Database Info

Can't switch boot partition without a bootloop

Hello,
(how) can I get my Google Pixel to such a state where I choose in TWRP Slot A and I get a rooted system and if I choose Slot B in TWRP I get a stock unrooted version?
Reason behind is that I have some few apps that don't like the root like Banking Apps. This way I could do backups / restores with Titanium Backup but still use the TAN App after a simple reboot.
I installed today sailfish-nmf26u-factory, twrp-3.0.2-0-RC1 and SuperSU-v2.79-SR2. If I boot Slot A (was active during TWRP and SuperSU Install) then I can boot and have a rooted system. If I choose Slot B I get a bootloop. Luckily I can switch back to Slot A for the moment.
Cheers

Cheers. I did this days ago too, everything seems fine but for both system, I lost the ability to access developer option

bush911 said:
Cheers. I did this days ago too, everything seems fine but for both system, I lost the ability to access developer option
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried tapping the build number repeatedly again until it shows up?

Yes I did. Something wrong with userdata, wipe userdata and fixed it
dtrud0h said:
Have you tried tapping the build number repeatedly again until it shows up?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

There's already a few threads on here talking about it.

aholeinthewor1d said:
There's already a few threads on here talking about it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey, don't want to complain but I could not find such a thread one week ago so I created this one. Can you give me a link?
Thank you!
KobiP

KobiP said:
Hey, don't want to complain but I could not find such a thread one week ago so I created this one. Can you give me a link?
Thank you!
KobiP
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Totally understandable that these public forum threads can get jumbled up quickly. It's noone's fault; it's just the natural course of an ask-and-answer dialog. You'll find the discussions of your question loosely in just about every thread here -- mostly in the kernels threads, the TWRP thread, or the SU one, and many debates in every ROM discussion as well. I believe I demonstrated what you're trying to achieve in one of the first pages of the WETA ROM thread. There's also one fairly new specific thread on this on the Pixel XL side, but that one isn't very well-participated because I think most folks are tired of talks about the Pixel's dual slot system. However, I would look at the kernel threads, especially the Sakete one because Android Pay availability was the whole intention of his compiling that kernel. Or you can also compile your own kernel.
In practice, what you want to do is:
Make sure both slots are bootable.
In TWRP, know which slot you're on, install a kernel that is SafetyNet-patched in that slot, SU the other slot you wish to root. That's all.
You wrote slot B is boot looping. That indicates that you installed something that overwrote its boot image. Keep in mind that SU, TWRP, and kernel reside in Nougat's boot. To get slot B bootable again, I'd suggest you flash the stock boot.img back to that slot. Or you can use the flash-all.bat that's modified to skip restoring slot A.
Or, you can simply use the unmodified flash-all.bat to put everything back. Remove the -w switch if you don't want to lose data. Then install TWRP, boot the phone from both slots once. Install a new kernel to the slot you want to use AP. Root the other slot.
BTW, most banking apps work on rooted phones. They haven't jumped on the SafetyNet train yet. My PennyMac, PNC, Chase, Amex apps work.

quangtran1 said:
You wrote slot B is boot looping. That indicates that you installed something that overwrote its boot image. Keep in mind that SU, TWRP, and kernel reside in Nougat's boot. To get slot B bootable again, I'd suggest you flash the stock boot.img back to that slot. Or you can use the flash-all.bat that's modified to skip restoring slot A.
Or, you can simply use the unmodified flash-all.bat to put everything back. Remove the -w switch if you don't want to lose data. Then install TWRP, boot the phone from both slots once. Install a new kernel to the slot you want to use AP. Root the other slot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey,
tnx for your advice. I think the Issue is somewhere else.
Try One, Slot A Active:
I executed flash-all.bat without the "-w" and then said fastboot set_active b and fastboot reboot bootloader. I can read "Boot-slot b". If I try to boot now I get a bootloop and after a few cycles I can boot. adb reboot bootloader and voila, back to "Boot-slot a". Now Slot B is broken
Try Two, Slot B Active:
Same, I executed flash-all.bat without the "-w" and then said fastboot set_active a. Reboot, see that slot A is active and then I get stuck in a bootloop. After a while I am booting to Android but this time in Slot B. Now Slot A is broken.
quangtran1 said:
BTW, most banking apps work on rooted phones. They haven't jumped on the SafetyNet train yet. My PennyMac, PNC, Chase, Amex apps work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True, but my Push TAN App doesn't work, it simply crashes when starting the App and the Browser opens with a help page that says that I can't use this App on rooted phones... I tried to open the app now after the flash-all.bat and it opens just fine.
Cheers

Hello,
I tried again with sailfish-nof27b Version. This time I did not change the flash-all.bat so that it will reset my phone.
Then I flashed the latest SW to my phone (Slot A active). I can boot into Android and my phone is reset. Now I boot to the bootloader, switch to Slot B and get a bootloop. After a while it automatically switches back to Slot A and boots.
If I do run again flash-all.bat with Slot B active I can boot Slot B but not Slot A (bootlooping).
How can I get both Slots back to work on my phone?
Cheers

KobiP said:
Hello,
I tried again with sailfish-nof27b Version. This time I did not change the flash-all.bat so that it will reset my phone.
Then I flashed the latest SW to my phone (Slot A active). I can boot into Android and my phone is reset. Now I boot to the bootloader, switch to Slot B and get a bootloop. After a while it automatically switches back to Slot A and boots.
If I do run again flash-all.bat with Slot B active I can boot Slot B but not Slot A (bootlooping).
How can I get both Slots back to work on my phone?
Cheers
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can flash all the factory firmware u want if u don't use the modified command, like the guy said in the above post your not going to boot into that other slot.
Read this thread
https://forum.xda-developers.com/pixel/help/dual-booting-t3507924/post69834495#post69834495

mac796 said:
You can flash all the factory firmware u want if u don't use the modified command, like the guy said in the above post your not going to boot into that other slot.
Read this thread
https://forum.xda-developers.com/pixel/help/dual-booting-t3507924/post69834495#post69834495
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey,
your linked post works amazing! Thank you very very much! Only thing to add is to flash a certain Slot (A/B) it must be active first. But now I can boot both Slots!

Unable to install any custom roms...

I have flashed stock from googles web site and I have tried everything I can to get a custom rom back on this device. I have tried everything. every thing I do just boots to regular google. But I can flash twrp, and magisk on stock and it works. OEM is unlocked but as soon as I flash a rom then twrp and sign it, it says its successful for everything but when I boot to system it just reboots a couple times then boots but up to stock. Any one have any ideas?

KingAroan said:
I have flashed stock from googles web site and I have tried everything I can to get a custom rom back on this device. I have tried everything. every thing I do just boots to regular google. But I can flash twrp, and magisk on stock and it works. OEM is unlocked but as soon as I flash a rom then twrp and sign it, it says its successful for everything but when I boot to system it just reboots a couple times then boots but up to stock. Any one have any ideas?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is normal. Your custom ROM is flashing to the opposite slot your on. When your done u need to reboot to bootloader and boot twrp then install TWRP again and install verified boot signer zip. If not just going to loop once and boot to the slot that works

mac796 said:
This is normal. Your custom ROM is flashing to the opposite slot your on. When your done u need to reboot to bootloader and boot twrp then install TWRP again and install verified boot signer zip. If not just going to loop once and boot to the slot that works
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will try that's next time. I just went through hell trying get back on the RR ROM and rooted with magisk. But I finally got it haha. Took about 20 stock flash's to get it finally working

KingAroan said:
I will try that's next time. I just went through hell trying get back on the RR ROM and rooted with magisk. But I finally got it haha. Took about 20 stock flash's to get it finally working
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea once you do it a couple of times you will have it down. Just remember from May bootloader's on, you have to use that VBS zip. Also keep track of what slot your on when your flashing

mac796 said:
Yea once you do it a couple of times you will have it down. Just remember from May bootloader's on, you have to use that VBS zip. Also keep track of what slot your on when your flashing
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I still don't get the slot thing. I was figuring that slot a was stock and slot b was any custom rom guess that wrong

KingAroan said:
I still don't get the slot thing. I was figuring that slot a was stock and slot b was any custom rom guess that wrong
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No there the same. You can put whatever on either one. There for normal use. seamless updates they call it I believe.

KingAroan said:
I still don't get the slot thing. I was figuring that slot a was stock and slot b was any custom rom guess that wrong
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The different slots are for seamless updates. If you're using the stock rom and taking OTA's, the OTA gets flashed to whatever slot is currently inactive. It used to be when you did an OTA, the OTA got downloaded and then you'd be prompted to reboot to install the update. When you rebooted, the update would get installed but you had to sit and wait for it to install before you could use your phone again. With the two slots, it now downloads the update and installs it to the inactive slot while you continue to use your phone. Eventually you get prompted to reboot but instead of having to wait for it to install, it just reboots like any other time you reboot the phone and there is no wait for the update to install. It's already installed. When it reboots, it switches to the slot that was previously inactive because that's where the update is installed to. So, if you're on slot A when the update is downloaded and installed, you'll be using slot B after you reboot. The next month when the update comes out, it will get installed to the other slot again and you'll once again be using slot A and so on and so on for every month after that.
For a custom rom, they can be installed on either slot. It just depends on which slot is currently active. If slot A is the slot that's currently active, TWRP will flash the rom to slot B. If B is active, the rom will get flashed to A. Anything else gets flashed to the slot that is currently active (SuperSU, Vendor files or what have you). That's why after flash the rom, you have to reboot the phone (either reboot to recovery or the OS) before flashing the rest of whatever it is you want to flash. If you don't reboot before flashing SuperSU or whatever, it won't get flashed to the same slot the rom got flashed to and obviously, this causes issues. Bottom line is, slot A or B, it has nothing to do with whether it's a stock or custom rom. Whichever slot is inactive when you flash a rom is the slot the rom will end up on.

robocuff said:
The different slots are for seamless updates. If you're using the stock rom and taking OTA's, the OTA gets flashed to whatever slot is currently inactive. It used to be when you did an OTA, the OTA got downloaded and then you'd be prompted to reboot to install the update. When you rebooted, the update would get installed but you had to sit and wait for it to install before you could use your phone again. With the two slots, it now downloads the update and installs it to the inactive slot while you continue to use your phone. Eventually you get prompted to reboot but instead of having to wait for it to install, it just reboots like any other time you reboot the phone and there is no wait for the update to install. It's already installed. When it reboots, it switches to the slot that was previously inactive because that's where the update is installed to. So, if you're on slot A when the update is downloaded and installed, you'll be using slot B after you reboot. The next month when the update comes out, it will get installed to the other slot again and you'll once again be using slot A and so on and so on for every month after that.
For a custom rom, they can be installed on either slot. It just depends on which slot is currently active. If slot A is the slot that's currently active, TWRP will flash the rom to slot B. If B is active, the rom will get flashed to A. Anything else gets flashed to the slot that is currently active (SuperSU, Vendor files or what have you). That's why after flash the rom, you have to reboot the phone (either reboot to recovery or the OS) before flashing the rest of whatever it is you want to flash. If you don't reboot before flashing SuperSU or whatever, it won't get flashed to the same slot the rom got flashed to and obviously, this causes issues. Bottom line is, slot A or B, it has nothing to do with whether it's a stock or custom rom. Whichever slot is inactive when you flash a rom is the slot the rom will end up on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Holy ****, i didnt know that part, i just thought it flashed it to your current slot and when you rebooted into system, the slot didnt change.....brb but first a quick titanium backup

Full OOS 9.5.2-> 9.5.4 not possible after rooting

After successfully installing Magisk, I got 9.5.4 update. As my bootloader is unlocked, system forced full image update
Now, update install successfully through OTA updater but on reboot I get stuck in stock recovery. From there, I had to manually boot to fastboot and switch to slot b to boot OS, back. After spending an hour, couldn't get any leads. Any advice is appreciated..

arvindgr said:
After successfully installing Magisk, I got 9.5.4 update. As my bootloader is unlocked, system forced full image update
Now, update install successfully through OTA updater but on reboot I get stuck in stock recovery. From there, I had to manually boot to fastboot and switch to slot b to boot OS, back. After spending an hour, couldn't get any leads. Any advice is appreciated..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think you've to flash magisk again after an update. I'm not sure though. Not taking responsibility for anything that'll happen if you do so.

icyfire said:
I think you've to flash magisk again after an update. I'm not sure though. Not taking responsibility for anything that'll happen if you do so.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ofcourse I own the responsibility,
Yes tried flashing it seperately for slot a. Then seperately for slot b. Since nothing worked out, flashed twrp on slot a and still nothing.
Then, tried going to slot b 9.5.2 ROM, did local sys update then without reboot, inside Magisk flashed Recovery zip. Even then slot a ROM, doesn't boot

arvindgr said:
Ofcourse I own the responsibility,
Yes tried flashing it seperately for slot a. Then seperately for slot b. Since nothing worked out, flashed twrp on slot a and still nothing.
Then, tried going to slot b 9.5.2 ROM, did local sys update then without reboot, inside Magisk flashed Recovery zip. Even then slot a ROM, doesn't boot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe try unrooting by flashing the stock boot.img. You can get the boot.img for 9.5.4 here.

Help, I can flash and boot LineageOS but not OxygenOS

Hi, as the title explains I can flash and boot into lineage os but when I try to flash a stock OxygenOS signed flashable zip from this thread (https://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-6/how-to/oneplus-6-mirrors-official-oxygen-os-t3792244)
and when I boot to system, the screen doesn't show a boot logo, it just goes black for a few seconds before rebooting back to twrp (also if it helps, when it goes to twrp all the files are gibberish, I have to shut off the phone and boot into it from fastboot or I can't see any files).
This all started because I misunderstood the instructions and tried to flash an ota package which then broke the system, it's working now but I'd much rather use OOS as Lineage is missing a lot of the features I'm used to on Oxygen.
I've also tried the "flash-all-partitins-fastboot" from https://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-6/how-to/rom-stock-fastboot-roms-oneplus-6-t3796665 but unfortunately that gave the same issue, it just went back to recovery and wouldn't load OOS.
If anyone has any ideas on how to get back to oxygen that'd be super helpful! I'm considering using the MSM tool but I'd rather not have to start from scratch and lose all my files.

I'm just guessing, but there might be something wrong with your TWRP, did you try re-flashing it?

mati11233 said:
I'm just guessing, but there might be something wrong with your TWRP, did you try re-flashing it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I should've clarified in the post, I mean all the files are gibberish (as in not decrypted I think?) but when I
Code:
fastboot boot twrp.img
it works fine and I can see all the files.
I've probably tried flashing it 4 times through twrp but every time it just does the same thing, boot to system just shows a black screen for a few seconds then reboots to twrp.
I'd love to use blu_spark like everyone recommends but I can't find the blu_spark recovery for the op6, only their kernel.

The reason why it's gibberish is because your device is encrypted and you need to input the password in the twrp to be able to access it. Seems the twrp doesn't detect the encryption correctly so there might be something wrong with it.
Here is the bluespark twrp https://github.com/engstk/android_device_oneplus_enchilada/releases

mati11233 said:
The reason why it's gibberish is because your device is encrypted and you need to input the password in the twrp to be able to access it. Seems the twrp doesn't detect the encryption correctly so there might be something wrong with it.
Here is the bluespark twrp https://github.com/engstk/android_device_oneplus_enchilada/releases
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just tried with blu_spark and the same thing happens but I realised something else, twrp only doesn't work on slot A.
If I see that it didn't decrypt the files, I can set B to active, reboot to recovery, and it works perfectly.
I noticed after one of the failed boots it switched the active slot to B even though I had set it to A before flashing. So every time it doesn't show the logo or anything, it sets the active slot from A to B and reboots to recovery.
Also I just looked and from the Backup page, it shows 2.7 GB for system on slot A and 1.7GB on slot B so I'm going to try wiping both and reflashing the flashable signed zip on each then twrp.
UPDATE: Just did that and the twrp installer was giving an error saying unsupported android version so I looked and system is only 4MB after flashing that package (OnePlus6Oxgygen_22_OTA_034_all_...zip), I'm trying an older one (...OTA_026...zip) to see if that actually works.
So I tried with the older one and lineage and they both still left the system partition at 4MB and the blu_spark twrp installer isn't detecting an android version. The system image partition is at 2.6GB if that means anything.
Oh wait more update, I'm dumb and shut off the phone while taking the case off (got stuck and it was pushing the power button) and even though the twrp installer couldn't detect anything and twrp said No OS installed when trying to boot to system, lineage just started up, no problem. I am very confused I miss when there was one system partition.

How are you flashing the OS?

mati11233 said:
How are you flashing the OS?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm using twrp, blu_spark and normal, and both have the same result. They can flash lineage and it runs fine, but oxygen refuses to boot and just switches the active slot and goes to recovery instead.
I also tried the fastboot rom flashing thing from the thread I linked to in the OP and it's the same thing, just goes back to recovery and wont boot.
P.S. I'm currently copying over /sdcard to an external drive and if I can't figure out how to fix this by the time that's done, I'll just use MsmDownloadTool and start over.

And you are wiping each time before flashing it, right? If it is the case then the download tool is probably the easiest way to go about it, rather than spending days troubleshooting it.

mati11233 said:
And you are wiping each time before flashing it, right? If it is the case then the download tool is probably the easiest way to go about it, rather than spending days troubleshooting it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried it with and without wiping and it always seems to do the same thing either way, works with LOS not with OOS. Thanks for the help! but yeah I think I'm just going to end up using the download tool once everything's over.

can't switch slots and TWRP is gone.

Hi there!
i tried to flash TWRP, but eventually it got me to these problems:
1: there is no TWRP at all anymore, in slot A it just shows a black screen (no matter if i start system or recovery)
2: i cannot switch to slot B. and when i do, either it starts fastboot right away or it just restarts immediately and loads slot A again.
i tried to flash different TWRP versions to both slots, but no result.
what should i do?

anyone?!

Hi, what os you wanted to flash?... cause it feels like you Android is gone now...can you boot twrp from adb?try it...if you dont know how to do it...just ask...and feels like your final way is to use MSM download tool....good louck
And yes last but not least...DONT SWITCH SLOTS FROM TWRP... DON'T DO IT...NEVER...IF YOU NEED TO SWITCH SLOT JUST RESTART TO TWRP AGAIN...AND IF AFTER FLASHING TWRP YOU DONT FLASHED MAGISK YOUR TWRP IS GONE...

So here it is...your problem...read it...you switched slots manually...that is your problem...

James Blode said:
So here it is...your problem...read it...you switched slots manually...that is your problem...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
so basically i have no other option but to flash it and wipe all data