Database Users

Dirty Santa and Restoring From Backups - Suck in some kind of limbo?

So I would have asked this question directly in the DirtySanta thread, but apparently I don't have enough posts to actually do anything there yet.
So my device is now in a rather bizzare zombie state. I did manage to get my device fully rooted with TWRP installed. Followed the instructions on how to get everything working with no problems. I ended up wanting to try to flash some audio mods (V4A and such), however they did not install properly, so I went and did what anyone else would do - restored to a full backup I made of the device before I started mucking about.
The restore did complete successfully, and I still have a device that has a working recovery, and an OS with root permission...but I can't flash anything anymore from TWRP. TWRP is unable to mount the /system partition after the restore, and seems convinced that I have no OS installed, even though there is one and the phone boots into it just fine. The restore I'm on now is post-flashing the Konverged Kernel. Attempting to restore to an even earlier backup (one I made just before flashing Konverged) produces similar results - the restore succeeds and produces a bootable phone, but TWRP still can't flash anything.
Just to cover bases I also tried running "fastboot flash recovery twrp-3.0.2-1-us996.img" again in case TWRP got messed up (trying to get the "Swipe to allow system changes" prompt to reappear - it didn't), with no changes - TWRP still works fine, but cant mount and edit /system and still claims I have no OS installed when requesting a reboot.
Any advice on how to get things working again would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

This may be an issue with TWRP. When I had my Galaxy S3 rooted back in the day I would have this issue, also with a Nexus tablet I rooted as well. It turns out I needed to flash a specific "fixed" version of TWRP to fix the mount/flash issue. That was a long time ago though, so this might not be the problem, but I thought I would at least tell you my experience.
Sent from my LG-LS997 using Tapatalk

biglightbt said:
So I would have asked this question directly in the DirtySanta thread, but apparently I don't have enough posts to actually do anything there yet.
So my device is now in a rather bizzare zombie state. I did manage to get my device fully rooted with TWRP installed. Followed the instructions on how to get everything working with no problems. I ended up wanting to try to flash some audio mods (V4A and such), however they did not install properly, so I went and did what anyone else would do - restored to a full backup I made of the device before I started mucking about.
The restore did complete successfully, and I still have a device that has a working recovery, and an OS with root permission...but I can't flash anything anymore from TWRP. TWRP is unable to mount the /system partition after the restore, and seems convinced that I have no OS installed, even though there is one and the phone boots into it just fine. The restore I'm on now is post-flashing the Konverged Kernel. Attempting to restore to an even earlier backup (one I made just before flashing Konverged) produces similar results - the restore succeeds and produces a bootable phone, but TWRP still can't flash anything.
Just to cover bases I also tried running "fastboot flash recovery twrp-3.0.2-1-us996.img" again in case TWRP got messed up (trying to get the "Swipe to allow system changes" prompt to reappear - it didn't), with no changes - TWRP still works fine, but cant mount and edit /system and still claims I have no OS installed when requesting a reboot.
Any advice on how to get things working again would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I beleive you have to do Dirty Santa over again....The steps that is.

biglightbt said:
So I would have asked this question directly in the DirtySanta thread, but apparently I don't have enough posts to actually do anything there yet.
So my device is now in a rather bizzare zombie state. I did manage to get my device fully rooted with TWRP installed. Followed the instructions on how to get everything working with no problems. I ended up wanting to try to flash some audio mods (V4A and such), however they did not install properly, so I went and did what anyone else would do - restored to a full backup I made of the device before I started mucking about.
The restore did complete successfully, and I still have a device that has a working recovery, and an OS with root permission...but I can't flash anything anymore from TWRP. TWRP is unable to mount the /system partition after the restore, and seems convinced that I have no OS installed, even though there is one and the phone boots into it just fine. The restore I'm on now is post-flashing the Konverged Kernel. Attempting to restore to an even earlier backup (one I made just before flashing Konverged) produces similar results - the restore succeeds and produces a bootable phone, but TWRP still can't flash anything.
Just to cover bases I also tried running "fastboot flash recovery twrp-3.0.2-1-us996.img" again in case TWRP got messed up (trying to get the "Swipe to allow system changes" prompt to reappear - it didn't), with no changes - TWRP still works fine, but cant mount and edit /system and still claims I have no OS installed when requesting a reboot.
Any advice on how to get things working again would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So your phone isn't booting beyond TWRP? I'm assuming that's what you are saying. I only want clarification because you mentioned how it won't flash anything.
Try this. Go to "mount" and make sure system is checked. Then power off the device. Then use the button combo to boot back into recovery. It's power + volume down, as soon you see the LG logo let go of the power button and then press it again and hold it (never let go of the volume down button though). If done correctly you'll get a white screen asking you if you want to factory reset. Choose yes for both questions. This will boot you back into recovery. Once in recovery again go back to mount and check system again. Now reboot system. This method got me out of being stuck in TWRP after I had tried every other method I could think of.
PS. Make sure you are on a fully stock version of the ROM that came on your phone. This may work for any backup you have but just incase use the most stock version backup you have.

imucarmen said:
So your phone isn't booting beyond TWRP? I'm assuming that's what you are saying. I only want clarification because you mentioned how it won't flash anything.
Try this. Go to "mount" and make sure system is checked. Then power off the device. Then use the button combo to boot back into recovery. It's power + volume down, as soon you see the LG logo let go of the power button and then press it again and hold it (never let go of the volume down button though). If done correctly you'll get a white screen asking you if you want to factory reset. Choose yes for both questions. This will boot you back into recovery. Once in recovery again go back to mount and check system again. Now reboot system. This method got me out of being stuck in TWRP after I had tried every other method I could think of.
PS. Make sure you are on a fully stock version of the ROM that came on your phone. This may work for any backup you have but just incase use the most stock version backup you have.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry if I wasn't clear, its a bit confusing to me also. Normally TWRP saying you have No OS installed is pretty bad news, but it seems to be a bit confused itself, since there IS and OS installed, and the phone boots into it.
The phone basically works exactly as you'd expect after the DirtySanta exploit. It can boot into whatever backup I restore it back to, and works just fine, root included. I can also boot into TWRP just fine also..... Its just that within TWRP, if I try to flash anything at all (apps, zip files, kernels) it comes back with an error just after "Updating Partition Details". The specific error is "failed to mount /system (invalid argument)". If I had to guess I'd think that /system was somehow marked as Read Only after I did the restore. I haven't needed to use the button combos for anything since ADB and Fastboot commands all work just fine too.
If I go into the "Mount" section in TWRP "System" is unchecked, if I tap it to try to check it the phone vibrates as if it accepted the input, but the check never appears. If I select "Mount System as Read Only" I can mount it though. I followed the instructions in the DirtySanta thread to a T, and am using all the recommended software versions.
I also tried restoring back to the backup I made just before flashing Konverged Kernel, with similar results. The restore works, and the phone boots into Android, but if I try to pick up where I left off and flash Konverged again from within TWRP, it fails with the "failed to mount /system (invalid argument)" again.

biglightbt said:
Sorry if I wasn't clear, its a bit confusing to me also. Normally TWRP saying you have No OS installed is pretty bad news, but it seems to be a bit confused itself, since there IS and OS installed, and the phone boots into it.
The phone basically works exactly as you'd expect after the DirtySanta exploit. It can boot into whatever backup I restore it back to, and works just fine, root included. I can also boot into TWRP just fine also..... Its just that within TWRP, if I try to flash anything at all (apps, zip files, kernels) it comes back with an error just after "Updating Partition Details". The specific error is "failed to mount /system (invalid argument)". If I had to guess I'd think that /system was somehow marked as Read Only after I did the restore. I haven't needed to use the button combos for anything since ADB and Fastboot commands all work just fine too.
If I go into the "Mount" section in TWRP "System" is unchecked, if I tap it to try to check it the phone vibrates as if it accepted the input, but the check never appears. If I select "Mount System as Read Only" I can mount it though. I followed the instructions in the DirtySanta thread to a T, and am using all the recommended software versions.
I also tried restoring back to the backup I made just before flashing Konverged Kernel, with similar results. The restore works, and the phone boots into Android, but if I try to pick up where I left off and flash Konverged again from within TWRP, it fails with the "failed to mount /system (invalid argument)" again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would run the dirtysanta exploit again from the beginning. Your assumption about being stuck in read only seems correct. I'm guessing you might have chosen read only on accident one time when you booted into TWRP and now it's stuck there.
Or you could try using flashfire to flash the TWRP.img

I am having the same issue. I tried doing the DAC mod that enables high impedance as always on. Audio quit working along with the stock music app. Did a restore from after I flashed the konverged kernel. And now no r/w ability and twrp will not mount system unless I check mount as read only. I was able to reinstall supersu from the recovery. But still have the issues.
Only thing I can think of is waiting for a return to stock unrooted method to Come out and re-root.

biglightbt said:
So I would have asked this question directly in the DirtySanta thread, but apparently I don't have enough posts to actually do anything there yet.
So my device is now in a rather bizzare zombie state. I did manage to get my device fully rooted with TWRP installed. Followed the instructions on how to get everything working with no problems. I ended up wanting to try to flash some audio mods (V4A and such), however they did not install properly, so I went and did what anyone else would do - restored to a full backup I made of the device before I started mucking about.
The restore did complete successfully, and I still have a device that has a working recovery, and an OS with root permission...but I can't flash anything anymore from TWRP. TWRP is unable to mount the /system partition after the restore, and seems convinced that I have no OS installed, even though there is one and the phone boots into it just fine. The restore I'm on now is post-flashing the Konverged Kernel. Attempting to restore to an even earlier backup (one I made just before flashing Konverged) produces similar results - the restore succeeds and produces a bootable phone, but TWRP still can't flash anything.
Just to cover bases I also tried running "fastboot flash recovery twrp-3.0.2-1-us996.img" again in case TWRP got messed up (trying to get the "Swipe to allow system changes" prompt to reappear - it didn't), with no changes - TWRP still works fine, but cant mount and edit /system and still claims I have no OS installed when requesting a reboot.
Any advice on how to get things working again would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey I was having the same problem and I fixed it myself messing around with a few things I could think of.
Here it is pasted from another thread.
Dinked around with a few ideas and got my problem fixed! Heres what I did.
1. Made a backup of system in twrp just in case.
2. Formatted system in wipe > advanced > and only checked system.
Panicked because I thought I bricked my device, wouldnt boot farther than the lg logo,
(next steps might be unnecessary but I panicked and tried them lol)
3. still had fastboot access so I repeated step 3 in the root method.
4. Reflashed boot2.img
5. Rebooted to recovery with volume- power, release power while keeping volume- at lg for a second then repress and hold power. Yes twice to get to recovery.
6. Restored system backup. (was able to fully boot now but with lag)
7. Reflashed konverged kernel.
And everything is working perfect now and I have my r/w ability and can mount system in recovery without having to select mount as read only.
---------- Post added at 09:57 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:10 AM ----------
You can probably just wipe your system like I said in the previous post then Just restore it. I panicked and did a bunch of extra stuff. I realized that when I did my initial backup of my system, or said that its size was about 126247251477482716MB. So I'm guessing when I did my restore (possibly what happened to yours) that it somehow messed up the system.

malfunction

Hi Guys.
I recently noticed that I couldn't create a backup with TWRP. Firstly, I thought it was a TWRP problem, as I had some issues installing it after the B588 update. So I flashed it again, but nothing changed. When my back up would reach about 70%, it would give me a reboot. Then I tried to install B588 again, to fix any errors. Although, I flashed it correctly, when I tried to restore the back up I had through Huawei's app, I got an unexpected reboot. So I decided to intall sokkoban's rom. During my first attempt to copy the zip files, it stoped the process. So I took the files directly to the SD card (with an adapter and not via usb cable). I re-flashed TWRP and then entered recovery, to flash the zip files (I am only able to enter custom recovery, only through xposed modules and adb commands since my latest update: 01-01-2017). After managing to enter TWRP, I tried to clear everything, but I got an error:
The message was: mkfs.fat /dev/block/mmcblk1p1 process ended with ERROR: 1 Unable to wipe sdcard. (just in case the image is not visible)
Can anyone help with this?
Currently I am trying to install the ROM ...

spirto82 said:
Hi Guys.
I recently noticed that I couldn't create a backup with TWRP. Firstly, I thought it was a TWRP problem, as I had some issues installing it after the B588 update. So I flashed it again, but nothing changed. When my back up would reach about 70%, it would give me a reboot. Then I tried to install B588 again, to fix any errors. Although, I flashed it correctly, when I tried to restore the back up I had through Huawei's app, I got an unexpected reboot. So I decided to intall sokkoban's rom. During my first attempt to copy the zip files, it stoped the process. So I took the files directly to the SD card (with an adapter and not via usb cable). I re-flashed TWRP and then entered recovery, to flash the zip files (I am only able to enter custom recovery, only through xposed modules and adb commands since my latest update: 01-01-2017). After managing to enter TWRP, I tried to clear everything, but I got an error:
The message was: mkfs.fat /dev/block/mmcblk1p1 process ended with ERROR: 1 Unable to wipe sdcard. (just in case the image is not visible)
Can anyone help with this?
Currently I am trying to install the ROM ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This error is quite normal.....I have got this many times wiping everything and this isn't an issue...
With reboot during restore I think that your backup is corrupt at some point

Stuck in recovery

So i probably did something stupid.
I wanted to root my oneplus 5, so i updated it to last oxygenos 5.0.1 and copied all necessary stuff to pc.
After that unlocked the bootloader, got the phone to fastboot and flashed twrp 3.2.1-0.
Somewhy i couldn't access internal storage from twrp, it said its 0 mb and sdcard folder was empty, however i put magisk 15.3 there before, so i googled for a while and found that it probably couldn't mount storage. so this is where i probably did stupid thing by formating and fully wiping the phone. after that i could mount the storage, but the files were gone so i just put them there again. After that installed magisk and booted to system only to find myself in recovery again. So i though that i completely wiped the phone with the rom, so i downloaded the latest oxygenos and put it on the phone to install from twrp but it just doesnt install. returns error 7, which is, as google says, has somehting to do with asserts, it suggested to remove them form updater-script file, but opening it doesnt show any asserts in it. So here i am with phone with twrp and no rom at all. What do i do? Please help
tl;dr: I have OnePlus 5 with twrp 3.2.1-0 after complete wipe, and it cant install oxygenos because of error 7
Edit: only after posting noticed that there's a help thread, sorry for that. problem is not fixed though

Try a different TWRP.

update
thanks for suggesting different recovery. first tried older versions of twrp with no success, then tried twrp blu spark and it got a different error, something to do with unlocked bootloader. so i edited updater-script file and it installed normally. so i now have a clean oneplus 5 with oxygenos 5.0.1
will try to install magisk again, hopefully wont wipe everything again
update
yeah, everything worked. installed magisk and got root. but it always says 'install' inside magisk manager, is this normal?
saw that it should say 're-instal' in yt videos

It's normal.
Magisk updates regularly, those YouTube videos don't get updated.

I bumped into the same problem as mentioned by hyro28..
Please explain how to "update updater-script file " -- where is the file found, how to update it? I am new to this, would appreciate detailed instructions -- links, written instructions, videos, etc Thanks!

OP5 Doesnt boot after TWRP, no_verity_op5.zip, Magisk

First of all, all my Data is backed on my Harddrive, so we dont need to take care of them.
I followed the Guide on One Plus Forum on how to unlock the Bootloader and Flash TWRP and root.
I wanted to use Magisk for root.
I followed the guide until the step with the decrypted filesystem. I installed the "no_verity_op5.zip" and magisk as statet in the guide and now my phone starts with the "g.com/abh" message and goes directly to TWRP.
When i start fastboot, bootloader and baseband is blank.
Any idea how to fix my phone?

G-Evil said:
First of all, all my Data is backed on my Harddrive, so we dont need to take care of them.
I followed the Guide on One Plus Forum on how to unlock the Bootloader and Flash TWRP and root.
I wanted to use Magisk for root.
I followed the guide until the step with the decrypted filesystem. I installed the "no_verity_op5.zip" and magisk as statet in the guide and now my phone starts with the "g.com/abh" message and goes directly to TWRP.
When i start fastboot, bootloader and baseband is blank.
Any idea how to fix my phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
maybe u can try to ignore the blank screen on the fastboot and fash TWRP, if it's showing success on the cmd/powershell, then try to boot into recovery via command on the cmd/powershell. or maybe u can relock ur bootloader.
also in my experience i didn't install the "no_verity_op5.zip", i just did the unlock comand and select unlock bootloader and it's done

Sorry for the late reply, i needed a sleep.
I flashed TWRP a few times without succes, also flashing no_verity_op5.zip didnt help.
My previous idea was to use Resurrection Remix from XDA, so i flashed it and the Phone started again.
But it didnt connect to my Wifi, several restarts of the phone and of my router later i flashed OOS Again.
Maybe ill try to root it again. If it fails, ill be here again.

/data needs to be completely formatted after flashing the no_verity zip, there's no other way to remove the encryption.

The reason that's relevant is you'll get what your experiencing of you don't format /data, as it's trying to access the encrypted data that the fstab says isn't encrypted at this point and can't get further than that

1/ Backup your files on your computer
2/ Format your Data partion (format.. it's not a wipe!) you will erase all your data/internal
3/ Wipe all your others partitions (Dalvik/Cache + Cache + System)
4/ Install your rom
5/ Install no-verity zip oreo if you want have a decrypted device or flash nothing if you want have a encrypted device (more safe)
6/ Install Magisk... a 14.x Magisk version instead of a 15.x, 15x might cause bootloop after a clean flash. You can update your Magisk after the first boot

are you on 5.0.1? dirty reflashing the rom worked for me

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HMSS013 said:
Had my new OP5 rooted and almost everything was right in the world, but i flew too close to the sun by uninstalling a few apps I thought were expendable and eventually Google Play Services started crashing. When all troubleshooting failed I ended up flashing a fresh copy of OxygenOS (5.1.7) to my device, but every attempt to re-root the device has failed.
The first obstacle I ran into was that there was no access to Internal Storage in TWRP, I was able to fix that by Wipe > Format Data and then using Advanced Wipe to clean Dalvik/Cache/System/Data for good measure.
My next issue was that TWRP returned Error 7 when attempting to flash the stock OOS rom... after some digging I was able to clean the 'asserts' line from the updater-script file and now the rom will flash.
The headache has been getting the device re-rooted, and I feel like I've tried everything. I have to flash the SuperSU or Magisk zip (both fail to root the device) before reboot because the dm-verity encrypts on first boot and after that I can't access any storage to flash from internal memory. The three different dm-verity patches I've found don't prevent it. I also tried 'fastboot oem disable_dm_verity' to try and stop it but after talking with the device fastboot returns 'unknown command'.
My final effort to get around it was to flash a kernel that didn't force dm-verity (blu_spark kernel) but that returns Error 1: 'Unsupported Android Version' when I attempt to flash it.
I've tried dozens of variations on this, including a Lineage OS rom instead and also trying to sideload certain zips, but still no dice. Any and all help would be appreciated.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which rom do you want to install?

HMSS013 said:
The first obstacle I ran into was that there was no access to Internal Storage in TWRP, I was able to fix that by Wipe > Format Data and then using Advanced Wipe to clean Dalvik/Cache/System/Data for good measure.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, this one is because of your TWRP. Please flash Codework's TWRP and try that with it. It should solve your issue for sure. (same thing happened to me while I tried installing custom roms and every time I needed to wipe everything to see my internal storage again)
This guide can help you out with Error 7 on TWRP https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2522762
I do believe your this issue you're having caused by TWRP. Also after rooting the phone, install magisk app. (you don't need to install supersu, it comes with magisk). After rebooting into system reboot your phone again once more it should show up on magisk app that you've successfully rooted your phone. Remember after flashing magisk you need to reboot twice in order for phone to realize it. Please try the steps I told you and let me know.
Also you don't need to flash dm-verity patch at all.
Try clean flash instructions with Codework's TWRP and root it with latest Magisk.

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HMSS013 said:
I actually really like the Oreo version of OxygenOS, so when I had to resort to re-flashing to fix this mess I dug up one of the stock (5.1.7) roms, it served me well (assuming I can get it rooted, lol).
I'd be willing to move to Lineage if I absolutely have to, but if not, I'd really like to keep Oreo if at all possible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For 5.1.7 try this twrp https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UlTftbe6wooAs4Fp0cjwXlOKmfQHgdfL/view?usp=drivesdk along with magisk 17.1.
Clean flash is recommended. If it didn't help, please list your steps again(detailed).
Don't use supersu and skip the other suggestions for now please.

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