed on the Leagoo T5 by powering off the phone and then pressing the pwr and vol+ buttons together but this still resulted in it booting straight to twrp. I then decided to uninstall twrp by flashing the stock firmware recovery image to try to boot from stock recovery. I did same and rebooted from fastboot and it booted to system.
The bad news is there is an imei failure message and the sim is not connecting to the network.I googled imei failure and saw that its can happen when firmware is changed. I installed the "mobileuncle" app but according to a youtube video I watched, when I tap "Engineer Mode" there should be 2 further options available, one being MTK Mode. I am only getting one option "Engineering Mode (Android) which when I select just results in being returned to the previous menu. please say this is not a major problem!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It could be many reasons why device didn´t boot to system. Then to flash it you had to format data + flash DM-verity. Also is possible that this TWRP version is not completely suitable for your device or is unable to mount/unmount partitions correctly, you have to check from where you downloaded it and if some users are experiencing similar issues with it.
As per you IMEI lost, better is ever take a backup of the NVRAM through TWRP before to go further then it´ll be easy to recover it. In almost all firmwares for mediatek devices you´ll fnd inside the zips SPFT and SN Writer that is to recover your IMEI. Your IMEI is not really lost only got actually covered by blank codes due to a bad/incorrect flashing/wrong sequence firmware, so be careful what you do with Mobile Uncle tool if you´re not experimented with otherwise you´ll lost permanently.

SubwayChamp said:
It could be many reasons why device didn´t boot to system. Then to flash it you had to format data + flash DM-verity. Also is possible that this TWRP version is not completely suitable for your device or is unable to mount/unmount partitions correctly, you have to check from where you downloaded it and if some users are experiencing similar issues with it.
As per you IMEI lost, better is ever take a backup of the NVRAM through TWRP before to go further then it´ll be easy to recover it. In almost all firmwares for mediatek devices you´ll fnd inside the zips SPFT and SN Writer that is to recover your IMEI. Your IMEI is not really lost only got actually covered by blank codes due to a bad/incorrect flashing/wrong sequence firmware, so be careful what you do with Mobile Uncle tool if you´re not experimented with otherwise you´ll lost permanently.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I got into engineering mode via dialer code. CDS option was missing from connectivity. I installed https://m.apkpure.com/cds-mobile/com.doubleapaper.cds.cds_mobile but CDS is still missing from engineering mode

pcfreeze said:
I got into engineering mode via dialer code. CDS option was missing from connectivity. I installed https://m.apkpure.com/cds-mobile/com.doubleapaper.cds.cds_mobile but CDS is still missing from engineering mode
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, just realised that this is the wrong app! nothing to do with cds in engineering mode! I triedhttps://apkcombo.com/common-data-service/com.mediatek.connectivity/
but got message that the file was corrupted and it would not install

Question Complete crash/shut down

My husband's phone deviced to completely shut down. When he tries to use the bootloader, it shows a message about being corrupt and not trusted. Any idea how to fix this?
-Selecting Bootloader, Recovery, Restart and Off all take him back to the same screen about corrupted phone.
Phone will go into FASTBOOT but will not go into RECOVERY mode.

kimball_mom said:
My husband's phone deviced to completely shut down. When he tries to use the bootloader, it shows a message about being corrupt and not trusted. Any idea how to fix this?
-Selecting Bootloader, Recovery, Restart and Off all take him back to the same screen about corrupted phone.
Phone will go into FASTBOOT but will not go into RECOVERY mode.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is what a half unlocked bootloader looks like. What device and build?

mattie_49 said:
This is what a half unlocked bootloader looks like. What device and build?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OnePlus 9 for TMobile.

If he's rooted, that means he didn't unlock the bootloader first. This is what causes that and I've done it myself.
I don't know if either of these will work but worth a shot in this order.
Option 1: *FLASH* UNMODIFIED stock boot.img via fastboot flash boot.img (whatever your filename is, or just drag and drop it in the adb cmd window)
2: Use the TMobile MSM tool to revert back to stock. I believe I tried this on the 6t and it didn't fix the issue somehow but in theory it should cause this is how OnePlus's legendary horrid tech support does it.