yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
I'm 90% certain this is not possible, given the information I currently have (from Mr. Sumrall)

What I have been told so far is that fixing this damage requires wiping the chip completely. The best way to do so is a firmware upgrade, which will do a low-level wipe/reset of the chip (at a lower level than what is documented in the JEDEC eMMC standard). I'm not sure if it's possible to do a full reset without a firmware upgrade, but currently I have been led to believe by credible sources that a firmware upgrade without a wipe is not possible.

A low-level wipe of this kind will nuke your bootloaders - so it's an easy road to a "traditional" hardbrick. (JTAG recoverable, but still a hardbrick.)

As a result, I'm fairly certain that proactive firmware upgrades to the eMMC chip will never happen - simply too dangerous. The only proactive measures that are likely to be taken are disabling ERASE functionality on known bad chips. (Currently, the only safe method without a better list of what is bad and what isn't is just disabling it across the board on affected devices - which isn't too bad since right now, I don't know of any device other than the Kindle Fire that has a significant mix of "good" and "bad" eMMC chips).
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Pika007:
You know, though it's good news they might start working with XDA towards a fix, it also means they either didn't do anything on the subject yet, or have no idea what to do.

Like i said, i'm not overly optimistic at the moment.....
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] reinbeau:
Gentlemen, this thread isn't to discuss warranty repairs, it's to discuss Samsung's and XDA android experts work towards solving the issue. Stick to the topic, please.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] garwynn:
Entropy,

Can recruit some coworkers to help with language barrier if needed. 3 in my office are native speakers with similar dev experience as me or higher. Maybe that can get it moving along more easily....
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nileshkucha:
usb storage

sir afte they fix emmc ..my bad sector will erase ?? right now i have 8 gb after emmc fix it will be as much as default ??
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nanoronline:
I think Enthropy has made it clear that Samsung will not fix the Emmc but rather just prevent the phone from bricking.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] sonkameja:
You would think they would stop sending out ota updates for ics with the possibility of bricking or devices that most of us paid an arm and leg for

If this doesn't get resolved in two months I'm for one getting rid of this already obsolete device as there doesn't seem to be a way to expand any features without running the risk of destroying the dam phone

Profits first, quality and customers second eh Samsung ?

Sent from my GT-N7000
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nileshkucha:
help

then how to remove bad sector from the usb storage ? :confused::confused:
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nanoronline:
OTA (or Kies) updates is the only way to go for delivering the fix. The updates won't brick your phone as long as you do not wipe data or factory reset the phone.

But yeah, hopefully this issue gets fixed sooner than later.

---------- Post added 27th June 2012 at 12:01 AM ---------- Previous post was 26th June 2012 at 11:57 PM ----------

You should check this thread for a temporary workaround for reviving bricked Notes but if you have not done anything to your Note like wiping data or factory reset while running ICS then you should be fine.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nileshkucha:
help

yes i did my note alrdy revived but what to do with bad sector..bcz my phone is keep freezing and restarting..sir..so..plz help :(:(:(
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nanoronline:
Did you use that thread's method? In the thread there's instructions on scanning for partition errors and how to deal with it.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
We may be getting a repair methodology, but upgraded eMMC firmware will likely only be deployed as a repair method for devices that have suffered damage, since I do not believe it is possible to upgrade the firmware without wiping the chip.

(It could be possible - but right now what most of the devs here want is the ability to repair - if we can repair damage, we can take slightly more risks as far as causing it, such as methods of erasing that Samsung thinks are safe but we're not sure enough to bet devices on yet.)
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] garwynn:
Does that mean that the Nexus devices given to Google were probably reshipped by Samsung after patching the firmware at one of their facilities? If not then they had to have a deployment solution already in place - likely something of the style of a boot, move to memory, flash pass 1 to update firmware, flash pass 2 to repartition and drop stock image and restart.

Not an expert but this doesn't seem too far off from updating the BIOS NVRAM on your computer, except if you bork that they may have a secondary BIOS chip to fall back on until you can flash back to something safe. Similar risk, just this is newer territory on smartphones in general.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
I'm fairly certain that Google had access to low-level USB bootloader code, and also the Nexus is OMAP4 based which has a VERY well documented boot sequence.

Many ARM devices have a low-level USB bootloader in hardware. I know that OMAP4 devices have it, so do Exynos and Hummingbird. (See AdamOutler's UnbrickableMod). With a small hardware mod (changing 1-2 resistors), they can be forced to boot from USB. On Exynos, we're missing some binary blobs that are required for this to work right, but there's a possibility we might be getting them.

That is, for example, the official method for flashing ICS on a PandaBoard - power it on with no SD card, which causes it to drop to USB bootloading, send fastboot via USB, insert the SD card and flash it using fastboot. :)

Adam had a call with a contact at Samsung today, and we have a conference call including him, myself, and 1-2 other ERDs tomorrow. It is starting to look like we may get the information required to repair damaged devices.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] bigstarrynight:
What would happen to someone with say, an 18 month old device that suddenly gets bricked on the eMMc? Will Samsung still support that user? I'm starting to find this whole issue with the eMMc brick bug quite hilarious as it seems samsung are still shipping brand new devices in germany with the faulty eMMc and ICS pe-loaded. So that means new owners are walking around with a potential time bomb, and the most vulnerable are those who regularly use the factory reset option from the settings menu. This is crazy. Do your contacts at Samsung have any idea how many units are affected? Do they have in place any procedure or action plan to eliminate the problem? Its admirable that you and other guys are developing workaounds, but I've never accepted a workaround as anything more than a band aid while the permanent fix is still in the pipeline. So far, I cant see anything like a permanent fix in the pipeline. Have I got it wrong?
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
jeez you didn't even bother to read my posts properly...

As I said, we may be getting a repair methodology... However it requires a bit of negotiation to get Samsung to release the material. Adam had a great call with our contact yesterday, we're trying to organize a second conference call today but right now it is difficult - no matter what someone has to make an international call. (With more notice I could get a VoIP setup back up and running but right now I don't have that.)
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] syncopath:
I have a Skype account which I could perhaps "lend" you. Would that be any help? If so, please PM me.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] bigstarrynight:
Likewise, I also have a Skype account which I will lend out, just let me know in a pm.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] MR.change:
Exactly what I've been thinking ,ever notice how when you upgrade a BIOS ,the flash will be done in multiple phases.

erase.....upgrade ........store upgraded bits ........erase the rest........ upgrade.

I hope sammy can cook something similar.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] MohElShafei:
Dear Entropy512,

Wish you all the luck in your next call.. I'm very happy with the progress so far.. hope to hear a good news soon :)

Regards,

Mohamed ElShafei
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] jedro072:
Tnx Entropy Im also hanging for the fix as I came from ICS and now stuck on GB worried of bricking this damn expensive phone I sacrificed a lot to buy this note cant afford for new mobo as bought in black market no warranty....wish you luck Sir. Waitin for fix soon
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
An update: Our conference call last night went very well. I'm now 90% certain we will, at the very least, be able to turn "superbricks" into JTAG-recoverable "traditional hardbricks". Everyone is hopeful that some developers will be receiving this information sometime next week (do note that it is going to take some time to develop this information into a deployable solution - how long really depends on what I will discuss below.)

This is of course not ideal, since it means the device is still bricked (but at least repairable using known methods), but we've made our case to Samsung why it is highly beneficial to everyone involved if the bits and pieces required to make Unbrickable Mod available for Exynos4 devices are provided. With that information, we will not only be able to fully recover "superbricked" devices to operational state, but will be able to recover many traditionally hardbricked devices to an operational state too. (Unfortunately, depending on the nature of traditional hardbricks, some may require resistor modifications to start the process. The "superbrick" recovery process fully wipes everything, so the device will USB-boot without any resistor mods.)

One caveat: Right now, the process of recovering from a superbrick will ALSO nuke your EFS partition. EVERYONE who is able to should make a backup of their EFS partition to their PC (or at a bare minimum, an external SD card) ASAP! Those who have lost their EFS partition to Superbrick damage are in a unique and unfortunate situation, there are some possible paths for recovery here though that the ERD community, XDA admins, and a few others are looking into. The problem is that regenerating the EFS can change a phone's IMEI, which presents unique ethical and legal challenges.

As to being stuck on GB - as long as you use a safe kernel (such as Speedmod, Franco's kernel, or the CM9 kernel) you should be fine.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] musashiro:
happy to hear that. but we are also waiting for the emmc fix by samsung to avoid bricks.

as the saying goes, prevention is always better than cure... any news regarding the fix?
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] sangalaviral:
@Entropy At a place you mentioned that superbrick requires full wipe and can be done through usb boot without resistor mod.

But at other you mentioned that by information samsung will share will make superbrick devices be jtag repairable.

Can you please clarify?

And did you talk about potential fix they are putting forward for the bug?
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] PoisonWolf:
This alone makes me think that it is unlikely that Samsung will release this into the wild. Or if they do, whatever they are making will perform the auto-backup and reinstallation of the EFS folder.

If they can't achieve this, they will only deploy this solution to authorized repair services to do the procedure.

Just being able to change the IMEI alone is something I do not think Samsung wants to give to any consumer, period. (IMHO).
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] ckmemphis:
It seems that there will be lots more discussion about this at Sumsung HQ... It's a rather tricky position they find themselves in. I think the best for them is to repair the affected kernals, and release them in a set of updates for every version of ICS there is... Users will then just have to plug into Kies and update, or let it update OTA... But there are too many units out there to risk the fact of bricking from doing a simple task, and I don't think Samsung will opt for something of that nature. Yes, most of the users of the Note, or any other phone out there doesn't really know of all this, and about flashing, rooting, and recovery modes, they just happy to have the phone.... So, it's going to take a while for this to materialize, and I think it might be best for us to sit back and wait, as I'm sure no one here wants to brick the devices....
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] bigstarrynight:
Under UK law, You must either be the manufacturer of the phone, or, have the permission of the manufacture to change the phone identifier. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2002/31/section/1 Its not what Samsung wants, its the law. You cant alter the numbers. Knowing how the legal profession works, restoring from a backup might be construed as reprogramming, and that is an offence as well. But I guess there is plenty of case law on that, lifes too short to dig for that one. ;)
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] PoisonWolf:
There you have it. You pretty much quashed all hope that this would reach XDA :D. It's starting to look more and more like a deployment at the authorized repair centers. :)
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] bigstarrynight:
That's about it. All stems from not doing the job right in the first place. OK millions of guys out there with no problems at all, but one or two will hit the brick, out of warranty, and will have to pay for the fix. The best way out, is as suggested, the preventative measure to disable the offending coding. That's the way I see it anyway. No wonder Samsung has been so bloody coy about this.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] tbong777:
Meh by the time this will matter the Note I will be old news. I probably won't even sell mine. just keep it as a back up up going forward. September is right around the corner.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] bigstarrynight:
Indeed, it burying the mistake long enough so it gets overwhelmed by new products. btw that's a poke at samsung, not you. It'll make a bloody good back-up though, posh git. All I have is a crappy motorola clam, cost £10.00 including £5.0 credit.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] garwynn:
If Samsung and/or XDA devs script the implementation to run based on a ODIN push other things such as recovery and download packages would have to be copied to memory and brought back down to the eMMC once wiped and functionality restored. Given that both the Note and GS2 has 1GB+ RAM it should suffice to copy all of the necessary information to RAM during the wipe. Heck, it could still push it back even if it fails so long as the device doesn't lock up; that way it could be pulled again if necessary during a JTAG operation.

There are other features that could be added such as a battery check over xx% to reduce failures due to power loss in this scenario. Or require an MicroSD card so that it can use the storage there as a failsafe (copy the data, don't allow modification of it - maybe encrypt?)

So there are ways around the efs backup problems if you think about it.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
USB boot requires binary blobs that we don't have for Exynos4, and which Samsung is VERY hesitant to release. However we've outlined why it is very good for them to release that particular component.

If we don't get what we need for USB boot, JTAG is a fallback, but that's non-ideal. It's better than now, since JTAG won't bring devices back currently, but it's not ideal either.

I'm not sure yet what they will actually be deploying, but I can tell you - I am fairly certain they will not be updating the firmware defect, just eliminating the trigger conditions for it. There are a few ways to do this - the ERDs have said their opinion on what components MUST have fixes (there must be kernel-level blocking of damaging commands in my opinion), we don't know how Samsung will use this info.

During the call, everyone on the call (including those on the XDA side of things) pretty much agreed that for a wide variety of reasons, we are 100% on our own in terms of dealing with EFS.

I guess the short summary:

A repair method that fully resets the chip and leaves it in a blank slate (hardbricked, but not superbricked) - 90% certain we'll be getting it, and a good chance we'll be getting it next week (but deploying a solution to users is going to require some time)

Ability to resurrect "traditional" hardbricks without JTAG - I'd say maybe 25% chance. If we don't get this, using the information above will be very difficult - it will take some time to develop a reliable solution that we feel comfortable deploying.

Assistance from Samsung regarding EFS recovery - 0%, and we completely understand this because there are some pretty nasty laws that cover this. XDA is on our own in this specific case, HOWEVER there are some avenues we can pursue here even without support from Samsung. We made a specific point of telling Samsung, "we'll deal with this issue on our own" so that they can focus on the first two items, which are the ones we actually need help from them for.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] panyan:
awesome - im really glad that this is progressing - you guys are just incredible - you make xda what it is :)
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] SpyderTracks:
Can we make a sticky about backing up the EFS partition? Is it an adb affair or simple copying of directory?
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
Multiple ways of doing it - including EFS Pro which was just covered on the main XDA portal.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] SpyderTracks:
Thanks, that makes it a bit easier!

Link for those interested:

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1308546
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] cdmackay:
EFS: For S2 and Note users only...

Non-windows users might want to try the kTool app

Creates both a 20MB img and a tar file of the EFS dir's contents.

edit: it also dumps out the current kernel, and compares the current EFS contents to a backup, to verify. Interestingly the EFS contents vary over time (not the IMEI, of course, but other things in there). Also formats and restores EFS partition.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] sangalaviral:
Even of it takes a week or couple more and they give out to you the binary blobs then it will be wonderful to the android community since then we can have usb bootloaders.

Did they discuss anything that are they working on releasing the patch for thr superbrick bug as i think this contact is some other person
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] tribalkg:
@Entropy: Will there be a difference between Samsung's solution and the solution that developers did with the custom ROMS (CM9 and others) when we talk about disabling the problematic call of the function?
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] alvinasnow:
Resurrected my Note today

Using Dr. Forest's superb method:

http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=26285877&postcount=12

revived my Note today, but still due to the emmc bug, i had to sacrifice my 3GB space.

Waiting patiently for an absolute fix.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] reinbeau:
Thread cleaned

There is no reason to parse the very clear post Entropy512 made. Read it for comprehension and do not post speculative 'interpretations'. Keep this thread informative, it isn't a discussion thread.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] nileshkucha:
after solution ..will we able to fix the bad sector/bad blocks ??

4 gb i compromised..will i able to get that back..??
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] sonkameja:
4gb less on a phone is less than what was stated at launched date. That's false advertising and if a class action lawsuit comes I'll def jump on that

Sent from my GT-N7000
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] inurb:
Do any of the mobile blog sites such as Engadget, MobileCrunch and BGR know about this issue?

Maybe if they report on it, it might raise even more awareness over at Samsung. I know big companies never like bad press.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] cdmackay:
What nonsense is this? "We" are probably a tiny fraction of 1% of Samsung's revenue stream for this device, we should expect no preferential treatment whatsoever.

I know many people with Android phones, but only one of them has actually rooted theirs, let alone put a custom ROM on it.

What's amazing to me is that Samsung are willing to sit and listen to our ERDs at all, and kudos to the devs for getting that far.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] oka1:
From the Moderator

OK....PEOPLE.........

This is the second time a moderator has had to come in here and try to calm the waters.

In a nutshell, Post on Topic, do not make personal comments about each other, DO NOT FLAME, Stay on topic, FOLLOW THE RULES......

About the Emmc Bug........ Samsund Does have their hands tied from so many directions .......as well as the country to country configuration issues as well as the legal issues....... So, as stated before.... Stop griping and attacking each other ... it does not help.

Want to help ??? Join us complaining to Samsung via the social media here:

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1728974

This is how all of us can help each other.

NOW, Play Nice Be Respectful , and follow the RULES !!!

Thanks, ~~ oka1
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] abhijit038:
I agree with you, though I am rather skeptical about Samsung willing to help 'rooted' users, yet that seems to be a good sign. Nonetheless, there are no proven evidences of non rooted users bricking their phones. It's only then Samsung would have to worry about.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
Try reading... This has already been answered.
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Spiralzz:
Alright.. Ive been following this thread for a long time... And most of the questions have been answered by Entropy512 (Thanks for your time btw ;)..)... So if anyone has a question, try reading the posts of Entropy512 on this thread and i am fairly certain that you will get answers to ur questions....
[Galaxy Note GT-N7000 General] Entropy512:
Right now, things aren't entirely definite, but it looks like I am probably going to be having a face-to-face meeting with Samsung next week.

They are unwilling to provide AdamOutler with what is required to repair devices with damaged bootloaders, but we at least will be slightly better off than we were before.

This is what is currently being discussed since USB-booting (See Unbrickable Mod for Galaxy S1/Nexus S devices - We are missing a small but critical component for Unbrickable to be deployed on Galaxy S2 family devices) is not something they are willing to discuss even though I feel it is necessary to deploy a proper solution to end users.

1) A solution will only be available for users whose devices can still boot a kernel. If a device has a damaged bootloader or the kernel partition is damaged, these devices will be unrepairable by users. It may become possible to recover these devices via JTAG.

2) The solution will require wiping the chip, repartitioning, and then repopulating bootloaders all in one go. This is going to have a very high failure rate - after all, even merely overwriting the bootloaders in an OTA (see Captivate Froyo and T-Mobile Nexus S ICS upgrade fiascos) often can kill a device - we have to wipe the chip, power cycle the eMMC chip from the kernel and reinitialize the MMC subsystem, repartition the chip, then rewrite the bootloaders.

The little bit of good news is that at least these devices will become recoverable via JTAG (which they currently are not). The bad news is that a reliable solution will not be deployable to end users - a partial unreliable one will be, but I fully expect it to fail and require JTAGging for many.

I'm really pushing for more, but it's not looking good.

So the summary right now:

If your device boots but is missing chunks of storage, we will possibly be able to fully restore the device

Devices in the category above that fail to fully repair will have all storage space back, but will require JTAG to boot again

Devices that do not boot will still require JTAG, however it should become possible for JTAG shops to repair the damage