Database Users

Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 Recovery Post Mortem

A story you might find some useful morsels in . If you are impatient, yes, a happy ending.
Monday night I opened the case on my tablet and it was booting. I figured that was strange and after a few minutes realized it was just stuck booting. So I rebooted it. Came up... and then suddenly during the everything loading up phase, rebooted. This repeated several more times.
Uh oh. Working quickly between boots I unset the default on Apex launcher (since it updates frequently) and turned off the live wallpaper. I also shut off Wifi. No effect.
Next stop recovery. Cleared caches, etc. Nope. I had a fairly recent backup but took another one and it worked (whew). Decided that I would do a data wipe from recovery. Uh oh. Any attempt to format /data causes a crash.
I go to Odin to see if I can repartition flash. I can't find a PIT file for the P5113 but did find one for a 16K 7 inch model. Odin repartitioned it but still no joy. Wiping data causes a reboot. So does trying to restore a backup to /data.
Next stop Kies. You can tell it to reload firmware but you need your serial number which is written on the back of your tab (yes it is, it is about the height of a carbon atom). However, it asks you to enter "recovery" mode by pressing buttons that aren't on the tablet. I tried Odin mode but it couldn't connect. Using CWM recovery didn't work either.
So I decided I needed stock recovery. I could not find a P5113 stock recovery that wasn't bundled with an entire update package. So I unpacked an update package to get recovery.img. Flash_image didn't work (seems like it never works on this tablet, and now that I think about it, I think I wrote a thread on how to do it with dd that I forgot about last night! Duh: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=31293383&postcount=32). Instead, I repacked just recovery.img with tar. Odin was able to flash this and I was back in the ugly stock recovery.
I never did try Kies though because I asked the stock recovery to reformat /data and it worked! Back to Odin to reflash CWM and then the backup I made Monday night rolled back on and I was back in business.
Restore my screen saver, redefault (is that a word?) Apex, and turn Wifi back on. Oh yeah, and run Triangle Away
So I'm not sure what to make of all this. Open questions:
1) Did I need to repartition? What's the right PIT file to use? I sure wish Odin could dump a clean image, but if it can, I don't know how.
2) What mode does Kies want? This could have been a VirtualBox problem but I got it to work before I got Kies installed on my wife's real Windows box (man Kies is slow!).
3) Why could stock recovery reformat /data but CWM could not?
4) Would it have been sufficient to just reflash the stock recovery, do the data wipe? I suspect so, but don't know.
Anyway.... things are back to normal. Love the tab, but sure wish these big companies wouldn't assume we don't know how to fix our own stuff and muck things up with "simplified" tools. By the way, this is the "touch" CWM that seemed to fail to fix /data. I did not try the normal one.

wd5gnr said:
A story you might find some useful morsels in . If you are impatient, yes, a happy ending.
Monday night I opened the case on my tablet and it was booting. I figured that was strange and after a few minutes realized it was just stuck booting. So I rebooted it. Came up... and then suddenly during the everything loading up phase, rebooted. This repeated several more times.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here we go again. Same problem but I'm not even getting into the boot. Does anyone know how to actually reformat and rescan flash for bad blocks? I have a feeling I have a bad flash block that is doing something evil.
Sigh.

Tried a different approach this time.
Booted to recovery and did an fsck on /data since it seemed to have the problem.
It did a lot of clean up and now I'm back up. Not sure what got damaged if anything though. Time will tell.

Good to hear that it is a happy ending, bro!
Sent from my AT1S0 using xda app-developers app

[Q] My s4 reboots as soon as i turn it on;/

Hi!
So I followed Djembeys guide to root my s4 back when ME2/MF2(or smthn in that matter)was the newest firmware avable. But now I wanted to go back to stock and update my phone and as stated in the guide that would be no problem, well OTA didn't work so i did it via Kies. It worked as expected for a while before my phone started freezing and rebooting itself forever, like as soon as i get into the launcher.
Things I've tryed to do:
*Checking in download mode that everything is official, it is, and the phone doesn't seem to reboot while in download mode, should I flash a stock rom, I mean, what if the phone shuts off in the middle of the process?
*Doing a factory data reset via stock recovery, the "android" in recovery falls down and a triangle at his stomach. However the data reset worked, but it didn't solve the problem, still reboots but now when the phone is trying to set itself up.
What can i do guys? You think i can send it back to the store seeing everything is official in download mode?

NidexX said:
Hi!
So I followed Djembeys guide to root my s4 back when ME2/MF2(or smthn in that matter)was the newest firmware avable. But now I wanted to go back to stock and update my phone and as stated in the guide that would be no problem, well OTA didn't work so i did it via Kies. It worked as expected for a while before my phone started freezing and rebooting itself forever, like as soon as i get into the launcher.
Things I've tryed to do:
*Checking in download mode that everything is official, it is, and the phone doesn't seem to reboot while in download mode, should I flash a stock rom, I mean, what if the phone shuts off in the middle of the process?
*Doing a factory data reset via stock recovery, the "android" in recovery falls down and a triangle at his stomach. However the data reset worked, but it didn't solve the problem, still reboots but now when the phone is trying to set itself up.
What can i do guys? You think i can send it back to the store seeing everything is official in download mode?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which s4 is this? This is the sprint variant. Post it in the appropiate s4 of your carrier. You can try to odin back to stock.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using xda app-developers app

ROMANTiC KiD said:
Which s4 is this? This is the sprint variant. Post it in the appropiate s4 of your carrier. You can try to odin back to stock.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Aww really, i totally missed that this was for sprint:/. I have the NEE version(unbranded GT-I905). Are you sure i can flash stock, what if it would reboot while flashing? It is already stock, just that I have this damn problem with the reboots;(

Mine did some of that kind of thing when I first went to MF9 a few days ago. I think the reason I had the problem was because I did a nandroid recovery using a custom recovery (TWRP). I think (but have no proof) that it overwrote some of the MF9 stuff with MDL stuff. So to fix it, I redid everything and recovered my apps and data through Titanium Backup instead. All good now.
Follow the directions I posted yesterday in the following thread to get to unrooted, stock MF9:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2427006

jejb said:
Mine did some of that kind of thing when I first went to MF9 a few days ago. I think the reason I had the problem was because I did a nandroid recovery using a custom recovery (TWRP). I think (but have no proof) that it overwrote some of the MF9 stuff with MDL stuff. So to fix it, I redid everything and recovered my apps and data through Titanium Backup instead. All good now.
Follow the directions I posted yesterday in the following thread to get to unrooted, stock MF9:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2427006
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It worked fine and your phone didn't reboot in download mode? I've tested to be inside download mode for around 10 min, so i guess it's fine if i flash stock rom.

NidexX said:
It worked fine and your phone didn't reboot in download mode? I've tested to be inside download mode for around 10 min, so i guess it's fine if i flash stock rom.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not exactly sure what you're asking, but the phone worked fine once I redid it. Before that, it would have random boots, and then multiple boots like a boot loop. But it never did more than 2 boots before actually coming up. But it would reboot after a while. BlueTooth would not turn on, stuff like that. It just was not right. But the redo with the TiBu restore worked great. I'm now very stable on MF9, rooted, stock rom.

jejb said:
I'm not exactly sure what you're asking, but the phone worked fine once I redid it. Before that, it would have random boots, and then multiple boots like a boot loop. But it never did more than 2 boots before actually coming up. But it would reboot after a while. BlueTooth would not turn on, stuff like that. It just was not right. But the redo with the TiBu restore worked great. I'm not very stable on MF9, rooted, stock rom.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
nvm dude, seems like it's hardware failure. I tried flashing it with stock MGA firmware and the problem remains, as well as the screen ****ing up just before it is about to reboot. Well, thanks anyway!

[Q] Phone Randomly Rebooting after flash

I flashed Stock(ish)v05, played with it for a while, and thought I'd try TriForce5.4. I flashed it, and I really liked the starting from scratch, as I've had my phone for a year or so, and it has a lot of crap on it -- probably good to start fresh.
I installed the essentials, email accounts, facebook, tweetcaster, solitaire megapack and hungry shark evolution.
I think I kind of screwed up installing hungry shark. I had originally installed it on Amazon, and reinstalled it with the play store. No biggie, right? I noticed mainly because the opening animation is different, slightly.
I installed the new google now launcher, and put the games in a folder.
When I played hungry shark - I was surprised to see that it had my app data (I wiped/formatted system/etc) -- I was close to getting a great white, so that was cool. A couple days later -- hungry shark was not in the folder. I went to the play store and it was uninstalled. hmmm. I reinstalled it, and no data -- back to Maco shark. A couple days later -- it wasn't there again. I tried to install it with amazon, but it locked up and wouldn't show it.
I then decided maybe I'd go back to Stock(ish)v05. I went back and proceeded to reinstall stuff. The phone started rebooting randomly. It might seem like a memory error, as it usually happens when installing something. I noticed Stock(ish)v06 was up, so I did a full wipe and went to V06. It had the same problem. After some searching -- I thought maybe there was a modem problem. I odin'd a fresh MK2. Same problem. Any advice? I'm not really a noob, but sometimes have no idea what I'm doing.

CtDMonet said:
I flashed Stock(ish)v05, played with it for a while, and thought I'd try TriForce5.4. I flashed it, and I really liked the starting from scratch, as I've had my phone for a year or so, and it has a lot of crap on it -- probably good to start fresh.
I installed the essentials, email accounts, facebook, tweetcaster, solitaire megapack and hungry shark evolution.
I think I kind of screwed up installing hungry shark. I had originally installed it on Amazon, and reinstalled it with the play store. No biggie, right? I noticed mainly because the opening animation is different, slightly.
I installed the new google now launcher, and put the games in a folder.
When I played hungry shark - I was surprised to see that it had my app data (I wiped/formatted system/etc) -- I was close to getting a great white, so that was cool. A couple days later -- hungry shark was not in the folder. I went to the play store and it was uninstalled. hmmm. I reinstalled it, and no data -- back to Maco shark. A couple days later -- it wasn't there again. I tried to install it with amazon, but it locked up and wouldn't show it.
I then decided maybe I'd go back to Stock(ish)v05. I went back and proceeded to reinstall stuff. The phone started rebooting randomly. It might seem like a memory error, as it usually happens when installing something. I noticed Stock(ish)v06 was up, so I did a full wipe and went to V06. It had the same problem. After some searching -- I thought maybe there was a modem problem. I odin'd a fresh MK2. Same problem. Any advice? I'm not really a noob, but sometimes have no idea what I'm doing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Best bet to clean all the nasties is a complete Odin wipe - grab the full MK2 .tar and flash that. It'll wipe all your partitions and set things right. The tar is here in the forums search a little.
Run Titanium if you want to back up some app data but don't restore any system data.

Fresh MJ2 rom? Stock with root, I assume (no knox) -- which one?

No the super clean tar will have Knox and all bloatware. And no root. You will have to reroot which takes 30 seconds.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using Tapatalk

daniel4653 said:
No the super clean tar will have Knox and all bloatware. And no root. You will have to reroot which takes 30 seconds.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I odin'd a stock tar (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=49213024), and now I'm stuck in the "android is upgrading" screen. I tried a hard reset, data wipe and it still goes to the "android is upgrading..." screen, "starting apps"
Does it make a difference that I was never on a stock MK2? I never updated, I was rooted stock with a bootloader and kept getting the annoying "update downloaded" icon, but never processed it - just ignored it (an occasionally deleted it in file explorer, but it would eventually download again). Help?

CtDMonet said:
I odin'd a stock tar (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=49213024), and now I'm stuck in the "android is upgrading" screen. I tried a hard reset, data wipe and it still goes to the "android is upgrading..." screen, "starting apps"
Does it make a difference that I was never on a stock MK2? I never updated, I was rooted stock with a bootloader and kept getting the annoying "update downloaded" icon, but never processed it - just ignored it (an occasionally deleted it in file explorer, but it would eventually download again). Help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You didn't brick your device. It turns on and starts to boot it's not dead.
Please go back to here and read through the ENTIRE thread.
Also when you are Odin'ng use version 3.09 (search for it it's here) AND run as administrator.
Power off the phone completely, then go to download mode. Start Odin on your PC then connect your phone to it.
Run Odin.
Many people have used this method to get them back to 'zero' - stock MK2 ROM. You will have to root again - you can use CF-Autoroot or Saferoot; both are here too.
Slow down take your time and do some reading too.
Good luck

leaderbuilder said:
You didn't brick your device. It turns on and starts to boot it's not dead.
Please go back to here and read through the ENTIRE thread.
Also when you are Odin'ng use version 3.09 (search for it it's here) AND run as administrator.
Power off the phone completely, then go to download mode. Start Odin on your PC then connect your phone to it.
Run Odin.
Many people have used this method to get them back to 'zero' - stock MK2 ROM. You will have to root again - you can use CF-Autoroot or Saferoot; both are here too.
Slow down take your time and do some reading too.
Good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've done that with odin 3.07 and 3.09 several times. I've downloaded the file several times, wiped-hard reset several times, and still get stuck on boot (sometimes on the pulsing SAMSUNG, sometimes on the Android is updating screen... still no work.
I've seen something about PIT files? Before initiating this process I was having problems with memory which probably initiated trying something new (flash something without bloat -- only install the stuff you use...yadayadayada). I might have had a problem with something there. I keep copying files onto my SD card, and it might have a problem. I'm currently backing up my photos from it to reformat it, and see if that's why I can't copy a ROM to it. Is there a new partition file I can flash? I tried checking that box in odin once, and it errored out.

CtDMonet said:
I've done that with odin 3.07 and 3.09 several times. I've downloaded the file several times, wiped-hard reset several times, and still get stuck on boot (sometimes on the pulsing SAMSUNG, sometimes on the Android is updating screen... still no work.
I've seen something about PIT files? Before initiating this process I was having problems with memory which probably initiated trying something new (flash something without bloat -- only install the stuff you use...yadayadayada). I might have had a problem with something there. I keep copying files onto my SD card, and it might have a problem. I'm currently backing up my photos from it to reformat it, and see if that's why I can't copy a ROM to it. Is there a new partition file I can flash? I tried checking that box in odin once, and it errored out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do not go the pit route. You'll surely destroy your phone.
Boot to stock recovery and try a factory reset
Sent from my SPH-L720 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

leaderbuilder said:
Do not go the pit route. You'll surely destroy your phone.
Boot to stock recovery and try a factory reset
Sent from my SPH-L720 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your help....I'm generally pretty handy searching the forums, but this hasn't responded like it should (always hangs - even after factory reset). I found an old TWRP backup, and restored it. It didn't work, as I had already flashed the (unsuccessful) stock MK2, that had already updraded to MK2 (and the old backup was from MF9, I think?). From there I didn't have data, but I could wifi and download the Stock NAE with root (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2650706.
I'm dealing with 4 month old text messages and expired passwords, but it is working.....:victory:

[Q] Recovery Rebooting Issue

Hello,
I sure could use some help here! I just upgraded to BajaROM 16 in my stock rom slot. All was fine until I did a boneheaded thing. I wanted to go into recovery to attempt to install another ROM in slot 1 so by mistake I clicked on "recovery" in the drop screen that also has the restart and shut down buttons. Now I appear to be in a endless loop trying to find recovery. I have no idea what to do now. I tried doing the three button approach but nothing happened. I have pulled the battery and waited a few minutes but as soon as I re-start the phone, I get that damn "Recovery Reboot" message again on the top left side of the screen.
Any ideas?
Thanks!

I'm in the same boat, phone has been constantly rebooting for the last 12 hours and I can't figure out how to make it work again...

same boat here.
edit...
Resolved...

I have encountered this as well. I fixed it by Odin flashing the modem back to the phone. Once flashed, it rebooted and I had Safestrap and my rom back. Just be sure you flash the right modem file as the wrong one will brick your phone. I have done that in the past as well.

Bizack said:
same boat here.
edit...
Resolved...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What was the resolution? I'm in the same boat and can't get ODIN to recognize the phone.

tdamore said:
What was the resolution? I'm in the same boat and can't get ODIN to recognize the phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Whoa, Odin wont recognize the phone in download mode?
vol dn + home & Power?
You need to not use USB3, switch USB ports, change cables, if your computer wont recognize switch computers.
Open up Kies3 and re-install drivers.
Many options, try them all, don't give up. It your shot won't even turn on, then take that **** back!!!
What IO did to achieve salvation...
I flashed NC4, Rooted using towl root, then busy box and Safe Strapped flashed the NC2 kernel and bamm(no relation) back on Baja16....
(there is a process, please don't follow the steps above, go here...)

I was in the same boat...
tdamore said:
What was the resolution? I'm in the same boat and can't get ODIN to recognize the phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was also rebooting into recovery mode over and over again after my first boot up of the recent Baja and rebooting into Recovery after updating to the new version of SS.
The only thing I could do was pull the battery and it would do again. I read the above about updating the modem, but unsure what that was, I tried rebooting into download mode again. From here, instead of hitting UP VOLUME to continue, I hit DOWN VOLUME and low and behold, I got the baja flash and it booted up my phone again.
PHEW!
Just thought I'd share what worked for me...

what am i doing wrong i did the root methods and setup the safestrap(3.75) and have been trying all evening to install bigginsRom+v6. i go thru all the steps and when i hit continue for it to reboot it just dies and does nothing. i have to pull the battery and get it back to safestrap and reinstall the stock rom. i am supposed to set it up on slot 1 instead of stock right?

downloaded another rom and tried it in another slot and the same thing. the only one i can get to load is the stock backup. anything else it just goes black and does nothing. have to pull the battery to even get it to power back on

BigHoss3 said:
what am i doing wrong i did the root methods and setup the safestrap(3.75) and have been trying all evening to install bigginsRom+v6. i go thru all the steps and when i hit continue for it to reboot it just dies and does nothing. i have to pull the battery and get it back to safestrap and reinstall the stock rom. i am supposed to set it up on slot 1 instead of stock right?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
BigHoss3 said:
downloaded another rom and tried it in another slot and the same thing. the only one i can get to load is the stock backup. anything else it just goes black and does nothing. have to pull the battery to even get it to power back on
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Guys, Please Go here.
Follow these directions to the letter.
First ting is figure out where you are at and use the correct method to get your s**T back up and running...

Bizack said:
Guys, Please Go here.
Follow these directions to the letter.
First ting is figure out where you are at and use the correct method to get your s**T back up and running...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It took some work but I got it booted back to the stock rom

I also had problems getting Odin to see my phone. In my case I just needed to unistall the USB drivers bundled with my phone and install the latest drivers FROM Samsung's website.

Softish Brick Recovery i9505 int

Hi,
My i9505 Intl (Australian Telstra LTE) SGS4 has been rooted for a year at least now, and recently (a few months) had TWRP recovery and CM13 installed and everything was going great. I loved CM!
Anyway I had done a few nightly patches of CM and all seemed good and then a week ago I installed the most recent nightly (possibly this one cm-13.0-20160819-NIGHTLY-jfltexx-recovery.img ). Well the subsequent reboot put the phone into a boot loop. So I thought no problem just boot to recovery and install my recent Nandroid back up. So did that but in my haste didn't clear cache or data. The nandroid reinstall seemed to go ok but a subsequent boot hung at the CM logo (I think it was a while ago now) and I couldn't boot to recovery, just hung with the blue text.
So I fired up Odin and booted to download and reflashed with TWRP. Boot to recovery still didn't work however I could still boot to download.
Tried different USB ports, different versions of Odin, re installed drivers to no avail. Also tried CWM, TWRP and Philz recovery and once I did get it to boot to recovery with Philz. THIS TIME cleared cache and data and loaded a good copy of CM that I had on my SD card. Again stuck in boot. Couldn't get back to recovery.
Tried loading the orginal samsung firmware and they I was stuck with a Samsung logo boot looping. Ditto recovery just hung at the logo and the blue text "recovery booting".
Rinse and repeat a few times and now the phone has started to become difficult to get into download or recovery. If I leave it with the battery out for a while it seems to come good again.
Odin when flashing a new recovery either hangs half way though or completes and says everything is OK. Full blue bar on the phone.
Rebooting however still leaves me in the boot loop.
There is no mention on Odin of any issues with the partition however I have d/l a PIT file from one of samersh72's posts but am not sure if it is the correct one for my Int phone or indeed if I need to use it as Odin doesn't seem to report any partition errors.
If any one has any suggestions I am very receptive to ideas right now.....
Thanks

Did you perform a factory wipe after flashing stock before booting the rom for the first time?

audit13 said:
Did you perform a factory wipe after flashing stock before booting the rom for the first time?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did a factory wipe and then installed CM from my SD card but that is the only time I have able to get into recovery since the first time when I reloaded my nandroid backup

Did you try flashing recovery without selecting auto reboot? Once flashed, remove USB cable, remove battery, replace battery, try to boot into recovery.

audit13 said:
Did you try flashing recovery without selecting auto reboot? Once flashed, remove USB cable, remove battery, replace battery, try to boot into recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup tried that, as I realised that the auto boot might be overwriting the custom recovery...........however as a new development I haven't been able to boot to download or even the stuck recovery since yesterday.
I think it has now moved to a full hard brick

Is still turns on? You have a USB jig to try?

audit13 said:
Is still turns on? You have a USB jig to try?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No I don't have one but I have all the makings of one so i'll put one together and give it a go. Though I have to say that I am not that hopeful as I can't even get a peep out of it now.

A jig may be the last solution before sending it for repair or replacing the motherboard.

audit13 said:
A jig may be the last solution before sending it for repair or replacing the motherboard.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks Audit, Ill let you know how I get on. Just looked at some replacement motherboards and they don't seem too common for the LTE version used here in Australia AND USD60......pretty much get a working phone locally here on ebay for that and I get the rest of the parts too.

Have you tried already flashing a stock rom as a tar file from sammobile?

justgamer01 said:
Have you tried already flashing a stock rom as a tar file from sammobile?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup did that as well!

Ghostdog1 said:
Yup did that as well!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure if it will work! But try emergency recovery with Smart Switch!

justgamer01 said:
I'm not sure if it will work! But try emergency recovery with Smart Switch!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
With Smartswitch I get the same outcome as with Kires
"GT-I9505 does not support initialising. Please contact our service centre."
But on the plus side it is actually responding to button presses today. I will pick up some 100K resistors tomorrow and finish off my USB jig. See how that goes.

Well it appears to have finally died fully. No response to any button or combination of button presses. Made up a USB jig but without some response to a boot that won't work either.
Thanks to Audit and Justgamer for your advice. Think it is time to draw a line under this one and move on. Maybe a new Nexus when they drop?