Rooting Samsung J4 Core - only official binaries allowed - General Questions and Answers

Hello, apologies if this isn't the right place to post this question but I'm at a complete lost and I'm desperately trying to fix the device. My goal was to simply root the device.
I tried following this guide but by the end of my first run of the guide I had errors with the contacts and phone android apps. But the device still wasn't root. I attempted it again only to break the device completely. I wasn't even able to open Android Recovery and only flashing the bootloader only did I manage to to back to the recovery screen. However, from here, I am unable to flash the firmware any further. I only get a message now notifying me: "only official released binaries are allowed to be flashed".
What I'm hoping to achieve with this question is to get some direct guidance on how to resolve my current error. I've followed a few guides and thread a few threads but nothing seems 100% applicable to my issue or the device.
Using Odin3_v3.13.1 and what I think is the stock firmware for J4 (following the download links on the guides) I do the following:
Unzip the binaries with 7zip ZS to uncompressed the various files, specifically the AP, BL, CP, CSC and HOME MD5 files.
I further unzip the AP file and drag the boot.img.lz4 into lz4.exe to just give me the img file.
I run that through Magisk Manager to create a patch file (on another phone) and reupload back to the pc.
I then take the patched file and drag it into lz4.exe to just give me the img.lz4 file
I then delete the original boot.img file and select all of the files and compress into a tar archive.
OR, even without doing any of that and just straight selecting the AP file without doing the patching, I either get a straight up FAIL! (Auth) from Odin and if that doesn't happen, I get the error on the phone itself saying that "only official released binaries are allowed to be flashed".
And that's where I'm just stuck. I know there are many guides, and I tried making sure I have the best one and knowing what to do, but I think I messed something up along the lines. Any assistance would really be greatly appreciated.
Thank you.

Related

[Q] GT-P5113 modify stock firmware and flash question

I have spent several weeks working on this (reading thread after thread) on modifying stock firmware and im running into a problem. I more or less want to know if what i want to do is actually possible. I have downloaded the original .tar.md5 firmware image, opened with 7zip and "extracted" the .tar file (more or less just removed the hash) and then extracted the .img files from the .tar file. I have unpacked/mounted/modified/repacked using several methods (dsixda kitchen -which havent been able to work around adding the java path since after i add the path cygwin thinks im missing clean app until i remove the path in which case i get an error saying it cant find java/ i have tried mounting using ext4_utils in ubuntu) my issue arises when i take my modified and repacked system.img file i cant get it to work either by 1. zipping it in a .tar with the other .img files and flashing with odin, 2. zipping system.img alone into a .tar and flashing with odin, 3. installing cwm/root and flashing the system.img)
More or less my question is
1. is it possible to modify the stock firmware and load it onto the tablet without rooting
2. can system.img be flashed by itself or does it need the other .img files in the same .tar
3. does the tar file require being signed before flashing even with CWM recovery and root already on the tablet?
I have used these forums for a while to find answers, but i am new to posting, i havent needed to post a question until now since i spend as much time researching as i can before bothering people with a question (i like to figure stuff out and hate to admit defeat) Thanks in advance for the help despite my noobishness

First ever attempt to upgrade my tab and failed! Need some direction

With much embarrassment I have to admit I really thought I was smarter than a tablet and a few simple clicks. Apparently not. So now I am here with issues that I am sure someone can answer because your more advanced than a few clicks and a tablet.
I have briefly looked for a resolve to my issue but it is very overwhelming. So if you can just point me in the right direction and hold my hand at the same time I would be very appreciative :good:
Issues:
I originally downloaded Odin, GT-P5113 4.0.4, CM 12.1, CW Unofficial Touch 6.0.3.3 p5100 zip. I launced Odin and followed the steps from a you-tube video. Well upon my surprise CW was not on the tablet so I was at the Tabs generic recovery screen. I choose the option to delete all user data ( lots of no's to select from and one Yes). Well continuing to be a fool I completed this process. When the tablet rebooted I was stuck at the Samsung logo screen. I decided to get to the download screen and install smt810_cf_autoroot.tar. After loading this tar via Odin I became stuck on the Android man downloading screen. Waited a bit and nothing. Then my tablet shut down and came up with "Firmware upgrade encountered and issue" with the tablet-yellow ! icon and pc icon.
Another issue is when i download these files Odin will not find them in my file. Why? I usually keep them unzipped as a .rar in order for odin to show them so I can select PDA and attempt to install them.
Is there a way to still upgrade the Android system and fix this Firmware error at the same time?
Basically I am so new to this I need specific directions on resolving my issue. So if anyone has a moment please help me out here. I appreciate your time and knowledge
And I can use Odin to install to the tablet. If that helps Just not in the download screen on the tablet.
Learning76 said:
And I can use Odin to install to the tablet. If that helps Just not in the download screen on the tablet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
first you should download the stock firmware of your device, if it's p5113 then search and download the same firmware.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2203309 check this thread if it's there, if it's not please google it, if already have it, ignore..
Once you have it, you should get the firmware md5 file (by unzipping the rar.) Odin will take tar file or md5 file. put it in Odin AP/PDA check the thread for all the details on how to flash correctly.
you have to get into download mode by pressing the power and volume up/right to do that once the firmware is successfully flashed and your tab starts running again. first get this part done.
Always use files that are meant only for your device. if your tab say p5113. then make sure the file you are flashing states it is meant for p5113 and not p5100. (maybe not in the rooting case cause it's same
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2203309 here for all)
At some places you will find files marked as p51xx. those files are generally safe too and are meant for the p51xx tab series but that is later stage.
I appreciate the feedback and have found I had tried to flash my tablet with GT-P5110 software when i actually have a GT-P5113TS. I have found the firmware but my issue is when I download anything and extract it with using rar. I never get a .tar file or anything Odin can not recognize to select PDA and use.. What would cause that? How do I fix this?
Thank You
Learning76 said:
I appreciate the feedback and have found I had tried to flash my tablet with GT-P5110 software when i actually have a GT-P5113TS. I have found the firmware but my issue is when I download anything and extract it with using rar. I never get a .tar file or anything Odin can not recognize to select PDA and use.. What would cause that? How do I fix this?
Thank You
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try winrar or 7zip, it should extract, you need md5 or tar format in pda section. If not what error are you getting? There must be some file when you open the archive?
Basically when I download the zip file I want and then extract it to a specific folder. All I after unzipping is File folders with other file folders inside,Img, File, PROP, and SH. I never extract anything that is a Tar file or anything Odin can recognize when on PDA within Odin. Plus a lot of times I click on a link for a download off this site and it sends me to some watch-movies website. Not a actual download. Or I am just missing it.
Learning76 said:
Basically when I download the zip file I want and then extract it to a specific folder. All I after unzipping is File folders with other file folders inside,Img, File, PROP, and SH. I never extract anything that is a Tar file or anything Odin can recognize when on PDA within Odin. Plus a lot of times I click on a link for a download off this site and it sends me to some watch-movies website. Not a actual download. Or I am just missing it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe it's a bad link to your stock file then. Perhaps someone can give proper file link to the stock firmware. Inside the zip it's basically a md5 file for firmware to flash. Sadly I don't have a proper yoi will have to find of the net.

Can I recover Tab3 7.0 Android 4.4.2 WiFi using Haimdall on FWUL and how is it done?

As Odin in Windows does not do the trick for me, flashing stock ROM onto the Tab3, 7.0 WiFi device, I'll now want to try using Haimdall on FWUL.
But to make that happen, I seem need seperate .img files as Haimdall works with seperate files instead of that big tar.md5 file like Odin in Windows does.
So the first question would be:
What tools do I need to get all these seperate .img files out of the stock ROM Odin uses??
In Haimdall I managed to detect the Tab3 device and download and save the PIT file successfully.
But when I try to write into 'recovery' partition using a renamed file (TWRP 3.0.0-0.img) recovery.img, the process failed.
The log shows successfull writing of the PIT file, but it failed on recovery.img with this error 'failed to confirm end file transfer sequence'.
Also, there's no progressbar showing on the Tab3 device, while writing.
I already tried other USB cables, same results.
So the second question would be:
What did I do wrong, or did I miss something?
xdausernl said:
As Odin in Windows does not do the trick for me, flashing stock ROM onto the Tab3, 7.0 WiFi device, I'll now want to try using Haimdall on FWUL.
But to make that happen, I seem need seperate .img files as Haimdall works with seperate files instead of that big tar.md5 file like Odin in Windows does.
So the first question would be:
What tools do I need to get all these seperate .img files out of the stock ROM Odin uses??
In Haimdall I managed to detect the Tab3 device and download and save the PIT file successfully.
But when I try to write into 'recovery' partition using a renamed file (TWRP 3.0.0-0.img) recovery.img, the process failed.
The log shows successfull writing of the PIT file, but it failed on recovery.img with this error 'failed to confirm end file transfer sequence'.
Also, there's no progressbar showing on the Tab3 device, while writing.
I already tried other USB cables, same results.
So the second question would be:
What did I do wrong, or did I miss something?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To extract the firmware down to the individual .img files, try this thread, it leads to another guide on another site.
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2138885
Keep in mind, this guide is a bit old, the basic process is still valid but some things may have changed in how Samsung firmware is put together, there may be some extra steps required for firmware from newer devices.
Sent from my LGL84VL using Tapatalk
Droidriven said:
To extract the firmware down to the individual .img files, try this thread, it leads to another guide on another site.
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2138885
Keep in mind, this guide is a bit old, the basic process is still valid but some things may have changed in how Samsung firmware is put together, there may be some extra steps required for firmware from newer devices.
Sent from my LGL84VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your reply,
Right after I wrote this text, I came up with another approach ... to just rename the stock ROM extension 'tar.md5' to '.tar' and so I did, then I unzipped the file.
But thanks anyway ...
Inside I found several files and about 6 image files and the PBL.bin file.
For 4 partitions I found an image file, system.img, NVM.img, cache.img and hidden.img.
Guess what ... with Haimdall in FWUL the upload went successfully and there's also a statusbar on Tab3 while at download, where as Odin (any version) in Windows failed on me all the time.
All files needed to upload seperately though, all at the same time gave me this error 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
For the boot.img file I couldn't find a partition.
Recovery.img and the PBL.bin file failed to upload using Haimdall with errors 'failed to upload' and 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
I also tried to rename a TWRP image to recovery.img, but that upload failed as well.
At this point I only proved the hardware being OK, that is the USB cable and the USB port on the Tab3 device.
It seems like Android operating system crashes after the message windows from antivirus program 'program has stopped', it then shut down and reboot.
After login the same thing happens all over again ... like some sort of boot loop.
And there's just not enough time to change any of the system settings, nor to disable any apps due to all those message windows you have to click first.
Overall status being Android operating system is still faulty.
This means that I just may be able to fix this thing, I only need the right tools to get the job done.
And I can't believe there's no one out there that couldn't help me out ...
xdausernl said:
Thanks for your reply,
Right after I wrote this text, I came up with another approach ... to just rename the stock ROM extension 'tar.md5' to '.tar' and so I did, then I unzipped the file.
But thanks anyway ...
Inside I found several files and about 6 image files and the PBL.bin file.
For 4 partitions I found an image file, system.img, NVM.img, cache.img and hidden.img.
Guess what ... with Haimdall in FWUL the upload went successfully and there's also a statusbar on Tab3 while at download, where as Odin (any version) in Windows failed on me all the time.
All files needed to upload seperately though, all at the same time gave me this error 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
For the boot.img file I couldn't find a partition.
Recovery.img and the PBL.bin file failed to upload using Haimdall with errors 'failed to upload' and 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
I also tried to rename a TWRP image to recovery.img, but that upload failed as well.
At this point I only proved the hardware being OK, that is the USB cable and the USB port on the Tab3 device.
It seems like Android operating system crashes after the message windows from antivirus program 'program has stopped', it then shut down and reboot.
After login the same thing happens all over again ... like some sort of boot loop.
And there's just not enough time to change any of the system settings, nor to disable any apps due to all those message windows you have to click first.
Overall status being Android operating system is still faulty.
This means that I just may be able to fix this thing, I only need the right tools to get the job done.
And I can't believe there's no one out there that couldn't help me out ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to edit the last post, because I can change the stock ROM file name as mentioned before and that did not cause any problems with the md5 hash.
At this point, I can also download all files (10) succesfully from Heimdall with the Samsung tablet.
The only problem is caused by replacing the 'system.img' file, as the tablet immediatly reboots after Heimdall released the device after download was successfully.
It could mean that after the succesfull download, the downloaded system.img file is deleted at immediate reboot of the tablet, which would also explain why there's no changes after tablet reboot.
With all the other 9 downloaded files from Heimdall, it took several seconds until reboot of the tablet.
xdausernl said:
I have to edit the last post, because I can change the stock ROM file name as mentioned before and that did not cause any problems with the md5 hash.
At this point, I can also download all files (10) succesfully from Heimdall with the Samsung tablet.
The only problem is caused by replacing the 'system.img' file, as the tablet immediatly reboots after Heimdall released the device after download was successfully.
It could mean that after the succesfull download, the downloaded system.img file is deleted at immediate reboot of the tablet, which would also explain why there's no changes after tablet reboot.
With all the other 9 downloaded files from Heimdall, it took several seconds until reboot of the tablet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try a windows PC and try flashing via Odin, it tends to work better than Heimdall.
Also, if you are trying to use a system.img that is different than the system.img in your firmware, your bootloader may not be allowing the different system to flash or boot on your device.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
xdausernl said:
Thanks for your reply,
Right after I wrote this text, I came up with another approach ... to just rename the stock ROM extension 'tar.md5' to '.tar' and so I did, then I unzipped the file.
But thanks anyway ...
Inside I found several files and about 6 image files and the PBL.bin file.
For 4 partitions I found an image file, system.img, NVM.img, cache.img and hidden.img.
Guess what ... with Haimdall in FWUL the upload went successfully and there's also a statusbar on Tab3 while at download, where as Odin (any version) in Windows failed on me all the time.
All files needed to upload seperately though, all at the same time gave me this error 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
For the boot.img file I couldn't find a partition.
Recovery.img and the PBL.bin file failed to upload using Haimdall with errors 'failed to upload' and 'failed to confirm end of file transfer sequence'.
I also tried to rename a TWRP image to recovery.img, but that upload failed as well.
At this point I only proved the hardware being OK, that is the USB cable and the USB port on the Tab3 device.
It seems like Android operating system crashes after the message windows from antivirus program 'program has stopped', it then shut down and reboot.
After login the same thing happens all over again ... like some sort of boot loop.
And there's just not enough time to change any of the system settings, nor to disable any apps due to all those message windows you have to click first.
Overall status being Android operating system is still faulty.
This means that I just may be able to fix this thing, I only need the right tools to get the job done.
And I can't believe there's no one out there that couldn't help me out ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Droidriven said:
Try a windows PC and try flashing via Odin, it tends to work better than Heimdall.
Also, if you are trying to use a system.img that is different than the system.img in your firmware, your bootloader may not be allowing the different system to flash or boot on your device.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your reply.
But I came to Heimdall because Odin3 in Windows and even JOdin3 in Linux failed.
My guess is that the installed system.img on the system partition the culprit was in this case, because the stock ROM was the correct one for my tablet.
If you don't have the correct software, you either cannot install it or you will get your device bricked.
My device seem to be software bricked, for that matter and that is due to either the root software, anti virus software or an combination of both.
xdausernl said:
Thanks for your reply.
But I came to Heimdall because Odin3 in Windows and even JOdin3 in Linux failed.
My guess is that the installed system.img on the system partition the culprit was in this case, because the stock ROM was the correct one for my tablet.
If you don't have the correct software, you either cannot install it or you will get your device bricked.
My device seem to be software bricked, for that matter and that is due to either the root software, anti virus software or an combination of both.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Meanwhile I think I found a possible cause for failure using Heimdall-Frontend.
Heimdall-Frontend uses only extracted content of a stock ROM, in my case that's 10 files.
Although the download of the 'system.img' file completed successfully and Heimdall-Frontend releases the connected device, there's still a slightly different behaviour at reboot of Tab3.
Because after the release of the connected device, Tab3 then immediately goes into reboot.
That's not the case with all other downloaded files.
After releasing the connected device, it then takes a few second until the Tab3 goes into reboot.
So my guess is that at immediate reboot the downloaded 'system.img' file will then be deleted from the Tab3.
That would explain why after reboot nothing has really being changed.

Flashing stock rom for Samsung devices with Heimdall

Hello y'all.
I got this SM-A530F/DS, a galaxy A8 (2018), from a relative that got a problem. I am not sure about specifics, but it was never tampered with or rooted, I believe that things start to go bad after an unsuccesful OTA update. The phone does not boot, it just stays on samsung logo screen indefinetly, I can put the phone on download mode though so I think this is fixable by flashing the stock rom anew.
Now I got the stock firmware from sammobile and it seems good, but it is on a format for Odin, unfortunately I dont have access to a Windows computer, just Linux. So I got heimdall and read through whatever info I could find and I think I grok the fundamentals.
TLDR:
I have the following questions about the process:
1) Inside the stock files there is a .pit file that I assume is tailored to the stock ROM being distributed, should I use this .pit or should I use the one that I can extract from the phone with Heimdall?
2) The .img files seem to be lz4 compressed so should I first decompress those, or can I pass the compressed file to heimdall?
3) Inside the tar file for Odin {AP, BL, CP, CSC} there are a meta-data folder with a fota.zip file, does this file in any way influence heimdall flashing process?
p.s. I not sure if this should be moved to the device subforum as the questions mainly deal with the Samsung devices and heimdall in general and I could not find a Samsung sub forum to post this to
So I got the situation sorted.
1) The .pit file in the stock rom was the same as the phones, so I didnt have to do anything about that
2) The .img, .bin files must be decompressed first, not a great deal just had to 'lz4 -d' those
3) Those fota.zip didnt matter for heimdall, I just followed the phones .pit file to match partition names to partitions file and did a single 'heimdall flash' command

Remove Bootloader unlocked warning in modern samsung devices

Hello! I need to know how to replace the warning says Bootloader unlocked in samsung devices. I have already followed plenty of solutions found on internet but got no success. My procedure as follows;
1.Got stock rom file and extracted up_param.bin (There's no param.bin file on newer devices -mine is M01Core)
2. Opened file and tried to replace, delete orange_state.jpg, but it fails with error in 7Zip
There are some data after the end of payload data
I tried it with 7zip android, 7zip standard on pc but no luck.
3. Next I used a hex editor and replaced image successfully without corruption in archieve.
But when I attempt to flash it via odin, it's also blocked with security error.
So any suggestion or solution are highly appreciated. Thanks.

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